Host volunteer visit

This week brought a change of pace from the more seminar-oriented week before. We had a standard day of classes on Monday, but on Tuesday we left to do our Host Volunteer Visit (HVV). The HVV is a three day trip out to the site of a current volunteer. I went with another trainee to a small town about 60 or 70 km away. We first went to the Camptown of Mafeteng and met up with a few current volunteers for lunch.

The main purpose of this visit was to see a current volunteer in action. This was somewhat hindered by the face that the visit occurred during Primary School Leaving Exams, which Standard 7 students take at the end of their Primary School education. The entire school focuses on these tests, and all the other Standards are told to stay home. So, rather than go to the school and observe some Primary English teaching, I instead conducted what amounted to a survey of the school's physical plant. But I did get to talk to some of the teachers at the school, who helped talk through a few research topics about Basotho culture with me. I also got to spend some time reading one of the texts I will be teaching, A Crooked Path.

It was enjoyable and eye-opening to see how a current volunteer lives, and I can see myself making the transition in a few months.

Lumela, metsoalle! (Hello, friends!)

I've now been in Lesotho for just over a week.

We (my fellow volunteers and I) landed in Maseru on Friday, October 11th, and have been keeping very busy since then. My training village is in a district (a district is similar to a U.S. state) called Berea, and I lived with a wonderful host family. We met our host families on Friday at Morenang (the place of the Chief), and they greeted us and gave us our Sesotho names. Around these parts, I am known as Bokang Kose, Bokang meaning "Be thankful" and Kose being my surname. My host 'm'e (mother) likes me to call her "Mama K," and other members of the Kose family live close by, so there is always a large cast of people coming in and out of the house: ausi (sister) Shudy, and bo-abuti (brothers) Paballo, Kananelo, and Tlotliso. Another volunteer lives close by with another branch of the Kose family, and sometimes his 'm'e will come by with her two daughters, including a baby whose nickname is, I believe, "Numpy Numpy." Numpy Numpy and I are in a similar place in our Sesotho language education, so I will sometimes see Mama K feeding her potatoes and saying "litapole," while my ausi Shudy will point out the potatoes on my plate and say "litapole." It's nice to have someone learning with me.

My village is located on the slope of a plateau, with a large concentration by the base on a flat. The Kose house is way up on the slope on the far end of the village, and we have a terrific view of the mountain. At night, the light of the moon is enough to see around. In the house, I have my own square room with windows on two sides, a table with two chairs, a table with my water buckets and water filter, a bed, and a two-burner propane stove for boiling water and (soon!) cooking my own food. I usually study Sesotho for a little bit after dinner by the light of a paraffin lamp, but really I don't spend too much time in my room.

Each morning our Sesotho language training begins at 7:30 in a room in the local high school, and continues for about twohours. My Sesotho is developing pretty well, and we have plenty of opportunities to utilize it, as the Basotho place a lot of value in greetings. It's not uncommon to talk with five or ten people on the walk back home each afternoon. After language training each morning, we go by bus to a central hub (the training cohort, 26 volunteers, is divided across three villages), where we have technical training.These sessions focus on things like health, HIV/AIDS information, lesson planning, and cultural training. This lasts until about 5:00 in the afternoon.

The days have been very packed, and all of us volunteers seem still to be caught up in the initial high of living in a new country. Really, everything's been ideal so far, and I hope I can figure out soon how to get some pictures posted.

I'm typing this now from the Vodacom store in the Pioneer Mall in Maseru, where we are today on a field trip (the stated purpose is to get us acquainted with public transportation). I picked up a Blackberry phone from the Vodacom store, so I should always be in email contact. I hope everyone is well back in the States, and I look forward to keeping you updated.

One week away

Welcome. One week from today, I will head to Philadelphia for staging, and the day after that, I will fly from JFK to Johannesburg to Maseru. Not much to report at this point, but I wanted to get the blog set up before I left so that I don't have to fuss with it too much once I'm in Lesotho. I will not have access to the internet on a regular basis, both during training and during service, so it will take me some time to establish a proper blogging routine. Perhaps I will try to post once a week, or once a month. Perhaps this will be the only post. We'll see.