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“Good bye my friend, you never know when the last time will be the last time do you? See you on that side. The best part of PC was making friends like you”. ~Love, Betty the Bulldozer (aka Kate Greenmun aka Oratile) May, I thought, was going to be my month to return home to the US. My group, Bots 7s earliest possible Close of Service date was May 18. PC wanted to get us out of here before all of the chaos with the World Cup began, so the required 27 month service got whittled down to 25. I was planning on leaving, but here it is, May 19 and I’m still here! The other day in Gabs, I saw the smiles, bursts of joy and peaceful looks on the faces of those articulating the words…”I’m leaving tomorrow.”It was a strange feeling when the reality of it hit me. I believe there is only one other volunteer in our group who is extending for a 3rd year and a few others who are leaving the first week in June. Here, I remain, struggling with slow Internet connections, fax machines with no paper, a la

"With Clifford’s death, I honestly think that if he was taken to the hospital and given some medical attention he ‘might’ have survived. But on the other hand, I think we just have to accept that it happened and what’s done, it’s done. You know, everything in life happens for a reason. God has a plan for all of us and that’s why we should always accept whatever life throws at us. Rest in peace my brother. We will know the truth sometime soon. And Masa I am so hurt that you have to go. You really helped all of us here in Motswasele a lot. Thanks for everything and God bless you." ~ Anonymous MJJ student As I walk home from a PACT meeting with the kids at school, I hear a dog screeching in the distance. Immediately, I know it’s coming from my house- not an uncommon sound at the family compound. I enter the gate and see the young neighbor girl beating our family’s small, fragile dog with a stick as it shrieks at the top of its lungs. My Motswana moth

Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them - every day begin the task anew. ~Saint Francis de Sales Early in the term, a teacher asked me what I missed most about America. I was surprised at my immediate reaction as my eyes became watery while I uttered the words, “feeling useful… feeling needed…. feeling wanted.” For the next few days the question followed me and my mind continued to come up with more answers. One morning during school assembly, while listening to the school head give his typical Monday morning talk (angry rant) to the student body, I thought to myself, I miss feeling inspired; like anything is possible as long as I’m willing to do the work required. It seems the system here creates so much discouragement that it’s amazing anything gets done at all. In some ways, things are probably even more difficult, though, for us ‘lekgoa,’ as there is litt

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don’t give up. ~Anne Lamott, writer The 2009 school year has come to a close along with the last general meeting of the year, which I had been dreading. As is turned out, the School Head did not attend and there was no discussion regarding the report I had submitted. Although, one of the art teachers who was responsible for the mural art project had asked (and I paraphrase)’what was going on between the Peace Corps Volunteer and the Guidance and Counseling committee,’ which opened it up for me to say that I had no counterpart so things have been very difficult. This was handled by the Deputy Head suggesting that we (me , ‘my counterpart,’ and the Guidance and Counseling committee) work this out at another time outside of this particular meeting (translation: lets not deal with Lekgoa issues). As a result, nothing major happened at th

Life Skills Concept #11: Dilemmas Dilemma- a situation that requires a choice between two unappealing alternatives. This past week I had to make a decision that could be considered a dilemma. A dilemma that was self-invoked that began with an idea I came up with in a moments notice: To ask my students one simple question, “What can the Ministry of Education do to make your school experience better?” The problem is, when I come up with these bright ideas, I don’t foresee the path of headaches that they’ll lead me on. First of all, the 17 pages of comments that needed to be typed into the report, and secondly the consequences suffered from submitting the report. There I was, holding in my hands, an in depth proclamation of the problems plaguing the school; problems that redirect the blame off of the students and onto the teachers and administration; a place where no one has dared to venture until now….until the ‘lekgoa’ has dared to expose the forbidden domain. I had handed similar rep

Learn to Fail or Fail to Learn The time has come for the form 3s to take their final exams along with the form 1s and 2s who will be taking their end of month exams. The students seem to always be taking exams without much classroom teaching. As I walk by teachers correcting exams, I look at the papers and sometimes see… 6%! The only tests that really count are the final exams that are taken at the end of form 3. The final test covers everything on the syllabus since form 1 and will determine whether the student will make it to progress on to Senior Secondary school. Sometimes the syllabus is not completely covered, so much of the time, kids are taking tests on topics they’ve never been taught. I went to school last Monday thinking the kids would be taking exams. I would not be teaching, but once I got into school, plans had changed because no one ordered paper to print the tests on. Suddenly, my day went from having no classes to having four. As I sauntered along to my first class, wh