Every culture seems to have it’s own “magic solution” to hiccups. My grandma told me if you held your breath and dramatically touched your pointer fingers together juuust right they’d automatically go away. As an elementary schooler I remember leaning upside down against a wall with a friend as we tried to turn our heads to look at each other to see if the hiccups had gone. No dice.
Some South African methods:
1. stick a match in your hair, close to your forehead so you look quite like a unicorn
2. put paper on your forehead. This works especially well if it is toilet paper, wet it (they didn’t say with what) if that fails to work.
Today I had an obnoxiously loud bout of hiccups. Anna looks over at me while driving us home from work/volunteering at the elementary school and just laughs.
“You know, you should try putting paper on your forehead.”
Blank stare.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“No, no, no! That’s how South Africans do it.”
…tentatively I reach down and put the cute picture one of the students drew for me on my forehead, skepticism running high.
Hiccups, instantly gone.
Call me crazy, but I’m a believer. (though juries still out if this newfound belief will ever lead to sticking wet toilet paper on my forehead)
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Saturday, October 6, 2012
Mina's Story
Apartheid, legalized racism to the extreme, tore apart South Africa for decades and only recently ended in 1994. The stories that survivors have to tell are powerful examples of the strength of the human spirit and fight for justice.
While drinking tea together after dinner my host mom Mina shared this story with me about her friend Anne:
*note: this is paraphrased as close as possible to her exact words
“Anne was always the most outspoken of us. She was gentle and kind and loving but she could not stand for injustice. As a teacher she would talk against [Apartheid] in her classrooms and was outspoken at school meetings. I was in the marches but she was a leader. They went after the leaders.
Anne lived alone; they came in the middle of the night. It was ten days after she was in my wedding, 1985. They took her to prison and put her in a tiny cell to break her spirit. Anna and I would sew short messages on paper into the hems of t-shirts and send them to her. She knew to find them; they helped to keep her strong. We were never allowed to see her so instead we asked a Swedish pastor serving at the prison where her cell was and would stand outside and shout to her from the street side. When police came by to ask what we were doing we pretended that we were waiting for a komvi (van) to come.
While she was there I found out that I was pregnant and wanted to tell her. I stood at the street and shouted the message to her, tears running down my face. Anna was beside me, telling me not to let the police see my tears and yelled encouragements to Anne to not let them break her spirit. We asked the Swedish pastor what we could do to help and he encouraged us to keep fighting, marching, and signing petitions.
They had no official charges against her and Anne was released after six months. She returned home in the middle of the night and we immediately drove the 2 hours to go see her and celebrate. Anne was so skinny it looked unhealthy. But they hadn’t crushed her spirit.”
While drinking tea together after dinner my host mom Mina shared this story with me about her friend Anne:
*note: this is paraphrased as close as possible to her exact words
“Anne was always the most outspoken of us. She was gentle and kind and loving but she could not stand for injustice. As a teacher she would talk against [Apartheid] in her classrooms and was outspoken at school meetings. I was in the marches but she was a leader. They went after the leaders.
Anne lived alone; they came in the middle of the night. It was ten days after she was in my wedding, 1985. They took her to prison and put her in a tiny cell to break her spirit. Anna and I would sew short messages on paper into the hems of t-shirts and send them to her. She knew to find them; they helped to keep her strong. We were never allowed to see her so instead we asked a Swedish pastor serving at the prison where her cell was and would stand outside and shout to her from the street side. When police came by to ask what we were doing we pretended that we were waiting for a komvi (van) to come.
While she was there I found out that I was pregnant and wanted to tell her. I stood at the street and shouted the message to her, tears running down my face. Anna was beside me, telling me not to let the police see my tears and yelled encouragements to Anne to not let them break her spirit. We asked the Swedish pastor what we could do to help and he encouraged us to keep fighting, marching, and signing petitions.
They had no official charges against her and Anne was released after six months. She returned home in the middle of the night and we immediately drove the 2 hours to go see her and celebrate. Anne was so skinny it looked unhealthy. But they hadn’t crushed her spirit.”
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
A Long Overdue Life Update
Hello everyone!
I think it’s just about time for a life update. Sorry it’s taken so long, I’ve been putting it off until things have officially come together. Nothing is still fully set but by now I have my bearings much more than when I arrived super tired, sick, and full of anticipation 3 weeks ago. The delay in part has to do with the switch in placement from Kimberley to Cape Town but is also quite to do with South African Time. As one person put it: if you expect to do more than one thing in a day you’re in too much of a hurry.
Life update: Mina and Mesheck, members of my host church, have graciously invited me into their home to live for my first month here. Along with Mina’s elderly mother and her caretaker, Elsa, we are constantly laughing, cooking, talking, and drinking tea together. Mina had two sons and is so excited to finally have a daughter that she told my parents she’s not giving me back. Elsa, who speaks only Afrikaans plus a smidgen of English, and I play cards together regularly and she teaches me Afrikaans as we play. We’re becoming friends despite the language barrier and she showed me yesterday that she had set a picture of me as the backdrop to her phone. Love has no language :)
While volunteer placements have been coming together I’ve been helping out at church and will be re-starting the youth group with Shane, a guy my age from a nearby town that is also at the church for a year. It’s completely dead now so we have a challenge in front of us but I’m excited for it. I’ve also spent some time at a local elementary school that’s unfortunately in a rough neighborhood. My next door neighbor is a teacher there and the kids are incredible. When I visited the kids’ jaws dropped after I pointed how far away I was from on the globe. But the opportunity I’m SUPER EXCITED about is a chance to volunteer at a Red Cross as a kid cuddler. Some kids there have families that can’t visit often so they ask volunteers to come in to show them lots of love on a regular basis. Am I excited? YES YES YES. Hopefully I can work that out!
Life is a constant adventure and I never know what will happen the next day. I’m learning to take each day as it comes and savor it for the beautiful moments that come along unexpectedly and make it all worthwhile.
Now that I’ve finally gotten internet sorted out(after hearing the sales rep tell me buying internet online was “a bit dodgy, man” I took matters into my own hands and now have limited but reliable access) I’ll be posting here more regularly. So many stories to tell!
Love from South Africa,
Jen
I think it’s just about time for a life update. Sorry it’s taken so long, I’ve been putting it off until things have officially come together. Nothing is still fully set but by now I have my bearings much more than when I arrived super tired, sick, and full of anticipation 3 weeks ago. The delay in part has to do with the switch in placement from Kimberley to Cape Town but is also quite to do with South African Time. As one person put it: if you expect to do more than one thing in a day you’re in too much of a hurry.
Life update: Mina and Mesheck, members of my host church, have graciously invited me into their home to live for my first month here. Along with Mina’s elderly mother and her caretaker, Elsa, we are constantly laughing, cooking, talking, and drinking tea together. Mina had two sons and is so excited to finally have a daughter that she told my parents she’s not giving me back. Elsa, who speaks only Afrikaans plus a smidgen of English, and I play cards together regularly and she teaches me Afrikaans as we play. We’re becoming friends despite the language barrier and she showed me yesterday that she had set a picture of me as the backdrop to her phone. Love has no language :)
While volunteer placements have been coming together I’ve been helping out at church and will be re-starting the youth group with Shane, a guy my age from a nearby town that is also at the church for a year. It’s completely dead now so we have a challenge in front of us but I’m excited for it. I’ve also spent some time at a local elementary school that’s unfortunately in a rough neighborhood. My next door neighbor is a teacher there and the kids are incredible. When I visited the kids’ jaws dropped after I pointed how far away I was from on the globe. But the opportunity I’m SUPER EXCITED about is a chance to volunteer at a Red Cross as a kid cuddler. Some kids there have families that can’t visit often so they ask volunteers to come in to show them lots of love on a regular basis. Am I excited? YES YES YES. Hopefully I can work that out!
Life is a constant adventure and I never know what will happen the next day. I’m learning to take each day as it comes and savor it for the beautiful moments that come along unexpectedly and make it all worthwhile.
Now that I’ve finally gotten internet sorted out(after hearing the sales rep tell me buying internet online was “a bit dodgy, man” I took matters into my own hands and now have limited but reliable access) I’ll be posting here more regularly. So many stories to tell!
Love from South Africa,
Jen
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Mastering Afrikaans
This year I’m living in an Afrikaans-speaking community and thus have decided to attempt to learn the language. To help with this process, I talk as often as possible with the caretaker for my host grandma that lives with us. Elsa speaks only Afrikaans with a dab of English and so we play a game I like to call stare-at-each-other-blankly-until-resorting-to-charades.
A dialogue from this morning:
Elsa: Goeie more! (Good morning!)
Jen: Goeie more!
Elsa:Hoe gaan dit? (How are you?)
Jen: Goed, dankie. Ek es lief vir jou! (Good, thank you. I love you!)
Elsa: blank stare
You know, I think things are coming along quite nicely.
A dialogue from this morning:
Elsa: Goeie more! (Good morning!)
Jen: Goeie more!
Elsa:Hoe gaan dit? (How are you?)
Jen: Goed, dankie. Ek es lief vir jou! (Good, thank you. I love you!)
Elsa: blank stare
You know, I think things are coming along quite nicely.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
The Many Faces of South Africa
It’s not often a stranger leans over to show you a topless picture of themself and relatives on their cell phone.
Meet Bongi. 27, recently married, career woman, grew up in Zulu culture, big hair, and even bigger laugh. We’ve been sitting next to each other on the 10 hour bus ride from Pietermaritzburg to Bloemfontein and chatted for quite a bit now to while away the endless hours of dry countryside. Quite the dramatic, she soon begins to spill out her marriage problems to me—all of them. Stuck in my seat I can do nothing but listen as she tells me all about the exorbitant amounts she spent on gifts for her relatives, the goat they had slaughtered for the ceremony, the unhappiness she feels at being trapped in a lovely marriage, and the conflict between her feminist ideas of freedom and independence clashing with the traditional values of her culture.
“Look!” she says, pointing out the different faces in the picture and naming each one. The women’s skirts are a riot of color even in the mini screen shot while I can just make out the dead rabbit one woman is holding by its feet at the end of the row.
Having no experience with marriage, Zulu or otherwise, I smile and nod as she spills out secrets I feel I shouldn’t be hearing. “What do I do? I’m trapped,” she laments and looks at me like I should have a magic answer to solve it all. Looking at the professionally dressed woman next to me, it’s so incredible to me that behind it all are traditional roots that combat the modern ideas that city culture has taught her. Caught between expectations of past and present, there are no easy answers to be had. Eventually a movie comes on the Greyhound TV screens and she kindly shares a set of headphones with me. Leaning in close to make the cord reach, I smile to think what a strange pair we make at the back of the bus laughing together at Ice Age 3 as the miles roll past.
…
Happy Cultural Heritage Day!
Bongi is just one example of the many, many faces of modern South Africa. From Zulu to Afrikaans, Tswana to Indian, there’s no end to the cultural heritages mixed here. Today is the official day to celebrate it all and so there are plenty of opportunities to wear their traditional clothes. Even I’m going to, apparently.
After a good crying session this afternoon (nothing emotional, just onions) my host mom announced I would be going to a cultural night and she would be dressing me up in traditional African wear. I’m excited! She just came in, looks like it’s go time ☺
Meet Bongi. 27, recently married, career woman, grew up in Zulu culture, big hair, and even bigger laugh. We’ve been sitting next to each other on the 10 hour bus ride from Pietermaritzburg to Bloemfontein and chatted for quite a bit now to while away the endless hours of dry countryside. Quite the dramatic, she soon begins to spill out her marriage problems to me—all of them. Stuck in my seat I can do nothing but listen as she tells me all about the exorbitant amounts she spent on gifts for her relatives, the goat they had slaughtered for the ceremony, the unhappiness she feels at being trapped in a lovely marriage, and the conflict between her feminist ideas of freedom and independence clashing with the traditional values of her culture.
“Look!” she says, pointing out the different faces in the picture and naming each one. The women’s skirts are a riot of color even in the mini screen shot while I can just make out the dead rabbit one woman is holding by its feet at the end of the row.
Having no experience with marriage, Zulu or otherwise, I smile and nod as she spills out secrets I feel I shouldn’t be hearing. “What do I do? I’m trapped,” she laments and looks at me like I should have a magic answer to solve it all. Looking at the professionally dressed woman next to me, it’s so incredible to me that behind it all are traditional roots that combat the modern ideas that city culture has taught her. Caught between expectations of past and present, there are no easy answers to be had. Eventually a movie comes on the Greyhound TV screens and she kindly shares a set of headphones with me. Leaning in close to make the cord reach, I smile to think what a strange pair we make at the back of the bus laughing together at Ice Age 3 as the miles roll past.
…
Happy Cultural Heritage Day!
Bongi is just one example of the many, many faces of modern South Africa. From Zulu to Afrikaans, Tswana to Indian, there’s no end to the cultural heritages mixed here. Today is the official day to celebrate it all and so there are plenty of opportunities to wear their traditional clothes. Even I’m going to, apparently.
After a good crying session this afternoon (nothing emotional, just onions) my host mom announced I would be going to a cultural night and she would be dressing me up in traditional African wear. I’m excited! She just came in, looks like it’s go time ☺
Friday, September 14, 2012
I’m Going to Cape Town!!! Aka How I Found Myself Doing the Electric Slide in Swaziland
Moments of clarity like to hit when we least expect them. For me, it was dancing the Electric Slide in the rain at night in Swaziland, 16 hours into an 18 hour Crazy (yes, capital C crazy) road trip.
Let’s rewind a bit.
It’s the first week of September. My palms are sweaty as I wait for my 1 on 1 with Tessa, our program coordinator, to hear more about details on what I’ll be doing/where I’ll be volunteering this year. The church door opens and Tessa’s smiling a bit to reassuringly for my comfort.
“So, do I get to do program management like was in the letter?” I blurt out before we’re even seated.
Her smile gets even bigger as we sit. This can’t be good. She pauses for a moment. “Housing fell through in Kimberley, what do you think about Cape Town?”
Silence. Processing. Everything I thought I’d be doing, out the window.
Twenty seconds later, with all sincerity, “Yes! Sounds great!”
During the beautiful “it’s okay to mourn for lost dreams” speech that subsequently followed my mind sped through the few things I knew about the city. Ocean. Mountains. Big city. Tons of cultural minglings. Baboons. So what comes out of my mouth, ending her eloquence entirely?
“There are baboons in Cape Town!”
So yes, folks, I’m now in Cape Town! Sister city of San Francisco, penguins on the beach…you read that right. And the dean I’ll be working with seems great! Tomorrow we’ll get a chance to talk about housing and volunteer options, one thing on the list is work at a reconciliation center. Stoked. I’ll also get a chance to update more frequently now that I’ll finally be settled (and no longer living out of a suitcase!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) All of this falling together on such short notice and fitting perfectly is totally God working. Already I feel like I belong here and am fitting into the community.
What does this all have to do with the Electric Slide? A simple matter of learning to say “yes.” In the waiting time for Cape Town logistics to come together I was sent with Katie, another volunteer, to Swaziland on the second craziest road trip of my life to attend the Young Adult League biannual conference. It was more than we had bargained for, to say the least. Eighteen hours each direction, eleven women yelling at each other in Tswana the whole way, a stop at a town named Bethlehem where I bought a ham & cheese sandwich from a cashier in a devil outfit, tons of Christmas decorations in Bethlehem with none of them religious (please appreciate the irony in both of these), a conference that lasted from 7am to 2am with no breaks. 16 hours into the journey there and I was tired, still hadn’t heard the final confirmation on Cape Town, and was incredibly grumpy. Life wasn’t turning out like I had planned and honestly I would have rather been settled anywhere than on the road and living out of a suitcase again for another weekend. Stop at wrong hotel #3 looked dismal as ever and I chose to stay in the van instead of stand outside in the rain with everyone else. The music turned on, the same African slow jams we’d been listening to for hours, and, against all odds, people started dancing. Sitting grumpily in the car by myself it hit me that saying “yes” to opportunities was entirely my decision. Whether I enjoyed the bumps in the road or stewed in my own pit of impatience was all up to me. So what did I do?
I said “yes,” got out of my comfort zone, and started dancing in the rain.
*Zulu marriage counselor story next…I figured moving to Cape Town was slightly more important
Let’s rewind a bit.
It’s the first week of September. My palms are sweaty as I wait for my 1 on 1 with Tessa, our program coordinator, to hear more about details on what I’ll be doing/where I’ll be volunteering this year. The church door opens and Tessa’s smiling a bit to reassuringly for my comfort.
“So, do I get to do program management like was in the letter?” I blurt out before we’re even seated.
Her smile gets even bigger as we sit. This can’t be good. She pauses for a moment. “Housing fell through in Kimberley, what do you think about Cape Town?”
Silence. Processing. Everything I thought I’d be doing, out the window.
Twenty seconds later, with all sincerity, “Yes! Sounds great!”
During the beautiful “it’s okay to mourn for lost dreams” speech that subsequently followed my mind sped through the few things I knew about the city. Ocean. Mountains. Big city. Tons of cultural minglings. Baboons. So what comes out of my mouth, ending her eloquence entirely?
“There are baboons in Cape Town!”
So yes, folks, I’m now in Cape Town! Sister city of San Francisco, penguins on the beach…you read that right. And the dean I’ll be working with seems great! Tomorrow we’ll get a chance to talk about housing and volunteer options, one thing on the list is work at a reconciliation center. Stoked. I’ll also get a chance to update more frequently now that I’ll finally be settled (and no longer living out of a suitcase!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) All of this falling together on such short notice and fitting perfectly is totally God working. Already I feel like I belong here and am fitting into the community.
What does this all have to do with the Electric Slide? A simple matter of learning to say “yes.” In the waiting time for Cape Town logistics to come together I was sent with Katie, another volunteer, to Swaziland on the second craziest road trip of my life to attend the Young Adult League biannual conference. It was more than we had bargained for, to say the least. Eighteen hours each direction, eleven women yelling at each other in Tswana the whole way, a stop at a town named Bethlehem where I bought a ham & cheese sandwich from a cashier in a devil outfit, tons of Christmas decorations in Bethlehem with none of them religious (please appreciate the irony in both of these), a conference that lasted from 7am to 2am with no breaks. 16 hours into the journey there and I was tired, still hadn’t heard the final confirmation on Cape Town, and was incredibly grumpy. Life wasn’t turning out like I had planned and honestly I would have rather been settled anywhere than on the road and living out of a suitcase again for another weekend. Stop at wrong hotel #3 looked dismal as ever and I chose to stay in the van instead of stand outside in the rain with everyone else. The music turned on, the same African slow jams we’d been listening to for hours, and, against all odds, people started dancing. Sitting grumpily in the car by myself it hit me that saying “yes” to opportunities was entirely my decision. Whether I enjoyed the bumps in the road or stewed in my own pit of impatience was all up to me. So what did I do?
I said “yes,” got out of my comfort zone, and started dancing in the rain.
*Zulu marriage counselor story next…I figured moving to Cape Town was slightly more important
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Hello from Bloemfontein!
HOLD THE PHONE, STOP THE CLOCKS….
I SAW A WILD GIRAFFE!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 OF THEM!!!!!
I AM SO HAPPY!!!!
(they’re my favorite animal if you can’t tell)
Hello from Bloemfontein!!
Orientation is finally over!! Yay! It’s been a long ten days of hanging out in Pietermaritzburg learning, listening, and chatting about South Africa and preparing us for our journeys this year. To jar us out of our comfort zones our country program coordinator Tessa took us to lunch at an English tea garden just before touring a prison that held hundreds of black political prisoners during Apartheid. The huge disparity in condition was a shock to see so blatantly side by side, not to mention hearing the history surrounding the place where Nelson Mandela and even Gandhi (ya, you read that right. He started out as a lawyer in S.A.) were imprisoned for some time. What was perhaps more disturbing was that in the tea garden restaurant it was impossible to see the poor neighborhood just outside the door, makes me wonder how much we do that in the US in allowing ourselves to be blind in our own comfort bubbles.
Now we’ve all left for our own corners of the country to volunteer. In a wonderful and strange turn of events, I’m temporarily staying in Bloemfontein for the week with my friend Katie because….I’m going to Swaziland this weekend. Nbd, it’s not another country or anything. It’s the church’s national youth gathering for Southern Africa and my church supervisor decided to send me along. From what I’ve been told it will be a bunch of singing and dancing and worship music, with quite a bit of it in Zulu. I’m excited!
Life is still very much in transition but will hopefully be settling soon once I get to my volunteer site. Once there, hopefully I can get more blog posts out and spend some more time with it.
Have a beautiful day! Thanks for tuning in!
Preview for next post: “Jen’s run-in as a Zulu marriage counselor”. True story.
I SAW A WILD GIRAFFE!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 OF THEM!!!!!
I AM SO HAPPY!!!!
(they’re my favorite animal if you can’t tell)
Hello from Bloemfontein!!
Orientation is finally over!! Yay! It’s been a long ten days of hanging out in Pietermaritzburg learning, listening, and chatting about South Africa and preparing us for our journeys this year. To jar us out of our comfort zones our country program coordinator Tessa took us to lunch at an English tea garden just before touring a prison that held hundreds of black political prisoners during Apartheid. The huge disparity in condition was a shock to see so blatantly side by side, not to mention hearing the history surrounding the place where Nelson Mandela and even Gandhi (ya, you read that right. He started out as a lawyer in S.A.) were imprisoned for some time. What was perhaps more disturbing was that in the tea garden restaurant it was impossible to see the poor neighborhood just outside the door, makes me wonder how much we do that in the US in allowing ourselves to be blind in our own comfort bubbles.
Now we’ve all left for our own corners of the country to volunteer. In a wonderful and strange turn of events, I’m temporarily staying in Bloemfontein for the week with my friend Katie because….I’m going to Swaziland this weekend. Nbd, it’s not another country or anything. It’s the church’s national youth gathering for Southern Africa and my church supervisor decided to send me along. From what I’ve been told it will be a bunch of singing and dancing and worship music, with quite a bit of it in Zulu. I’m excited!
Life is still very much in transition but will hopefully be settling soon once I get to my volunteer site. Once there, hopefully I can get more blog posts out and spend some more time with it.
Have a beautiful day! Thanks for tuning in!
Preview for next post: “Jen’s run-in as a Zulu marriage counselor”. True story.
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