I might jump around a bit in the time-scale, but I wanted to fill you in on a couple of other things I've been experiencing here.
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda is taking place in Arusha right now. It doesn't cost anything to go watch, and it's walking distance from our hostel (Arusha isn't a very big city). Several of us went the day after we got back from the Safari. I don't actually know a lot about the Genocide, but it sounds to me like the tribunals will be going on for hundreds of years due to the sheer number of accuseds. We turned in our IDs, signed in on a very unprofessional-looking paper notebook with ruler-drawn columns, gave any cameras or recording devices we were carrying, and went through the security check. Once we got to the sitting room we would be watching from, we signed in again, received a headset set to English translation, and sat behind windows showing the room that was supposed to be the courtroom. I expected it to look more like a courtroom I see in the US than it did. Their break ended about fifteen minutes past the time it should have (Tanzania time), and we all rose and were seated to start anew.
Although we were witnessing the testimony of one of the accuseds, I wish I could say that it was very interesting... The general feel I got from that particular trial was that many of the officials were bored, and the procession was very slow. Possibly because they were picking at events that had happened fourteen years ago. At one point we all had some comic relief when the translator used the word "excommunicated" instead of "expelled" (referring to an officer's relation with his former affiliation), and the man on trial made a joke that he was sure that only the Catholic Church was capable of excommunicating its members.
In all, I am glad that I went, and am interested in learning more about the Genocide, as this was not much of an educational opportunity (due to the minuteness of the disputed facts in the larger scheme of the historical event).
On another note, all of the volunteers have now arrived. We start our official SIC program this morning at 11. We all now have our cell phones, too. My number (calling from the US) is: 011-255-786-065-693. It is free for me to receive text messages, so they are very welcome! (It's not free for you, though.)
[I can also receive phone calls for free, but when I'm in the villages I won't be able to charge the battery.]
Swithching gears again, I mentioned before that on the Safari I had--and took--my first teaching opportunity. Marielle was talking to some of the cooks from vaious safari companies stationed at our campsite during lunch on the first day when they asked her to teach them how to use a condom. She came over to the rest of us, resting and reading or writing after lunch, and asked if we had a condom with us. None of us did (the cooks asked why we called ourselves teachers and didn't carry our teaching materials with us), so I suggested we ask the European couple sitting at a table nearby. Fortunately, the were 1. Dutch, and 2. on their honeymoon. In keeping with the stereotype, they joked that they had plenty and gladly gave us one. So it started with Marielle, myself and later with Sarah M, giving a condom demonstration (using the available props: an "ndizi" or banana). From there the three men started asking a plethora of questions. I was very proud to be able to answer all of them. Many of the questions were what our prefield coordinator, Dana, had prepared us for, many of them were somewhat new. But there were many.
The time was approaching that we would be heading back out on a Game Drive, so one of the men (the one with the most questions, the most limited English and the one that seemed to me was the most emotionally disturbed by the AIDS situation in Africa at large) said he would build a campfire that night and wanted us to sit with him and talk more about it.
So that's what happened. Long after dinner and his campfire was made, he came and fetched us from our group bonding session. He and two or sometimes three other men sat around the fire for between two and three hours, late into the night, answering every question they asked us... and covering nearly the entirety of our SIC HIV/AIDS education curriculum (with the exception of mother-to-child transmission through breastfeeding and other STIs), ending with one of the men asking for personal advice about his situation. WOW. I am nineteen years old, this man was twenty five (he seemed much older), and he had respect enough for us (myself and Devon, who were the last to go to bed) to ask us for personal advice. From a completely different culture.
The night was incredibly rewarding, and I would love to go into more detail, but I won't now. I must get off the computer and experience this wonderful place!
I think starting today I will have significantly less internet access, so I wanted to give you all as much information and description as possible before getting down and dirty.
"The service you do for others is the rent you pay for the time you spend on Earth." -Muhammad Ali
And it begins... Please continue to know with me health and peace.
Love,
Carrie
