• You can eat too much peanut butter

• Mosquitoes annoy me

• Stepping on a glass bottle is not that big of a deal

• Water is crucial to one's health

• Diarrhea is part of life in Namibia

• The standard size of a beer bottle should be 750ml

• People are people, no matter where you go

• Teaching is not easy

• Teaching in Namibia is really not easy

• Africa is a huge continent

• Kids too often fail once and instantly give up. The possibility of them failing another time is just too much to bear... It is a huge moment in one's life when s/he realizes that the possibility of succeeding once is worth so much more than the possibility of failing twice

• "Thought is free"

• There is a remarkable sense of African unity

• Everyone changes the world, whether they like it or not

• Time doesn't move forward or backward, fast or slow, it just is

• Dogs are edible

• We are works in progress

• Beware: do not eat a loaf of brown bread within 12 hours

• Uniqueness is engrained in each of us, but creativity is not; people sometimes need a kick-start in the art of harnessing uniqueness in order to use it constructively

• A really low population density yields a collection of attention-deprived people

• "Teach a man to fish..."

• Sitting in the back of a pickup truck going 80 mph is not as scary as you might think... It's actually pretty comfortable if you have a few bags to lay on

• Too much sand is a bad thing

• "People are just about as happy as they make their minds up to be"

• Africans like Justin Bieber more than Americans

• Hitch-hiking is kinda fun

• Speaking another language is difficult… I can't hate on those kids who cannot tell the difference between an 'l' and an 'r'

• A bull is worth as much as N$ 100 000 and it's also a collector's item!

• Ketchup + some Italian seasons ≈ tomato sauce

• Radio > TV

• I probably have numerous parasites currently living inside me and that fact doesn't really bother me

• "Oshifima makes you strong"

• ...but it makes you shit bricks

• It's cool knowing that every one of my elders in northern Namibia is either my father or mother (tate or meme)

• 90 degrees is not hot

You may or may not have noticed that the last post on here was spam. It turns out that while I was away on holiday somewhere in east-central Africa, my GMail (and subsequently, my Blogger) account was hacked. You may have also received a spam e-mail from me. If you were in any way adversely affected by this spam, I apologize for the guy (or girl) who insists on causing undue harm to people s/he has never met.

Anyway, I'm not sure why it has taken so long for me to write this update since I've regained my account about two months ago. Actually, I do know why.. I don't really like writing blog entries. They're require too much time and effort to write and too much time and bandwidth to upload. I definitely toyed with the idea to remove the blog on several occasions, but as you can now see, I've left it open for future posts because I know a few people would like to get an insider's look at a region they will never get a chance to experience first-hand.

Although my Blogger account remains open, don't expect many future posts; I think Facebook is a much better way of sharing the type of information I want to share with you all, so find me on Facebook.

Mombili,

Joe

_

to my friends:Im never someone to suggest a service unless its really

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recommended for weight loss and I've lost eight lbs in a week. Three

of my friend's who just started using it also lost 7 lbs each.

http://powerpluss.com P.S. that site sells it for half as much as

other sites

“Wa lele po meme/tate?” “Nawa tuu?” [Direct translation: Have you laid down, mother/father? Rather well?] I hear these words and speak them about 20 times each day. If you know your interlocutor well, the greetings will go far beyond the aforementioned two phrases and will many times include, “Opo ou li?” and “Ou li nawa?” [Direct translation: You are there? You are well?]. Since learning this lingo during language training in Okahandja, I scarcely go a day without uttering these words and it’s safe to say I will never get used to it!

In America, we can so easily walk past someone without saying a word, but that act in Namibia is surprising disrespectful. Some regard greeting someone as acknowledging their presence, so walking by without saying hello essentially means you don’t see them as a person. It’s a totally different dynamic and one that is particularly difficult for someone like me (who goes out of his way to avoid empty conversation) to live in accordance with. But no matter how uncomfortable greeting makes me, I put a smile on my face and chant those magic words each morning. Why? Well, because I’d hate to not acknowledge someone as a person, but also because I recognize the clear link between greeting and community here.

Community means something entirely different in Namibia. If you live in a village and interact appropriately with everyone in the village, you are essentially family members. That’s why every woman is “meme” [mother] and every man is “tate” [father]. Not greeting would mean you are not part of the community and hence not part of the family, making you an outcast. And no one wants to be an outcast, so we greet and greet and greet and greet.

That’s just life in Namibia…

_

If you have been following along with this blog from the start, you likely have a good idea what my life entails these days. I work at school during the week, basically living like a teacher in the U.S. and on the weekends I tend to leave the village and head to town to get food and hang out with friends. Pretty boring, right? Don’t get me wrong, I still wake up most days knowing that something crazy will ensue before the sun sets, but truth be told not much surprises me these days. After living in Namibia for awhile, I have finally gotten used to some of the (from an American point of view) odd events that occur in my life and what seemed so strange when I hopped off that plane way back in August of last year are really not so weird anymore. Things that I’ve written about once (riding for hours in the back of a pickup truck or cab of an 18-wheeler for free, wading through waist-deep water, eating random bugs or body parts) occur quite often and are really just parts of life here in Namibia. With that said I have decided to flip the script on my blog posts and no longer offer lengthy descriptions of what has happened in my life and focus the entries exclusively on some the elements of life in Namibia that make it unique. Unless something really ridiculous happens, future posts will only be about life in Namibia and not about me. And these posts will be shhhhoorrrrt… Hopefully that’ll encourage me to write more frequently.

I really have no clue how I let nearly a month go by without posting. Time really does fly…

Now, what makes Namibia special??

_

Rainy season is really supposed to be picking up around this time of year, but Mother Nature seems to be holding off so far. Maybe not for long. Although it has not rained much over the past few months many say this year will yield plentiful rains for all of northern Namibia.

But actually, this entry is not about Namibian weather at all. Rather, it’s about some of the recent events in my life and the many experiences that will be coming my way in the next two months.

Not much has occurred in the past few weeks (hence no blog post), but I have a feeling things are going to get interesting fairly soon. Teaching has become just like a normal job now that I am (generally) not considered the oshilumbu and now seen as just another teacher by most of the students. Home is generally good, but certainly not like the US. And some random events have kept me busy, but not as busy as I’ll be come March and April…

The first five weeks of the school year are complete and the days are really flying by now. The first week or two went kind of slowly as I was feeling out the learners trying to see how much they know, what pace I should teach at, and if they could actually understand me. After much careful examination I think I have a good idea about how to approach the task of teaching these kids and they are also beginning to become acquainted with how I do things so the lessons are going much more smoothly. Math in both 8th and 9th grade have really been a pleasant surprise. I am going through the material fairly quickly and it seems as if the kids understand most of what we have done so far in both classes. Physical science is the complete opposite. They know very little, we are going slower than we should be going, and the kids are very rambunctious (I yell at them every day for at least a few minutes). BIS provides a fun break from promotional classes. The kids have enjoyed most of the fun activities I have prepared for them so far and once the computer lab is back in action (more on that later), I’m sure they will be even more enthusiastic about this class.

Outside of school, everything in Ohalushu is nawa. Let me just redact some of the statements I made about home in the last post. When I was writing the entry, I was recovering from an awful illness and all I could think about was how rough the last few days had been. Sure the puppy barks a lot and the kids like to play around and yell at each other but puppies bark and little kids play. That’s just what they do. Life at the homestead really is good in general and the comments I made in the last post were almost entirely illness-induced. One other note about home: I still don’t have a refrigerator in my room. Surprisingly, living sans refrigeration has presented very little problems for me and I don’t think it would be an issue if I went the rest of my service here in Namibia without a refrigerator.

Beyond school and home, a few events/noteworthy thoughts have come up recently:

First off, I have officially been living in Africa for 6 months now. Not sure how big of an accomplishment that is, but judging by all of the Facebook updates I saw from fellow Group 32 PCVs here in Namibia, it holds some kind of significance. Plus, the new group is now in country, meaning we are no longer Freshmen.

I wrote in the past about the computer lab and its ups and downs. They continue to this day… The current project I am working on is setting up the server with Windows Server 2003 and then I will deploy Windows XP Embedded images to each of the thin clients. This has involved a lot of reading and even more time downloading things. Hopefully the conversion will be beneficial to the kids as Windows is much more frequently used throughout the world than Edubuntu and the skills they learn within the Windows XP framework should be better suited to how they might operate a computer in their future endeavors.



We recently had an athletics competition for the cluster (nearby group of schools). The event was held near Ongha and took the entire Saturday. Events included: running, running, and more running. The kids ran 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 1500m, and 3km, and 5km races and there were many heats for each age group and each race. Two kids represented our school and they both did remarkably well, moving on to the next competition. If they move on this weekend, they will go to Oshakati and represent the Region. And if they continue, it’s on to Windhoek. The winners from Windhoek then go to Johannesburg, South Africa. Although our kids will likely not make it to South Africa and end up International athletes, it was nice to see them having fun and not worrying about plowing the mahangu or sitting in class all day enduring a relentless onslaught of facts and figures being force-fed to them in their second or third language.

My hair has not been cut in 5 months. I must say, it is pretty weird having a lot of hair and there are both benefits and detriments to owning some lengthy locks. The positives: not having to cut my hair every few weeks is freaking awesome, being respected by people in the community just because I have many white hairs (a sign of wisdom to the Owambos), and some people think my afro-esque hair looks cool. The negatives: long hair doesn’t allow for adequate release of head heat (a big problem in the sweltering African summer), some people (including meme) here in Namibia think that guys should have a shaved head and that my having hair makes me girlish.

Okay, enough of what has already happened and onto what’s in store for the next few weeks:

So my APCD (basically Peace Corps boss who helps make sure everything is going well at my site) is going to be visiting my village, school, and homestead sometime this coming week. The visit is just to check up on things early on in the school year to make sure there are no major problems that the PCV was not aware of. I expect the visit to go fairly smoothly. My APCD will meet with my principal, then with me, and then with my family to talk about how things are going thus far. It’ll be nice to have her give me some feedback about how I’m doing, but I am kind of anxious about the visit as I hope I am on schedule in terms of doing all that I should be doing here. We only have 2 years and the time goes quicker than one might expect. Without proper planning and organization, PCVs can quickly lose track of their primary goals and end up accomplishing fairly little in their time at site. That’s what I am trying to avoid and hopefully I am doing well so far. I guess we’ll see next week…

On Friday I am headed to Windhoek (oh yeah! the big city – or should I say only city) to attend a benefit concert headlined by UB40. The event was scheduled for December but was cancelled and ticket holders were not given a refund. Fortunately, the event was rescheduled and it should be even better than expected because the once several hour event is now an all-weekend event with many other bands and our tickets get us access to all of the festivities for the whole weekend. Several other PCVs are going and we are bound to have a really good time. It’s always nice getting out of the village for a little while to meet up with friends in town, but Windhoek is another story; that’s like a once- or twice-a-year kind of thing!

In early March I will be attending a workshop in Ondangwa about food security. The workshop will (among other things) teach my fellow colleagues, my counterpart (another math teacher at my school), and I “key Permaculture and Bio-Intensive Gardening techniques to mitigate the impact of HIV/AIDS and help families & PLWHA to increase their food and nutritional security in Namibia.” After attending the workshop, we will bring our skills back to the village and set up a demonstration garden in the community to help introduce the concept to families in Ohalushu ways to improve their diets to best combat the effects of HIV/AIDS. I know very little about gardening, but if I ever were to spend several days learning about gardening and missing school for it, this would be the reason.

And the events don’t stop… The following week includes Namibia’s Independence Day (school holiday = long weekend = PCVs having a good ole time). The extended weekend coupled with some friends’ birthdays should ensure that this weekend will be a blast. I’ve heard Benny’s (waterpark in Ongwediva – yes you read correctly, the one and only waterpark in Namibia is only like 20km away from me) is the place to be and I think there will be many oilumbu paying the N$20 entrance fee over Independence weekend.

In mid-April I will be attending yet another workshop. This one will be held in Windhoek and will be all about creating feasible secondary projects in our communities. I have decided that one of the first and easiest to implement secondary projects is making the computer lab at school a resource that anyone in the community can benefit from. Computers are generally not something people have access to in the village (many elders have never even seen a computer) and I want to utilise to the fullest extent the resources we have at the school to allow as many people as possible to become acquainted with the new-age technology. This will certainly require some planning and the PDM workshop should be the perfect platform for discussing with my colleagues and PC staff what is the best way to move forward with the project.

Soon after the PDM workshop, the first term of the school year will come to a close. The end of the term will likely be hectic. Just coming back from the workshop in Windhoek with like a week of school remaining will be difficult, but hopefully I can prepare the kids for the end of term examinations and they will all do well. Marking will also be crazy during this time as all of the teachers will be spending copious hours filling in grade sheets and making sure all of the administrative paperwork is in order.

After that, it’s vacation time… I’m not 100% sure, but I should be going to Victoria Falls and/or Zanzibar for roughly two weeks in late April and early May. Should be nuts!

So although not much has happened in the past few weeks, you can see how the rest of the term looks to be rather eventful with something going on seemingly every week for the next two months or so.

Haha, a few minutes ago I began to hear thunder from afar. Now it’s pouring and for the first time ever my tin roof is actually leaking water due to the intensity of the rain. I guess the storm has officially begun…

_

Two weeks in the bag. What can I say??

After reading through some of my fellow PCVs' blogs, I have been doing a whole lot of teaching compared to the norm. It's quite common here in Namibia for schools to take one to three weeks before all the kids begin showing up and all of the teachers have their timetables (schedules) for the year. Result: no teaching for quite some time. But I actually had the opportunity to begin teaching on Day 1 of the school year and I didn't pass it up. These kids need as much time as possible to get used to me as their teacher and also to learn things they probably should have learned like three or four years ago. So, we started with multivariate calculus in 8th grade math, group theory in 9th grade math, and physical chemistry in 8th grade physical science. </joke> ßNerd!

Now about the teaching itself... Although I never taught a class in the States, I actually got to teach a bunch of lessons during the final term of last school year so I was able to acclimate myself to the situation a bit. With that said, I wasn't too nervous about how things would go during the first week. I think that made things easier too. Although I didn’t know exactly what to expect, I had a decent idea of how much material could be covered in one class period so I was able to prepare a few reasonable lesson plans for each class. And the lesson plans helped a lot! One of the things that I found difficult in my brief teaching stint during the end of last year was determining what to present in the next class and I’ve since found that looking ahead and preparing a progression of related lessons works wonders. Kinda makes sense, right? Plan ahead and have future lessons be related to recent lessons if possible.

I think the learners are getting used to me as well. I can pretty easily identify when the whole class is clueless and when just a few are confused and the latter occurs way more than the former. The big problem in my school (and probably many other secondary schools throughout the country) is the 8th grade learners are not adequately prepared to perform at the secondary school level. The kids know very little English and too frequently suffer from incomplete training in almost every promotional (important) class. With that said, we teachers have to teach a whole lot of make-up material in addition to the topics included in the syllabus for each class. This presents many issues. Right now, my approach is to teach close to what the syllabus suggests for each class and work on incorporating basic competencies from past years whenever I see a good opportunity. We’ll see how this strategy pans out when the end of year examinations come. Ahh!

Yeah, so the beginning of my first full school year has been pretty good so far. More than I could have hoped for given all of the horror stories I have heard over the past few months from other PCVs. But not everything is perfect in Ohalushu… Here’s some of the bad:

My principal was offered a position in Oshakati and he has since transferredThe computer lab is still not fully functionalEvery school in the region wants me to make their timetable (exaggeration)My principal, Mr. Pohamba (no relation to the president of Namibia), after just two years of exemplary performance at the helm of Isai Nhinda JSS, has moved on to bigger and better things. I’m happy for him. He’s a great guy and really did a lot of awesome things for our school in his short time as principal, but it’s also difficult to see such a good guy leave the school. He really did drive performance at the school and his motivating nature will be greatly missed.

The computer lab. Oh, the computer lab. The eighteen 1990s processor/case combos with monitors on top and the one decent server with horribly outdated Edubuntu software regularly ensure that I leave school with a headache. Sometimes we have internet access, sometimes we don’t. I am currently in the process of upgrading the software on the server so maybe things will soon get easier. Personally, I am not a fan of trying to do a sweeping overhaul of a server’s functionality through the terminal (command line) and new graphics-based software should help make the upgrades easier to incorporate. I’ll let you know how things progress with this project. As it stands, I now completely control the computer lab so I get all of the acclaim for things that work (totally don’t care about this), but I also get blamed for anything that becomes broken (kinda care about this).

Sometimes it’s good being the only person that knows how to do something. With enough time and resources, the knower can teach the non-knowers the desired information and everyone wins. The non-knowers now know and the knower gets satisfaction knowing that his/her knowledge was put to good use. Problems occur when there are too many non-knowers and too few knowers or if there are not enough resources or if there is not enough time for the knower to train the non-knowers. A perfect storm occurred recently when everyone and their mother asked me to create their timetable. I simply don’t have the time and energy to take the several hours to create teacher, class, and master timetables for each school in the region. This has been a big annoyance so far as the school year has begun and teachers like me should be focused on teaching. Something preparatory like a creating a timetable should have been done before the school year began. I would have been glad to help out during my exceedingly long summer break, but now that it’s over I want to do the job that I am employed to do and not some administrative garbage for another school.

So even with these last few drawbacks, I can say confidently that the start of the school year has been a positive rather than a negative experience. Hopefully I just never have to open that dreaded timetable-generating software again!

Oh yeah, I was really sick last week. It began on Sunday with a sore throat (remember I said I was coming down with something, mom). On Tuesday afternoon, after back-to-back days of post-schoolday headaches, I gathered that hearing myself speak too much gives me headaches. [If you know me well, you probably know I tend to enjoy pristinely quiet environments and say less than 100 words per day unless forced to do otherwise.] I now believe this supposition to be incorrect and the headaches to be the rumblings of thunder before the vicious 4-day storm hit me from Wednesday to Saturday. On Wednesday and Thursday I suffered from 102- and 103 degree fevers, respectively. Additionally, the minor after-school headaches that I experienced on Monday and Tuesday had become far more intense and really quite debilitating. I began to develop acute muscle fatigue throughout the majority of my body and found it difficult just to get out of bed in the morning. And I completely lost my appetite. I forced myself to eat about 500 calories of rice per day from Wednesday to Saturday so I didn’t die. Lastly, when I didn't have a fever or a headache I was literally covered in sweat. I don’t know how my body produced so much sweat… Maybe it found some secret reserves that are to be used only during times of considerable illness. So in a word the illness was nasty, but I made it through the storm and am now in full health (or very close) once again. I didn't even miss a day of school (or even a lesson) throughout the hellish week. In fact, I spent my entire Saturday at the school trying to work on the wretched computer lab. I saw the week as an opportunity to show the kids that sometimes we must work through adversity to accomplish a task.

I’ll end with a brief update about the homestead. I don’t think I mentioned this yet on the blog so I’ll say something quick about the eating situation. I used to eat oshifima and meat/soup with the family but now I cook for myself. It sort of sucks (no working refrigerator yet so the options are limited), but there are some positives too. I eat a whole lot of bread, peanut butter, and rice which means my diet is not good but I also don’t have to buy food for the big family anymore so I save a lot of money. Also, I stated earlier how important silence is to me and it’s been everything but silent around here recently. Since the beginning of the school year, we have obtained two more sub-5-year-old children on the homestead and they are quite naughty. I think one of the new kids taught my young cousin how to cry for attention and she has been bawling ferociously for the past two weeks for at least an aggregate of 30 minutes per evening. The kids also run around yelling and playing which is fine if there are a few kids and they do it every once in awhile, but there are like ten kids and they are constantly running around and yelling at each other. My final gripe is about the puppy. This thing could be the most obnoxious animal ever but I think it has brain damage (meme has hit it with the truck at least once [her driving is scary – she almost plowed into one of the huts this morning when she forgot the car was in gear]). Anyway, the dog barks incessantly. Every single noise it hears sets off a trigger in its mind to unleash a sadistic assault on any ear within a 5 mile radius. I once timed a barking spree that went on for 18 minutes! Really, okambwena? Really?

Okay, that’s enough for now. I have to go to sleep. I hope you enjoyed reading and hope you are doing well wherever you are!

-J

_

Wow, it’s been a really long time since I last updated this thing…

I’m not entirely sure where the story left off – and I don’t want to waste the Tango to go online and check – but if I recall correctly, my last post was about Reconnect. With that said, I have a jam-packed month of events to recount in this post. Hmmm, where to start…

After Reconnect I returned to my site in Ohalushu for some simplicity on the homestead. That lasted a whole two days! Before long, friends began collaborating and devising a plan to best utilise (British English, that’s right!) our time off. The overwhelming majority of people had an acute desire to explore coastal Namibia, namely Swakopmund (where I’ve heard Brangelina and Sharon Osbourne frequent), the Skeleton Coast, and Walvis Bay. So to the coast we went.

What’s the best way to get to the coast? Pay several hundred nollars (how we PCVs differentiate between Namibian and American dollars) and ride in a fairly safe, but overloaded and stinky combi or free ride south out of Owamboland in the back of a bakkie and then get on an overnight train headed straight for the holiday party capital of Namibia? That’s right, option 2. The train was awesome! Our small group of eight definitely had the best pre-coast journey, celebrating the night away and arriving at sunrise a day before everyone else showed up.

By December 24th, all ~30 of us were in Swakopmund, camping roughly 100 yards from both the beach and Tiger Reef (the tiki bar where many of us spent entirely too much time at during of our stay).

Swakop is a really cool place. There’s plenty of high quality non-oshifimic nourishment available, the sights are awesome with beautiful sunsets and views of the dunes and ocean, a vast and interesting assortment of people pack the small town for the holiday, and there are many extreme sports for those who want to push life to the limit.

I was one of the aforementioned people who spent way too much time laying around and chilling at the bar. Other than time, I managed to spend a remarkable amount of money on good food and N$15 ($2 USD)/bottle wine. Additionally, I played some beach football with friends, attempted and failed to sandboard down the nearby dunes, and did a bit of reading.

On Christmas, we had a Secret Springbok (Secret Santa) which was pretty hilarious. There are some really creative people in our group, so it was funny to see what they did with the N$40 limit. Other than that, the day was very non-Christmasy. At least it wasn’t 110°F along the coast like it is up north.

It even rained moderately for about 10 minutes on one of the days. A complete shock seeing as Swakopmund receives like 1cm of rain per year.

By the 28th, around 20 of the campers expressed desire to travel along the coast so we rented two trucks and hit the road. Highlights include:

Dune 7Cape CrossCamping along the beach near a sunken shipWalvis Bay

Dune 7 is one of the tallest dunes in the world. Its enormity is pretty startling and climbing it was quite the experience. The dune’s height pales in comparison to many mountains even within the country but the baking sun and the quicksand-esque nature of the sand makes the climb all the more difficult. Doing it barefoot is nearly impossible due to the heat of the sand. Needless to say, I left all of my socks in the village and attempted the climb with flip-flops and bare feet. About halfway up I realized that the flip-flops were causing more harm than good and I converted to straight-up barefoot. As I approached the top, I could feel my feet boiling and I was beginning to wonder if I would incur long-term damage from this afternoon jaunt up a hill of sand. Luckily, Ryan, who had reached the top long ago, tossed his socks down, allowing me to reach the summit alive. The experience was overall a positive, but the second degree burns on my feet kinda sucked.

Cape Cross is a little peninsula not far north of Dune 7. The Cape’s stake to famous is the remarkable collection of 200,000+ seals which call it home. The sight got mixed reviews from fellow PCVs. Certainly it’s cool to see a region so densely populated with seals especially with the large collection of young’ns that were born in early December. But with that many animals in a one place, some of them have to die. Dead ones riddled the cape and really gave the place a weird feel. There were no mixed feelings about the smell of the Cape… It was grotesque! Since returning to the village, I have read that Cape Cross has been rated one of the worst smelling places in the world.

The Skeleton Coast is an intense place. Not many animals are able to subsist along there, hence the name. Apparently not even ships can stay afloat in this spooky desert/ocean mishmash world and many litter the coast. We were lucky enough to spot one and spend an evening camping out and partying nearby it. Definitely a good time!

Walvis Bay was the last stop on our journey along the coast. Home to a huge port, Walvis is the second largest town in Namibia, behind just Windhoek. I would have never guessed it had I not known beforehand. Some of the best and cheapest seafood in the world is available here and we enjoyed our fair share of it. But mollusks run the place… There is very little to do here outside of the seafood industry and our visit was short-lived for this very reason.

We returned to Swakopmund on the 30th just in time for the big New Year’s celebration. There was a huge bonfire at Tiger Reef and hundreds of people attended. The event was, for me, the best part of our trip. Everyone had a great time until the tides came in around midnight and numerous cell phones, cameras, and shoes were lost. Luckily I left all of my valuable stuff at the campsite and only lost my flip-flops which a trip to a China Shop in Ondangwa quickly rectified.

Ten days was all we had scheduled for our campground in Swakopmund and by January 2 everyone had dispersed from the site. On my way back home, I stayed two days with my host family from Okahandja. It was really nice to see everyone at my old home in Veddersdal for the first time since swearing-in in October and it made the journey back to Owamboland a bit easier. Plus, Ouma (grandma) did my laundry which saved me a day of hand-washing back in the village. Baie dankie, Ouma!

The finale was the trek back up to my village in the north. I was really lucky to get a free ride out of Okahandja all the way to Ondangwa. When I got to Ondangwa it was clear that rainy season was in full effect. Torrential downpours basically flash flooded the town, making walking, biking, or driving very difficult. I managed to get to the Peace Corps Office in town to chill for a bit while the town dried out. By 6:00pm it was time to leave. I hopped in a cab with a few of my friends that happened to also be in the PC Office when I showed up and we headed north. I guess the storm had moved north because now it was pouring in the village. I had no power for two days, but I was home and I spent a total of about $2 USD to get from Swakopmund back to my village. Vacation was finally over.

That’s all that I can recall – or that I’m will to share in this public forum – from the past month. I know I said I’d have pictures but truthfully I didn’t take many and it is such a time- and energy-consuming process to upload photos with this 2G internet connection. With that said, maybe I’ll upload some once school re-opens and I have access to a faster internet connection, but until then maybe take a look at some of the pictures posted by my friends on Facebook (not many) or better yet check out other PCVs’ blogs here.

Now it’s time for school. Teachers start this Thursday so I have to revamp my mindset and prepare to work again. I feel like it has been so long since I did anything of value and it will definitely be nice to get back in the classroom and start teaching.

_

Onghalo oi li ngaipi koAmerika? kEumbo lange mOhalushu oku li nawa. Oihongiilonga ihapu oya manena xuuninwa, nonda hafa nda aluka komukunda konima oivike ivali mOvenduka.

(How’s the situation in America? Everything is good at my home in Ohalushu. The many workshops have finally ended and I am happy to have returned to the village after two weeks in Windhoek.)

Sorry about that... Just felt the urge to practice a bit of writing in Oshikwanyama. More than anything else, writing helps me learn the language but unfortunately there aren’t many opportunities to write Oshiwambo so hopefully my little outburst quells my desire to write and also gives you some insight into the structure of the language.

A brief linguistic investigation (in case you were wondering): Oshiwambo is a Bantu language spoken in northern Namibia which has 8 dialects, one of them being Oshikwanyama (the dialect I have begun to learn here in Ohalushu). Oshikwanyama is spoken by the Kwanyama people – “the meat eaters” – who reside in a circular region containing north-central Namibia and south-central Angola. Oshikwanyama is the most prevalent dialect of Oshiwambo and is one of the two written dialects, the other being Oshindonga. There is a playful debate between the Ndongas and the Kwanyamas over which tribe is the most respected, but secretly even the Ndongas know the Kwanyamas reign supreme.

Okay, enough about Namibian language... Maybe you want to know about what I have been up to??

So in my last blog entry I indicated that I would be headed to Windhoek (Namibia’s only city, population 300,000) for a conference called Reconnect. The conference was two weeks long and we talked about all of the issues that we have faced in our first six weeks at site in addition to planning for our primary (teaching) and secondary (community development) projects for the upcoming year. The sessions were generally helpful: it was very beneficial for me to see how other volunteers were planning their lessons and we received much valuable information about how to begin a secondary project and how to get funding for it. But some things didn’t go so well: the long days took a lot out of us and many of us thought that only six weeks between PST and Reconnect were not enough to get a reasonable idea about the dynamics of our respective communities. In any case, most of us had a good time at Greiters (the resort we stayed at for the duration of the conference). The food was awesome – maybe because we eat porridge every day in the village – and it was fun to hear about everyone’s experiences thus far and explore Windhoek together.

Not much else has happened since my last post. I did, however, get to see the beautiful town of Tsumeb for a few days of work collaboration with some fellow volunteers on the way back to the North. The stop broke the trip into two very reasonable 4-hour drives rather than one of 8 hours and the only drawback was the incessant rains on Tuesday that halted our departure plans.

Now I am back in the village, typing this blog entry to avoid doing any real work (some things will never change). I am having a difficult time grasping the fact that it is mid-December due to these blazing hot daytime temperatures. But with that said, the holiday season is indeed upon us and in a few days I will be headed to Swakopmund along the Atlantic coast to celebrate Christmas and the New Year with many other volunteers. Apparently, everyone and their mother go to Swakop during the holidays so it should be an interesting experience. Additionally, some of us will also be headed to the Skeleton Coast to see the signature sand dunes of the Namib desert. Look forward to some awesome pictures in my next post…

Here are some images:

We stayed at the building on the right for two weeks... No wonder volunteers from more hardcore countries call PC/Namibia "Peace Corps Light!"

A cool stone structure in the hills of Windhoek near Greiters (the resort in the above photo).

Here is a map of my village that I have created after exploring the community for a few weeks. Note the fact that there is one "road" in the village and it is actually just an ondjila, a gravel path. Also note the amount of shebeens (bars).

Peace,

Joe

_

Onghalo oi li ngaipi koAmerika? kEumbo lange mOhalushu oku li nawa. Oihongiilonga ihapu oya manena xuuninwa, nonda hafa nda aluka komukunda konima oivike ivali mOvenduka.

(How’s the situation in America? Everything is good at my home in Ohalushu. The many workshops have finally ended and I am happy to have arrived in the village after two weeks in Windhoek.)

Sorry about that... Just felt the urge to practice a bit of writing in Oshikwanyama. More than anything else, writing helps me learn the language but unfortunately there aren’t many opportunities to write Oshiwambo so hopefully my little outburst quells my desire to write and also gives you some insight into the structure of the language.

A brief linguistic investigation (in case you were wondering): Oshiwambo is a Bantu language spoken in northern Namibia which has 8 dialects, one of them being Oshikwanyama (the dialect I have begun to learn here in Ohalushu). Oshikwanyama is spoken by the Kwanyama people – “the meat eaters” – who reside in a circular region containing north-central Namibia and south-central Angola. Oshikwanyama is the most prevalent dialect of Oshiwambo and is one of the two written dialects, the other being Oshindonga. There is a playful debate between the Ndongas and the Kwanyamas over which tribe is the most respected, but secretly even the Ndongas know the Kwanyamas reign supreme.

Okay, enough about Namibian language... Maybe you want to know about what I have been up to??

So in my last blog entry I indicated that I would be headed to Windhoek (Namibia’s only city, population 300,000) for a conference called Reconnect. The conference was two weeks long and we talked about all of the issues that we have faced in our first six weeks at site in addition to planning for our primary (teaching) and secondary (community development) projects for the upcoming year. The sessions were generally helpful: it was very beneficial for me to see how other volunteers were planning their lessons and we received much valuable information about how to begin a secondary project and how to get funding for it. But some things didn’t go so well: the long days took a lot out of us and many of us thought that only six weeks between PST and Reconnect were not enough to get a reasonable idea about the dynamics of our respective communities. In any case, most of us had a good time at Greiters (the resort we stayed at for the duration of the conference). The food was awesome – maybe because we eat porridge every day in the village – and it was fun to hear about everyone’s experiences thus far and explore Windhoek together.

Not much else has happened since my last post. I did, however, get to see the beautiful town of Tsumeb for a few days of work collaboration with some fellow volunteers on the way back to the North. The stop broke the trip into two very reasonable 4-hour drives rather than one of 8 hours and the only drawback was the incessant rains on Tuesday that halted our departure plans.

Now I am back in the village, typing this blog entry to avoid doing any real work (some things will never change). I am having a difficult time grasping the fact that it is mid-December due to these blazing hot daytime temperatures. But with that said, the holiday season is indeed upon us and in a few days I will be headed to Swakopmund along the Atlantic coast to celebrate Christmas and the New Year with many other volunteers. Apparently, everyone and their mother go to Swakop during the holidays so it should be an interesting experience. Additionally, some of us will also be headed to the Skeleton Coast to see the signature sand dunes of the Namib desert. Look forward to some awesome pictures in my next post…

Here are some images:

We stayed at the building on the right for two weeks... No wonder volunteers from more hardcore countries call PC/Namibia "Peace Corps Light!"

A cool stone structure in the hills of Windhoek near Greiters (the resort in the above photo).

Here is a map of my village that I have created after exploring the community for a few weeks. Note the fact that there is one "road" in the village and it is actually just an ondjila, a gravel path.

Peace,

Joe

_

Over two weeks have passed and no posts… Hopefully you’re not disappointed that I’ve already failed to adhere to my goal of posting once per week. I must say that after re-considering my situation here – and fully coming to grips with the phrase “African Time” – I will probably never post more than once every two weeks. And with that little note out of the way, here is chronological recapitulation of my life since my last post:

I didn’t realize it at the time, but the week following my last post was the last full week of teaching for this school year. I was beginning to get into the groove of teaching and it was sad to see the year come to a close but as the days before the end-of-year examination waned away I came to realize how deeply seated some of the academic problems here really are. Example: a class of 8th grade students unanimously agreed that 0-1=0. Yeah, much work remains…

The following weekend, I was introduced to the community members of Ohalushu and surrounding villages during the church service. The school counselor of the whole Ohangwena Region introduced me and I delivered a brief speech telling the people about who I am, why I’m here, and what I will be doing over the next two years to help the community. The event was both a positive and negative experience. I was able to meet some important members of the community and gain acceptance from them, but I also was a bit of a laughing stalk of town for the rest of the day. You see, I had fatally damaged the one and only belt I had brought with me on Sunday morning and had to stand before the 200+ people and speak sans-omwiya, pants hanging on by a thread… In hindsight, it was a pretty funny experience but during the event I was mortified. By the way, I ended up going to Ongha to get a N$25 (~US$3.50) belt at a China shop after church, so ombuluweva yange fit once more.

Last week, we finished revising (reviewing) for the examinations and I began to train some of the teachers in the basic functions of a computer. The learners and teachers represented completely different attitudes this week. The learners looked mentally maxed out with the hot Namibian sun draining all of their cognitive juices. I could only hope they would be able to muster the energy to make it through the almost three weeks of non-stop examinations to close the school year. Conversely, the teachers, seeing holiday right around the corner, used their spare time to pick up on some of the technological advancements of the past decade. Almost every teacher eagerly attended to my informal sessions on basic computer functionality and accessing the newspaper through the internet was better than sliced bread – which maybe not surprisingly doesn’t exist here in the village, we have to go into town to get it.

Finally, exuliloshivike la fika. About 12 of us northerners came together in Ondangwa on Saturday. We had a good time and then some of us moved on to Ongwediva for Saturday night and Sunday. Sunday was cool because most of my language group got to meet our language trainer’s family and have lunch together. I realize the details of this weekend were severely lacking and that was done purposefully…

And that brings us to now. This week at school is all about invigilating (proctoring) the examinations for grades 8 and 9. I got my first taste today and it was exceedingly boring. I tried to keep myself busy during the two-and-a-half hour exam, but I ran out of bread and yesterday so my stomach was aching for some nourishment. I can only imagine how slowly the time ticked away for the countless learners in class who struggled to recall everything about physical science while nursing an empty stomach. I invigilate one more exam on Thursday and then it’s off to somewhere near Windhoek for Reconnect.

Some important future dates:

Mon 29 Nov Start Reconnect Fri 10 Dec End Reconnect Mon 13 Dec Begin "Work Collaboration" Week 1 Fri 17 Dec End "Work Collaboration" Week 1 Sat 18 Dec Begin "Cultural Weeks" Sun 2 Jan End "Cultural Weeks" Mon 3 Jan Begin "Work Collaboration" Week 2 Fri 7 Jan End "Work Collaboration" Week 2 Sun 9 Jan Return to site

Reconnect - conference to review the things that did work and things that didn’t work during the past few weeks (Phase 2) and gain from the experiences of our peers

Work Collaboration Weeks - time for us PCVs to get together in small groups and plan workshops and lesson plans for the upcoming school year

Cultural Weeks - time for PCVs to travel throughout Namibia and gain cultural insight A.K.A. vacation time for the holidays

So as you can see, it is possible that come this Saturday I will be away from my site for about 6 weeks. With that said, I may only post once or twice before the beginning of the next school year in January.

Hope all is well back in the States…

Oshi li popye,

-Joe

P.S. It rained last week. HARD. I guess the rainy season isn’t too far away.

P.P.S. I know some people requested my new address. I asked my principal and I probably won’t be using my school’s address to receive mail. It is likely that I will use my host family’s address and I will update the address on the blog when I have a definitive answer. Also, once I post it, do not send me a package until January. Packages get lost in the mail very frequently during the holidays and I’d hate to see someone send something and have it never get to me.

_

First off, I’mma keep these blog entries short from now on since I should be able to post at least once a week with my newly acquired fairly regular access to internet.

So… three weeks in at site and things are going pretty well: I’m starting to understand the whole family dynamic on the homestead, teaching is fun, and each day I get a better idea of how I might be able to influence development within the community.

Living with a host family is never the easiest thing in the world. Both parties must make sacrifices to the ways they lived in order to accommodate their new family members and the negatives can sometimes outweigh the positives at first. The goal, though, is that as the host and the hosted become acquainted with each other, the benefits will overcome the detriments of the changes that each had to endure in their lifestyles. My host family and I shared many uncomfortable moments during the first week or two (and there are sure to be plenty more in the coming years), but I am starting to understand more about my host family members and seeing how they live their lives really makes it easier to avoid the awkward moments. The good thing is my host mom is a teacher at my school and we see each other many times throughout the day, giving me ample opportunities to learn more about her and gain insight into how things are done at school.

At school, I have spent the majority of my time teaching, marking (grading), and recently fixing computers. For the past two weeks and for the remainder of the third and final term of the school year, I have been teaching 18 periods per week (6 periods of 8th grade math, 6 periods of 9th grade math, and 6 periods of Basic Information Science). The learners are doing pretty well considering some of them are unable to write their name in English (they are taught entirely in Oshikwanyama until 5th grade and sometimes afterward, so English skills are generally lacking). Marking is tedious but it allows me to see what type of problems the kids have difficulty with, so it is beneficial for the teachers too. And recently a large part of each of my days has been devoted to maintaining the functionality of our school computer lab. The lab houses one server running Edubuntu (Linux-based) and about 20 roughly ten-year-old PCs. Needless to say, upkeep is a mess in the lab. The one major success has been the introduction of internet to the lab this week. Apparently, the school has been internet-capable for some time now, but no one understands the Linux terminal and the settings had never been configured properly to allow the computers access to the web. I had no idea how to use Linux either, but some research ended up being rather fruitful eventually yielding both wired and wireless connections. So although I have technically been doing less than half the work of most teachers (the normal teacher workload is 40 periods) I have been pretty busy. Next year, we PCVs are expected to teach 28 periods per week when we really begin our assignment. The rest of the time, we are supposed to work on our secondary projects where we will aim to bring about growth and development in the community.

As a PCV, determining what the community needs most and how to bring about sustainable development are things that need to be pondered frequently and for an extended period of time. Before one can get an understanding about the community needs, he must meet with members of the community. That’s what I’m doing now; I’m trying to get involved in community events and meet people who are passionate about the community and where it is headed. I met with the counselor of our constituency yesterday to get a better idea about what the community needs and where I might be able to help out and it looks like a computer resource center or community library would be good ideas but both concepts require a lot of funding and effort from many outside sources. I certainly understand the community more than I did a week or two ago, but much work remains.

And since people love pictures, here are a few I took after school today…

One of our loud roosters in the homestead that likes to wake everyone up at 3am, 4am, 5am, etc..

My youngest host cuz. I almost know as much Oshikwanyama as here.

Ombwa yetu. We have a puppy too. They eat everything from bones to bugs.

The sun setting beyond the yonder trees._

I have 2G internet, so bear with me... Here are just a few pictures I have taken since arriving in Namibia:

This is near Okahandja (where we had training - PST - the first eight weeks in Namibia. A few friends and visited this mountain several times during training as there was pretty little to do in town...

These are some of my host cousins living with me on the homestead in the village. I will be with them for the entirety of the time I remain in Namibia. They love to have their pictures taken, so you'll probably see more...

These are a few of our goats right outside of the homestead. Note the environment that I live in. Oh yeah, did I mention I ate a goat eye at school the other day? It was pretty tasty.

Sick (written 10/17/10)I can say with confidence that I have been sicker than any of the

other 44 members of PC/Namibia Group 32 since we arrived in country

two months ago. It's funny because I am rarely ever sick in the

States, but everything is hitting me at once these past few weeks.

About two weeks ago, I stepped on a thorn. Thorns are ridiculous

here, so I'll try to paint the picture for you. This thing went

through my flip-flop and about 2 cm into my foot. Not the type of

thorns one might see in the NE USA. Anyway, I stepped on the thorn

and it hurt and all but it's a thorn. How much damage can it do? I

decided to continue walking for an hour or so until my friend and I

reached our desired destination. We sat down and relaxed for a bit

and then were on our way again. Walking didn't work out too well this

time. The pain that had been isolated to the front 20% of the sole of

my foot had made its way to the top of my foot and was slowly entering

the base of my foot. Soon after, we reached town but my health was

wavering. My whole foot and calf hurt and I was beginning to get

dizzy and light-headed. As my vision began to fade, I realized I was

soon going to pass out if I didn't get some fluids and electrolytes

into my body. Luckily, some friends were exiting the market I was

standing outside of and they handed me a sports drink. I drank it

rapidly and regained complete consciousness. I imagine I was simply

dehydrated from walking all morning in the hot Namibian sun and my

quick recovery seemed to warrant little additional attention. The

problem was the lingering intense pain in my foot so afterward we

contacted the Peace Corps Training Manager and he organized a ride

back to my host family's house. I got home and we didn't have water

in the community because a pipe had broken, so I couldn't clean the

wound… Little did I know this was the first of many days of agonizing

ambulation. The pain didn't go away, so I went to the doctor a few

days later and he prescribed an anti-inflammatory (with codeine) and

some antibiotics. The drugs seemed to work; after two weeks, the

inflammation is gone. But the sole of my foot is still tender. Maybe

it wasn't the drugs… I received multiple treatments from host family

members and language trainers, and I still cannot identify whether or

not they helped or hurt the healing process.

So that's the story of my foot injury and a bit of the story of my

problems with dehydration in Namibia. I guess I'll continue

explaining my dehydration issues. It's hot in Namibia. We sweat a

lot here and accordingly we lose a lot of fluids in the process.

Sometimes it's not so easy to find water either. Those two facts add

to yield dehydration, light-headedness, and struggles with maintaining

consciousness. But that's just the everyday struggle… What happens

when you add in food poisoning? Well, I can say it is certainly not a

good thing! About a week ago (at the beginning of the last and most

important week of PST and while I still was battling the pain from the

aforementioned thorn incident) I began experiencing the effects of

food poisoning. Put bluntly, I had diarrhea. I was dehydrated just as

a consequence of my daily life, but then anything I put into my body

(food or water) would exit rapidly in liquid form within the next few

hours. I won't elaborate any more, but for about five days I had a

headache, stomachache, footache, and a desire to not eat or drink

anything. It sucked. But I survived and I'm ready to take on malaria

and any other disease Namibia throws at me.Back to the Village: Future Teaching Awaits (written 10/17/10)PST is finally over. 8 weeks of blood, sweat, and tears. Literally…

I had a great time in Okahandja (I can finally say where we were

located during PST because we are now dispersed throughout the country

and pinpointing our location no longer represents a security threat)

with all of my new PC friends, but it's time to start doing what we

came here to do. I left yesterday to return to my new home for the

next two years. The feeling is a bit weird. Probably because we have

still not gotten into any regular routine since arriving in Namibia

over two months ago and sadly the routine will not come until at least

January. For the next few weeks I will be co-planning and co-teaching

with my colleagues at school. I will get more practice teaching and

begin to understand the needs of the community and learners (students)

in the school. In six weeks, my PC/Namibia Group 32 friends and I

will meet up for a conference called "Reconnect" where will share our

experiences and begin to formulate long-term plans for community

development and ideas to improve classroom lessons. Then we have

holiday (vacation) because the schools will be closed. I'll probably

do a bit of traveling with some good friends and see my host family

from Okahandja over this time, but I'll leave my schedule open for the

time being.

I've been living in Namibia for about a month now and this is my first blog post since setting foot in the sands of my new home country. Who would have thought it'd be so hard to gather enough time and energy to

write a few paragraphs and post it to the internet, but alas I sit here in my bedroom at 4:00am typing this and preparing to upload it with some funky USB device that allows me access to the internet.

So, what's my life like in Namibia? Busy. I have classes from 7h30 to 16h30 each day with language classes (sometimes two hours long, sometimes four hours long) in the morning and cross-cultural and

safety/medical sessions in the afternoon. When I'm not in class, I'm normally either at home with my host family or out with friends (PCTs and local Namibians) playing sports or chilling at the local hotspots.

Classes are decent. Some days I learn a lot and am glad we had each of the sessions, but other days I get worn out by the four-hour Oshikwanyama (the language I'm currently learning) classes and the

repetitive afternoon sessions. Luckily all of the trainers are awesome and try to make the day as easy as possible on us, knowing how exhausting some of the sessions can be.

My host family is very large and everyone is generally fun to be around. I still don't know exactly how many people I live with, but I imagine it's about 10: grandma, mom, uncles, cousins, and brothers and

sisters. We live in the upper-class part of town and the family knows many people in the community, so I tend to see fresh faces at the house on a regular basis. The only problem is I am learning Oshikwanyama and the family speaks a combination of English, Afrikaans, Damara, and Otjiherero, leaving me with no one to look to

with questions about the material we cover in language class. But it's all good. I don't expect to understand much by the end of training; the real learning will occur at site during my two years of service.

By far the most enjoyable part of my first month has been getting to know the 44 other PCTs in Group 32 (the 32nd group of Peace Corps Trainees in Namibia). There are a few people I interact with more than the rest of the group, but I cannot say I dislike anyone in our group. We are all very different but at the same time so similar. It's hard to explain, but we all share a common link at our core, the Peace Corps (I know, corny… but I had to do it). If I was writing this entry just for myself to look back at years down the road, I would probably end it here, but I'll add a few details for people concerned about the minutiae of my everyday life…

Food. So far, I can't say my diet has changed much. A decent amount of meat accompanied by a reasonable load of grains and many fruits. Vegetables are fairly lacking, but I frequently eat fresh tomatoes and sometimes assorted frozen vegetables. Spices and seasoning play a large role in Namibian cuisine. Butter and tomato sauce (sugary ketchup) go on everything, so my cholesterol and blood pressure will probably be through the roof by the time I'm ready to leave Namibia.

Weather. The weather has been ridiculously nice thus far. I have no clue what the temperature is, but it has generally been fairly cool in the morning and hot in the afternoons. The dry heat is not bad though. I walk around in a t-shirt, a long-sleeved button-up and pants each day and I rarely feel uncomfortably warm. I guess it gets hotter in the summer (roughly October to March) and in the north (where I'm going). Oh yeah, it hasn't rained since I've arrived in Africa, but the few days we've seen with clouds have resulted in the most amazing sunrises and sunsets. No pictures yet because I'm scared to bust out the big SLR camera, but I will be sure to take a few at some point or gather links to other PCTs' pictures at some point in

the future.

Animals. I have seen a few fairly cool animals so far. Some baboons, a giraffe, several brilliantly iridescent birds and various insects I have never heard of. The real cool stuff is in the north, though. Etosha National Park is home to all five of the Big 5 (see Wikipedia) and I will be living about a two hour drive from there. There are also plenty of snakes and insects to be seen in the north.

Where I live. I can't say exactly where I live for safety reasons, but I am near Windhoek in a decent-sized city. I said earlier that I live in the upper-class region of town, but I get to see the other very different parts of town when coming together to play sports or go out to see the community. Some places are not so safe, but my PCT friends and I have developed some connections with quality members of the community and our Namibian friendships allow for a sense of comfort in the most troublesome areas in town. Plus, our Namibian

friends provide us with sweet lingo and cultural insights (maybe I'll expand on this in a later post, but not now), so we are slowly becoming acquainted with the Namibian customs. Oh yeah, I guess I should say a bit about my future as a teaser for my next post. I'm currently about halfway through training, so my next post (if I decide to post monthly) will be around the time of swearing in and the time when I depart and head to my final site. Much will occur within the next few weeks… On Friday of this week, I will be headed north to Owamboland where I will stay for five days at the homestead I will be staying at for the rest of my service here in Namibia. I will get to observe the community, learn about my host family, and see the school I will be teaching at (Isai Nhinda JSS about 25 km north of Ondangwa in north-central Namibia near the Angolan border). Then it's back to training where I continue sessions and begin to make final strides towards become an official PCV.

Stay tuned for information about my site visit, details about the swearing in ceremony, and any other critical events that may occur in the coming weeks.

Until next time…

Note: Sorry if I dropped a few Namlish (Namibians speak a weird, sometime utterly unintelligible form of English due to so many cultural and linguistic influences within the country) phrases/terms throughout this post and in future posts.

For future Peace Corps Namibia people (and anyone who cares), this is what I brought with me:

Bags

Hiking backpack (1)

Duffel bag (1)

Laptop bag (1)

Clothing

Work pants (4)

Ties (4)

Dress shirts (4)

Belt (1)

Hat (1)

Shorts (1)

T-shirts (3)

Thermal shirt (1)

Boxers (5)

Pajama pants (1)

Bathing suit (1)

Socks (6)

Dress socks (3)

Shoes

Dress shoes (1)

Sneakers (2)

Flip flops (1)

Toiletries

Deodorant (4)

Bottle shampoo (1)

Bar soap (4)

Tube toothpaste (2)

Bottle sunscreen (1)

Electronics

Laptop (1)

MP3 player (1)

8 GB USB flash drive (1)

Hair trimmer (1)

Camera (and lenses) (1)

Headlamp (1)

Watch with extra battery (1)

Miscellaneous

Towel (1)

US Stamps (20)

Envelopes (20)

Books (6)

Duct tape (1)

Notebook (1)

Journal (1)

Sleeping bag (1)

Water bottles (2)

Deck of playing cards (1)

Uno (1)

Daypack (1)

Batteries (AA/AAA, large package) (2)

Package of dice (1)

Roughly 62 lbs total. Well below the 80 lb limit. Hopefully that's a good thing, but I guess it could be bad. I've heard there will be plenty of places to buy things in Windhoek.

My next post will be from Namibia. Maybe two or three weeks from now.

Until then....

- Joe

I'm currently in Philly. Chillin'. Getting to know the other 44 members of our Peace Corps Namibia group. Our group is quite young (probably average age of around 25). About 35 teachers (English, Science, and Math) and roughly 9 business administors. Luckily most of the teachers I've spoken with have not taught in a classroom setting, so my lack of teaching should not be an issue (or we're all screwed).

Not much has happened yet.. We registered last night and received a Yellow Fever vaccination this morning and have a few events this afternoon and evening.

Tomorrow is the big day. Wake up at around 2:00am, drive to NYC, and depart to Johannesburg, South Africa (roughly 15 hour flight). After that, we take a short flight to Windhoek -- roughly where I'll be living for the next two months.

Training is eight weeks. We'll receive medical, cultural, and language training during that time and I will be living with a host country from Week 2 - Week ~9. From what I've read, these few weeks will be fairly intense and most of the time I'll want the training to end as soon as possible but once it's over I'll want to go back. I'll guess we'll see in the coming weeks. More to come on that...

Yeah, so I'm still in the States -- perhaps I won't be by the time I get to post this -- and I really have no clue what type of access I'll have to internet, so check back from time to time. I hope to post 2-4 times per month, but that may change depending on my specific situation in Namibia.

That's all for now. About to go for a "jog" with a few members of the group.

Peace.

- Joe

_