November Potpourri

Hello Dear Readers - almost a month has gone past without a post on our blog. We had a bunch of technical problems with our internet connection which pretty much prevented us from posting anything, but that seems to be behind us now, so we will do our best to catch up.

Lusaka Halloween - this is a very, very late entry. We didn't really celebrate Halloween here, but we did carve a "pumpkin", well, it's a watermelon. Someone emailed us and demanded a picture, so here it is.

Oooh, the worlds scariest (and tastiest) jack-o-lantern

Teaching Systems Administrators - I (John) have just finished teaching some of the staff at our partner schools and the ISP partner in basic systems administration for the Linux computer systems we have installed in the schools. Despite being eight or nine years old the computers are performing pretty well, but when they do break, the schools always call me. This training is an attempt to get the schools to be more self sufficient, to be able to create and delete accounts on their own, to set up printers and so on. We had eight students for eight classes and it went pretty well. Some students were very quick on the uptake, but everyone seemed to have a good time. We'll see how effective the course was by how well the computers keep running.

The happy students

Team Meeting - One of the great things about MCC in Zambia is that we have regular team meetings. It's great to get together with all the far flung MCC volunteers, this year there are more than ever with the Smith family working up in Kitwe. This time, after a day and a half of meetings we went to "Adventure City", which is Lusaka's (and probably Zambia's) only water slide park. Everyone had a great time.

It's all downhill from here

Putting up the Christmas Tree - Christmas trees are really not available around here. Christmas time is the right time for mangoes, avocados, lychees and guavas, not pine trees. However, friends of ours are in the US for Christmas and lent us their fake tree for the season. Erin and Kristina had a great time putting it up, and now we have a lovely fake tree, and no needles on the floor.

We have to figure out where the branches go....

Tada!

Coming Events: We are looking forward to our big MCC Southern Africa regional retreat starting next weekend. Our friends Dave and Ruth and their two boys are coming out mid December and we will be taking a trip to Zanzibar with them - we are also very much looking forward to that. December will be very busy!

Camping - Zambian style

So, the provocative title of this blog is somewhat misleading, as it turns out that Zambian camping and Canadian camping have a lot of similarities. Read on to find out more.

Two weeks ago we spent a weekend with a bunch of families from our church at a place called Nsobe about 300 km north of Lusaka. It was a nice, relaxing weekend without any schedule to follow.

The big difference from Canadian camping is that Nsobe is a game park, and there were three giraffe near our campsite and a few kinds of different antelope too. We (John) went for a run and ran right past a bunch of rare sable antelopes! Our campsite was right at the edge of a little lake and we did some canoeing, swimming and just general hanging out.

Hanging out at the lake,

canoeing - just like in Canada,

and hiking

Our second night there was the official start to the rainy season in that area and after not having any rain for over 6 months, there was a good long downpour for a couple of hours which resulted in some puddles in our tents but our beds stayed dry for the most part. We felt that this part of the weekend was a lot like some of our other soggy Canadian camping experiences. Fortunately, the poolside restaurant had a very large thatched roof so we were all able to hang out there during the rain and have our suppers there, and the next day dawned sunny and warm and everything dried out pretty well.

A nice swim after lunch

The drive home, a view of prairie fields out of the window while the kids sleep in the back seat- just like in Canada

We (Charlene) are still not convinced that we're cut out for regular camping excursions but once in awhile it can be a nice get away.

A Season of Lasts - by Charlene

Even though we are still in our first year here in Zambia, we are in our last year of service with MCC so every season from now on is the last one we will experience here in Africa. We’ve begun talking about going home (next July) and the things we’ll miss about Zambia. One of the physical attributes of Zambia that we love is all of the blooming trees. We are just at the end of Jacaranda season now and I seem to have missed the perfect photo opportunity on that one but there are still a few of the beautiful lilac coloured flowers left here and there.

We are in the peak of the season for the Flamboyant tree which is also known as the Flame tree because of its firey colour. It seems the whole city has erupted into this glorious colour…

Our mulberry tree is giving much more fruit than we can handle but we’ve made some wonderful milkshakes, pavlova and some jam that turned out to be syrup.

Mango season is just ahead and it’s promising to be a good one.

How do we cool off in the heat? Nice cold watermelon, another one of our local crops. We bought our first watermelon of the season on the side of the road on the way to Kitwe last week and then we immediately bought another in the Kitwe vegetable market with our colleague Cheryl.

Happy Independence Day! Today is the day 43 years ago that Zambia gained its independence from the British. To celebrate, the girls’ school had a Parade of Nations assembly where each person dressed in attire from their home country. There are 48 nations represented by the student body and 15 nations represented by the teachers, it is truly the International School of Lusaka.

Three Canadian girls: Erin, Danica and Katrina.

Tree Tops Photos

We were able to get over 200 photos of Erin's school trip from some of the teachers (see previous blog). We'll just share a few:

This is both of the Year 6 classes and teachers on the trip.

This pod of hippos were right in front of their picnic spot.

When elephants start flapping their ears and charging towards you it's not a good sign.

On a walking safari with a guide - yes, the gun is loaded.

It appears that this dead hippo had a heaping helping of grass for its last supper. The kids returned at night to watch 18 lions enjoying a big dinner.

The mama lion watched over the dead hippo until dinner time.

Still playing netball...

This weekend Erin had a netball tournament, Erin blogged about netball when we were in South Africa but for those who missed it, netball is like basketball without the backboard and without any dribbling. Basically, the ball gets passed up and down the court and the players play specific positions in different zones based on the position stated on their pinnie - Wing Attack and Wing Defense were the two positions that Erin played this weekend. Some of the other teams had much bigger kids and they had played together much longer but they all had fun. Here are some pics:

This is one very HOT kid!
The temp was actually about 35 degrees in the shade - unfortunately the girls weren't playing in the shade.

An enthusiastic fan...
Danica actually just finished reading the new Harry Potter book - for the third time!

What do Kids want? - By John

This afternoon I visited George compound to interview a bunch of kids about what their needs are. Chisomo, one of our MCC partners, is thinking of starting an outreach ministry in this area of town, and instead of barging in and telling people what they would do for them, they decided to take the more thoughtful approach and ask what people wanted instead, and this is where I was helping out. George compound is a pretty poor part of town, poor even in the standards of the local slums. There is no running water anywhere, no sewerage, and limited and sporadic electricity, so if you want to find poverty it's a pretty good place to start looking.

A couple of weeks ago we interviewed the ladies of the community to ask for their feedback, and it was pretty interesting. What they wanted was consistent and inexpensive food and access to education for their children, all other things coming in a distant second. Of course, all this boils down to having monetary resources. We were wondering if the children would feel the same way, so we set out to a local church for our meeting.

I was expecting about thirty kids to show up, instead we had over 80, from four or five year olds to sixteen year olds. It was pretty noisy when we got there, but it was fun talking to the children, luckily I had an interpreter with me.

The children were happy to participate

After a good question and answer period a few interesting observations emerged. While most of the kids have regular meals, most of them also miss a day of meals quite regularly, perhaps as often as once a week. Most of them don't eat three meals a day, two is more likely. They all LOVE nshima, but they all love biscuits (cookies) even more, so this confirms that they are like children all over the world. They also all want to go to school, but many are prevented by poverty. In theory, Zambian government schools are free, but there are additional school fees levied by the Parent Teacher Associations for things like books which become an effective barrier to education for someone without money. There is also the problem that there are not enough spaces in the government schools for everyone, so the solution that emerges is community schools, which are outside the government system and run for profit or as a cooperative enterprise. Community schools charge a tuition, so if you can't afford it, you can't attend. It's pretty tough to hear a twelve year old talking about wanting to attend school but not being able to because they can't afford the uniform or the notebooks required.

It might be 35c outside,
but what this girl wants is to wear her fuzzy pink toque

After the meeting we gave the kids a soft drink and a pack of biscuits, they were pretty happy!

Hooray for soft drinks and biscuits!

... and hooray for a better Internet Connection!

We have been very blessed by working out a deal for a new internet connection at our house. One of our partners working on the community school computer project is a local Internet Service Provider (ISP), and in a kind of "you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" deal we got hooked up a few days ago, what a difference. I'm happy to reciprocate by helping to set up software and do some training, which is part of the project. A big thanks to Nick and the crew at iConnect!

Ndine munthu, sindine nyama! by Charlene

I have completed my two week course and I have been thoroughly initiated into the ways of the Zambian people. The course was really excellent and it covered topics such as Zambian history, culture, economics, traditional religion, the judicial system, the role of chiefs in today’s society and much more. Most of the topics had guest speakers who were experts in their field making it very interesting.

The course also included daily language training. Zambia has 12 official languages so most communications are done in English but I wanted to learn a few of the basics in Nyanga (nee-AN-ja). When I go on my morning walks and when I shop at the market I have been greeting local people with “Mwauka bwanji?” (mwa-OOO-ka BWA-ngee) which is always met with surprise, a smile and sometimes laughter. It seems that not many muzungus (white people) take the time to learn any local language. I think of it as bringing joy to someone’s day. Just like yesterday when Siggi passed me on the road and gave me a huge bunch of bananas still on the stem. I turned to carry them back home and there were a group of Zambians who actually pointed and shouted out loud “A muzungu carrying bananas!” Apparently it was terribly funny. Anyway, the language training was good but I couldn’t get my head around all of the phrases. The expression in the title of this blog is “I am a person, I am NOT an animal!” It was one of the first phrases we learned but I haven’t found occasion to use it but just in case the question arises, I’m ready for it!

We had a couple of outings as part of the course and meeting Christine was one of the most inspirational moments. This Scottish family moved here on business (she is a doctor and he is an accountant) and they have a tremendous heart for the street kids. To make a long story short, they started by inviting the street kids over for Sunday dinner and gave them an opportunity to bathe, wash their clothes, swim in their pool and have a nice big meal and that has developed over a couple of years to them now having 44 street kids living in their home with them! They send all of the school age kids to private school and they also teach the boys carpentry, welding, farm management and she has recently started a catering and baking business to teach more skills to her household. A completely amazing and inspirational family that has changed the future of these children forever.

Christine in her converted garage which is now a bedroom for 14 boys.