Alethiology (Epilogue)

alethiology (n)- the study of truth

I made a short list of the things I learned on the plane ride home. Here it is, in no particular order, with some explanation.

What Did I Learn

-Europeans aren't as sophisticated as they act. Whenever I heard the word "European," I used to immediately think: sophisticated, advanced, and refined; I assumed all European people embodied these attributes. However, I had never been in close contact with people actually from Europe, just emigrants and descendants. My European roommates, behind the doors of our flat, were just as foul, careless, and rude as the people in the dorms on American college campuses. They did not think about resource use, taking interminable showers, blatantly refusing to recycle, and driving cars everywhere when it would have been easier to walk. They did not consider the consequences of their actions, like playing techno music at 3 in the morning or leaving towels in heaps on a wet bathroom floor. I know these were just the four people whom with I had contact. It certainly shifted my prior perception of the utopia that is European life.

-American culture has a global presence. Why? Why do people throughout Sub-Saharan Africa listen to our pop radio, watch our embarrassingly bad comedies, and know more about our political system than Americans themselves? American media is broadcast just about all around the world, giving people in other countries a skewed lens of what it is like to live in the U.S. Coca Cola is probably the most popular soft drink in the world. I knew it was widespread but I didn't know how pervasive it was nor how it inundates (figuratively) entire communities. My understanding is that people in South Africa, at least, if not in the rest of the world, see the people of the U.S. as rotund, lazy, gluttons who garishly drive our gas-guzzling S.U.V.s to menial jobs that allow us to live in whatever decadent manner we choose. My friend described the U.S. as a veritable land of milk and honey, where people don't have to work for what they have and subsequently don't value their abilities, possessions, or freedoms. Thankfully, he said I helped shift his perception somewhat.

-I've had it so unbelievably amazing with regards to education, safety, sanitation, parenting, infrastructure, hunger, healthcare, and especially love. I had a solid education from my public school without my parents having to pay exorbitant school fees. My parents helped supplement my education and fueled my curiosity and my passions. My parents were able to pay for me to attend a four-year university and learn about a subject that I find fascinating, not just one that I think will make me employable. Although I'm sure my parents did, I have never worried about going out alone at night. I never have to wonder if I will have access to electricity, water, or passable roads. I have never had to wonder if the water coming from the tap was clean enough to drink. I have never been hungry, except for by choice. I have not begun to think about life without my parents' presence. I can afford, through my parents' generosity, the medicine I need and doctors to take care of me. I speak the dominant language of my country. I have people who love me, both out of familial obligation and of their own volition. I will never, ever forget the crushing loneliness that accompanies the knowledge that no one in your hemisphere loves you and your home, with open, unconditionally loving arms, is half a world away.

-It's far too easy to just be complacent. Whether it is vacation planning or political regimes, it takes effort to speak up when something is important. A phrase I heard so often in South Africa was, "it's just one of those things, hey?" in response to the latest tragedy, injustice, or scandal. The supermarket being out of your favourite flavour of yogurt is 'just one of those things.' Police forces shooting at peaceful protestors or millions of people living in squalor cannot be 'just one of those things.' If we allow ourselves to accept such atrocities as constant, given factors, they will never change. Yes, change is hard. Yes, the bad things in the world can be overwhelming in their abundance and severity. We cannot be content to sit back and let other people try to sort their problems out at the same time they struggle for basic survival. Those with privilege and power, which is anyone who can identify with the statements in the above paragraph, must speak up. And with regards to the vacation planning, life is short; we only have so many chances to do the things we dream about; opportunities should be seized when they are present and created when they are not. I didn't see any baobab.

-My education is preparing me for a life as a world citizen.The South African university system focuses on training people who will be successful in their chosen fields. By contrast, the U.S. higher education system focuses on people who are well-versed in their discipline but also broadly introduced to the basics of many other subjects. A scientist needs to know a little bit about economics and politics just like an artist should know about physiology and history. My fellow students back in the U.S. were more rounded and socially conscious because of the interdisciplinary nature of our education.

-Diversity is detrimental when integration is missing. South Africa describes itself as "the rainbow nation." While I did personally see the beauty and the majesty of so many cultures, languages, and mindsets in South Africa, I learned the hard way that the presence of many different peoples does not equate to the harmonious cohabitation of these peoples. For example, South Africa has eleven national languages, which sort of implies that each language has equal importance in the eyes of the government. However, take road signs: warnings and important information is printed in either English or Afrikaans. Someone who doesn't speak either of those languages would be lost. Of course, I'm not saying that different cultures should abandon their identities in order to form a more cohesive whole (although it would, arguably, make communications easier). What I am saying is that any entity, be it a family, university, or nation that claims to value diversity needs to ensure that each contingent part of the whole is equally represented and that no one group is given more weight than any other. Also, different peoples need to know about each other, the basic tenets of the various cultures, such that neither alienation nor assimilation need occur. Only when this delicate balance is achieved will the whole become whole, one unified collection of many disparate, though not disjointed, parts.

-A little kindness goes a long way. This one is simple, self-explanatory, and vastly important.

-What I want with my life slightly narrowed. This is a very good thing, although it is slight. I now know that I want to pursue a career in conservation biology and that I want to continue on to earn my Master's degree to fully grasp the scientific methodology necessary for a position in this field that is fighting an uphill battle, so to speak. Like so many freedom fighters before me, I have stumbled across the idea to which I am prepared to devote my life: Homo sapiens is just another species inhabiting the multitude of ecosystems present on the planet. Our population has grown in numbers and intelligence such that we are destroying our co-earthlings, and at faster and faster rates. Therefore, some humans have to take the initiative to protect the species and their habitats that are in danger of disappearing, in the speediest and most efficient way possible.

-An identity as a woman and as an American. Augh, this is an experience that I find hard to explain. As I mentioned earlier, I know what Americans are thought of by other peoples from other nations. Thus, I was able to define myself in the context of what I know of my American life and what other people assume happens within American borders. Sort of? Similarly, I became hyper-aware of myself as a woman in South Africa. People were always telling me, oh, it's dangerous for a girl to do that, to go there, etc. I spent many hours thinking about why South Africa is like this, why it has the highest rape rate in the world, why women are still treated as inferior to men. Here's my theory: during WWII in the U.S., women stood up to the jobs that men had performed before they were drafted off to foreign battlefronts. When the men returned, they found women perfectly capable of doing the industrial, labor intensive, or managerial jobs they had abandoned for the war. After this period, women were more accepted in the workplace and began to be treated more like their male co-workers. In South Africa, only a small number of men were drafted to the U.K.'s war efforts, not making space for women in the workplace until the equality laws of post-Apartheid South Africa were enforced. Anyway, I felt like my freedoms were restricted as a woman living in South Africa. Returning to the U.S., I have reclaimed those freedoms and treasured them like never before.

I have this idea that as we move through life, we are constantly learning. Some of the things we learn are factual, and they are truths that we add to our working knowledge of the world. Some of the things we learn are so deeply and staggeringly resonant that they must be integral to to the working of the world; this is the Truth. It is universal. It is whole. It is the fabric of being. It is perfect. We can only learn the Truth by exposing ourselves to as much of life as possible. I sit comfortable with the feeling that studying abroad in South Africa helped me add to my tiny understanding of the Truth.

Hypnopompic

hypnopompic (adj)- of or relating to the partially conscious state that precedes complete awakening from sleep

Returning home was waking from the dream. I had that feeling the whole plane ride home- where the reality of the waking world taps lightly at the periphery of your dream. Every familiar accent, every Starbucks cup, every hushed echo of the words "San Francisco" coursing through the plane reminded me of the life I had forgotten. When we finally landed and I was joyously reunited with my exuberant family, it was just the same as struggling to keep your eyes open after you first wake up. I forced myself to remember, Oh yes! The sky is soft and grey in San Francisco. This is winter; the air is crisp. This is the car and I sit on this side when I'm not driving and we drive on that side of the road. I had to explain it to myself in order to understand. It was similarly surreal walking into our house, smelling and hearing all those details I had missed for almost a whole year. As disruptive, consuming, and ineffective as our furnace is, I love its unique din.

As time passed, I slowly eased back into my former life like easing into a hot bath. At first, I just wanted to tell stories, show pictures, and pass around trinkets. My family had work and school, though, so I spent some time resting and thinking.

Walking into the grocery store was an ordeal. Every time I went shopping, I was curiously reminded of the comforts of home that I had lived without, somehow. Simultaneously, I was crestfallen to search for the products I had become accustomed to and not find them. Even still! I wake up craving Ouma Rusks, some custard for my peaches, gem squashies, tennis biscuits, or a granadilla. Sigh.

If you've never had one of these, you have no idea what you're missing.

After about a week of being home, it already felt like the past ten  months had been a dream, a hair-pin loop, a detour from the course of my previously scheduled life. It was so easy to file the entire experience away and focus on living in the present. Once the hymnopompic gauze fades and you decide to really get up and actually keep your eyes open, the rest of your body adjusts, right? I focused on finishing up my degree, on family, on my friendships, and on my neglected relationship.

Once you are immersed in a dream, as confused and nonsensical as it may be, you roll with it. You can hardly do otherwise. Moving to South Africa was a serious departure from from my waking consciousness and the body of information that was my understanding of the world. Like the foreignness of a strange dream, I had to be open minded, flexible, and also careful of my new world. Being back in the warm swaddle of familiarity, I am back in my element, come full circle to the place where I started.

And yet.

And yet, everyday I am back in South Africa. I hear a bird call and think, wait, was that a goose or a hadeda? I see plants whose names I did not know before but that I now recognize as South African natives. I think, the sun feels strange today; has it always been so weak? I hear a song that came out last year and I am transported to the minbus where I heard it for the first time. I see a movie poster and think of the fabulous date on which I saw it. Every time someone talks about the operating system Ubuntu, I am caught off-guard.

How could it not be dream, with this terrible monster roaming the streets?

I am restored to familiarity. I am not back in my context, however, because my context has been forever altered by what I learned when I lived abroad.

Abecedarian

abecedarian (n): a person who is learning the alphabet or a beginner in any field of learning (and much to my enjoyment, you pronounce it: ay-bee-cee-dahr-ee-uhn)

One of the most powerful, educational, and meaningful experiences I had while in Mzansti was the privilege and responsibility of volunteering at Pendla Primary School in New Brighton. In Port Elizabeth you can always feel the presence of poverty, of people left behind in the glorious wave of peaceful revolution that was to reform and uplift South Africans. That presence is easy enough to ignore. One can dismiss the occasional beggar or disheveled person lying in the street. That was not so in New Brighton, one of P.E.’s townships. It was painfully evident that every member of the community was straining just to get by. The people are all black, predominantly Xhosa, and largely impoverished. 

Lunchtime at Pendla. A simple meal of beans, pap, and some meat, served in plastic containers from tupperware to pencil boxes.

My job was to step in to this foreign community, just for a few months, and endeavor to throw a cog in the cycle of poverty: education. Because of England and the United States’ global presence, business, politics, and education are conducted in English. Unfortunately, by speaking only their native tongues, the Xhosa youth are disadvantaged from the start. We were simply to improve the English skills of these abecedarians by practicing reading from story books and primers (government written and distributed, of course). 

The school’s education wasn’t making much of a difference, evidently to me. Even with a passionate, devoted teacher, a class ratio of 40 third-years to one teacher is impossible. And passionate or devoted are not words I would have used to describe any of Pendla’s teachers. I saw these women tell their students to go outside to play while they sat inside, toying with their cell phones (iifowuni). I saw a first-year teacher leave her class unattended while they were supposed to be learning to come take silly pictures with us on one of our breaks (What? What are you thinking?). The teachers don’t call their classes in from the breaks when the bells don’t ring (Why don’t the bells ring consistently?). The school didn’t have the money to pay a salary swollen enough to persuade competent, skilled teachers to work in New Brighton. No worth teachers were willing to work in a dangerous, challenging environment for little pay, at least not for the long term. Money. Tsk tsk. These children who had so little of their own and were deserving of so much, were dealt a cruel hand that worked to keep them from succeeding. 

The spare classroom

So, for three hours a week, several of the international students would take a taxi out to New Brighton (about a twenty minute ride), pull half of the 40 third-years out of class, divide them into groups of 4-6, and try to find somewhere quiet to read with them. We could sit outside if it was not raining or too windy. We could sit inside an empty cinder block classroom with broken chairs and a threadbare rug if the weather was poor. We used the same primers full of simple stories every week. I can still quote them from memory even now: “Vuyo loves to read...,” “My sister Aisha is perfect…,” “We are going to build a treehouse…” I began to wonder if, like me, the student simply memorized the banal stories. I would supervise their behavior, correct them when they read words incorrectly, try to talk through the themes of the story, and get to know them as best as I could. 

A huge challenge was that all the students were at different reading levels. Some were fluent in English because they had an English-speaking parent at home. To these few, our weekly reading corner was a tedious task that was just slightly more enjoyable than being reprimanded (or ignored) by their teacher. For others, English was an ocean to their desert island. The words “the” and “an” were road blocks. We also had no idea whether English itself was the problem or simply reading. Because I had a smattering of Xhosa, I was popular with some of the less English-inclined students. They could not believe that a white woman, an American nonetheless, was able to speak their language. They would ask me question after question in Xhosa with a high-pitched note of incredulity, with amazed smiles when I would provide the answers.

In just a few hours a week over the course of a semester, I learned so much from the children of Pendla Primary that I became the abecedarian. I’ll share the most memorable and meaningful lessons.

-No matter the resources available, nothing educates better than a good teacher.

-Children can’t focus on learning when their bellies are empty, their teeth ache from unattended decay, and their feet are poking out of their too-tight, worn-out shoes.

-Children also can’t focus on learning when they fear judgment by their peers for their scholastic shortcomings. These children could be so harsh to one another. Nothing could fix that look on Mihlali’s face when another student said, “This one, teacha, she doesn’t read English.”

-Don’t assign your background to a member of a foreign culture. I incorrectly assumed, at first, that these children had the same upbringing as I had: books to read at home, parents at home to take care of them, and people who encouraged them to read. Heck, some of these children did not even have permanent shelters to call home. I simply could not relate but I was never more grateful for my own childhood then after visiting Pendla each week.

-Lastly, don’t assume that the pattern of the past must be the way of the future. One boy, Washu, I think, had significant trouble reading even simple English words. He was laughed at by his peers and sheepishly shrugged off their taunting. When break time came and the children were sent outside, Washu stayed in the library with the tin roof and bare dirt floor and asked if he could stay to read with us. He read the same four-page story over and over again until he was confident he was pronouncing the new words correctly.

Isithembiso (left) and Asiphe (right)

I have a multitude of meaningful, silly, and heart-wrenching stories from my time with these children but I’ll sign off with this message: the reading corner at Pendla was an awakening, sobering, trying, hope-granting experience that changed the way I see the world permanently.

Penultimate(s)

penultimate (adj)- next to the last

I left South Africa on 30 November 2012. It has nearly been an entire year since I returned. Since it has not quite been a year, I am going to take advantage of the time left to finish this blag. I have three more pieces that I have written over the course of this year that I will post in the coming weeks. If there were a word that meant fourth to last, I would use it as the title for this post. I think I need the closure that will come with having "finished" this, even though I am still learning from my experiences. It is one less loose end dangling in my memory.

Just to keep you (yes, all three of you who are still interested in my blatherings) aware of what is to come.

Diapason

Diapason (n)- a full, rich outpouring of melodious sound. 

I wrote this a few weeks ago but thought I would share it now that I have had time to type it up. 

I attended a memorial lecture honoring Stephen Bantu Biko last night. The event was hosted jointly by CANRAD, NMMU’s Center for the Advancement of Non-Racialism and Democracy and AZAPO, the Azanian People’s Organization. Azania refers to the land stretching down from East Africa, basically Sub-Saharan Africa. It’s interesting to see a center for non-racialism and the former Black Consciousness Movement operating together. Does “non-racialism” imply anti-racism, which implies an ownership of racial identity by oppressed groups? I was always under the impression that Steve Biko’s work with promoting Black Consciousness was rejecting the white status quo to reject “Blackness.” That doesn’t seem to mesh so well with non-racialism. Indeed, the entire student/staff body was invited to the event, multiple times, but the vast majority of the attendees were AZAPO members. I was one of four white people in an auditorium full of people. It bothers me that since I have been living here, I have a tendency to take a inventory of the represented groups. Not specifically racial groups, but genders, languages, nationalities, whether people wear glasses or not. I first thought it was a reaction to South Africa’s significantly different racial composition but maybe I am simply trying to learn about the nation’s people. I remember in high school history class answering the question “How many races are there?” with “One: human.”However, people here are much attached, defining themselves by their racial/ethnic/cultural groups. The number of races is pretty much set: Black, White, Coloured, Indian. Race and differences between races are just too important to the history here, I suppose. People don’t want to separate themselves from their past struggles or achievements to embrace unity and justice. People should in no way abandon their unique cultural traditions or languages but the animosity seen sometimes is staggering to me. I have been told, “Oh, no, Zulus hate Xhosas,” “Oh, it’s because he’s Shaangaan. Nobody likes the Shangaan,” “I’m not African. I’m South African,” and “I’m not Khoi; I’m not San. I’m not that African. I’m more Griqua [I can’t pronounce your Xhosa last name].” 

                I have noticed that it sometimes looks as though people segregate themselves according to race but what is actually happening is quite different. Even though English is the language of business, politics, and higher education in South Africa, almost no one’s first language is English. People learn to speak English as they grow up but speak a variety of other languages at home. Even for one who is fluent in another language, using the first language is probably more comfortable. If there are others around who speak your home language, you are going to gravitate towards them to be able to better communicate. It just so happens that native Xhosa speakers have dark skin while native Afrikaans speakers have lighter skin. I have no idea to what extent this factor divides people but language is definitely the segregating factor in my classes at the university. It’s actually a bit frustrating because in group settings, the people who speak the same languages will be talking to one another and those like me, who do not speak Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu, or any other represented language, are left out of the loop. This is a difficult issue: surely having a variety of language groups is indicative of a thriving diverse community. Suppression of the speaking of native languages was a policy of the Apartheid government. The problem is that the people are literally not speaking the same language; how can they communicate with one another? Can a community exist without communication? If not, the result is sub-communities still segregated along the lines of language and, unintentionally, race as well. 

Anyways, at the event, I was slightly concerned that I wouldn’t be welcome as a white person at a Black Consciousness Movement event. It’s like one day when my Momma asked me as I said I enjoyed a song that talked about Jesus, “What does it mean to you?” It means I stand in solidarity with the struggle of the past that is still quite evidently unresolved today. It means I recognize Steve Biko’s work, his morals, his courage and his power and that I denounce the injustices of the era when he fought. Of course, no one paid me (or my skin color) any attention. The nice guy sitting next to me thought I was afraid of all the Black people (he told me so) and he thought it was funny that I didn’t understand any of the Xhosa being spoken. I suppose I was a little overwhelmed but I was never scared.  

Something that I have noticed being here is that Black speakers are very long-winded. They take a long time to say what they mean. The most proficient speakers take long, almost excruciating pauses in the middle of their sentences to heighten the drama between clauses (if you don’t believe me, watch a YouTube video of one of Jacob Zuma’s speeches). I was not all that impressed with the event’s keynote speaker. He spoke about the inadequacies of today’s political leadership in contrast to that of Biko’s time, mostly criticizing the current government. Everyone knows the country, the continent, the whole world has problems. This professor (Comrade Mosala) offered no solutions to the predicament and in no way connected the problems with AZAPO’s cause except for saying that AZAPO was better than the ANC.  How can this possibly mesh with Biko’s ideas of power through unity? In the question section, someone asked what the solution to our problems is and he replied with, “I cannot tell you the answers. To find them, you must go out and try to die, like Biko did. It is your time to die.” While I appreciated the sentimentalism, I did not really care for the sentiments. I though South Africa was past that point? That we would stand for no more death in the name of freedom? I suppose the Marikana events of late indicate otherwise. The Prof said he had prepared an end to his talk that praised the future of humanity in light and in respect of Biko’s legacy but that he felt entirely unjustified in delivering it given the deaths at Marikana. 

The part of the talk that was the most captivating was his personal experience with Biko and his leadership. After having been arrested with six of his comrades for a political demonstration, Biko asked to see Mosala specifically and apparently criticized him: if you are only seven people, no matter if you have right ideas, you are not a being a leader. A leader is nothing without followers (or something to that effect). Unfortunately, the rest of the speech was wholly unremarkable. The best part of the event for me was hearing the protest songs being sung by the AZAPO members. Everyone was standing up, clapping, swaying, and rocking in time to the diapason of deep bases and soulful altos. At the end, we sang N’kosi Sikelel’ iAfrika and I felt quite proud to be standing there, with my ‘a’ shape fist in the air, singing along. It’s an old hymn turned resistance song turned national anthem, creating unity out of disparity. But then, even still, some Afrikaner folk only sing the parts in English and Afrikaans because they haven’t bothered to learn the words in the other languages. Even still, I felt like an imposter perching in the precipice of integration not diving into the pool. I read Khabzela (finally) last week and the author brought up a point that I often think but don’t see reflected in South African culture: sometimes eclecticism can be counterproductive. People trying to work together, live together, and create a unified, peaceful country together aren’t privileged to the same background, aren’t raised with the same values or goals. How can they be communicating? Why weren’t there more white folk at that event? Integrating such diversity into a functional whole is a hefty challenge South Africa is facing. 

The week before, Stephen and I went to the NMMU choir presentation as per my request and his reluctance. When the choir came on, they started singing in such a diapason that I couldn’t help the tears from running down my cheeks. “THIS,” I thought, “is the Africa I have been looking for.” I started to realize that the glorious, unified image South Africa portrays to the rest of the world is a careful façade, a show. The choir was just as comfortable with medieval German  as new South Africa. Sure, people are living together, sharing equal rights but the temporary celebration of freedom has fun out. The rejoicing is over and people are wondering when, if at all, their problems will be solved by the “New South Africa.” The beauty and grace of tradition integrated with modernity, of Mama Africa, is a poetic myth. I was quite naïve to think otherwise. We left the concert with Stephen bearing a pained look of “I told you so” and I feeling more disappointed in this country than ever. I though South Africa could, was going to, teach the world a thing or two about reconciliation. Until the AZAPO event, it seemed a farce. Now, I think: where things are moving forward, where problems are being solved, that spirit of Africa is absent. Where the spirit of Africa is, progress isn’t. I don’t know why.

Recapitulate

Recapitulate (v)- to review by a brief summary, as at the end of a speech or discussion; summarize.

When you don’t write for so long, it’s hard to start again because there are so many things to be said that one doesn’t know where to start. Excuses if there is no logical, even chronological flow in whatever follows.

I haven’t been writing for so long because… I dunno, really. I was extraordinarily busy with school for a few months, that’s one reason. Also, the internet at our house was down for most of a month, with intermittent periods of regular internet access. That has been an interesting exercise in time and resource management. I also sort of lost interest in writing. It felt like a chore more than a constructive activity. I reactivated my Facebook account so I could more easily communicate with people but it seems all I do is a fair bit of lurking. 

So, to recapitulate the past few months: 

What have I been up to… I became SCUBA certified. I had moderate success with my exams. I had four distinctions and one equivalent of a B+. The B+ was in my honours class, the exam for which was an 8 hour writing session. I'm happy with my marks. I had a wonderful vacation in July; my grandmother, mother, and sister came to visit. We went around P.E., to Cape Town, the Kruger area, and Johannesburg too. It was really an eye-opening experience for all of us. Seeing and meeting people from different parts of the country was rather humbling. We also had incredible animal encounters. It would probably take three pages to list all we saw at the game reserves we visited. My favorites were elephants trumpeting at the riverside, a civet, a group of white rhinos grazing in the sunset, and a pack of African wild dogs with their puppies. This trip also helped show me how much I had changed in the last few months. I felt very apart from my American family but still totally distanced from South African people as well. Identity changes with knowledge and experience, I suppose, along with convictions and beliefs. 

University started back up at the end of July. I had a module on evolution which took us on a fossil hunting excursion to the Karroo! That was amazing. No therapsids (mammal-like reptiles) were found by the class, but I found a trilobite pygostyle, some Glossopteris leaf imprints, and some casts of ancient brachiopods. My paleontologist dreams from my early life were coming true. We were also treated to San and Khoi rock art, a trip to Nieu-Bethesda to see the famous Owl House, and some of the best goat cheese I have ever eaten in my life. Wow. 

Can you look closely and see the rock art in the back?

The Owl House. I'll tell you all about it sometime.

Kompasberg from Ganora Farm, in the Karroo

What else… the weather has been right dreadful. As I write, the rain has been pouring non-stop for two days straight, with no indications of cessation anytime soon. I have spent many days hanging out watching movies and ‘scratching around on the internet,’ to borrow a phrase from my friend Stephen. I did an ecology project on hermit crabs; I wrote a massive project on the evolution of sex-determining mechanisms in reptiles and gave a presentation on this fascinating (bold= sarcasm) topic in front of the assembled zoology department; I extracted and sequenced frog DNA as a part of a larger biogeographic study on Strongylopus grayii, the clicking stream frog. I saw a pod of dolphins and a pod of whales. I saw a chameleon on my way to school on my birthday! Stephen took me to a reptile collector’s place where we held giant reticulated pythons (sorry, we didn’t take pictures) and we saw black mambas (eeek!). I’m reading copiously. I’m still volunteering somewhat regularly at the penguin rehabilitation center. Oh! I'm also volunteering teaching reading at a township school. I'll definitely talk more about that later.

 

For now, I’m mostly trying to enjoy the time here without worrying too much because home is little more than a month away. Although the end of the year is approaching quickly, this has been the longest year of my life, I think. Time has never been so reluctant to cooperate with me. Under expected circumstances, I would have wanted the year to go by slowly so that I could enjoy each moment to the fullest.  In actuality, I never foresaw how much I would miss the comfort of home. The familiarity, yes, but mostly the sensation that I know what to expect of the coming day and that the people I love the most are within arm’s reach.

I don’t know that with my knowledge of this year I would make the same choice to study abroad. I have made many mistakes and experienced some great sorrows. That being said, this has been an enlightening experience. The fact that it wasn’t a wholly positive lesson does not diminish its importance as a learning experience. I keep using that word. I know now that as much as I would like to volunteer with the Peace Corps in my future life, I am not a strong enough person to go on my own. I’m not giving up on that dream, just altering it slightly. At some point, I’ll make a list of everything I have learned this year. I do that every year, usually at the end of the school year but this year will be especially poignant. A recapitulation of this year, in one liners. I think that will explain the lessons I learned but leave out the nuances of the year, which I'm fine in keeping for now.