I Heart Africa

So I bet you thought my last blog would be the final one before I come home. Psyche! With the advent of my trip home I am beginning to realize, despite all the frustrations and problems Africa has, the endearing qualities are most definitely not to be over looked. I love Africa, I don’t know if it is that I am at a really good place in my service, or if it is because I am leaving what I have learned to be my home for the past year and a half for just a visit home, but I am sorely going to miss this place, and I know that once I go home for good I will spend a decent amount of time in efforts to get back here.
Africa, I tell you, is one of those places that once you get it in your blood, it takes hold and you just kind of have to go with it. Fighting Africa once it gets into your blood would be like trying to crack a coconut open with a toothpick, pointless. This place is vastly different from any other I have ever been too, I haven’t been that many places but for me (and this will probably make no sense) it is different in ways that no other place is different. Nothing works, absolutely nothing works, but somehow or another, things get done. If I didn’t have a cell phone and no digital way to communicate, I could still let my best friend in Maseru know to meet me for lunch at 12 at Nando’s just by telling someone. Or when I feel stressed and belt show tunes (which the Basotho love by the way) at the top of my lungs in my house along with the cheesy choreography I come up with on my own, nobody even questions my sanity, because they all do it at home, work, church, the grocery store, etc too. Heck, half the time they join me. Also the culture exchange is wonderful. While it is me learning more about Basotho culture then them learning about American, when I do talk about American culture, it is fascinating to them, especially when I point out the similarities. Like how I cooked for my family growing up and all the young girls here have to do the same. But I love it so much when they share their culture. When they do share it, it is like they are opening up to me and allowing me in on a part of them that is purely Basotho and they know I won’t judge it, unless of course it promotes the spread of HIV/AIDS in which case they get a lengthy lecture from me, sorry!
I mean for all the complaining, ranting, and raving I do, I really like it here. I have adapted to what I have to do without (so what if I don’t have ice for my Diet Coke and have to substitute lemon juice for lime juice) and I have come to find genuine friends in village, something I thought I would never be able to do. I have become accustomed to hanging out with the Basotho and find myself craving it. If in the morning by 8am I haven’t gotten to talk to anyone, I fervently seek them out, just so I can greet them, tying me into their world. And the way they have accepted me is astounding. White people are weird, there I said it. We really are and the fact that all they do is laugh at me is really quite surprising. God only knows what they say about me in Sesotho, but the fact is they are still willing to help me assimilate to their culture, even if at times I don’t understand it. However, knowing that they think I am so weird is liberating. With this knowledge I feel very free to just be however and not care too much about what others think. I think this is the first time in my life when I have truly not cared what people have thought or said about me, they are going to do it no matter what I do, so I might as well enjoy it, right? So this I will greatly miss. If I act half as weird as I do here at home, I will never hear the end of it from my sisters, and I can understand them.
There are countless other things here that I love, the people being both endearing and frustrating, as well as the landscape. But, being Africa, it constantly draws me in. A place so fascinating, and people so rich in culture (it makes me examine my own, grasping for parts of my culture as rich as theirs) along with all the problems makes Lesotho and Africa bewildering. I could write a book about the differences between this place and home, and yet I find myself seeking similarities, just so I can relate home back to this place so when I go home I know there will be things there to constantly remind me of Africa. I mean where else are you going to find a place where most water is unsafe to drink, or just not there but you can always get a Coca-Cola or beer. Or a where it may be 10am, it maybe a Wednesday and you will find the village bar packed, just getting an early start on celebrating Wednesday. Or you frequently see taxis called “Chocolate Mousse,” “The Taliban,” “Accessorize,” or “The Holy Roman Catholic Mass” with details of all 12 Apostles on the side. Or you live next door to a bar called the Jakaranda, wait, at home I live next a bar, hmmm…. Where else are you going to find gems like this? I will genuinely miss the plethora of conundrums and clashes with western culture, it is just so priceless. So at home I will be heart sick for this place, because, as much as I refused it at the beginning, it has become my home, where my life is, and I’m just going to miss it. Africa, the Basotho, Peace Corps friends, heck my lovely home where I can sing at the top of my lungs, even the bar maid who I say hello to everyday when I leave for my run. I will miss it all, but lucky for me I get to come back and soak it up for at least 6 months more.
Well, if you are reading this on Sunday I have 8 days until I get on the plane back to the states for my Christmas visit, eek! And I am sure they are going to fly by like no other, or crawl by like a slug. I’m not sure which I would rather happen. So Merry Christmas because this is my last post until I get back to Lesotho or unless I feel really motivated at home and decide to write one then. Anyways, Christmas E Monate!!!! And, ummm, I will see many of you sooooo soon!!!!!