Letter from Stevie!!!! : D

Blog entry 5/23/09 – (Received and typed by Monica- LOVE YOU STEVIE!)

Some general questions:
Hello Everyone! I hope people are enjoying the beginnings of Summer. Although I have to admit that in my mind it is still snowing in Portland. Being here where the seasons are so different, I find myself just thinking of the states the way I left them. So I wouldn’t be surprised if I think it is Winter for the next two years.

So I thought I would take a few minutes to answer the questions I have been getting. I am only 3 months in and I am sure some of the answers will change with time, but right now here is where I am…
Are you picking up the language?
Well- not as quickly as I would like. Hopefully this is one of those answers that will change soon. I can greet and barely get by in the market. As for the rest of my vocab, it is centered around HIV/AIDS and education. But whenever I am working with people in these fields we use English. The official language of Zambia is English and is supposed to be what everything is taught in after grade 2. So because I spend the majority of my time with teachers, we speak a lot of English. In reality, very few students can actually speak English and all the lessons in school are usually translated into the local language. Plus, to work with people in the community especially women- I need to be better about studying and I have found a tutor in my village- I’ll keep trying.

Food: Any cool or funky foods> Are you getting enough?
Well let me assure everyone that I am getting more than enough. People are often disappointed with the amount of nshima I can eat. And the first week I was in my village I was getting so much food, I couldn’t eat it fast enough. Leftovers without a fridge is tricky. The staple food of Zambia is nshima- basically ground maize that is cooked into a porridge paste you roll it into a ball and eat it with a relish- either very cooked veggies, beans, or on a really special occasion- chicken. Nshima is very hard to make and doesn’t actually have any nutritional value but a meal is not a meal without nshima. It is believed “Nshima is POWER!” While it is not the healthiest food, Zambians love of it is understandable. The one thing nshima does is make you feel full. Whether or not your children are getting the vitamins they need, at least they are going to bed full.

Zambia is slightly lacking in its variety of food. It is a lot of nshima, ground nuts, sweet potatoes, onions, and tomatoes. A few bananas, sour oranges, and on a really good day giant avocado. The veggies are leafy- some are similar to kale, there is Chinese cabbage and most commonly it is sweet potato leaves or pumpkin leaves. Of course when you get the larger cities you can find more variety but where I am it is a lot of the same thing.

As far as cool or funky food…
The two finkiest think that I have not tried yet but are very popular, and mice and caterpillars. And something tells me I can go through my two years not needing to try these. Although I am a bit excited to try hippo meat at a festival next month.

Now that I am cooking for myself, I eat a lot of rice and soya pieces, eggs, pasta, oatmeal. I cool everything in a small charcoal brazier. I have been perfecting my tortilla skills and other breads. Last week I even managed to bake a pretty decent cake for another volunteers birthday!

Is it hot?
Yes! Right now it is cold season but there is very little cold about it. Maybe the mornings are a bit chilly and the sun is setting earlier but if this is cold season- I am not looking forward to hot season.

How is your house?
I love my house! It has three small rooms, tons of furniture because my host father is a carpenter, and a very nice grass roof that does leak yet (keep your fingers crossed for the rainy season). I have a nice dirt yard just waiting for me to plant a garden and a nice little kinzanza (a gazebo type structure). It faces five or six other houses on the compound so there are always people walking by and kids in my yard. I have a very cute cat posted down from the volunteer before me- Myo. Myo keeps the mice away and climbs in my lap in the mornings. Plus I am right down the road (well, path) from my main school. Which is nice- especially when meetings are canceled. My house is feeling more and more like a home and I seem to be handling living on my own just ok.

Ok- that is it for now- Life is pretty boring but hopefully I will have some good stories soon- keep the letters coming! I promise I will write back!!! Hope Life is well and I miss you all. Thank you for all the support.
Mwende Bulongo (travel well)
Na Natemwa (with my love)
Stevie

Blog part of a letter sent to Erin G and received 6-3-09

4-19-09

I am about to enter my final week of training and just started reading "Life Of Pi". I came across this passage and think it perfectly describes our group of trainees.

"In many ways, running a zoo is a hotel keepers worst nightmare. Consider: the guests never leave their rooms; they expect not only lodging but full board; they receive a constant flow of visitors, some of whom are noisy and unruly. One has to wait until they saunter to their balconies , so to speak, before one can clean their rooms, and then one has to wait until they tire of the view and return to their rooms before one can clean their balconies; and there is much cleaning to do, for the guests are as unhygienic as alcoholics. Each guest is very particular about his or her diet, constantly complains, and never, ever tips. To speak frankly, many are sexual deviants, either terribly repressed and subject to explosions of frenzied lasciviousness , or openly depraved, in either case regularly affronting management with gross outrages of free sex and incest. Are these the sorts of guests you would want to welcome to the inn?" pg 14

....OK, so maybe not perfect, but a pretty good description. Except the "gross outrages" are more subtle and manifest into inappropriate jokes in mixed company, or a stronger need for hugs. Both are equally scandalous acts in Zambia. There is also the similarity in the way we are watched like zoo animals. "Look, there is a new group of White People in a constructed habitat
that is made to look like their natural home. Lets watch and see how they live."
...and it makes me smile.

It is going to be hard to walk away from training. Well not really training but my training group. Sure it is nice to actually have a schedule and a defined purpose for everyday, but I have a feeling I won't really miss 4 hour language sessions, 3 hour tech, and all day medical, cultural, and admin. presentations 6 days a week. It's just the people I don't want to leave. It is always the people. My life is and has always been about the other people in it. (thus the reason I even write this blog) And somehow in only 2 months I have become ridiculously close to people here. Peace Corps plays this horrible game where you are placed in an extreme situation with a group of people and just as you are making this your family, you all are torn apart and are scattered across the country.

So here goes- I am jumping into community entry- leaving behind another family and entering a village for 23 months.

Kafwako Lukatazno
( Ain't nothin but a thang)

7.05.09 The noodles (from letter to Lauren)

I am not sure if I have mentioned this before so forgive me if I am repeating myself but - I love the kids (or noodles as Lexi has taught me and I use constantly). They are by far one of the things I love about Zambia. I think Carrie (my room mate throughout training) put it best... the kids here look like lost boys from Peter Pan. They run around barefoot, with ragged clothes in groups playing with anything they ca make into a toy. It is quite impressive actually. Old plastic bags and a bit of old string becomes a football, volley ball, cricket ball, or something to throw at smaller kids. Some twine/string, old dried corn rinds, drink cartons, tin cans -- they become make-shift cars of things to push and pull around. Since moving in I have become the newest form of entertainer. While I am walking to market little voices come screaming out of the bushes. "How-ah-you How-ah-are How-ah-you." Noodles just come and sit outside my hut watching me cook, read, wash dishes -- it never gets old. I have become their television program although this tv program smiles back and that sends them into a laughing fit. Their smiles break my heart every time. They really are just too cute to handle. Maybe in a year they will start driving me nuts but for right now Natemwa obewa bingi. I love the noodles! Stevie.

Care Packages!

hey everyone! So I am breaking the cycle and taking a few kwacha to write to everyone. Everything here is great. I am officially a volunteer!!! And am getting dropped at my site in two days- SCARY! Thank you all so much for the the kind thoughts and letters and keep[ them coming...I promise I will respond to any letters/ packages set my way. It is your best shot at getting some Zambia postage!

I have gotten a few questions about what to send me so I thought I would put up a list. Please don't feel like you have to. But if you so choose to put something in the mail, know that I will love you forever and you will probably make my life complete. If you do put a package together please don't feel like you need to get everything these are just ideas because people asked

things that I would love gettting...in no particular order
good tea
hot chocolate
candy...like sour worms, skittles, starburst etc
chocolate...in any form
your favorite baking recipes
any kind of protein that does go bad...packets of salmon, chicken, tuna, beef jerkey
magazines...like rolling stone, spin, the economist
ready spice packets...like taco/ fajita packs (not sure what those things are called but you know what I mean?)
any kind of art supplies
yarn
trail mix/nuts...I love most things trader joes comes up with
things that make water taste better...ice tea, kool aid, crystal light packets

And just because my birthday is coming up-aka if you want to send me a gift it should be in the mail by the middle of june
travel board games or games that breakdown easy
stationary
DVDs...things that you like to watch when you wnat to do nothing all day or are sick(especially tv shows...the office, grey's, arrested development...etc)

Ok that's it and really no pressure!
I'll keep the blogs coming
love you all
mushale bulongo

UFSIZ (Update From Stevie In Zambia)

Hey everyone! Below is the latest UFSIZ (Update From Stevie In Zambia)...
-Maya

Well if there is one thing both Peace Corps and the Zambian education system loves- it's acronyms. For example, currently I am a PCT (Peace Corps Trainee) in the middle of PST (PreService Training). I am in the RED program (Rural Education Development). Most of my trainings are at FTI (Farmers Training Institute). The PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer) has given me a total of 8 shots thus far and more are coming. I am about to go on my SSV (Second Site Visit) where I actually get to see where I am moving. Then hopefully after PST I will become a real PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer). Tomorrow I have interviews with the CD (Country Director), and TD (Training Director).

And that's just the beginning. The Zambian ministry of education (MOE) loves them even more! Every position has it's own acronym. Schools are broken into zones. Each zone has somewhere between 10-30 schools. In each zone, there is the ZHS (Zonal Head School), with a ZIC (Zonal Inset Coordinator), an acronym within an acronym inset (In-Service Training), and every school has an SIC (School Inset Coordinator). The ZHT, ZIC, and SIC make-up the ZEST (Zonal Educational Support Team). Then there is SPRINT (School Program for Inservice of the Term- Not sure how that one works...). SPRINT is baiscally any training or meetings for teachers. Like... a TGM (Teachers Group Meeting) or a SIMON (School Inservice and Monitoring) or a GRACE (Great Meeting at Resource Center)... And the list goes on and on- seriously that is just a few!

Now you can be a pro! I am afraid after my COS (Close of Service), I will never be able to speak in complete sentences...

Mwane!

-Stevie

Update Via Haley

I know we all miss Stevie, but how amazing is she! I’m so proud to call her friend…


LIVE from Zambia
April 3rd, 2009

Basic training schedule.

Right now I am two weeks into training. I stay in a smallish mud hut. It has a mat on the floor with my mattress on it. It is a thatched roof with garbage bags to help with the rain. I have a mattress draped in my LOVELY mosquito net at all times. I have a little window but just keep my door open so I can see and get any light in my room. I have a small stool, table and lantern. Every morning I wake up around 6:30, (two hours after the rooster, no not The Rooster), starts. My Bjmama heats up some water for my bucket bath. I have a bathing shelter that is basically an open room made of tall grass. After my bath I usually have breakfast of tea, peanut butter and some white bread or fried cornmeal. Then I have 4 hours of language-go home for lunch- then 3 hours of tech training. Thursdays and Saturdays are the only time my entire intake is together for HIV/Aids Training, as well as cultural sessions. So we have half of Saturday and Sunday off to study and do whatever.

Yesterday we threw together a game of Ultimate Frisbee and just hung around till dark. Basically, my day ends when the Sun’s gone, (around 8p) and I stay up for a bit with my flashlight, but am pretty lame and crash by 9:30p. I have training until the end of April and I think it will be a mixed blessing when it’s finally over. I am REALLY excited to cook for myself, have my own place, see and meet my community, actually be around people using the language I’m currently learning and be on my own schedule! But, this also will mean I will be totally on my own…might not have cell service and won’t see anyone from training for three months. So at this moment the training days feel like they are crawling by, but I am sure, like everything, I will miss them when they are gone.

Kaeikaipo,

Stevie

Yay! An update from the Rooster! I (Maggie, friend from Willamette) recieved this letter yesterday, and attempted to hack her account, only to find out she doesn't even have the right password for her account (really, rooster, REALLY). It is with further ado that I bestow these wonderful words upon the masses!

Friday March 13th, 2009

Currently I am sitting on my little stool watching my Bamama cut up vegetables for dinner. It is right before sundown and I can almost feel time slip by me- those last few minutes of usable light never seems long enough. The giant sky is threatening a storm and thunder is looming in the distance. But I am still not sure if rain will really fall. It is the tail end of the rainy season here and it is starting to cool off at nights- but it is a perfect 75-85 degrees during the day.....that is a guess- and hopefully soon my guesses will be in celsius!

As I switch to lamp light.....I am just finishing my third week in Zambia and my second week with my family. I will be here until the end of April (I think)....and honestly I keep waiting for the big freak-out but it hasn't happened! Life kind of just goes on....and although I am nowhere near comfortable, the unfamiliar is becoming comforting. Plus training has a very structured schedule so it just feels like what I am supposed to do. I am adjusting to the diet and minus one day of general stomach aching, I haven't gotten sick. Knock on wood- but I know my time is probably coming.

I had my first language test today. It was an oral test with two different teachers covering basic greetings, talking and asking about me/other people/ where I come from/ what I do/ what my family does/ names/ marital status, etc. Then the test my vocab on school supplies, gardening tools, food, body parts, eating utensils, illnesses and a few commands- oh and describing another person physically. Not bad for a only two weeks fo language class. I feel like I still have so much to learn and don't understand most of what my Bamama asks me but I made it through the test and I don't think they are sending me home yet ;)

Saturdays we only have half days of class. So after HIV training and then HIV training again in Kikaonde, a bunch of us usually play some kind of game at the football pitch. (**editor's note- roughly translated to SOCCER FIELD....she is so cultured!)

And really I am super excited for Sunday- we get to go into Lusaka and go to an "American" type shopping mall. Who would have ever thought I would look forward to a mall!? But it means a grocery store and I can buy fruit for the first time in weeks! ....and maybe some ice cream...... There is a fruit shortage or something in my village so an orange has become gold! Well, dinner calls......

Miss you all!

Shalaipo!

Stevie