August Vacation and More

AUGUST VACATION

First days: hung out with Ashley and her parents in Windhoek for a day.

Next days: came back to the village. There was a big political event going on, supposedly teaching them how to vote. They played all sorts of Owambo music and Kwaito that generally my tribe does not listen to. There was a relatively famous Damara singer there though and the crowd was big for his performances. I really love being in the village.

After that: I spent two days hitchhiking alone up to Opuwo. I do not prefer to hitchhike alone, but no one was going north at that time.’

DAY 1
Hike # 1 (Dordabis – Windhoek): Older Afrikaner couple who lives 60km south of me. Told me the reason why white people do not pick me up is because they think I must be insane to hike from Dordabis. Good to know. Invited me to the farm. Free.

Hike # 2 (Windhoek – Okahandja): White German-descended Windhoeker. He was on the way to pick up his mother. Believes the next empire will be Germany. Hates Chinese people. Free.

Hike # 3 (Okahandja – Otjiwarongo) Black couple on their way to Rundu. Didn’t talk to me, which is always preferred to awkward conversation. N$ 50.

Hike # 4 (Otjiwarongo – Outjo) Black man. I forgot to pay him, so he tracked me down. N$40.

DAY 2
Hike # 5 (Outjo – Opuwo) By far the best ride, in government car with Penny. Good conversation, safe ride, no harassment, direct route and Free!

After that, I hooked up with Ashley’s parents. We swam in the pool at Opuwo Lodge and bought lots of Himba bracelets. Opuwo surprised me in the fact that it is still very Namibian. I expected it to feel more exotic or uncomfortable.

For those that do not know, Opuwo is the home to the Himba and Themba tribes. Both still wear traditional dress. The Himba women wear a animal skin as a skirt and lots of homemade jewelry. They do not wear shirts or tops. They cover their skin with a mixture of ochre and animal fat. Their hairdo indicates class, whether they have menstruated yet, and whether they have had children yet. The Themba wear printed fabrics as skirts and also go topless or wear brightly colored bras. They do not use ochre. They put beads in their hair. Himba men also can wear traditional dress in skins, but I did not see any. All the Himba men wear western clothing. Themba men wear skins or colored fabric short skirts and jewelry. Then there are Herero people who speak the same language but wear longsleeve ankle-length dresses with 6 petticoats underneath, based on German attire from the colonial era. Then there are Himba/Herero women and men in Western clothing. Basically anything goes, but it all feels so natural and completely normal (to me who is used to Namibia).

After seeing Opuwo, we headed a long way to Palmwag Lodge. It is in Damaraland, the homeland for my tribe. The landscape is very beautiful, but we did not see many animals.

Later, we headed to Swakopmund where it was freezing! I couldn’t wait to get out of there!

Finally, we were in Windhoek for several days for the COS conference. The hotel was great, except for the mouse that got in our trash and woke me up in the night because he was rustling around so much. After PC the problem is not that there is a mouse in the room, but that it actually woke me up!

The COS conference was scary (getting a job sounds hard, as does readjusting to America), emotional (leaving Africa will be sad), and fun (vacation planning, hanging out one last time).

VACATION PLANS:

December:
Hitchhike out of Namibia
Travel across half of Zambia on minibuses
Take the train to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Take the ferry to Zanzibar Island
Spend Christmas at the beach in Zanzibar or in Stone Town

January:
Travel to Northern Tanzania: see the Serengeti, Mt. Kilimanjaro
Travel to Nairobi, Kenya and tour surrounding areas (Amboseli Park, Lakes of Rift Valley?)
Fly to Ethiopia.
Travel by bus to the historic sites of Addis Ababa Bahir Dar, Gonder, Tigray, and Lalibela. (rock hewn Christian churches, stelae)

February:
Fly to Cairo, Egypt
See tombs/temples/museums in Cairo and Luxor. Climb Mt. Sinai in Sinai Peninsula.

Beginning of March: Fly home! Probably around March 4-7. Will know for sure in a month or so.

SOME THOUGHTS:
Leaving Namibia will be difficult, despite all the frustrations of living here. There are still days where I can barely bear living here. But most days I have really appreciated all the good stuff. Somehow, I’ve become really good friends with my staff and kids. I genuinely love them and will miss them a lot.
I’ve never been this sad over leaving a place (despite the fact that there are places I love more), but I think that is for a number of reasons. I am sad because I will miss:

1. PC life – 3 months of vacation, doing good work, PC culture (being grody is ok, there is no such thing as Too Much Information, you can show up at anyone’s house at any time)

2. NAM life – cultural elements I will miss: attitude towards time, tribal system, pace of life, hitchhiking, etc.

3. Namibians I know – teachers and students. These are the children I will always remember and wonder if they made it.

4. Maybe I will never come back.
I was sad to leave Costa Rica and Mexico, but I knew I could easily always come back, and I probably will continue going there for the rest of my life. Coming back to Namibia would be much more difficult. I had always assumed I would never come back, so I could preserve Namibia as it was while I was here. There is a good chance I may not get back here anytime soon, and even if I do, I may not see my students or the teachers ever again.

CURRENT POST-PC PLANS:
Stay in DC area (northern va?). Apply for government, NGO, company positions, preferably using Spanish. If I don’t get any jobs after a while, go back to school for teaching certificate in Spanish grades 6-12 or English 6-12 OR English as a Second language, get a teaching job. Before I’m 30, I’d like to live abroad again, probably as an ESL teacher or a Spanish teacher at an American school abroad.

LATEST NEWS FROM DORDABIS
My replacement comes on Monday! I will finally get to meet him/her.

One of the teachers who has children of her own who are mostly grown has adopted several orphans from her own family. One of them is Kennedy, my best 7th grade student. Kennedy’s mother is dead, but I am not sure if his father is dead. He calls the teacher mother, so it must have happened a long time ago. Another child the teacher was caring for was a 2nd grader who was the aunt’s child. That child (I’m not sure what her name is) died over the holiday. Nobody is saying what she died of, so it must be AIDS. She used to come over quite a bit and borrow DVDs for the family. I thought I was going to get away with not knowing anyone personally who had died in my village, but I was wrong. She was a sweet kid. It is really a shame. The memorial service is next week.