I know that it’s been a long time since I wrote an entry. I needed to take a break for a while. This New Year has definitely brought its share of unexpected changes. Most of you have heard by now, but I had a difficult situation arise in my community in March. In the end, Peace Corps determined that I could no longer continue to work in the community I was originally placed in. This situation is not common. In fact, as I began to share my story with other volunteers, most of them said they weren’t sure they would have chosen to stick out the process. It wasn’t an easy transition, but with a few Peace Corps friends by my side (saying they would do anything to help me through), I decided to stick with my commitment. As you can imagine, moving to a new community is no easy under taking. It was incredibly hard to stay goodbye to my old host family. They did an amazing job making my stay enjoyable! I’ll miss the deep conversations we had most nights under the stars, the little two year old pounding on my door in the morning demanding that I come out and play, and the quietness that came in living so far off the beaten path.
Peace Corps then put me up in a hostel in Mbabane (the capital of Swaziland) while they got a new homestead and community ready to host me. Staying in the hostel was tons of fun. I made many new Swazi friends, ate lots of KFC and Chinese food, and was able to spend some quality time with Peace Corps friends as they passed through Mbabane to visit the Peace Corps office.
Although I miss my old community immensely, my new homestead definitely has its perks. Now I have electricity, running water just outside my door, and easy access to transportation into town. It has been interesting to see the differences between the two communities. In my old community, the chief was on a major national committee and did not stay in the community much. In my new community, the chief is very young and makes it a point to be involved with the daily functions.I have been working closely in my new community with the Gogo Center manager. As I mentioned in a previous entry, the Gogo Centers are managed by NERCHA and most communities in Swaziland have one. Gogo centers are meant to serve as community focus points for the fight against HIV/AIDS. Each Peace Corps volunteer was paired with a Gogo Center manager for work in the community. The Gogo Center manager in my new community is amazing. His enthusiasm for improving this community is enthralling. For instance, we just finished working together to host a soccer and netball tournament for primary school students in the area. With my counterpart’s enthusiasm, we were able to put this entire event together over the course of two weeks. We were hoping that by serving food, we could attract many community members into watching the games. We were then planning to provide education, dramas, personal stories, and testing to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Although the event did not go nearly as smoothly as we would have liked, it was a success. The games went well and we were able to provide food for the players and dramas with personal stories for those in attendance.
Although Swaziland has the highest rate of HIV/AIDS infection in the world (42.3%) and the testing is free, very few Swazis have actually tested. For example, in my old community I surveyed 150 homesteads (this accounted for about 1,500 people). Only 10% of those surveyed had ever tested. Students often ask me why Swaziland has the highest infection rate in the world. I then write that question on the chalkboard and ask them to brainstorm possible reasons. The students don’t like thinking about the reasons and often find it difficult to even think about. However, I think getting to students to have this specific discussion is among the most affective things I do here in Swaziland. We end up listing things like poverty, lack of education, lack of condoms, lack of knowledge about condoms, cultural traditions, stigma, denial, the place of women in society, societal acceptance for having multiple concurrent partners, taboos surrounding conversations about sex, etc.
I will try much harder to keep this thing updated, especially now that I have electricity!
