For the past 6 months or so, I've been apart of the National GLOW Camp committee in Bots. GLOW stands for Girls (and Guys) Leading Our World and can be found in Peace Corps countries around the world. Many of my fellow PCVs have run GLOW camps throughout Bots, consisting of groups of students in their village or region, coming together for 3-5 days to learn life skills, leadership, and sexual and reproductive health. Although I had helped run two successful and similar Boot Camps at my school, I had yet to be apart of a GLOW camp, something RPCVs had told me I must do. Two PCVs from my intake group decided to attempt a National GLOW camp, pulling students from all over the country, and after applying, I was chosen to be on the curriculum committee. As a committee, we set the curriculum schedule and sessions for the camp. I focused mainly on Life Skills: goal setting, communication, emotional health, self confidence, positive friendships, stress management, decision making, and self awareness.
The National GLOW team (which we named, Re Bokamoso, Let's GLOW!) worked tirelessly on funding, logistics, curriculum, and everything in-between. The students finally arrived over the July holidays and we spent the week with 78 eight and ninth graders, and their teachers, social workers, and nurses, from all over the country. It was an incredible week. It was amazing to see the curriculum I had been developing come to life on day 1. As the days passed, you could see students breaking out of their shells, becoming more confident, and believing in themselves. Students made friends with kids from other schools and worked together to excel throughout the camp. Day 1 was dedicated to life skills, day 2 to sexual and reproductive health as well as HIV awareness and prevention, day 3 to gender and relationships, and day 4 to leadership. On day 4 we took a field trip to Parliament and were able to tour the building. I was so proud of our students as they asked intelligent questions that seemed to stump our tour guide, and continued to make sure their voices were heard. Our certificate ceremony was a celebration like no other as we cheered with all our might for each and every participant.
They came to us unsure and timid, but they left full of energy and confidence, armed with new knowledge and friendships. As we said goodbye to each van and bus full of students, I gave them all high fives and reminded them to be rock stars. It was the perfect final project of my PC service. We had an incredible group of facilitators and an inspirational group of kids. A week to remember for a lifetime.
Sunday, July 23, 2017
Friday, July 7, 2017
COSC, Zambia, and Rhinos!
The end of June saw all of the PCVs in my cohort taking long bus rides up to Kasane for our Close of Service Conference (COSC). COSC is a conference dedicated to saying goodbye to Peace Corps and starting to think about the future. So naturally, nearly everyone is in a different state of emotional disarray. It took me two days and approximately 12 hours on busses to make my way, but it was so worth it. It's baby elephant season in Kasane, and I was so excited for the cuteness, that it was basically all I could talk about the whole way up. As PCVs tend to do, on each leg of our journey, more would join our group until practically the whole bus was talking in loud American accents.
Our conference was at the beautiful Kasane River Lodge and included warthogs roaming the lawn and a beautiful river view. We had three days of sessions on preparing to leave, reflection, resume building, job hunting, and the long list of administrative tasks we have to do before we can leave the country. We also had a beautiful boat trip filled with hippo sightings and a magnificent game drive with endless baby elephants. As well as an awful Elephant that decided to aim it's fart right at our vehicle as it walked by. It was atrocious. During the conference I started to realize how grateful I am that I'll be returning to school for two semesters rather than job hunting immediately after service. There was a lot of time for friendship as well, to which I'm grateful, as it was the last time my cohort will all be together.
After the conference, a few of us took advantage of our proximity to other countries (Botswana meets Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe at the Chobe River) and went to Livingstone, Zambia. This was my 6th African country to visit! I wish we had more time to explore the rest of the country, but we only had two days for a short trip. Teresa, Gary, Joiwyn and I met Nele, a friend I had met in Australia four years ago through theater, at our hostel, Jollyboys. We also spent time with two other PCVs and a family who's daughter Teresa knew from Bots. On our first day we went to a market that was much more akin to what I had expected when coming to PC. There were tons of stalls with food in baskets and things hanging from the rafters. There was quite the smell coming from the fish and meat, as well as a mass of flies. We were in search of traditional african fabric, and we found the jackpot. There were several large stalls filled with beautiful prints for great prices, of which I bought a few.
We spent the majority of our second day White Water Rafting the Zambezi river, which flows from Victoria Falls (the largest waterfall in the world if you count both height and width). The hardest part was walking straight down the side of the gorge for what felt like an hour (probably 25 minutes?). I was so pathetically unprepared for the descent that one of the guides actually let me steady my hand on his shoulder for the majority of the trek. I kept telling them "I live in Botswana. You know how it is there? It's FLAT." Which was about the only humor I could muster. Our boat had 8 people plus our guide. We were with Bundu adventures who also had two other boats out for the day. The water was pretty cold, and there were (small) crocodiles in the river, so we tried our best to stay in the boat, and we were the only group that was successful! I've never been white water rafting before, and I'm so glad I went. It was a great adventure and I'm looking forward to rafting again.
After Zambia, we traveled back to Botswana and made our way down to Serowe to go to the Khama Rhino Sanctuary. At the sanctuary we stayed in a chalet and took two game drives. On our night drive we stumbled upon a rhino just meters from our vehicle. Suddenly, the rhino was startled, turned around, faced us, and started to run. At the last moment, it realized we were a large object (rhinos have poor eyesight) and veered to the side of us. This is the second time I've been in a game drive vehicle with Gary, Teresa, and Joiwyn and thought I was going to die (the first was a mother leopard we upset in September at Tuli Block). I'm not sure if that means I should do more or less drives with them.
We saw tons of Rhinos at the sanctuary, which has about 50 rhinos in it at the moment. Rhinos are highly poached due to their horns, which grow similarly to a finger nail. Thankfully, poaching hasn't been a problem in Botswana since the 90s. This is partially due to the fact that it is well known that if you attempt to poach in Bots, you will be shot on sight. Apparently, hangings used to be very common as well.
We saw a baby rhino on our morning drive, which was a fabulous start to our 4th of July, but one of the most surprising moments was when we had a visitor at lunch. We were sitting in the restaurant, which is enclosed with large glass windows and doors, when suddenly we noticed a Black Rhino (much more rare!) wandering around outside. It made it's way to the pool and started to drink. We rushed to the windows to take pictures, when one of the waitstaff opened the door for us and encouraged us to go outside to take better pictures. Now, after seeing that Rhino run last night, and hearing that black rhinos are the most dangerous, I was skeptical of going outside. But she insisted that sometimes people swim in the pool while the rhino comes to drink! So we got 4th of July selfies with the pool party crashing rhino. Not bad.
All in all, it was a great trip. But what touched me the most was when I returned home. I got to school the next day and was greeted by students who were concerned about where I was, by teachers who were delighted I was back, and by administration who hugged me and welcomed me home. I had been gone over testing, so I didn't miss very much, but I was missed, and that was enough. I only have a couple months left in my Peace Corps journey, and I'm not looking forward to saying goodbye to this life I've created for myself and these people who are my community. And I'm definitely not ready to say goodbye to the baby elephants.
Our conference was at the beautiful Kasane River Lodge and included warthogs roaming the lawn and a beautiful river view. We had three days of sessions on preparing to leave, reflection, resume building, job hunting, and the long list of administrative tasks we have to do before we can leave the country. We also had a beautiful boat trip filled with hippo sightings and a magnificent game drive with endless baby elephants. As well as an awful Elephant that decided to aim it's fart right at our vehicle as it walked by. It was atrocious. During the conference I started to realize how grateful I am that I'll be returning to school for two semesters rather than job hunting immediately after service. There was a lot of time for friendship as well, to which I'm grateful, as it was the last time my cohort will all be together.
After the conference, a few of us took advantage of our proximity to other countries (Botswana meets Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe at the Chobe River) and went to Livingstone, Zambia. This was my 6th African country to visit! I wish we had more time to explore the rest of the country, but we only had two days for a short trip. Teresa, Gary, Joiwyn and I met Nele, a friend I had met in Australia four years ago through theater, at our hostel, Jollyboys. We also spent time with two other PCVs and a family who's daughter Teresa knew from Bots. On our first day we went to a market that was much more akin to what I had expected when coming to PC. There were tons of stalls with food in baskets and things hanging from the rafters. There was quite the smell coming from the fish and meat, as well as a mass of flies. We were in search of traditional african fabric, and we found the jackpot. There were several large stalls filled with beautiful prints for great prices, of which I bought a few.
We spent the majority of our second day White Water Rafting the Zambezi river, which flows from Victoria Falls (the largest waterfall in the world if you count both height and width). The hardest part was walking straight down the side of the gorge for what felt like an hour (probably 25 minutes?). I was so pathetically unprepared for the descent that one of the guides actually let me steady my hand on his shoulder for the majority of the trek. I kept telling them "I live in Botswana. You know how it is there? It's FLAT." Which was about the only humor I could muster. Our boat had 8 people plus our guide. We were with Bundu adventures who also had two other boats out for the day. The water was pretty cold, and there were (small) crocodiles in the river, so we tried our best to stay in the boat, and we were the only group that was successful! I've never been white water rafting before, and I'm so glad I went. It was a great adventure and I'm looking forward to rafting again.
After Zambia, we traveled back to Botswana and made our way down to Serowe to go to the Khama Rhino Sanctuary. At the sanctuary we stayed in a chalet and took two game drives. On our night drive we stumbled upon a rhino just meters from our vehicle. Suddenly, the rhino was startled, turned around, faced us, and started to run. At the last moment, it realized we were a large object (rhinos have poor eyesight) and veered to the side of us. This is the second time I've been in a game drive vehicle with Gary, Teresa, and Joiwyn and thought I was going to die (the first was a mother leopard we upset in September at Tuli Block). I'm not sure if that means I should do more or less drives with them.
We saw tons of Rhinos at the sanctuary, which has about 50 rhinos in it at the moment. Rhinos are highly poached due to their horns, which grow similarly to a finger nail. Thankfully, poaching hasn't been a problem in Botswana since the 90s. This is partially due to the fact that it is well known that if you attempt to poach in Bots, you will be shot on sight. Apparently, hangings used to be very common as well.
We saw a baby rhino on our morning drive, which was a fabulous start to our 4th of July, but one of the most surprising moments was when we had a visitor at lunch. We were sitting in the restaurant, which is enclosed with large glass windows and doors, when suddenly we noticed a Black Rhino (much more rare!) wandering around outside. It made it's way to the pool and started to drink. We rushed to the windows to take pictures, when one of the waitstaff opened the door for us and encouraged us to go outside to take better pictures. Now, after seeing that Rhino run last night, and hearing that black rhinos are the most dangerous, I was skeptical of going outside. But she insisted that sometimes people swim in the pool while the rhino comes to drink! So we got 4th of July selfies with the pool party crashing rhino. Not bad.
All in all, it was a great trip. But what touched me the most was when I returned home. I got to school the next day and was greeted by students who were concerned about where I was, by teachers who were delighted I was back, and by administration who hugged me and welcomed me home. I had been gone over testing, so I didn't miss very much, but I was missed, and that was enough. I only have a couple months left in my Peace Corps journey, and I'm not looking forward to saying goodbye to this life I've created for myself and these people who are my community. And I'm definitely not ready to say goodbye to the baby elephants.
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