Peace Corps Namibia - 25th Anniversary

Last week, I had the privilege of addressing the Peace Corps Namibia community at our 25th anniversary celebration. I know I haven't posted in a while, but I feel like this speech covers a lot of the way my thoughts and feelings about my service and the PC Namibia program have developed in my mind. See the speech below with some media sprinkled in.

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Good morning ladies and gentlemen.

Last January I took a trip back to Okahandja to visit my host family. It was my host brother’s birthday and they were having a braai. It felt weird being back in Okahandja, the town that many of us trained in, without the rest of my group. Still, though the town felt so familiar. Elements of home. I’m sure many of us have felt it going back. At the Spar in town, as me and my family headed to the till, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see Doc, who owns a security company, smiling at me. I had met Doc during PST at our Small Business Workshop. After a warm and familiar greeting, he asked when the next Peace Corps small business workshop would be. He’d attended a few and was looking forward to the next. He asked me about my site and what work I was doing. He asked me if I missed Okahandja. He spoke to me with such familiarity and comfort – with an understanding of my service, my job, and my experience/purpose in Namibia. Moments like this, these small exchanges, remind me of the impact of our service. In moments like this, you really feel like a Peace Corps volunteer. When a car picks you up and the driver shares the story of his grade 9 math teacher back in 2004, followed by a, “do you know them?” and, “Tell them hello”. You know in these moments that you’re part of something special.

Today, as we look to celebrate Peace Corps’ 25^th year in Namibia, we – the Peace Corps volunteers – ask ourselves: how are we meant to celebrate? How do we celebrate a 25 year history that we have only participated in a fraction of?  Across so many different sites, projects, personalities and perspectives, what experiences can we collectively commemorate? Today I want to highlight one of Peace Corp’s most defining traits, and what I believe we would all say allows our work to be effective and impactful: the unique relationships and experiences we share with the people of Namibia.

As a PCV, It would be a mistake to attribute your experiences in Namibia as strictly a product of your 2 year service. Not that you don’t deserve credit. You absolutely do. But, we do not serve in a vacuum of our own experiences. While new relationships and individual experiences are largely products of our own efforts, we do not serve alone. We serve with the support and legacy of 25 years of Peace Corps Volunteers who’ve made PC Namibia what it is today – a trusted organization that is valued for its people and projects. We carry this with us everywhere we go. Every time we introduce ourselves as PCVs, or wear our PC Polo, or every time we present our ID cards, we benefit from the strong, and well-deserved reputation of this program. The reputation established by the PCVs who came before us. Today we celebrate them. We celebrate their successes – not defined just by the effectiveness of their projects, but also by the quality of their relationships. The skills imparted, yes, but also the true and honest connection they developed with the recipient of that skill.

Left to Right: Carl Swartz (Country Director, PC Namibia), Patrict McElroy (DPT, PC Namibia), Me, Saara Kuugongongwela Amadhila (Prime Minister, The Republic of Namibia), Ambassador Daughton (US Ambassador to Namibia), Dick Day (Regional Director of the Africa Region, Peace Corps)

It is hard sometimes to see ourselves as a part of that – so it goes with history. With each passing minute, each certificate printed, each learner graduated, and each person assisted we add to that history. Milestones such as these let us see ourselves within that 25 year context.

25 years of PC Namibia. 25 years of PCVs. 25 years of touring, traveling, and seemingly endless combie rides. 25 years of looking out the window of a car and being struck by the beauty of the Zambezi or Okavango Rivers, the dunes of the Namib or Kalahari Desert, or the Atlantic as you’ve never seen it before. 25 years of volunteer confusion from trying to figure out what the man giving directions is talking about when he says his shop is “just that side of the robot” or that “he’d be here just now” – only to find yourself a few short months later using the same exact phrases. 25 years of weddings, birthdays, and holidays. 25 years of host families and relatives who support and teach us so much – though I still will probably never effectively hand-wash my shirts. 25 years of a washer, dryer, and hot showers at the Peace Corps Office. 25 years of Peace Corps office staff who have made it their full time (and often overtime) jobs to assure that volunteers can be happy, comfortable, and successful at site. 25 years of incredible supervisors, counterparts, colleagues, and learners who deserve more praise than they could ever receive. 25 years of that look on a learners face when they finally figure “it” out, when a trainee approaches you and expresses their gratitude, when the meme who you’ve been working on budgeting with can now regularly pay for her electricity. 25 years of meaningful work. 25 years of friendship.

Me & Patrick (DPT, PC Namibia)

How fortunate are we to be given the opportunity to really experience this country. To truly get to know the people of this country? We are spoiled, yes, by the aesthetic beauty of this country. These are the things anyone with eyes notice, readily apparent to the average tourist. But as volunteers, we have the unique opportunity to truly see Namibia. We have the privilege to interact with the very fabric of this country. We have the opportunity to see this country not as a 14 day road trip, or 3 months of study abroad, but with 2 years of life.

It’s why when you talk to a volunteer in Zambezi, they almost always mention life in, around, or on the river – eating fish and pap, surrounded by friends, family, and a mosaic of shitenges. It’s why a Zambezi volunteer, though at first a bit uncomfortable, eventually finds kneeling and clapping to be as familiar as a handshake. It’s why a Kavango volunteer has countless, hilarious stories of drivers backing their cars a bit too close to the water as they get stuck at Rundu beach. A Kavango volunteer best escapes the heat of the day in the shade of a large tree with a massive monkey orange in hand. It’s why volunteers in Wamboland come to appreciate the sand in their oshifima because it is a constant and crunchy reminder of the strength of their early-rising sister. PCVs in Wamboland also come to prefer Marathon Chicken, and cast judgement on those who do not completely clean the bones of its meat. It’s why an Erongo volunteer knows that they have to wait to hear the language being spoken before they attempt greeting. The diversity of the country is represented in its population, and we come to expect each sentence to feature 2-4 different languages. It’s why everyone in Omaheke and Otjazondjupa mention the pride of the Herero culture and the emphasis put on family. It’s why a volunteer in Kunene notices the diversity of their region manifested in the landscape and the people. Volunteers in Kunene define fast food as a heaping plate of donkey meat with a side of flavoured ice. It’s why a volunteer in the south can always find a braai full of strangers, who quickly become Namily. PCV’s in the deep-south will always be boastful about their frost and snow covered towns, as the rest of the country to the north sweats it out. And it’s why all volunteers know one of the common themes of this country, one thing that unites every person who identifies as Namibian, is the undying, unquenchable love of meat. I mean, I thought I liked meat before I got here, but eish! You never leave a braai unsatisfied. Never. It’s about the experience though. Anyone can eat Namibian braai meat. But not everyone gets to experience the braai. As the fire is built, and the ashes crumble and crack, we talk. We share stories, talk about cultural curiosities. In doing that we experience Namibia in a way that is both honest and extremely personal. We get to experience its true spirit – interacting with its history, languages, cultures and traditions thorough its people. And it becomes more and more apparent, as the days go by, that we will leave here having learned far more than we’ve taught. It’s an oft-repeated sentiment, but how incredibly clear it becomes.

Post-Ceremony Group Photos
Top Row: Me, Eric Feldpausch (PCV), Alex Crisel (PCV), Patrick (DPT, PC Nam), Dan Appel (PCV)
Bottom Row: Linnea Carver (PCV), Sarah Jonson (PCV), Ally Conner (PCV), Kaitlin Schluter (PCV)

Our work is always focused on the future. Whether that future is a fully-functional and sustainable project that no longer requires volunteer assistance, or perhaps a strong foundation to pass on to the next volunteer, we serve with the future in mind. We serve for future generations of volunteers, staff, counterparts, and supervisors. We serve for the future, and so will the volunteers that follow us. We serve the future as did the volunteers, staff, counterparts, and supervisors that came before us. They served for your learners, your clients, your patients, your family, and your friends. So no, you may not know Group 1. But, in some way, they knew you. And today we all celebrate each other. As my Peace Corps supervisor, Linda Shiimbi, put it during training: “Though you are but just one raindrop, you land in a rushing river of change. And though alone one raindrop does little, a river can change landscapes”. Today we celebrate all the raindrops – Namibian and American alike – that have joined together to make this river flow.

As volunteers, we work for the benefit and development of Namibia at large, but our work is effective because we focus our efforts on a small section of the population. Whether we are teaching at a small school in Owamboland, working at a clinic in Kavango, or assisting youth entrepreneurs in Karas, our work and the work of our counterparts and supervisors depends on an intimate understanding of the people and places in which we serve. Events like this 25^thanniversary celebration allow us come together and put our individual, concentrated efforts into larger perspective. Collectively, we can look around this room and celebrate each other’s achievements as our own. But as we look around this room, make sure to visualize everyone who contributes towards our successful service.  See the colleagues that greet us every day and the supervisor that loves exchanging ideas.  See the entire Peace Corps staff and their passion for Namibian-American partnership and friendship.  See the government officials meeting in offices to strategically plan for the expansion of the education program and the entire Mission community discussing how to better use Peace Corps volunteers to make the national HIV/AIDS eradication agenda more effective.  See the fruit vendor that gives you an extra orange to thank you for your business, the kapana meme that knows how fatty you like your meat, and the security guards at Spar that always look out for you. It’s a truly magical thing when you realize that what we gain and leave Namibia with is not American colleagues and Namibian colleagues, American friends and Namibian friends, and American family and Namibian family, but just colleagues, friends, and family – connected through shared experience, friendship, and love. And how lucky are we for such a privilege. Thank you.

Superstar Sudster

As the sun inches up over the horizon, the fog clears, and the street lights flicker out, the true champions emerge. Line space is up for grabs. Your honor and weekly wardrobe depend on it. Sleep in and you'll miss your window. The doors swing open and out come the washing crew.

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Sunday, April 19th. 7 AM. Coffee on the stove, oats boiled and spiced, book in hand, and the freedom of an empty to-do list beyond that. Empty except for the 15-pound bag of laundry that I've pushed - both literally and figuratively - to the side. Not being able to open the door to my bedroom was as good an indication as any that I should lighten the load. I had a day filled with one activity - laundry. An all day affair, no doubt. But, as you'll soon see, this day was different. This load was not like any other. Today I would join the elites.

Hand-washing laundry is an art. Masters of the craft soak, squeeze, rinse, and drain with such fluency and efficiency as to cause borderline hypnosis in all on-lookers. The three Memes who live on my plot are shining examples. From one bucket to the next, rinsing, washing, and hanging. It's a rhythmic, full body activity. Like watching a master chef chop, or a professional golfer rip into a tee. It's vigorous but gentle. So subtle the skill involved, you can miss it if you don't know what you're looking for. The pro's make it look so easy. It's easy enjoy until you get your hands in that bucket. All rules are out the window. Baptism by fire bubbles. A task that should be fairly straight forward - soak and scrub. But over-simplification will leave you confused and your clothes dirty.

The yard is where all of the washing on my erf is done. It's as if the washing table was positioned as a shrine to the washing gods. With the houses lining the outer edges of the property, the washing table and buckets are placed, in full view, front-and-center, in the middle of the yard. It's like being on stage. Through observation, I knew the protocol - bring your clothes out, two buckets (one with suds and one for rinse), and get down to it. But I was nervous. Not ablutophobia (yeah, I Googled that). Most likely stage fright. Which explains why I spent the first 7 months in Swakopmund lugging buckets of water into the house to do my wash behind closed doors. I'd sit in my living room slopping the water around like a newborn in a bath tub. It beats looking like a fool in public, I thought. But, how crazy I must have looked to the people I live with as I walked by the table purposed explicitly for washing, only to drag my bubbly buckets into my house? How ridiculous must I have appeared, retreating from traditional techniques? I thought I was mitigating my foolishness, but, in fact, I was only magnifying it. But more on that to come soon.

There is a best way to wash, yet alternative strategies are abundant. Here are a few I've learned from observation and from some of my fellow PCVs - some more effective than others.

THE SOAK
By far the easiest, and least effective washing technique. It entails pouring water and detergent into a bucket filled with dirty clothes and soaking it for a period of time longer than 2 hours. Anything less than 2 hours is just considered wetting you clothes and does not qualify as doing laundry. After that time, you drain the bucket, rinse the clothes, and hang them on the line. This is a popular technique for the time-sensitive washers and beginners. Definitely don't want to do more than 3 loads this way though or those soiled clothes aren't getting any cleaner. I said it.

THE SOAK N' POKE
The ideal next step after The Soak. Safe to say that this is the most widely used technique among PC Namibia Volunteers. A long 'Soak' with some confused fumbling of your clothing underwater. There is no real strategy here - just mindless activity that makes you feel a bit better about yourself before hanging up to dry. Clothes get about 25% cleaner.

THE STIR
A version of 'The Soak' the entails circulating the clothing with your hand to mimic a spin cycle. Hilarious in theory. Never actually having seen it done so I can't speak to its practicality. This is one of those behind-closed-doors, deny-you-ever-did-it kind of things.

The aftermath of a Submerged Squeeze session

THE SUBMERGED SQUEEZE
My go-to move. Dunk the clothes. Squeeze them and stretch them under water. Resurface the article. Twist and rinse out the foam. Do this a few times - until you're either pretty sure the stank is gone or you forget what you were doing. Transfer to the rinse bucket. Rinse until suds are gone. Job well done, amateur.

THE SCRUB AND SQUIRT
This is the big leagues. A product of years in the bucket. A specific motion of hands that causes one part of the shirt/pant/towel to wash the other. It's effective (I'm told). There is a signature sound that is generated. Like the sizzle on a Fajita plate at Chili's or the swoosh on a Nike product, you know the squirt when you hear it. It's a sign of supremacy.

The story takes a turn here, not as you might suspect. I don't all of sudden master the Scrub and Squirt and impress the bubbles out of my neighbors. In fact, I think I'm forever stuck as a member of the Submerged Squeeze camp. And proud of it!

No. Today was difference because of something Oscar - the 4th grader that lives on my plot - said to me. One day after I washed and began hanging he asked, "You washed inside?".

"Yes, I did", I replied.

"Is your floor not wet?"

Blushing, I realized a fourth grader just questioned my ability to keep water in a bucket. He was right."But then I just mop it", I say.

Me and my roommate Job on a busy laundry Sunday

"Oh. But why don't you wash outside?", he asks. It's then I realize how weird I must have looked to him and everyone else I lived with. Every Sunday, this weird, bearded foreigner brings a bucket of dirty laundry from and to the house only to hole himself up for an hour before emerging with wet but equally dirty clothing. Why wouldn't this guy just join everyone else washing?

It may have been embarrassment or it may have been a bout of shyness, but for some reason I retreated. But on April 19th I said no more. I kicked open my door, dropped my bins on the table, and shoved my hands in the bucket. It's time. Everyone outside looked up, saw me washing, then just went back to living their lives. I never assumed anyone would care. But it was a big deal for me. Since then I've washed each and every load outside, had some really great conversation, and picked up a few tips and tricks. Thanks to the pressure of a fourth grader I felt compelled to jump out of my comfort zone and into the lives of my neighbors.

What Do I Even Do Here?

As far as bloggers go, I'm probably sub-par. I've been in country 8 months now (damn!) and I've only put up 11 posts - 2 of which came before I even left. So for that, my apologies. My intentions for blogging was to keep in-the-loop the people who were interested while not destroying any Facebook friendships I have with oversharing of stories and photos. I promise to (try) to do better.

As the title suggests, I'm going to focus a bit on my work. More with a future post than with this one, but I thought it would be nice to show you some photos from my first training. In really cool ways, I might actually be able to share my work with you. I'll explain in a bit.

Back in February I partnered with the Municipality of Swakopmund's Local Economic Development Officer, Rauna Shipunda, and the Chief Economist at the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) in Swakopmund, Helvi Petrus, to offer a Small and Medium Enterprise Training on Strategic Business Planning and Business Registration. SO MANY WORDS! We did this in the Municipality's  training room. This was a two day training that took place on two consecutive mornings. 

Municipality Training Room, Swakopmund, Namibia

This training brought together 42 small business entrepreneurs to focus on the formation of mission and vision statements, strategy building, goal-setting, action plan creation, business registration, and the sharing of SME programs offered through the MTI.

Municipality Training Room, Swakopmund, Namibia

Rauna Shipunda, LED Officer, Swakopmund, Namibia

In an exciting partnership between my organization (NCCI) and a local radio station (West Coast FM), all training content will be recorded and broadcast on Sundays from 4 PM - 5 PM on their business radio program. After airing, the recordings will be cataloged on a tab on their website dedicated to NCCI material. This way the content is available to any entrepreneur at any time. We're calling it Business Basics. I'll be sure to post the link as soon as the first training is up! 

Full Training Room, Swakopmund, Namibia

I'll throw a post up sometime again soon with a more detailed description of my job, but I did want to share what limited photos of my work that I do have.

Bad Breaks and Heartbreak

Well, I met someone here. We were introduced about a week or two after my arrival in Swakop and I’ve been seeing her since. My co-worker’s fiancé introduced us. He had come across her and thought that we’d really click. For a while he was right. He dropped her off at my house one day in October. I spent most of my first few hours with her not talking much. She really isn’t one for words. It was the little non-verbal cues – the posture, the eye contact, the presence. She was captivating.

I liked her because she’s complex. When we started talking about her past it was clear to me that she had her fair share of bad turns. She’d seen a lifetimes worth of pain and suffering, mistreatment and abuse. But she still stood strong. Held together by a thread, maybe, but standing nonetheless. For a while, it was perfect. Until she began to let me down. I don’t want to say she began to quit on me, because I don’t think that’s fair. I just think I expected too much of her. I should’ve been more pragmatic. More understanding. But I felt abandoned. Mostly, I felt stuck. If it wasn’t her wheels, it was her chain. If it wasn’t her chain, it was her handlebars. Let me explain.

I feel it’s time that I introduce you all to her. Here is a picture of my new (but otherwise old) bike. 

The white-almost-brown-rusted frame looks brand new compared to the crusty chain that looks like it was excavated from a sunken ship just last week. But as long as it works, I don’t mind too much. Not until I get on to ride the bike at which point my butt pierces with pain at each pedal against the hard shell plastic seat. My Peace Corps issued helmet has a softer exterior than the unbreakable, soft-as-a-baby-boulder, arguably a torture technique of a seat that I ride on. And to tease me, the bike has an 6 gear-shifter that has no wire attached to it. It just sits there on the handle bars and taunts me with what I could have had if I got to this bike before Y2K. And that’s the toughest part about it. I’ll be riding and I’ll think of what a bike she must have been in her glory years. Back when she had two functioning brakes instead of half of one. It’s so sad to see a legend out of his or her prime. Silly thing still thinks she is a great one.

She crapped out on me about two weeks ago. Technically I can go and get her fixed, but I can’t manage to swallow the frustration and, for the fifth time, go to get another part of her fixed.

A week after buying her, the back tire popped. I went to a bike repair place in town. As I was riding away the front tire blew out. Went back to the same place and got that fixed. A couple weeks later, rushing to a meeting I was late for, the screw connecting the handlebars to the bike came off. I was holding the handlebars with my left hand and steering from the base of the handlebar area with my right. Quite the task. Went and got that fixed too. A couple days later the chain came off the cogs. My sitemate Justin, having his fair share of bike experience, fixed that up for me. For a while things were going well – until the back tire popped again. I swore this would be the last thing I would fix. I went, bought a brand new tire track and got the tire tube replaced. Surely this would solve the problem for good. And it did. That problem anyways. As I was riding it home, the chain came off again. All I have to do is ask Justin to take another look at it, but I can’t. I hope you understand why. At a certain point you have to say, “Technology has failed me and broken my heart”. I know I can always rely on my own two legs. Plus, it gives me more time to Podcast. But every morning, as I lace up my shoes and get ready to walk out the door, I look at her with longing eyes. I do miss her. She just wants to be out on the open road. And I want to bring her there. I just need some space, I guess. Some time to think about her and me. Sometime to think about what it means to be a bike owner.

Thanksgiving: What it Means To Me Now

Today is an important day because I'm told it is. The calendar, as it does every year, lands upon the fourth Thursday of November and forces from people obligatory expressions of gratitude. The giving of thanks - not because I don't any other day, but because today I must. For most of my life, I was cynical to the values assigned with the holiday. I didn't buy into it. Not really until this past year.

To me, there had never been any special significance of this day beyond the feast. For most of my teenage and young-adult life my family has traveled down to Georgia to meet up with members of my mothers-side at my Grandparents house. The weekend was spent as most family gatherings are - checking in, touching base, and filling in the gaps since last year's Thanksgiving. But the crown jewel, the heart of the trip, hit your nose as you walked through the front door. That smell. Grandma's cooking to me was always more than a cliché - it was provable. A lot changed from childhood to my twenties - schools, jobs, personality traits, hobbies, and interests. A lot changed. But not that smell. That smell was a time-machine - the buttermilk fresh biscuit aroma sneaking out of the oven, blending with the no bake cookies drying atop the counter, alongside the cinnamon and nutmeg apple filling that was heaped in a bowl waiting to find its final resting place in a fresh, floury pie crust being rolled out on the island in the middle of the kitchen. All of these incredible scents fought for attention as they arrived at my nostrils. Every year the same combination of smells and every year the same ear-to-ear smile draped across my face as I considered the gluttonous future I had ahead of me. There's something to be said about that kind of consistency.

I fasted for a solid day before this meal just to clear space (for me that fasting really only meant not asking for a second pack of peanuts on the flight down). Meal time came and we split time telling family stories and memories with shoveling food into our already full mouths (maybe that was just me). The pattern from then on was predictable - eating myself into an early evening coma only to wake up, wipe my brow of the sweat that had formed during my turkey-induced slumber, and trudge to the kitchen grabbing left-overs.As if the sun setting on the previous meal some how erased the shame I should have felt for gorging myself to the point of inebriation. It's the Super Bowl of meals though - are you really going to sit out with a tummy ache? No shot. Push yourself off the couch, add a notch to that belt loop, and get back in there. It didn't hurt that Grandpa was right there next to me making another turkey, gravy, and stuffing sandwich in a biscuit. Respect your elders and do as they do, I thought.

"Your Grandma is trying to put me on a graham cracker diet", he'd say with a smile, still making his sandwich on the counter but looking out of the top of his glasses to see my grandma's reaction.

"Ooooh, Robert...", she'd say with a sense jovial criticism as she rolled her eyes.

Grandma, of course, always supported it. Her cooking was true, thick, and American - with her culinary skills influenced by residences in Iowa, Texas, and Georgia. Dishes that Paula Dean wouldn't hate. Each year it seemed each side got a little heartier and more gratifying. And for the same reason, each year the continued eating that made up the later part of this day of excessive consumption became increasingly appealing. She likely considered it a failure if you left the same weight as you arrived. Their house was, during this holiday, as warm, full, and filled with love as it would be all year. And for my grandparents, who spent their days thinking about how to keep an impressively large family together, this was when they were happiest. Generations eating, playing, and joking together.

And as I recount the schedule of each Thanksgiving I realize that my cynicism was generated by something that ran counter to the reason for the season. I showed little true thanks because I took for granted what for much of my life I assumed was permanent - the people around the table. There was no acknowledgement in my mind that this privilege of family ever could change. For a majority of my life I consider myself to have been fortunate - bad health or any other undesirable circumstances ceased to exist in my immediate family members. Thanksgiving was my anchor - while everything changed around me, this would always be the same, I'd thought. It didn't ever register that, looking around the table, seats could be empty.

When we lost my grandfather 2 years ago, the table had a gaping hole in it. We ate and chatted and prayed and recounted stories and loved in his memory. We still watched Johnny Carson re-runs as he would have insisted, and we still had cinnamon rolls and coffee the morning after like he would have requested. It started to hit me then. This feeling of permanence was protected by a wall that was built on lack of exposure to significant familial challenges and was slowly starting to crumble. Last year, when my grandmother passed, we didn't make the trip down to Georgia. The holiday, for the first time in m life, was changing. Ready or not, impermanence makes itself known to you when it matters most.

And now, when I'm further away from my family than I've ever been at this time of year, I think I finally understand it. I understand not just what it means to give thanks, but where my neglect to realize it earlier came from.

We celebrated the holiday at our house in Jersey that year. As I descended the staircase from my room to the kitchen the morning of Thanksgiving, a familiar scent returned to my nose. Grandma's cooking. My mom and sister were in the kitchen following her exact recipes. The same dishes we always ate hit the table for yet another year and I, yet again, stuffed my face like a rescued Tom Hanks in Castaway. The family that could make it still gathered together (and the ones that couldn't celebrated in the same way). Table talk consisted of family memories and stories. And as I sat, ate, and listened, I smiled and realized - my grandparents built this much in the same way that their parents before them, and theirs before them had. Our Thanksgiving wasn't changing, but sustaining. Our traditions may have morphed aesthetically, but they maintained in a way that would make my grandparents proud. If I use the past to inform the future, I see what this holiday means not just for my portion of family history, but for the generations that came before and will follow. Eventually titles will shift - parents becoming grandparents, children bearing their own, and new souls to take up the role of youthful neglect.

I was wrong. This holiday isn't an obligation. It's a choice. You actively choose to surround yourself with the people who, for your entire life and theirs, will provide you with unequivocal support and appreciation. You surround yourself with the memory of the people whose presence cannot be touched, but are fully felt through a smell, a song, or a television re-run.

Maybe my youthful too-cool-for-school attitude was right about something, though.  Maybe we aren't meant to spend a considerable amount of time during this holiday attempting to grasp the rarity of a table full of loved ones. Instead, we should spend that time existing in it. Life tends to move at a rate that my consciousness and appreciations struggle to keep up with. Value is found in scarcity or impossibility - the economics of the spirit, I suppose. Catch up with that value and see it as it is now. So as you sit around your table today, look at the faces of those who chose to join you in this annual feast, and try, for just today, to be present. Lock in this moment. Capture the smells, the colors, the smiles, the stories. Because, while life happens, you can't erase a memory.

Happy Thanksgiving to my family (both blood and chosen), friends and acquaintances.

My First Month in Swakopmund

I’ve been at site coming up on a month now. I’ve taken my time to adjust to my neighborhood, work place, and town – that being the goal of this stage of my service. In some ways this place already feels familiar. Understanding my way around Swakopmund – a small, fairly well planned town – took only a week or so. I once surprised myself when successfully giving directions to a tourist searching for the Post Office. But knowing my way from A to B is a far cry from truly understanding this town. Its people, history, industry, and complexities that follow from the interplay of those variables, and many more, still seem to me a giant puzzle – I feel this, naturally, as I also feel that no one should suggest they know a place in a month or any such insignificant amount of time. The heavy emphasis on community understanding during this phase of service, and the tools and processes Peace Corps has employed me with to attain such understanding makes me question whether I’ve fully grasped the intricacies of any place I’ve ever lived. Questions I’ve never asked, and reflections I’ve never considered are daily functions of true community appreciation. Insights that are often unexpectedly revelatory.

And as much as I value these tools, I hope not to install them in such a way that leaves me from the outside looking in. I am not a fly on the wall of Swakopmund. I am a member of this community now – or at least I should hope to eventually be accepted as one. I hope to define Swakopmund not as an anthropologist would, but as a participant.

At NCCI I’ve had the pleasure of working with  really helpful people. I work in the office with my colleague Danielle. The rest of the Executive Committee that comprises the Swakopmund branch of NCCI are business folk themselves and operate on the board as volunteers. For my first couple of weeks here all efforts were focused on preparing and marketing the first ever Swakopmund International Trade Expo that was run by the NCCI. Now that it has ended, I’ve been spending my days meeting with SME’s, the municipality, ministries, and other regulatory bodies that play a role in the SME/business community in Swakopmund. I’m really focusing on getting a lay of the land in these early stages. It has only been a month, but I already see some exciting potential opportunities.

The front view of my house.

My housing is more spacious than I imagined it would be. It’s a two bedroom, concrete, tin-roofed house in Mondesa (Google Map it, if you please, so you can see its nearness to the town), one of the many neighborhoods in Swakopmund. The other bedroom belongs to Mike, the owner – a 25-year-old art student in Windhoek. That being a 4-hour drive from here, I will very rarely share the space with him. There are two other rooms in the house – a kitchen and dining/living area. The kitchen has a refrigerator and stove. Since electricity is rather expensive, and the massive oven with a stove top consumes so much of it, we leave it unplugged. There is a mini, electric, two-burner stove that is placed on top of two of the built-in stove-top burners that suffices. To the right of that is my washing area. It’s a two bucket system. Since there is no running water in the house, I get my water from the tap a short walk from the house in the back. I fill my main bucket and sit it next to my wash bucket/tub for dish/food washing. When the water in the wash tub fills up, I carefully (a full tub of water is deceptively heavy and there is nothing more unpleasant than a misstep, resulting in a drenching of yourself in dirty dish water) bring it to the back, by the tap, where there is a drain. It’s an incredible exercise in water usage reduction – and maybe less for environmental reasons and more for the hassle of having to shuffle with a stinky tub of water.

And as I scoot by to the drain, I pass by the smirks of what I’ll call my plot-mates, who seem, always, to glide to the drain with effortless eloquence with their full buckets. It works in Mondesa, and many other townships in Namibia, that formal housing will also host some informal settlements on the same plot. These residences are often constructed of wood, metal, aluminium, or any other materials that can be sourced. It is affordable housing as residents are either renting from or are family of the main landowner. So immediately, when I moved in, I had people to help me acquaint with the area. We share the toilet in the back and the water tap. Bathing is done from a bucket inside the outhouse. Every morning before preparing breakfast I fetch water and boil it. Lately though I’ve just been using the water unheated for bathing. I’m sure this is a combination of built-up tolerance and laziness, but I’m telling myself it’s just the former.

I’ll admit that the language barrier is a bit tough when trying to connect with my most proximate neighbors. Most of my plot-mates speak Oshiwambo and a little Afrikaans. I have enough Afrikaans, I feel, to introduce myself, buy things, identify animals & foods, get directions, report a crime, go to school, and understand the context of most, slowly spoken conversations. But I can’t, yet, rely fully on my Afrikaans to build relationships (I have, though, found an Afrikaans tutor who I will be seeing everyone MWF for one hour). My broken Afrikaans and their English seem to get us by just fine though. As time has gone on though, I feel more connected with my plot-mates. One of the boys, Oscar, is a 3^rd grader with shy demeanour but an insatiable curiosity. Whenever I get back from work at a reasonable hour, him and his friend Ali come to my main room and go over with me what they learned at school that day. I then quiz them on some basic math / reading / spelling. Whoever gets the answer right first gets a cookie. Oscar, being a bit older, usually takes the cookie. Being the renaissance man that he is, he usually splits his spoils with his trusted playmate.  I enjoy those parts of my day and am realizing how I’m slowly becoming my father.

When it gets a bit later, I usually start to cook some dinner. I’m trying to save up for some travels so most dinners consist of parboiled rice and the addition of one the following: canned beans, curry vegetables, mashed potatoes, steamed onions/peppers/tomatoes. A novel idea was imparted on me by a fellow Swakopmund volunteer, Justin - occasionaly buy this loaf of bread at the grocery that resembles a personal pizza (everything by the sauce) and make some marinara sauce to dip it in. Then I smother it in sweet chili sauce. Dining is simple in my kitchen, but Sweet Chili Sauce is where my culinary joy comes from. Holy cow is that stuff delicious. I could spoon eat it. I haven’t. But I would. Okay I did. But it was just once. Judge me - I dare you.

Going out after the sun goes down isn’t necessarily advisable. Mondesa and Swakopmund in general are pretty safe places, but no need to take a chance in a place that doesn’t really have many street lights. Speaking of crime though – had my laptop stolen the day before my birthday. It was a pretty big bummer. I had all of my pictures and videos on it. But, hey, at least it can’t get stolen again, right? I had it covered by insurance – still waiting to hear back from them, but I’m hoping for the best. But I digress. So, nights are typically spent reading, writing, or watching my recent addictions – The Wire or The West Wing. I’ve had a fair amount of literature about the economic environment in Namibia that I’ve been familiarizing myself with, but I’ll save those findings for another post so as not to bore you away, assuming you’re still with me.

Walking about my street, I do feel warmly received. Initially, I get quizzical looks, often accompanied by giggles. People seem to think I’m either a lost tourist or one on a township tour. But everyone is hospitable and welcoming when I introduce myself. There’s a collection of people here who insist that I’m an actor on a popular Telemundo show that airs here. Yes, Telemundo made its way out here – dubbed in English. They’re called ‘Soapies’ and they’re amazingly entertaining for all the wrong reasons.

This town is fascinating. Swakopmund is really quite unique. A town that is so close to the dunes that a strong enough wind can cover the cobbled streets with a fresh sandy coating and close enough to the ocean that sea salt scents and a surprisingly chilly breeze hit you right as you square yourself up with the shore,  Swakopmund is a geographical juxtaposition.  Immediately, when you pull into the city limits, after about an hour and a half ride along the B2 from Usakos, you notice change. The air is a bit lighter, the architecture different, vegetation – whether indigenous or transplanted – unlike what I’ve seen in Namibia yet, and depending on the time of day the overcast is a massive change. It’s a bit to adjust to, but the line from the national anthem rings true – “Contrasting, beautiful Namibia”.

End of PST & Swearing-In

As of Thursday I will officially swear-in as a Peace Corps Volunteer. We’ll return to Kukuri Center where we first started our two-month training for a three-hour swearing in ceremony that will feature speeches in target languages, cultural dances, and speeches from our Country Director and the US Ambassador. We’ve spent the past two months in bubble – now they’re popping it. As we take our oath, swearing allegiance to both the United States and the people of Namibia, we solidify our commitment as Volunteers. For me, in some ways, this is a dream realized. The privilege of serving my country in this way has become increasingly clear to me over the past two months. I am proud to be representing America and proud that America has chosen me as one of it’s representatives.

Photos from Swearing-In

From left to right: Dan, Me, Oskar, Zach, Bryan

From left to right: Kaitlin, Me, Oskar, Janet, Zach, Bryan

From left to right: No shot

Saying goodbye to Okahandja will have its difficulties, though. The PC trainers here have become some really close friends. They are extremely hard working people who have sacrificed a lot of their lives to come teach a group of Americans about their country. Imagine taking a 3-month position with the objective of teaching a swarm of foreigners the details of American culture without making sweeping generalizations and avoiding using the phrase it depends. Sound like a challenge? Add in the difficulty of being away from your family and friends because you are living in a homestay that is likely many hours away from your hometown. Without the hard work and genuine passion of these trainers, we’d be shipwrecked volunteers floating on a raft of assumptions in a storm of cultural confusion. Sharing and exchanging has made for some unique friendships with the training staff. I hope to stay in touch with many of them. But, as many of them continuously remind me, I’ll likely see many of them as they visit me in Swakopmund.

Parting from my host-family will be tough too. I’ve been lucky to have the textbook experience. I can honestly say that I am leaving them with no complaints and gratitude that seems impossible to repay. In the past few weeks we’ve all let our guards down a bit. I’m able to act like a fool, discuss my frustrations, make jokes, or just relax. And I see them doing this more too. We have become less “host-family” or “trainee”, and more human. I can see their personalities shine through. And it’s refreshing. This last week especially, my brother Johnson has had me in tears. He just clowns around with Ouma and the two of them go at it. They can be themselves. They can be family. The other night, Ouma was giving Johnson a hard time because he was monopolizing the TV remote, as he tends to do, to watch WWE. After yelling at him for a bit saying that the news takes priority, she was silent. Fifteen minutes into the fight, one of the fighters was dramatically knocked to the ground. Rolling my eyes, (but not removing them from the screen) I hear Ouma yell, “STAAN OP! STAAN OP!”. She had picked a favorite. And he was leaving. And I was dying of laughter. What a sight. She noticed me laughing, looked at me, and began to laugh too. I was in stiches, man. Early on, I felt there could have been a filter. But the more they call me family and the more they act like it, the harder it is to deny. This is my new family. I feel it. I really do.

But I don’t think that ends with my departure. I know they’ll visit me and that I’ll be back to see them. I’ll take with me from Okahandja a new family, a belly full of PB&J, a killer t-shirt tan, and a head full of theoretical development, technical, and language lessons. Off to Swakop, where I’ll start work for the Chamber of Commerce and Industry. My job will consist of working with the Chamber and my counterpart to connect business resources in the community. Through trainings, consultations, and creativity, I’ll look to assess the business climate and the needs of my community. If it sounds theoretical, that’s because at this point it has to be. If I knew exactly what I had to do in my community before I got there, I’d be doing it wrong. But what I do know is that for me to be effective in my community, I need to first understand it.

The next step of service is what Peace Corps calls Phase 2. This will last until my group has our re-connect in 2 months. At the beginning of December we will meet up to review our first months at site. So until then, I’ll be tasked with a technical book report – read, analyze, and summarize my community by communicating with every relevant subset of people. I’ll also look to continue practicing my Afrikaans. It’s a language I’ve really grown to love. It’s creative and exciting.

Some might suggest that true service begins Thursday. As I hop on my transport to my new community and say goodbye to the Peace Corps as I know it, I’ll start my new life. I’ll say goodbye to my new friends and hello to my new friends. Thursday will be the end and the start. It will also be the start and the end. A clear divide exists. Manufactured or not, there is an official oath taken, and a new title assigned. I welcome this transition, as it does not much feel like one. Just another step. Isn’t that how steps work though? When your hands are full and your sight is blocked and a staircase approaches, you only need to find the first. Then your body knows. It trusts that gravity, physics, and geometry are all working in your favor. And unless the stairs are unevenly built, you find your way down those stairs without a hiccup. Lets hope my stair builder was a gifted one. I trust the next step is there, but have no idea where its bringing me.