Lost in a memory

Happy New Year! And what better way to start the new year than to write a blog...remember the flexibility of time here..in fact, I'm probably still early. I started writing this blog entry in January. Yeeeeeeaaaah. So we’ll start at the obvious place: New Years.

New Years was fun. I spent it in the village. A few days after, however, my Agogo Idah’s husband died. He was the old headman before my Zam-dad. I saw him just a few hours before he died. He was not well. The funeral that followed was quite the cultural experience. I’m still trying to process it. Sure, I had been to a few Zambian funerals before, but this one was right next door, so I got to experience the entire process. First, I helped my family clear the house in complete silence and watched as they tenderly carried the deceased man’s body from one room to another. The village gathered in the sitting room and just outside the house. I sat in a corner. Then, as if on cue the women began wailing and crying and screaming. This went on for hours…well into the night. I went to bed around midnight and got back up at 4. I sat outside the house and watched the sunrise. Then, some men went off to dig the grave and others began constructing the coffin. I never went back into the house. I helped care for my sisters and the small children. People just kept pouring into the village from all directions. There were hundreds as this old headman had been very good and was loved by many. Then, they took the coffin inside the house and you could hear the nails being driven in. Not one person spoke. Preachers stood up and began what I can only imagine was preaching, but it seemed like they were yelling at the people. I think one was drunk. Then, the coffin was brought outside and some women made a circle around it and sang and danced slowly around it. The chief showed up, which at first I thought was quite impressive. But as he gave his speech, he said some of the most disrespectful things I could imagine being said at a funeral…especially in front of the grieving family….with his hand resting on the coffin. After he left, we all proceeded to the gravesite. It was a very long and somber day.

Shortly after, I traveled to Lusaka for In-Service Training. It was so good to see everyone from my intake. They kept us quite busy with sessions and classes and gardening and a counterpart workshop. The most awesome thing that happened, however, was that my sister, Marcey, flew in! Well, that, and I won a lot of kwach at the casino thanks to Sajay, my enabler.

Marcey’s visit was ridiculous, insane, incredible, heart warming, heart wrenching, hot, humid, hilarious, etc. I usually wake up in the village between 6 and 6:30. With Marcey here, we slept in until 7:30 or 8! And let me tell you, my village is a ghost town at that hour. EVERYONE is either at school or at work in their fields….and who said Peace Corps isn’t the real world?

My Zam-fam (Zambian Family) got 2 kittens while I was away! One is a great mouser (with which they are quite pleased), the other has rickets and worms. So many, in fact, that Marcey and I named her “Gooey Sana.” It’s Spanish for “worm” although I’m fairly certain I’m not spelling it right. One night, Marcey went to bed kind of early so I went over to my family’s house to hang out. After about an hour, I went back to my hut to find Marcey, not sleeping, but standing in the middle of my room with a candle. She just looks at me and goes, “Gooey Sana is throwing up under your bed.” So I get on my hands and knees and shine my light under the bed. Sure enough there are several small piles and she is in the back corner hovering over one and scarfin’ it back down. There is a large pile real close to where I am so I shine my light on it and see that it’s moving! Naturally, I freak out. Then, on closer inspection we realize that it isn’t the puke itself that’s moving, but tons of white skinny worms waving and wiggling around! It is like a scene from a horror film. So, I ran to get Idah’s help. I have dealt with grossness here that I never imagined having to deal with and I did it gracefully. But this I just couldn’t handle. Ask Marcey.

Speaking of worms, I was sick the first half of Marcey’s visit and she was sick the last part. :) That did not stop us from gallivanting around the Zambian bush almost everyday (even though I’m pretty sure it was the constant traveling in the unfamiliar heat that got Marcey sick in the first place). We sang lots of Disney songs on our travels. We played netball with the teachers against the students at the school. We got to sit in on a few classes and they sang songs for us! It was really cute. After one week, we went into the BOMA and watched the super bowl rerun….no commercials…it was sorta boring…just wasn't very into it. BUT I did get to make queso from a huge block of velveeta that grandma and grandpa sent me! We made potato wedges and smothered them in cheesy goodness! Along with the beer it almost felt like a genuine American super bowl party…except there were no commercials.

The next day Marcey desperately wanted to get on the internet so she could download readings for the classes she was missing by being here. Pretty important, I will agree, but allow me to expound on the difficulties of interneting in Lundazi. There are 2 known places that like to call themselves internet cafes, but really they are just dark rooms with a few old machines that pass for computers. The first one we walked to is run by an NGO. They buy internet in bundles and when the bytes run out, well, so does your luck. So no luck there, except that they had, in fact, bought more bundles, but no one was sure where they were…really? You just lost your bundles? Just like that? Just misplaced the bytes? After living here for 7 months, I’m the least bit surprised. But several times during Marcey’s visit, including this one, I was reminded of the absurdity of MANY situations in this beautiful country. So we hike over to the other “café” that is run by a religious organization. Turns out they are able to receive the wireless internet that the radio station broadcasts. But they have no vouchers to sell. Yeah. The radio station is back on the other side of town beside the other internet café we just left. So back across town we go. It takes close to an hour to buy our wireless time because the guy selling it isn’t there at first and then he doesn’t have change. When Marcey gets back to the religious café, lo and behold, it still doesn’t work. So, on her way back to where we were staying she stops at the first café where they had miraculously found their lost internets! What should have taken an hour took four. This story should also exemplify for you some of the reasons why it has taken me 2 months to write another blog.

Marcey stayed with me another week. She took astounding photographs. On our last night, we ate Comida. I almost told my mama to cook a different chicken, one that my counterpart had given us. But we decided the new one needed a few months to beef up. I found out that they eat every single part of a chicken. All except this weird skin flap on the butt. They throw that to the dogs. Oh and the feathers. They don’t eat the feathers. But they munch on the toes, feet, head. I even tried a piece of chicken intestine and guess what it tasted like? Chicken, of course. Marcey and I taught them how to bread the chicken before frying it and man, oh man, Comida tasted better than KFC, or even Grandy’s.

Then we headed to Malawi: Marcey, Cherie, and I. It was quite a long trip over to the lake (11 hours and 9 hitches to be exact). We got stuck in a small town/area called Mvera. Yes, MmmmmmVera. For those of you who don’t know, Vera is the lovely name of my even more lovely mother. There is also a very small town in west Texas named Vera. I would drive through it on my way to and from home (in east Texas) during college. It was always a nice reminder of mommy while on the long road. So naturally, I was pleased to have landed in this nice town of Mvera, Malawi, thinking we would surely be graced with a great hitch to get us over to the lake by sunset. Well, Mvera turned out to be a vortex in the universe. We were stuck there waiting for soooo long! Looking back on the experience, even though that town broke us and turned us into delirious lunatics, it taught us patience…and also that I had accidently bought raw eggs instead of boiled eggs in the last town. However, the timing of that discovering was impeccable. Just as Cherie began to laugh at my misfortune (as she is wont to do from time to time), a little old man walked up behind me and said he was hungry. I turned around and said, “Well, I gots 2 eggs here you kin have. They’re raw so be sure n cook’em 'fore ya eat’em.” He looked so bewildered (and not on account of my waning English skills). Eggs are quite expensive and to just be given them by strangers (even though, technically, he asked) is unusual. But really, what was I going to do with them?
Finally, we made it to the lake. Oh, the lake was beautiful. Swimming did my mind, body, and soul wonders, just getting to completely immerse myself in water. It was magical. Magical in that special way that gives you worms. Ha! Yeah. Worms again. So Lake Malawi is known for its schisto. Schisto is a tiny worm that burrows into your skin and lodges itself in your gut somewhere (intestines, bladder, etc). I’m sure google or wiki could explain better than me (if you are going to look it up, know that I’m abbreviating it because I don’t know how to spell it out). Peace Corps won’t treat us for it until we leave at the end of our service. So until then, you can just call me Gooey Sana! You call them worms, I call them uninvited company (but company is company here, so I can’t complain too much).
It rained a lot in Malawi. I hope some of it made it up to my farmers because they have gotten so little this year. But every night there would be a huge downpour that lasted for hours and hours. And every night the roof over my feet would leak and each night the puddle would be larger than the night before. On the morning we left to drop Marcey off at the airport and head back to Zambia (my birthday, in fact), I mentioned the nightly puddles to the girls and explained to Marcey why I had been spooning with her a little more each night. Cherie looks at me and goes: why didn’t you just move the bed over? Cherie's logic = genius.

Not only was Marcey’s visit ridiculous, insane, incredible, heart warming, heart wrenching, hot, humid, hilarious, but it also came with the most inspiring and fulfilling moments. Thank you, my sister and best friend. Thank you for the sacrifice it took to come, monetarily, physically, and scholarly. Thank you for the love and understanding you gave me and my village. Thank you for being there when I cried. Thank you for always making me laugh when I cry. Thank you for the stimulating conversations and the intellectual debates. Thank you for the part of your life that you gave to experience, understand, and live a part of mine. Thank you for being the padoko to my tutuba! Thank you for being the mbasela to my nkuku! Yeah….that last one didn’t make any sense. But then again, neither does my lack of litter box, my inability to buy sunglasses (thanks grandma/pa, I bet you didn't know that I actually needed a pair), nor my irrepressible urge to yell “Booboo’s mama!” at the unsuspecting children.

Enjoy the cold my loves. And the olympics? And for pete’s sake, would someone in Texas drink a Dr. Pepper for me? And Bird, if you get a chance, go to the candy store at the mall and get me a big-o-bag of D.P. jelly beans. I hope they still have'em.

Booboo’s mama!