A few snipits:

July 8
A few weeks ago I spent about two weeks in the states for a whirlwind tour of love, friendship, community, and processing the past 8 months. Not all of my family and friends were present but the ones who were showered me with love and support for the coming 18 months I have left to serve. I spoke at The Journey with Ron about a project we are collaborating on and that was an incredible experience. Jamie had done a wonderful job of organizing our time (not to mention all of the support and care she was sending my way before that) and her kids Erika and Drew greeted me with a new pair of slippers (!!!!) and money they had saved for our project- together they raised N$187 Namibian Dollars which will allow one of my friends at the Hostel School to sleep peacefully at night on their new mattress when it arrives! I cried when I read their note, and saw the pictures of them I’d be able to take back to my home:) I will expand more on this project in coming blogs but basically I am collaborating with my Nkurenkuru Community, The Journey (a church community on the Southside of Indianapolis), NamibFoam, a mattress company in Namibia, Ron Branson and the women at Indianapolis Women’s Prison, and any other independent or group donors, to coordinate a project to purchase mosquito nets, mattresses and do building renovations on the hostel schools for Nkurenkuru Combined School. Learners spend 9 months out of the year living in the below conditions. We are in a hot zone for Malaria and many of the beds do not have nets- to add to it there is standing water in the showers and bathrooms that makes for prime breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Mattresses are either absent or terribly thin and kitchen facilities are inhumane. I will be writing a proposal with our church and hostel school committee to set up a donation link through the Peace Corps Partnership Program and will post it in a few weeks in order to open up the donating process to anyone who is motivated to help. When I post that link I will add more about the project.

July 9 (from an email/letter, sorry for the repeat for some!)
So, I had quite the flight back here- three days total to get to Namibia followed by a hitchhike from the capital to Gobabis where I stayed with a friend until Sunday. My driver was terribly racist but I was able to listen compassionately and plant seeds of acceptance. I’m almost certain those seed will never be watered but he was very clear that we didn’t agree on anything and at one point he said “you know, you are right- I am wrong.” That wasn’t my aim but I think my silence during his rants was loud enough and he talked himself into a realization of his own ignorance! Usually I would get out of the car and wait for another ride but there was something about our discussion that enabled me to open his eyes a little bit. Asking him to pull over and let me out would have sent him on his way stuck in this absurd mindset.

I celebrated the fourth of July with some American and Namibian friends. We had a braai (barbeque) and bought all the American foods we could at the store: oreos and nesquik!! :) We made a fire because it’s freezing here these days and sat around singing American tunes and Christmas songs!!! Hahaha it was great, a night I’ll never forget:)

So- when I first touched down in Johannasburg, South Africa I cried a little bit…not tears of joy either. Tears of sadness and a deep breath of “ah….ok, you can do this.” The transition back was a little rocky coming from so much love and affection, community, family etc but being with my friend Amanda for a few days helped ease me back in. Sunday I left early morning with the folks from BEN Bikes and we drove twelve hours all the way to Nkurenkuru! Michael, the director, is a really great guy and we had some good conversations all the way up. Vasisee is a project director and she is also wonderful- the two of them stayed on mattresses on my floor for the past two night because the B&B in our village closed down… I’m sure you are surprised that we even have one, but remember, we are an up and coming town!!! But of course it closed due to slow business- someone was a little to adventurous with their business planning:) So it was nice to have them around, it can get pretty lonely at times. Sunday we ate quickly then crashed after such a long road trip and Monday it was back to work for a full 8 hour day!

It was really wonderful being welcomed back home:) At 8:30am Augustinus showed up at my door just making sure I arrived back safely. At 9 we headed to the clinic for a meeting with BEN bikes and our management committee to go over a Memorandum of Understanding and iron out some details of the bike container arriving. I first greeted my supervisor, Ndadi, and introduced him to our guests. He was so hilarious joking around with them then gave this long speech about how I am welcome and he was glad I returned and that I am the community’s sister, daughter, AND mother He said I came as a guest but now this is my place and he hoped Michael and Vasisee were just like me with happy spirits and open to Nkurenkuru. I almost started crying again!! It was really amazing to hear that from him and I’m sure the universe knew I needed something to ground me since it was so hard leaving my community again. Ndadi also said that I was glowing and he could tell I was just at home because my smile was showing all over my face! After our first meeting at nine I made the rounds in the community greeting/checking in with everyone- banker, post women, my barber, the old nane’s walking around town and the folks at the open market. Every time I came upon someone new they just laughed and thanked me for coming back! We ate the traditional food at the market (it’s so much better here than what I made!) and headed back to the clinic for another meeting at two. This was our usual Monday meeting and the first half was quite productive because we were discussing the bike project. We now have a name for our project “Uukumwe Nkurenkuru Bike Shop” uukumwe loosely means “Let’s Work Together.” And they decided the colors of the shop will be green, cream and violet. Funny combination but it’s going to be the hit of the new town! The next topic of our meeting was the garden. First, I must tell you I checked it out in the morning and it looks AMAZING!!!! Everything is coming up so well- carrots, beet root, two types of cabbage and onions- it just looks wonderful and I almost cried (again) because this was really the first test at sustainability of the project. Now, at the meeting I got a different story- there was some angry discussion about who is watering, who is not, how we are going to distribute, who didn’t log their times for watering in the “log your time for watering” book etc etc etc. It was quite hectic so I did have a moment of “oh good lord, here we go” but this is nothing new. Working together is a foreign concept in practice, not in theory! And people have a hard time looking forward and planning for the future. So, normally I would be freaking out about how distribution is going to go and wondering if the project is on its way to failure BUT I am sure that when it is actually time to harvest it will run smoothly. Planning for that day is a nightmare because of the concept of immediate gratification. There is nothing tangible about “60% of the food will go to the people 40% will be sold for money for the project” blahblahblah- makes perfect sense to me but that one line requires a four hour discussion of going in circles about who knows what SO- even though I was COMPLETELY drained at 5 when the meeting ended I wasn’t feeling down and out like I was before I came home. The meetings were getting to draining but I was feeling a certain calm. Just knowing that somehow, some way, things will be ok. And if they are not, they’ll be ok eventually:)


July 15
It’s days like these that I’ll never forget. After morning dishes and some tea, Sam from the Buddy program called me to join him and Naimi in the garden. We made some new beds and transplanted the remaining onions. Several trips to and from the storage room along with funny conversations when passing folks each time took up a good chunk of my time. Selma, an employee of the hospital, wants to clear more space near our garden so that she can plant her large crop of sweet potatoes that she doesn’t have room for at her house. She is a rather large woman and she said “nana sarah, look at my leg…..the sweet potatoes are THIS BIG!!” :) Sam is the leader of the garden, I just do what he says because I don’t know much about planting, transplanting etc etc. I could tell he was getting a kick out of teaching me everything he knew. He would just add things here and there in between whistling and humming to the plants. Afterwards he and Naimi came back to my place for some peanuts, water and to take a shower. I showed them some videos from my cousins wedding a few years back and they were blown away. Naimi, very affectionately I’m sure, said “ah, oh, sarah, look at you, you were so fat and naughty back then in those days!” All one can do is laugh especially because I don’t know what she was talking about! They asked me when my wedding was going to be and that it needed to be soon…. Ha, one of the good days my friends, one of the good days ;)