A Space Odyssey and Traversing the Namib Desert

And How Exactly Do You Pronounce Sossusvlei? (Article by Woody)

Leopard at AfriCat Foundation
Okonjima Nature Reserve

Well, we had a chance to find out over the school break from late June to early July when we finally visited Namibia! In addition to funny German and Dutch town names like Sossusvlei and Swakopmund, Namibia is extremely scenic, with a number of national parks and private reserves focused on wildlife conservation. So on this trip, starting from the capitol Windhoek, we went on a camping trip and traveled with a tour group from Wild Dog Safaris going north and making our first stop at AfriCat Foundation's Cheetah and Leopard rehabilitation centre where we saw an old rescued leopard at feeding time (with a mongoose and red-breasted shrike trying to steal their share of dinner) and a trio of sibling cheetahs lounging in the late afternoon shade. 

Younger male head-butting an older male giraffe

The next day we continued to the east entrance to Etosha National Park, where we spent 2 nights and got to see a wide variety of wildlife, including black rhinos, a few lions, including a pair mating, giraffes fighting (complete with martial-arts ninja style dodges and fake-outs), and lots and lots of grazers like black impala, springbok, kudu, steinbok, and gray duiker. Along the way to the central gate of Etosha, we stopped at the giant salt pan that occupies at least one fourth of the park. Since this was the dry season, the salt pan was really a salt flat that stretched as far as we could see out to the horizon. It's a little surreal standing on what looks like it could be the edge of the world. But during the rainy season when the pan floods, it's filled with wildlife, mainly huge flocks of birds, that migrate in just for the season. Along the way, both the camp spots we stayed at had water-holes that were illuminated at night. While we didn't get any good sightings of big cats around the water-hole, we did see a number of elephants, tiny black rhino, and extremely skittish giraffes coming down for a late night drink.

Himba community outside the
far north Kaokoland region of Namibia

Following Etosha National Park, we took a short visit to a Himba village, where we met a small community still living the very traditional lifestyle of cattle herding and leather-and-bead craft work. 

Himba boys (photo by Anne Stacey)

From there we headed west again to AfriCat Foundation's Lion rehabilitation centre. There we camped for the night, and the following morning got to accompany the centre's guide to see feeding two of the centre's rescued male lions. We continued on our way west toward the coast, and in Damaraland stopped briefly to see the Petrified Forest then on to Twyfelfontein to see the rock engravings that were left by the San people more than 2,000 years ago. Looking at the carvings of all the different animals they tracked and hunted, it seems they ranged quite far, probably spanning the area from Etosha or even Caprivi in the east all the way out to the western coast.

Cape Cross seal colony

The next day we finally made it to the coast and stopped mid-day to see the fur seal colony at Cape Cross. A short way south along the coast and we reached our destination for the next two days, the big coastal cities of Swakopmund and Walvisbay. There we got to take a break from camping for a couple of nights and were able to check out the more touristy side of the town. 

Seagull on lamp post at Walvis Bay

Our tour group split up there with the few of us remaining who were heading south through the rough gravel plains and hills to the giant sand dunes in Sesriem and Sossusvlei. While it is quite a long drive from Swakopmund to Sesriem, the scenery is desolate and amazing, with rolling hills of stone sticking up at all odd angles and run through with a few seasonal river beds that only see water in the rainy season. It's such a difficult terrain that it's a wonder they even tried to run a dirt road through there. The only thing that manages to grow there is a little scrub and some very scraggly acacia trees, just enough to feed the few animals that are adapted to that environment and that can travel that terrain.

It was cold on the morning sunrise
tour of Dune 45 (photo by Tee La Rosa)

We made it to Sesriem, but too late in the day to see anything but a sunset. Early the following morning, despite the cold and heavy fog, we headed to Dune 45, named so because it's exactly 45km from Sesriem, and climbed it to get a look around. Unfortunately because of the fog we couldn't really see the sunrise, but it's still impressive standing on the ridge of a 170m high dune, with nothing but wind-blown red sand dropping off to both sides. After a little breakfast to warm us up, we continued down the road to Sossusvlei to see the dunes and flood plain where the river ends. By then the sun was out and had burned off most of the fog, so we could really see the extent of the dunes. In Sossusvlei, once we hiked a couple of km into the park, we even got to see the Big Daddy dune at over 350m high. While it was tempting to climb it, I think we were beat from having climbed Dune 45 earlier that morning and the walk into the park. So we settled on a shorter climb just to get a good look at the flood plain and the few dead but still standing acacia trees that remain in the old part of the flood plain, and which have been dead since the river changed direction some 700 years ago. We also got to check out a ravine carved by the river just outside Sesriem on its way to Sossusvlei. Because it's a seasonal river, we were able to walk along the dry river bed at the bottom of the ravine, but we could easily see the marks left by the river indicating the water level when it filled during the rainy season.

Sand dunes at Sossusvlei
in the Namib Desert

After these 10 days of mostly camping, we finally wound our way back to Windhoek where we got to rest for a couple days before flying back to South Africa. Like Botswana and Zambia, Namibia is in many ways similar to South Africa, influenced by a shared history, cultures, and environment. Yet despite the similarities, like Botswana and Zambia it has many unique things that cannot be found in the other three countries. Sooo... should you ever find yourself visiting the southern Africa region and can spare a few weeks to travel around, don't assume that visiting just one place gives you much of a picture of this part of Africa. Make it a point to see all three!

Click here to check out our Picasaphoto album to see pictures of our trip to Namibia: 

A Growing Business... (Article by Robin)

As an education volunteer, when we first came to South Africa, I had no idea that by the end of my 2 years of service that I would help to create a small business project. Since September of last year, Woody and I have been working with our community to create a training center to help community members produce handmade sewn clothing, accessories, and toys.

Traditional African fabric

Soon after buying my own personal sewing machine to keep myself occupied at site, I had a community member (and now student of mine) who approached me and asked if I could teach him to sew. He told me that he was interested in starting a small tailoring business and wanted to learn how to sew. So, I decided to start a sewing and crafts class one day a week for adults that met after school at one of our primary schools. When the class started, we had initially only 3 students all sharing 2 sewing machines (mine and one of the students had her own). Soon the word got out to the community about the class and we more than doubled our number of students to 7. At that point, we still had only 2 sewing machines to use plus the school owned a large industrial machine. So our students had to take turns cutting material and then rotating turns on the sewing machines. Realizing that we needed more machines, in March of this year, I wrote up project proposal to a local community development organization named Ulusaba Pride'n Purpose suggesting that we create items to be sold in their curio shop in order to raise funds for the project and purchase additional sewing machines and accessories for the class.

Student showing off her finished apron

Pride 'n Purpose quickly responded not only with granting us the opportunity to sell our items with them in their curio shop but also generously donating R4,000 as an enterprise development investment in our business. With that money, were were able to buy two more new sewing machines and an abundance of additional equipment such as sewing shears, an iron, seam rippers, bobbins, etc.

Getting ready to sew

From our humble beginnings as a weekly adult sewing class, the Ku Rhunga Klub Project quickly expanded into a small income-generating project. And recently we just sold our first batch of just over 50 items to Ulusaba which they plan to sell in their curio shop. We heard that 5 out of the 6 stuffed rhinos that we made were already sold in the first week.

Reversible purse-ables made by the KRK

Currently the Ku Rhunga Klub Project creates items such as girl's baby dresses, boy's jumpers, aprons, shoulder bags, and stuffed toy rhinos and giraffes. To make each item, the club members begin by cutting out patterns from traditional African fabric. Coincidentally, our clothing items are all reversible, so the club members have to choose two contrasting fabrics that look good together. Once the pattern pieces are all cut out, the pieces are assembled and machine stitched together. Finally, the buttons are hand-sewn on to the clothes and the feet bottoms and eyes for the rhinos and the giraffe toys are also hand stitched. The idea for making the stuffed rhino and giraffe toys came out of the need to utilize small scrap pieces of material as we were quickly running out of fabric. Each item takes between two and five hours to produce.

Stuffed "Richard" the Rhinos made by KRK

This month, Woody and I have also recently developed a new logo for the group, came up with a catalogue of items, worked with the KRK Project's committee to draft a business Constitution, and assisted with opening up a small business bank account for the group. All funds raised by project are split between supplementing the personal income of the participants and providing additional or improved equipment and supplies for the group. For each item sold, half of the profit will go toward the club member who created the item as labor compensation and half of the profit will be given back to the Ku Rhunga Klub Project to save for needed equipment and materials.

Painting the Stars (Article by Robin)

Art Club boys helping paint the library mural

Now that the new library building is complete at our high school, Woody and I are anxiously and hurriedly trying to get it all set up and usable for the teachers and students. The new Literacy Centre will be used for reference, research, enhancing English literacy lessons, and developing student and teacher computer skills. The Centre will also be used by the learners and community members for career guidance and materials and applications for university and other post-secondary education programs will also be made available through the Literacy Centre.

Robin paints the planet Peace Corps

One thing that Woody and I have been doing to prepare the library for opening is to paint a mural. Since the construction of the library began last January, we've been thinking about doing a mural. Traditionally a lot of Peace Corps volunteers across the globe have painted World Map murals since 1988 that can be utilized in conjunction with Geography classes. It is a great idea and initially we thought of doing a world map project too. However, since the previous PCVs had already painted a world map at one of our primary schools, Woody and I decided that we would do something different and go for the entire solar system! I had the idea for the design, but since I'm not the greatest at drawing and computer design, I asked our friend and RPCV Adam Willard to design the mural for us. Adam took my concept and made an awesome design for the mural.

The painting crew (boys from grades 8 and 9)

The next step was actually painting it. Ulusaba donated the paints and brushes and Woody and I set to painting it. We asked a few kids who were formerly in the Art Club at one of our primary schools, who now attend grades 8 and 9 at the high school to help us with the painting. The concept for the mural is a child on Earth sitting under a tree reading a book and out from the book flies the solar system – it's suppose to symbolize the idea that you can open your mind to the whole universe just by reading a book. The mural includes the 9 planets in the solar system plus one extra Peace Corps planet. Just for laughs, we even painted in the Starship Enterprise flying around our little planet Peace Corps.  The process for painting the mural has been lots of fun and additionally it has been a great tool for teaching the kids about space and the solar system.

We also received a ton of new furniture for the library. Recently, Ulusaba received generous donations from Builders Warehouse and also through donors to their Kickstart fundraiser this year. Every year they hold an enduro off-road motorbike riding event for fundraising and this year they chose to do fundraising for our Literacy Centre. The riders all donated R400 per rider and this year there were over 30 riders in the event giving us more than R12,000 that was used to purchase furniture, bookshelves, chairs, and more to outfit the library.

Kids In Space!!! (Article by Woody)

“Space - the final frontier.” ~Star Trek; The Wrath of Khan

With the start of Term 3, most of the kids attending the computer classes were getting bored with practicing typing and writing. So it was time to mix things up a little bit. In addition to allocating a little time from each lesson to typing instruction, we've introduced them to the TuxMath program to give them a little practice in basic arithmetic. Trying to explain the controls for the video-game format of the lesson took a little time. “No, don't just hit random keys to fire like crazy! No, no, no, don't just copy the sum! Work out the sum, then type the answer.” Eish! But they finally got the hang of it...

Math lessons in the computer lab with Tux Math

So we're working slowly through it, starting with very simple single-digit addition, then working up to 2 digit addition and on to subtraction, multiplication, and eventually (some day) division and simplifying fractions. At first, it was a little disheartening to the class teachers and to the principal when he visited the class, because quite a few kids, even those in the higher grades, were still doing relatively simple single-digit addition on their fingers. But it's promising and they're showing improvement. The game format is engrossing enough - Missile-Command-defend-the-planet with cool deep-space backgrounds - that they're not getting bored easily. The variation in pace and complexity keeps it from becoming monotonous, and kids being kids, they often celebrate with a little jig when they reach the end screen of each section that says “You've Won!”

Books for Africa Project (Article by Robin & Woody)

The construction on the new library at our high school is finally finished!  Now we are quickly trying to get everything ready for the teachers and students to use it.  And of course we are eagerly awaiting our shipment of books from Books for Africa.  We want to thank those of you who have donated to our Books for Africa project:

        Helen Al-haddad
        Rhoda & Ben Hill
        Cely & Joe Alhaddad
        Marla & Mohammad Al-Sulaihim
        Tim Branaman
        Kearstin Brewer
        Jennifer Hill & Aaron Martin
        Gillian Grant
        Natalie Eckberg
        Holly Gardner
        Susan Seal
        Tiffany Lewis & Parish Episcopal School
       
 

Thank you so much for your contribution and for helping to make our kids futures just a little bit brighter!  You all are our heroes!!!

Adventures with Words and Chasing Chocolate

Let's Get Creative (Article by Robin)

In March, I facilitated a lesson with Grade 10 and Grade 11 students at our high school regarding a creative story writing assignment. At the beginning of the lesson, I talked about how to introduce characters and the setting. I discussed the three main points of view (1st, 2nd, and 3rd person) and the 5 parts of a story. I gave them a brief overview of how to write a story. Then I handed out a worksheet to help the students write an outline or skeleton of their story. I also gave them each a picture from a magazine and asked them to use that as a starting point. The people in the pictures became their characters which they had to name and the background in the photo became their initial setting. I know that many people have trouble just coming up with a story on their own. So the idea was to use the magazine pictures as a starting point. We started with story outlines, then I had them write a rough draft, then lastly the final drafts of their creative stories. The goal of this project was to try and develop the learners imaginative abilities, help them learn and apply knowledge of the writing process, and especially help them practice their English writing skills. 

In the end, I got some great stories including a story about Captain Masiya who is a captain of a ship who sails to a place where birds will sing for you. But his two crewmen named Vincent and Reckson were fighting to the death until Vincent killed Reckson and the ship sank. Vincent then had to tell the tale of the ship's woes from prison.

We also had a story titled “The Unusual Wedding” about a beautiful wedding that took place on a ship in the middle of the ocean. It was the wedding of Elizabeth and John. Everything ran smoothly during the wedding until suddenly a storm came and shook the boat and John fell overboard. Elizabeth then jumped into the water and swam to save her love John. She carried him on her shoulders back to shore and the couple lived happily ever after.

Another story was about a teenage girl who saves an entire village of people who are suffering from heart disease by getting the whole town to exercise. She called a town meeting and encouraged people to exercise thereby saving people's lives.

We also had some sad stories including one about a teenage village girl who is tricked by her school friends into going to the mall in the big city and who then force her into having a “date” with an older man who locks her in his car and rapes her. But then the girl goes home and tells her mother what happened and they go to the police who finds the man and puts him in jail for 50 years.

Speaking of stories, here is another short story written last year by a grade 7 student who was attending Woody's computer classes. A few of the Art Club boys came to the computer lab after school and Woody taught them how to use the Paint program. In addition to drawing pictures on the computer, he asked them to write a short story to go along with the picture. The story is titled: 

3 Rooms by Isaac

 MY MOTHER'S HOUSE

This room is divided in to 3 ROOMS.

The first room is for me and my brother.

The next room is for my two sisters.

The last room is for my father and my mother.

There is no shower but there is a bath room.

Where we bath in when it is cold.

There is swimming pool where we swim here when it is hot.

MY father keep our family BEAUTIFUL by planting trees (and) green grass.

There are many trees that give us shadow.

When it is a time of fruits we eat more fruits like

Paw paws (papaya), mangoes, bananas and apples.

Story and picture by ISAAC (grade 7)

Show Me and I May Remember (Article by Robin)

“Read the directions and directly you will be directed in the right direction.” ~ Doorknob (Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland)

One observation that we have made while teaching here in South Africa is that regardless of their literacy level and educational background, many people are often more visual learners. People tend to need to be shown rather than told how to do things. For example, when we share an American food item with our host mom she often wants to know how it was made. Once we baked her banana bread and she loved it. So, she asked me how to make it and I wrote out the recipe, read over it with her, and gave her the baking instructions. But she still insisted that I come into her house that day and give her a cooking demonstration on how to make it – never mind that it was actually Woody and not me who made the bread. Also, while teaching sewing classes, I've noticed that my students prefer that I demonstrate something rather then give them the pattern instructions. Once I was helping one of the students use the school's industrial sewing machine. Since it is an industrial machine, I wasn't familiar with how it needed to be threaded. So, while my student immediately tried to thread the machine incorrectly, realizing that it wasn't right, I took out the manual to see how it should be done while my student stared in amazement that I would actually read the manual for instructions. Also, although Woody has repeatedly tried to show people how to use the 'Help' menu in Word or Excel, they still often have trouble understanding how to do things just by reading the instructions. So, he is left having to give a demonstration of how to do something even though the person he is helping just finished reading the step-by-step instructions in the Help menu. This also might explain why the 'Self Help' section of the school libraries are generally left untouched.

Having knowledge or knowing how to do something is highly prized here in South Africa. In America and the 'West' in general, it's common for people to freely give other people information. But that's not always the case in Africa. People tend to guard their knowledge in the same way that Americans might guard their personal items. Knowledge is an expensive commodity here. So, taking the time to show someone how to do something is highly revered. It shows that you care enough about someone to share with them.

Nonetheless, visual learning is definitely not a bad thing. It just means that we have to be more conscious of it when we are teaching people here in South Africa. I know that I myself have certainly gotten frustrated many times with sewing instructions that don't have good pictures to better explain what to do and how to do it. And I also have a funny story about Woody and a new washing machine when once he didn't read the directions.

The Birthday Race (Article by Robin)

What's the best way to prove to yourself on your birthday that you are not getting old? Why complete a marathon, of course... This year, the Longtom marathon happened to land on my birthday. Again like last year, Woody ran the 56K ultra marathon and this time I walked the half marathon. So, I spent my birthday walking my ass off until my hips were sore, my legs were sore, and my feet had blisters. Um, what the hell was I thinking doing this anyway??

Cold and foggy morning of the race

We started the 21K at 7 AM in Mauchsberg at 2,150 m above sea level at the top of a section of the Drakensberg mountains. It was quite chilly that morning when we started the race due to the thick layer of fog in the air. Typical me, not being dressed properly – I was freezing since I was dressed for the heat in a short sleeved shirt. Luckily I had brought along my trusty MP3 player which I didn't use to listen to music – but instead to keep my inner ears warm as I tend to get ear aches in cold windy weather. At the start of the race, my race companions and I started out running mostly just to keep warm. After we got our blood flowing again, we slowed down to a brisk walking pace.

Me and one of my walking partners

A few kilometers in, we got to the first well equipped waterpoint where people handed us water, soda, candy, bananas, and other high calorie energy goodies. Which helped to keep my spirits up but didn't do me much good for trying to burn calories off. Instead of burning calories, I was consuming them. But damn, they were good! I guess there should be some type of payoff for putting yourself through this kind of grueling exercise. Anytime I was starting to get tired, at least I knew that there was another waterstation coming up soon which meant that I would get candy!

Woody coming in toward the finish line

As the fog started to clear off, a beautiful view began to emerge. We could finally look around us and saw a picturesque view of the valley below and the surrounding mountains. As we descended down the mountain, we eventually reached the town of Lydenburg. As we got to the town, cars were literally running us off the road. By the time my walking companions and I got about 13 or 14K into the race, there were several of the faster 56K ultra people who were starting to pass us. However, one cool part was when we got to see the first female 56K runner coming in to the finish line. Additionally, the one female PCV in our group who ran the ultra marathon was the second female to finish the ultra race and the first PCV ultra runner to cross the finish line. It was great to see all these iron women. It definitely made me wish that I had gotten my grandfather's marathon running gene. Aaargh, why didn't I get that gene??

Woody and Robin at the finish line

After crossing the finish line and getting that well deserved medal, ;o) I tended to my sore legs, kicked off my shoes, and waited for Woody to come in. Woody arrived at the 7h 42m mark. I was so relieved to finally see him come in. Knowing how much pain I was in, I couldn't even imagine what he must be going through having run an ultra marathon. But after we finally got on the bus and back to the backpackers where all the PCVs were staying and took a quick shower, there was a full buffet of food awaiting us. Then I got to celebrate my birthday with cake and ice cream and surrounded by lots of friends and other PCVs. So, what more could you ask for on your birthday? Well, okay, I guess you could ask for a trip to Cape Town. Because that's what we did next. We spent the next 5 days over the Easter school holiday on an all too brief trip to Cape Town. Click here to check out our Picasa photo album to see pictures of our trip to Cape Town. We went to Table Mountain, the Cape Peninsula, Boulders beach and more. There are lots of cute pictures of penguins and dassies...

African Jackass Penguin

A rock Hyrax ("dassie") at Table Mountain

Woody and Robin at Cape Point

Books for Africa (Article by Robin and Woody)

“We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It's easy to say "It's not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem." Then there are those who see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes." ~Fred Rogers  
 

The progress on the new library at the high school is coming along well.  The masonry work is finished and the roof is going up.  Next we just need the electrical work and a few coats of paint.  And of course books!  We want to thank all of you who have donated to our Books for Africa project:

        Helen Al-haddad
        Rhoda & Ben Hill
        Cely & Joe Alhaddad
        Marla & Mohammad Al-Sulaihim
        Tim Branaman
        Kearstin Brewer
        Jennifer Hill & Aaron Martin
        Gillian Grant
        Natalie Eckberg

The response we have received so far has been hugely positive, but a large gap remains between the money we have raised and our funding target.  So far, our group of 10 PCVs have received donations totaling $8,475, about 53% of our total goal of USD $16,000.  Clearly, we still have a lot of ground to cover and we won’t be able to do it without your support.

Please keep in mind that the library building itself will be complete and ready to start housing books and welcoming students in less than 5 weeks.  Additionally, our service will reach an end in September / October this year.   While we hope that our schools will receive another set of volunteers after our service ends, we would like to know that there will be books coming to stock the library, even if they do not get here until after we have left.  So time is of the essence.  If you plan to support this project, do it now!  The sooner we reach that fundraising goal, the sooner the container of books will be on a boat and on it's way across the ocean.  When you break down the cost, the books are valued at around $1 each so even a $10 donation helps support 10 books!  It takes a village to raise donations for a library!  So, be rest assured that any amount you send will be making a huge difference in the lives of our high school kids. 


Please help us and take five minutes to follow the link to our project titled “We Succeed – Siphumelela”:  https://www.booksforafrica.org/donate/to-project.html?projectId=98

1. Scroll down to the green “Donate Now” icon above the project description.
2. Fill out all the necessary information.
3. Under the “Additional Information” field on the donation form, please be sure to write the name of the US Peace Corps volunteer who you are sponsoring.  For example please indicate:  “Robin Alhaddad” as the name of the person who told you about Books for Africa.
4. Click “Next” and you’re done!


Method 2: Check
To pay by check:

1. Make out a check payable to:  Books for Africa
2. Either add a post-it note or indicate on the memo section of the check that you are sponsoring “South Africa – We Succeed-SIPHUMELELA, Robin Alhaddad”
3. Mail the check to:

Books for Africa
253 East 4th St., Ste. 200
St. Paul, MN 55101 USA


Thank you so much for your contribution and for helping to make our kids futures just a little bit brighter! 

The Gift of Time and Giving Good Reads

Will it Be Done 'Now' or 'Now, Now'? (Article by Robin)

“There is more to life than simply increasing its speed.” ~Mahatma Gandhi

When Americans want things done we want them done right now and we don't waste a lot of time doing it. Some might even say that we Americans can be industrious and alacritous. But that's not how most things are done in Africa. Things move at their own pace here. Most things just get done whenever they get done. There are many examples of African time management all over the continent including everything from the way that houses are built to the responsiveness of customer service. In Africa, time is not seen as linear like the way it is in the Western world. I'm not saying that this is a bad thing, it's just different.

Houses in the process of being built are often built piecemeal and then left to sit for years unfinished. In America, fast-food restaurants are just that – 'fast food' but in Africa, that's not always the case. Also, just because you are told that something will be done by a certain date or certain time, it doesn't necessarily mean that it will be done by then. You would think that things might be different in the bigger cities, but in general they are not. It's so ingrained in the culture that people often have to differentiate between doing something 'now' meaning I'll do it in the next day or two and 'now, now' meaning I'll do it immediately.

Americans are also workaholics. We are used to working all the time. In my previous job working in the US at a non-profit organization, I worked typically around 60 hours per week, some weeks working 6 days a week, and received only about 2 weeks of paid annual holiday time off. Yeah, we also get some national holidays off too. But not necessarily. I once worked for an employer who never gave us New Years day off. Here in South Africa, some people can have up to 12 weeks of vacation per year, which is great for the employee morale but can often impact productivity taking two or three times longer to get things accomplished. We have often started a project only to find out that there is an industry strike, or an office will be closed, or an important component will be out of commission for two weeks – necessitating the rescheduling of the project. While this may drive us Americans crazy, most people don't seem to mind here. In some senses, African time is a good thing – people are more laid back and less stressed out or worried about when things will get done than most Americans are. For Woody and I, it just means that we have to learn to adjust our concept of time. We have to get ourselves out of our Western concept of time and learn to realize that although things won't get done as quickly as we hoped, they will get done eventually.

Here is a quote from Mother Teresa about time:

“In the West we have a tendency to be profit-oriented, where everything is measured according to the results and we get caught up in being more and more active to generate results. In the East – especially in India – I find that people are more content to just be, to just sit around under a banyan tree for half a day chatting to each other. We Westerners would probably call that wasting time. But there is value to it. Being with someone, listening without a clock and without anticipation of results, teaches us about love. The success of love is in the loving – it is not in the result of loving. ” ~Mother Teresa, A Simple Path

The Tooth-Fairy is at it Again... (Article by Robin)

Distributing about 60 toothbrushes to Grade R

Once again we received about 70 new children's toothbrushes from guests of Ulusaba. So, this time I decided to do the same dental hygiene demonstration that I did last November for the Grade R (kindergarten) kids at our second primary school. The two Grade R teachers helped me explain the need to brush twice a day and the techniques of how to brush top and bottom teeth and inside and outside. After giving a verbal demonstration of brushing, we distributed about 60 toothbrushes after labeling them with each child's name. Then with our toothbrushes in tow, we headed outside to the water tap where we had a chance to brush our teeth and sing 'Brush, Brush, Brush Your Teeth' to the tune of 'Row, Row, Row your Boat.'

Learner applying her back-handed excessive force technique

While observing the kids, I noticed that they all had several different types of toothbrushing techniques including the “back-handed holding technique,” the “applying excessive force technique,” the “grin and bare your teeth technique,” the “messy toothpaste everywhere technique,” and the “holding the toothbrush upside down technique,” and more! One girl was mimicking me while I was demonstrating how to brush only she didn't put the toothbrush inside her mouth. Others were eating the toothpaste and then coming back for more...

Getting ready to brush...

After the demonstration, one of teachers told me that she was happy that we did this lesson because she had recently told her students the week before that they needed to brush their teeth daily even if they didn't have a toothbrush – instead they should use the 'traditional brush.' Generally if people here don't have a toothbrush, they will use a branch from the guarri tree to brush their teeth. So, now that we have equipped all the Grade R kids with their very own toothbrushes, no more guarri branches are needed!  

Colouring a giant tooth

Demonstrating the
"messy toothpaste everywhere technique"

 

Last Call: Books for Africa Project

Outside the new library - just needs a roof!

The progress on our new library at the high school is going well. The building is almost complete! Just need a roof, lighting and fans, electrical work, and a few coats of paint. Therefore, we wanted to take a few minutes to send you a friendly reminder about the Books for Africa Project we are working on. We are trying to finish fundraising by the end of March — less than a couple of weeks away.

View from inside the library -
just needs electrical work and a coat of paint!

The response we have received so far has been hugely positive, but a large gap remains between the money we have raised and our funding target. So far, our group of 10 PCVs have received donations totaling $5,195, about 32% of our total goal of USD $16,000. We're not even close to 50% of the way to hitting our goal. Clearly, we still have a lot of ground to cover and we won’t be able to do it without your support.

If you have already sent in your contribution, then please accept our sincere thank you! To you we would like to say 'ha khensa' meaning “we thank you.” If, however, you’ve been meaning to send in your donation and got sidetracked along the way, now is the time to do it.

By developing a love of reading our kids will be taking the first steps towards radically altering their life prospects. And these books won’t just help the children here and now — they will be used for years to come. It takes a village to raise donations for a library! So, be rest assured that any amount you send will be making a huge difference in the lives of our high school kids.

 

Yay!... We're getting a new library!

Please help us and take five minutes to follow the link to our project titled “We Succeed – Siphumelela”:  https://www.booksforafrica.org/donate/to-project.html?projectId=98

1. Scroll down to the green “Donate Now” icon above the project description.
2. Fill out all the necessary information.
3. Under the “Additional Information” field on the donation form, please be sure to write the name of the US Peace Corps volunteer who you are sponsoring.  For example please indicate:  “Peace Corps Volunteer, Robin Alhaddad” as the name of the person who told you about Books for Africa.
4. Click “Next” and you’re done!

Method 2: Check
To pay by check:

1. Make out a check payable to:  Books for Africa
2. Either add a post-it note or indicate on the memo section of the check that you are sponsoring “South Africa – We Succeed-SIPHUMELELA, volunteer Robin Alhaddad”
3. Mail the check to:

Books for Africa
253 East 4th St., Ste. 200
St. Paul, MN 55101 USA

 

Thank you so much for your contribution!