Crazy Cows

Growing up my mother always told me, "when you see crazy coming, cross the street".  Unfortunately, she never told me what to do when you see a herd of cows  coming. 

 This  morning  I decided to start exercising, full disclosure I have only gone for a walk once since I moved to a peri-urban village in May (don't judge me).  Anyway, while  on my short but sweet walk I found myself  on a collision course with a small herd of cows, which looks pretty crazy for a girl raised in Tacoma Washington.  The "craziness" of my current situation reminded me of my mother's saying, and  I decided to cross the street, but it also began some musings on how to handle what look's like crazy in my daily life. 

 

 

 At the surface it seems like the saying promotes avoidance,  which may not be a good thing, but I think the real point is that there are somethings that it may not be worth your energy to engage with, sometimes the energy used to cross the street is the best investment you can make.   Other similar lessons from my mother, never argue with a drunk person.  Like a good girl I've always followed that advice, so I've never experienced the futility f trying to argue with a drunk person directly.  But I've seen people try it and I have to say, as usual my mom is right.

American queues are lines, African queues are squiggles

Eighteen months into my stay in Botswana and I suddenly had a realization of how little I actually know about how to function here. I’ve got most of my daily routines down; I know how to greet people, that you have a shop assistant in the produce section weigh the fruit before you go to the grocery counter to pay, I even recently learned that I napkin here is a diaper – not something you use to wipe your mouth that would be a serviette, so now waitresess can stop looking at me funny all of the time. However, I still have not mastered how to stand in a line or queue.  And since much of life is spent queuing here, it’s a serious issue.

It seems like there wouldn’t be very many options in how you queue, I mean you enter the location, you see a group of people standing in a line, you put yourself behind the last person. If you’re thinking like that, you’re thinking like an American.  In Botswana, queues are everywhere and there is a complicated set of rules around them that I don’t fully understand but will nonetheless try to explain some basic concepts and protocols for you.

CONCEPT NO 1: Booking – booking is the term people use for making an appointment, but this does not mean some people have called to make a reservation to exempt them from the line.  Instead it means that a person has showed up, stood around long enough to be recognized by the person in front of and behind them and then said my favourite phrase “I’m coming” (which actually means I’m going – and will eventually coming back).  When they do finally come back, which could be anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes later, they slide themselves back in between the people who recognize them as if they’d never left.  I’ve only tried booking in line once, because I’m American and it feels like cheating. It’s a great concept when it’s working for you but can cause horrible frustration when you think you're two from the front only to have half a dozen people who have booked suddenly appear.  Another downfall is there is not a consistent protocol for when you return and the people you’ve booked with have already finished and left.  Some people put themselves at the front of the line, but that doesn’t always go over well, as you can imagine. Booking seems most appropriate, in my mind at least, when it’s a result of an urgent call of nature or the need to take a call when there’s a lack of cell reception in the area, but I wonder what all these “bookers” are actually doing – maybe they’re actually standing in multiple lines at once cutting their errand time drastically, or maybe they are taking a nap somewhere, one day I’m going to follow a “booker” and find out. An important note, you may be snapped if you challenge someone who has booked so tread carefully.

CONCEPT NO 2: Signs Are an Optimal Tool for Misinformation – Imagine you walk into a r post office and there are 5 of 6 counters each counter has a person behind it who is serving customers. Each counter also has a sign above it describing a type of transaction.  I bet you think you know how to handle this situation don’t you? Look for the sign that describes your transaction and join THAT line – WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! I just came from the post office and I can assure that when sending a registered letter it is not appropriate to stand in the line labelled Registered Mail Sending and Delivery – instead you should stand in the line labelled Postal Inquiries – I can’t tell you why that is, but please believe me if you follow the signs you will waste your time. So, you’re wondering how you should handle the situation. What you should do is ask everyone near you what type of transaction they are doing and then decide which line to join.  Now if you’re like me and you’re asking in English, you’ll have a few people just ignore you and another couple answer in Setswana and then at least one ask you how long you’ve been in the country and then tell you, you should learn the language.  When I first got here and answered, I’ve been here 3 months – the “you should learn the language” had a tone of friendly advice – 18 months in the advice is a bit less friendly a bit more judgemental but must be listened to with patience because you desperately need the advice on which line to join.

CONCEPT NO 3: The Sit and Scoot – Undoubtedly because of the length of time spent in lines many locations decided to add chairs to the queue situation, these are set near the end of the line and serve the people who are about to go to the counter.  So after standing in line for 40 minutes or maybe 2 hours you get to the beginning of the chairs, take a seatand prepare to rest a bit as you wait for your turn. Oh, but wait someone has been served, so instead of resting comfortably in the chair that you just sat down in you must lift yourself and move to the next seat, where you sit for 3 or 4 minutes only to move to the next seat again.  Hopefully you didn’t bring a lot of bags with you because you will be doing this over and over until it’s your turn. WORD OF WARNING – in some situations if you decide not to sit but just move along with the line you are endangering your place in the queue.  For example, last week at the South African Embassy a young woman applying for her study permit got tired of the sit and scoot, so when she was two people away from being served she just stood near the counter and waited for her turn.  When it was actually her turn, the embassy staff person accused her of being a “queue jumper” and tried to send her to the back of the 2 hour long line.  She explained that she hadn’t jumped the queue and requested that the person who had been standing behind her in the 2 hour line testify that she was telling the truth – the next person in line just looked at her blankly and said nothing as the embassy staff chewed her out.

CONCEPT NO 4 – One can be for Two, Two Can be for One, Don’t Assume You’re Next – I don’t know why but often in queuing situations one line will feed into two counters or two lines will feed into one counter or in the same office you’ll have both situations happening simultaneously. Having one line feed into two counters could make sense, people are still being served in order – although it does mean that some people might go to the front thinking there’s only one person in line only to be shown the appropriate place at the back of the line by severely annoyed fellow patrons. (This is typically an issue if you’ve been paying attention to the signs, remember they’re a tool for misinformation, don’t fall for it!). I don’t know the purpose of two lines feeding into one counter, even people born and raised here seem to find it confusing – no one knows if it’s their turn or not, and if it’s a long line people get cranky and start  arguments about who is next. If I understood the situation I’m sure I could make it work in my favour, but sadly I don’t understand, so I often end up being stuck in a queue long after people who I recognize as coming in after me have been served and moved on with their business.

Coping Strategies

1.  Accept the fact that you need more prayer and meditation in your life – a two hour line is the perfect situation to fix this issue, and when you get to the front of the line only to realize you’re in the wrong line, the meditation will have lowered your blood pressure enough that you will not have a stroke.
2.  You also need to practice your humming – humming is fun, relaxing, free and time consuming.
3. I tried reading once, but wouldn’t recommend it.  You need to have your eyes on the people around you so you can try to sense who is a queue jumper and who is a booker
4. Freak Out! - Start yelling loudly for the person in charge and demand that the office does something to fix these haywire queues.  You probably won’t get served and the line won’t be fixed, but the other people in line will quietly agree with you and take back the nasty thoughts they had in their head when they realized how long you’ve been in the country without learning the language.  You may want to avoid this strategy in any immigration offices unless you’re trying to get deported.
5. Go home – Go home and stand in your your boring, straight, efficient, American or European lines for five or ten minutes, or even do all your errands via the internet.  You’ll miss out on some great people and experiences but you’ll have a lot more time to watch TV.

My African Diet

Walking through grocery store earlier this week, I was about to grab a bunch of green grapes, when I saw the price 40 botswana pula - which is roughly $6 for one bunch of grapes.  Yes, $6 for one bunch of grapes. It made me realize how drastically my diet has changed since arriving in Botswana a year ago.  Things that were my standard purchase in the US because they were relatively inexpensive like; grapes, strawberries, and whole chicken are prohibitively expensive here.  On the other hand things that are quite expensive in the states like; avocado, pineapple, steak and ribs are very affordable here. I have quite a bit of difficulty making an inexpensive meal; because the foods that are inexpensive I'm much less familiar with using as ingredients like cans of corned beef - I don't know how to work with that.

Then there are other things, like fresh pumpkin and green tomatoes, which are available year round.  I'd never actually cooked with fresh pumpkin before moving to Botswana. Canned pumpkin was always my method, but now it's pretty common for me to make pumpkin bread and occassionaly even a pumpkin pie with fresh pumpkin.  Fresh pumpkin makes pumpkin bread amazing, by the way.  And green tomatoes are available even in the spring and summer here.

This week has been ridicuolously hectic, so I've eaten out quite a bit, but I actually cook for myself a lot more here then I did in Seattle. Unfortunately, I haven't actually learned how to make any Southern African dishes, maybe I'll make a New Year's Resolution on that one and learn how to make seswaa- the national dish of boiled pounded beef cooked with salt for flavoring.  You'd think overcooked beef flavored only with salt wouldn't be appetizing, but it's actually delicious.

Debt, Loans and Conspicuous Education Consumption.

Hello People of the World!  It's official, eight years after finishing my undergraduate degree I am finally debt free.  Please applaud as I curtsy for you.  I can still remember the horrible feeling of panic I had as I went through the mandatory loan tutorials and signed the paperwork to finalize my school loans.  I was petrified that I'd end up taking a job I didn't want to pay back my loans.  I actually had less than $15,000 in debt when I graduated, far less then the average student. If only I had been a Motswana - I would have been debt free. Botswana has for decades supported university education both in country and at international schools for it's citizens.  In fact the government even provides living allowances for students.  Can you imagine?  This government actually values education.  But here's a question if you don't pay for your education do you actually value your education. 

I saw Malcolm Gladwell on CNN questioning the value of school rankings this weekend - and although I genuinely believe not all schools are equal; I do wonder if the value of the education you get varies as greatly as the price.  For example,  I went to a private liberal arts jesuit university in the middle of Seattle - which charged roughly $20,000 a year in tuition when I attending almost a decade ago - they are $32,000 a year now. It was a good school but I wouldn't say it was worth that amount.  Thankfully I didn't have to pay the full tuition; I was awarded several scholarships and given work-study jobs.

Now I'm ready to look at Business school and I have to say the price tag on these schools is frightening.  The Berkeley's and Harvard's of the world charge, what seems to me to be, ridiculous amunts.  But they also ensure the best jobs and contacts.  However, as I'm now celebrating being debt free I'm not ready to go back from whence I came.  Luckily, I've found a well respected school with a distance program and a reasonable price tag that I'm hoping to attend.  I'll let you know how the application process goes.

American Style Holiday

Being away from home helps one appreciate their own country and culture. I have met many people here that are under the impression that either American culture is an oxymoron or that American culture has infiltrated every nook and cranny of the world through movies and television; well I disagree with both points of view. One of the mainstays of American culture that I don't believe exists anywhere else in the world is the Holiday.


It's interesting because holidays are celebrated everywhere, and here in Botswana they have more public holidays then I've ever seen in my life - my four day Easter holiday was followed by a 3 day Labor day weekend and if I was in South Africa I would have gotten an addition Wednesday off for some other holiday. In the midst of all of these holidays with plenty of days free from work I found myself bored and homesick because holiday means something completely different in America than in does here it Botswana. Easter is the perfect example. I love Easter, Easter is probably the defining cultural holiday in the Black church. In the Black church Easter Sunday is full of colorful outfits and beautiful hats. Children typically get a new outfit, if you're a girl it's bound to be an extremely fluffy dress and every child old enough to speak does an Easter speech or plays a part in the Easter play. At 2 the speech usually looks like a little kid being prompted by their mom to say "Jesus Wept" at 10 it's probably a page long poem about crucifixtion and sacrifice but everyone participates.

White House Easter Egg Hunt

The Black Church does Easter a bit differently but across America communities of all colors and relgions greet Easter by organizing Easter Egg hungs, which creates days of fun you boil the eggs, you dye the eggs, you hide the eggs, you dress the kids up and you let them loose to hunt colorful eggs and choclates in a local park. I tried to talk about an Easter Egg hunt with one of my co-workers and they looked at me like I had three heads. "You hide eggs outside, what for?" Okay, part of it is probably the seasonal differnce while Easter marks the start of Spring in the states here Easter is at the beginning of winter - no one wants to send their 3 year old out to hunt dyed egges in the rain, but given that you get good Friday and Easter monday off here you think some sort of tradition would spring up. NADA! I actually had people over for an Easter dinner. I really didn't think it would work, don't you want to spend time with your family on Easter was greeted with the same blank stare as my description of an Easter egg hunt. It's just how culture works - America likes to celebrate holidays other cultures just don't quite get it. So as my American friends ramp up to celebrate Cinco de Mayo the holiday where Americans fill up on Margarita's and guacamole to celebrate the victory of Mexico over France in a small and insignificant battle - people in Mexico will go about their Thursday. And as Hallmark stores across the US switch from Easter Cards and decorations to Mother's day cards and decorations to Father's day and Graduation cards and decorations - I'll just continue scheduling dinner parties.

Here You Can Go Home Again

Recently, a colleague kindly provided me with some background information on how property works here. Almost everyone in Botswana has what they call a "home village"; this is the area, run by a chief where they or their parents grew up. When people ask where you are from, they are really asking you about your home village. If you were to reply Gabarone or Francistown, the two biggest cities here, they would just look at you in confusion. In the village each family has plot of land - a compound - which has enough room for several small homes. Older people usually live in the village, and all of their adult children consider this compound their home. If something happens, job loss, illness or just fatigue with city life; the adult children can go home to their village compound (mama's house) and leave there. If they want to stay for a while they can build a small house within the compound or even request a neighboring plot of land from the village chief. All Batswana are basically entitled to land, they can apply to the government for a plot of land or they can request from their home village chief or another chief if they are so inclined. They do have to develop the land in order to keep it, and even if you purchase land from an individual you must develop the land or the government can take it back.

Homelessness is virtually unheard of, and according to my colleague, even the people in shanty towns in Gabs, are there by choice in a way - there to make and save money, because they can always go back to their home village. Apparently many mothers even encourage their adult children to move back "home". I have a lot of questions and thoughts about how that impacts people's choices here. For example, here single motherhood is the norm - marriages happen late if ever and stable monogamous relationships are not as common as any many other places. Perhaps the safety net of the family home has made people much more financially independent then other places and deprioritized the nuclear family. When I compare Botswana to India or even the US where homelessness and poverty are a real and present danger for many single mothers; I can see how this safety net is a big plus.

As for my home, I moved into a very nice two story townhouse and am now completely settled and ready for guests; except I still don't have internet or cable. I have a little garden space for a garden in the back where I'm planning on planting marigolds, eggplant and some collard green seeds that a friend is couriering into Bots for me. The townhouse has 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms, and a huge open living room space; basically I'm swimming in space here. My last apartment would likely fit in the bottom floor of this current space and the smallest bathroom in my current place is at least twice the size of my last place. So if you're thinking about visiting me in Botswana your accomadations are totally taken care of. I actually spent several weeks trying to find a smaller place, but I couldn't find anything suitable in a smaller size - it's a complaint I've heard from quite a few expats. After I signed my lease I actually found a couple of apartment buildings that are more suitably sized for a single person, but they are all hidden and seem to go pretty quickly.