Heavenly jam

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Instead of getting more and more settled, I am feeling more and more depressed. It is hot season and I HATE hot season here in Zambia. It seems there is no reprieve from the dry, dusty heat. No air conditioned malls or movie theaters to escape to here. This constant heat wears on me and makes me cranky.

But I feel weighed down by other things as well. Peggy, my househelp, is losing weight and wasting away before my eyes. I make banana bread for her because I know she loves it, just so that she will eat something other than mealie-meal porridge, which she says is the only thing she can eat. Her grandmother is now retired and told Peggy she is expecting her to help with the bills. Normally not one to respond, Peggy told her grandmother that this is exactly what she had been trying to do with the restaurant but the family sabotaged that effort. Now she is back to no options and the grandmother just might be starting to see the results of her actions.

Since the restaurant failed, Peggy and I have been talking about what else can be done. But it is so discouraging. The biggest problem is her family. If I give anything to Peggy, they steal it. Peggy just revealed to me that the mosquito net I bought her the first Christmas I was here, “disappeared” after only a week. None of her family members knows what happened to it, they say, which means they sold it and got a bit of cash for themselves. When she buys snacks for her daughter to take to school, her family steals them. They go through her purse and if there is even 500 Kwacha (10 cents), they will take it. That is why, she says, you must always take any money with you when you bath. The stealing and lying and slander that happens in this “Christian” family is horrible.

MEF is in a huge financial crisis. They are waiting for donor money to come in that they say was supposed to come several months ago. Meanwhile, the employees have not been paid for almost five months. They have exhausted all their resources and are getting desperate. Peter’s colleague came to work late this morning because he was out “looking for cash” which means that he was asking family for money. He needed to beg so that he and his family could make it through the weekend. A MEF housecleaner came to my door last week asking for a loan because her sister needed xrays after a miscarriage. Each employee here has many other family members who are depending on their income so there are countless people affected. I gave the housecleaner the loan, knowing that it is was actually a gift. There is no way that she will be able to repay me and that is fine. We know we are so wealthy and want to be generous. We aren’t always sure how to share but when people ask, we have to give. Peter is trying to teach his courses but there is no paper, no toner for the copiers, nothing. It’s crazy.

I thought it would be easier to transition back to our life here in Zambia, but it seems to almost be taking the same amount of time as our initial transition. Some things are easier, but emotionally it seems just as hard. I’m sure all the sickness going through our family hasn’t helped either but I don’t feel up to the challenges of living here right now.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

But life must go on and Brendan’s postponed birthday sleepover party happened Friday night. He invited four friends over: Nikhil (Zambian of Indian descent), Patric (Australian), and Garikai and Taonga (both Zambians). These guys have become good friends and it was fun to see them interact together and be goofy. Being nine year old boys, much of the humor focuses on bodily functions but even I found myself chuckling at times. Brendan really wanted to watch a movie as part of the sleepover. I found it interesting that half the group was into that idea and the other half was not. Brendan, Jason, and Patric, the ones who don’t have satellite and have limited TV time, wanted to watch. The other boys, who live in homes that have the TV constantly on, were more intrigued by board games and wanted to do that instead. We were able to work something out eventually but Brendan was a bit disappointed for awhile. Since it was so hot and the boys were full of cake and ice cream, they did not make it an early night. They were finally all asleep by 11:00 (late for my boys who are usually in bed by 7:30) and I had high hopes that they would at least sleep in until 7:00. But no, they were up at 5:30 if you can believe that. Yikes! But Brendan had a good time and felt like it was a success so that is what matters.

depression peaked Saturday night. It had been building over the last several weeks. My symptoms included playing way too many games of PacMan on my computer, only wanting to watch the TV Series “Lost,” and not feeling the euphoria of beating Peter at the game “Ticket to Ride,” which is the only other thing I was interested in doing.

Peter left early Saturday morning to catch a bus to Lusaka then turned around and drove it back to Kitwe and made it home in time for dinner. I’m sure it wasn’t a pleasant day for him, especially since it is very hot these days and the car has no air conditioning. I have been waiting so long for a vehicle, I mistakenly assumed it would be the answer to all my problems. When it finally came, instead of jumping up and down for joy, I burst into tears. The cause of the waterworks was threefold (at least):

1) It didn’t solve all my problems.

2) All I could see were the car’s faults such as lack of air conditioning (something I consider essential in 100 degree heat) and a seat belt that doesn’t work (minor compared to the AC issue but I wasn’t in the best frame of mind).

3) It brought up all the car theft memories and reminded me of what we had lost.

I knew that gratitude was in order but it wasn’t forthcoming immediately. Sunday morning I had time and space to be by myself, talk to God and get centered once again. I took a serious look at the things that were weighing me down and decided to apply some of what I have been teaching regarding anger management. Because really, I was mad at a lot of things. Many of those things, it turns out, are not in my control. Therefore, acceptance was needed in order to let it go. I looked at what things I could try to fix or change to make life here feel more bearable. For example, if I am dying for a bit of air conditioning, I could ask Max if I could just go and sit in his cool car for a bit, and I would be sure to bring a can of Doom (or Raid) with me. Better yet, Peter says he is going to work on getting the AC fixed (so that I will stop complaining, most likely). It really is a nice little white Corolla, quite similar to our stolen one (ah, the pain comes again) but I was fixated on one flaw that would make or break my happiness. And at the end of this chat with God, I felt something lifted. I no longer wished that I would suddenly be deported or that MEF would completely collapse and that we would be forced to go home. There are good things about living here, I reminded myself, but I never seem to remember them during the hot season.

In the afternoon, we went as a family for a swim at Georgi’s house. Her husband, Greg, was there too, one of the weekends he was home from his mining job that is four hours away. The four of us had a nice conversation together. Georgi and Greg have lived in Africa for many, many years and they know and understand the problems of the place but manage to be gracious and not slip into cynicism. They modeled for me another way to live here which was an encouragement. I don’t feel so capable of that balance at the moment but it is something to aim towards.

Monday, October 12, 2009

On Monday mornings I show up at Lechwe to help teach the anger management curriculum I developed. I get to teach a different class each week depending on which teacher is absent that day or which teacher would like me to talk more with their class. The children are very engaging and eager to discuss what makes them angry and how to handle it in better ways. I hear stories about certain kids who are really taking the information to heart. The head teacher was telling me about a boy in Grade 6 who has a flaring temper and has punched kids before, nearly knocking out their teeth. She saw him the other day with strange markings on the tops of his hands. When she asked him about it, he explained that it was an anger scale. When he gets mad, he stops and looks at his hands and tries to figure out how angry he is about what just happened. This seems to give him enough pause to keep him from exploding and hurting others. It is exciting for me to see the teachers and students working on this area in their lives. It is powerful when the entire primary school is learning the same things each week and helping each other to grow in their anger management. Exciting stuff!

Wednesday, October14, 2009

Towards the end of last week, we realized that Jason was not recovering from his cough and congestion. He also started complaining about an earache so we started him on antibiotics. He finished his medication now and seems to be greatly improved. Yesterday morning I took him to the dentist here in Kitwe to have a cavity filled. Usually we go to Lusaka but it was “paining” him (as they say here) and we wanted to get it taken care of sooner rather than later. An Indian man with wild henna hair fixed it right up and sent him on his way. In the afternoon, we had arranged for Thabo to come over for a playdate. We knew something was up when Jason kept saying he was tired and he didn't feel like doing anything. Georgi dropped by a bit later and checked him over. She felt around his lymph nodes and found his spleen was enlarged and guessed that he probably was getting malaria. Sure enough, two hours later he spiked a fever. We had medicine on hand so started him on it right away. I kept him home today and he was his normal active self but then crashed in the afternoon. That is a normal pattern for malaria. So at least he doesn't feel crappy all the time. He loves listening to the ipod, at the moment he is obsessed with Veggie Tales music, so that keeps him happy.

While Jason was dancing and singing to “We are the pirates who don’t do anything . . .” over and over again, I was able to spend my morning making jam. Perhaps I should be a bit more modest but I must say that I made the most fabulous jam EVER! At the market I found some rhubarb, strawberries, and a little container of raspberries. So I combined all of them and made cooked jam for the first time. I've never done cooked jam before but since I don't have any room in my freezer and rhubarb needs to be cooked, I gave it a try. I couldn’t waste a single drop so I licked the spatula and it is heavenly!!!

In addition to making jam, I am working at putting together my trauma workshop again. All my files and research was lost when our computers and back up drive were stolen. I was able to recover a few of my handouts that I had emailed to other people so that was helpful. And I have hard copies of most of my other material so I just have to re-type it into my computer and make a few changes. Next week I will be traveling to Lusaka to do the first of three Saturday workshops for an MCC partner that does Peace Clubs in secondary schools.

In the evenings, Peter and I are forcing ourselves to work on getting his dissertation back in working order. He was able to get a PDF version of his dissertation but he has to copy and paste all of that into Word so that he can make revisions. This means a lot of reformatting for him which is tedious and takes time but not the end of the world. I have volunteered to enter all his references into an Endnote program which will help him reformat his footnotes later. This too involves a lot of copy and paste time but I’m glad to help out. I too want to see this project finished. It is easier when we are both working on it, I think. It is hard for Peter to be motivated to work on something that was so close to being finished, only to be back working on it again. But the end is in sight and there is no quitting now.

Saturday, October 18, 2009

It was a busy day around the Smith household. The project that involved putting screens on our windows which was postponed after our carpenter friend died is now finally finished. We were determined to finish the job ourselves but when we returned, things were a bit busy. Plus Peter needed to get around to different hardware stores to buy supplies which proved difficult with no vehicle over the weekends. But today we managed to sand and stain the last few frames and attach the screen material. Once again, we have a cross-breeze flowing through our home. It is a hot breeze but a breeze nonetheless.

Turns out that Jason was only sick with malaria for two days and only spiked a fever once on both those days. Is it possible to build up a tolerance? Or maybe our malaria prophylactic eased the symptoms? Or maybe the fact that he started on the medication when the first fever appeared? In any case, we are thankful there was no throw up and that he was chipper and his usual self most of the time.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Peter is my hero. He fixed the broken seatbelt in the back of the car and he found a mechanic in town that repairs air conditioning units in cars. We are now driving a car that has AC, thank heavens. I know I am a spoiled brat but at least I am not a cranky spoiled brat any longer.

Lately, Brendan and Jason have not been interested in playing with the neighborhood kids. I’m not entirely sure what this is all about. They have their own adjustments to make being back in Zambia, and also suffer from being tired in the heat. An unexpected benefit is that they are enjoying each other’s company more. They still have their spats and certainly know best how to irritate each other, but they also look to each other as primary playmate. They keep busy with practicing the piano, reading, listening to music, doing homework, as well as going outside to shoot penalties on each other. We read a chapter book out loud in the evenings after they have bathed. But they were still complaining about being bored. Both love history so I came up with the idea of making a timeline. Jason, enthusiastic about everything, was eager to begin the moment I made the suggestion. Brendan was slower to accept the idea but soon realized that it could be interesting. So we taped paper together and decided to focus first on the last 300 years. The boys are eager to research different events in history and write it on the timeline. I am also learning a lot in the process, realizing how certain events piggy-backed on others and putting things in context. We don’t have internet at home so research has to be done a little at a time, looking through books we already have, finding out information in the school library, as well as me finding information on the Internet and bringing it home later. It is helpful for us to have an on-going project like this to work on together and hopefully we will also learn a lot in the process.