Shenanigans That Side: The first six weeks...

After almost a month and a half I am finally starting to get settled into the Zambian way of life. I'm learning to slow down, relax, smile more, and laugh with people. It really is a laid back lifestyle. I'm afraid that I'm going to get so accustomed to the slow pace that when I come back to the States I will be left in the dust. I guess tackle that challenge when I get to it.

Until recently I was staying with Margaret Chilando, the principal of Mpelembe. She is absolutely wonderful. She has completely opened her home to me and made me feel very welcome and comfortable. We have an interesting relationship. At work its 'Yes Ms Chilando, yes madame' but at home we goof around and lounge in our pajamas. I've gotten really close with her daughter Mulenga who lives at home. Mulenga and I are quite close in age, she is only a few years younger so we get along well. She has really made it a point to show me around town, take me out to meet her friends, and accompany me to places that I shouldn't go alone. Every night before I moved we would sit around and talk about Zambia, the culture, the government, and I tell her stories from home. They have quite a bit of American television so she has fewer questions about the States than I had expected. I guess this is both a blessing and a curse because they have this warped view of what America is like based on reality TV and shows like Gossip Girl so I try to point out what is realistic and what is not.

This weekend I moved into my own flat. It is only a couple of houses down from the Chilandos so I'm familiar with the area and still tucked safely away on school grounds. It is nice to have my own space and privacy but I will definitely miss the ladies.

My house is actually quite large. It is two bedroom plus a large laundry room which in the states would be used as a third bedroom. Move in weekend was a bit hectic. I had been cleaning the previous week after work and thought I was about ready to move, when I realized that I had a cockroach problem (most likely living in the horribly dirty stove that has been there for ages and doesn't even work). So I sprayed for roaches, waited a day, and moved in all my stuff. The following day I realized that the spray I had used didn't work and I needed to use the more potent chemicals. So one of the guys at work volunteered to find me the supplies for a heavy duty roach extermination and I took a day off work to move all of my belongings to the center of the room, cover them, and then spray "doom". The next day I went into the house and found all sorts of roaches laying in the middle of the floor dead. Great, it's working! So then I had to clean the whole house from top to bottom, again, to wipe the chemicals off the walls and cupboards and arrange my things once more. I would also like to add that serious cleaning in this heat and humidity is a very dirty and smelly job. At the end of the final spraying/moving day I was very disappointed to realize that there was no water so I had to wait until the following day to bath. Not impressed.

I am now comfortably living in the flat and am quite happy. It has been furnished partly by the school and partly by neighbors. Everyone has been extremely generous. They have taken me through their homes and anything I need they give me. Everything from plates to couches to a mosquito net have been lent to me. I am now sleeping with a mosquito net because the location and quality of this house vs the other house is such that there will be more mosquitoes. It is not very pleasant. It is quite clausterphobic and gives me a headache because of the smell of the treatment but hopefully I will get used to it soon.

Over the past month I have tried learn to cook as much Zambian food as possible before I moved out so that I wont starve on my own. I've been making American food occasionally but it turns out to be very expensive because the ingredients we cook with are not easily available. The cheapest way to shop is to go to the markets where local farmers sit around and sell their produce, fish, whatever. I've been told that I probably should not shop at these markets because they see a Muzungu (white) and more than double the price for their goods. I'm better off paying for the expensive stuff in the supermarket than getting duped at the market.

My daily routine. I wake up at 6:15 and make my bed/tie up the mosquito net. Turn on the hot water heater (giza), turn off the security lights outside, then have breakfast while waiting for the water to heat. It is too expensive to leave the heater on all day so I get hot water once a day. Bath, not shower, bath, then start walking to work at 7:15. I have to walk through mud and yards and grass so my feet and legs are already quite dirty by the time I get to work. The pace at work is slow, nobody is in a real rush to do anything. If you ask for a quote from a shop in town it may take 4 days to get it. Sometimes the Internet (~64k for the whole school, think dialup shared by 20 kids) is up, sometimes its down (ISPs fault), people don't really seem to think its a big deal, just an inconvenience. Not inconvenient enough that the school is willing to pay more for reliable service. At 15 hours I go to the pool to coach the swim team. At that hour the sun is quite hot so I am getting quite the farmers tan, very attractive. I usually have 3 or 4 kids that show up for practice, always different kids so we're not really improving. They swim without goggles, lane ropes, or flags so you can imagine how entertaining it is, especially when we do backstroke. After practice sometimes I will stay and swim other times I will head home. As the sun is going down all the outdoor security lights are turned on and no matter how hot it is outside all the windows are closed, which keeps the mosquitoes and other creatures out of the house. Dinner is nshima and whatever vegetable and meat happens to be in the fridge. Then I will drop by a neighbor's house for a chat or sit and read my book since I don't have television. I'm going to get a lot of reading in over the next year... Before bed, I go through the house to make sure that all the sockets are turned off, make sure the curtains are all closed, double bolt the outside doors, and close and lock every door in the house. Whew, it's quite the routine.

Weekends are a bit slow. I have been going to town for groceries or shopping early on Saturday mornings because all the shops are closed by noon and are closed on Sunday so that is my only time to shop. I take a bus (which is an adventure on its own) into town and usually a cab back since I have too many bags. Traveling on a bus with bags is awkward and makes you a target for theft. From there I will go visit neighbors or go to the nearby orphanage to play with the kids. I have absolutely fallen in love with these kids, which if you know me at all, is saying a lot.

Sunday I get up and walk down to church which is on campus then come back for breakfast. There is lots more sitting around, watching the grass grow, pondering life. Sundays will also probably turn into cleaning and laundry day. Laundry is done by hand and hung on the line which is exhausting. Once on the line, you have to hang around and watch them because if it starts to rain they have to come in or be soaked by the torrential rain. When you bring them off the line, every piece of clothing, yes even underwear, have to be ironed. The reason for that is that bugs get into the clothes while they are on the line and the bugs can irritate your skin and even burrow under your skin and lay eggs. I've heard horror stories of people hatching maggots out of their armpits. HA! I'm very diligent about ironing :) All I can say is thank god for washers and dryers.

There really isn't a lot to do here. People don't really go out to do things very often for a couple of reasons. First, entertainment is expensive and most cannot afford things like going out for a drink or going out to dinner. Second, there aren't a whole lot of options. In a town of about a million there are only a few restaurants and a few bars. No movie theaters, no bowling allies. All the shops are locked and barred up by 18 hours so people don't go walk around town. Really, to entertain themselves it seems that people rely on their neighbors and their TVs and are tucked safely away in their houses shortly after dark. This is of course in the neighborhood I'm in. I hear stories about what happens in the compounds but I'll save that for another story. Needless to say I'll be doing a lot of reading, drinking a lot of tea, and visiting those with TVs ...

My school.