Making Connections

This week has been intense for a number of reasons and has involved as usual a wide variety of activities, both planned and unplanned. It began on Sunday with my having a good Peace Corps friend and her fiancé over to lunch. It was their first invitation as a couple so we took photos to remember the event. Most of the time was spent on planning the wedding. When, where and how were the main issues. How much should be determined by local customs and traditions, who would be invited and where it could occur? Lots of options existed so it was fun considering the many possibilities. The other topic was what Peace Corps requires for one of its volunteers to marry a local person. Security checks, forms, interviews, health check-ups and more were part of the process. So the entire lunch was enlightening in many ways.
The next night I had talked to another fellow Peace Corps volunteer who was under lots of stress. She had a local partner had almost been strangled by her long time boyfriend, who then proceeded to commit suicide which she later discovered. The next afternoon while I was training some students to visit a primary school to communicate with younger students, I received a call from my Peace Corps friend who had burned herself badly while trying to make cookies for her local partner. Peace Corps medical help was on the way, but she was in pain and needed to be distracted as the pain steadily increased even though she was immersing herself in cold water. Fortunately she was soon attended and received pain relief and very professional care both then and in the days afterwards when she was treated and closely monitored.
The following evening I had arranged for two of my favorite teachers to come for dinner. This proved more challenging since I had a planning meeting late in the afternoon and wanted to attend since I convince the group to invite my favorite hip hop teacher to work with our club. Fortunately the meeting went well and ended well in time for me to finish my meal preparations before my guests arrived. One was an Indian whose wife and son were in India and the other had his wife and four children living in different village where his wife worked. Both work so hard to improve the functioning of the school All went well and I learned lots more about my colleagues and the school.
Several challenges were presented at school this same week.. One of my club members was counseling a fellow student who was seven months pregnant and had not told her parents. Her boyfriend was married and already had children. Her friend’s final exams were coming up in a few weeks and she was trying to figure out how to deal with the pregnancy, school, her family and boyfriend. The other issue involved two students witnessing inappropriate behaviour between a male teacher and a fellow student. Fortunately, the school counsellor will be handling both these cases in the future.
On Wednesday we had a meeting of teachers involved in training their peers on teaching life skills. I was delighted we had 14 teachers turn up for the planning. We were able to agree on a date and time in the future for training 50 or more teachers which was progress. However, that said, it was clear that once trained, most teachers did not have time to implement this program since they were so pressed for time helping their low performing students deal with academic subjects.
On Thursday my students were planning to visit a rural primary school. The transportation there had taken considerable planning, but it seemed like we had both a driver and vehicle. However, at the last minute there was a major hitch- no fuel at the government fueling depot. We went through all the alternatives of delaying the visit to finding an alternative vehicle which the school was not using to bus teachers back and forth to their homes in designated location about 45 minutes away. Normally this might not be a problem, but my school has a double shift which requires two shifts for each shift. The only solution was for me to pay for fuel from a private source, which I did to make sure we could follow out our plans as scheduled. The visit went well and my students engaged about 50 students in games and conversation to help them with their issues of parental neglect, strict teachers, and extreme shyness. Energizers and icebreakers were a good beginning as well as a substantial snack for students who had eaten little all day.
The week ended on mixed note. The teen club really enjoyed the wonderful young hip hop dance teacher from Zimbabwe who challenged them in many ways as they went through a number of moves to hip hop, break dance and house music. A few members could follow easily, but others really struggled with the coordination and concentration. However, all had fun. While this was happening, my teen club student who was suffering with an inadvertent disclosure about her HIV status was being counseled by other club members. The local hospital nurse has also become involved and will also check with the family. Although no conclusion has been reached, I am still hopeful that she will return to school to finish this academic year and then find another school to attend next term. Time will tell…
I feel fortunate to be connecting such a variety of people. Yet at the same time I have not been in this country long enough to be able to attend effectively with many of these challenges. Many of these problems arise in the US as well. We may have more resources in place to deal with them, but the US has not always found effective solutions to many of these important issues.

Good Timing

One of the local teen club members seemed pretty content in school, until a few weeks ago. She announced that she wanted to attend a state boarding school, because of family issues at home. I went along and tried to help her find a spot in a boarding school. In the meantime she decided to attend the teen club with me in Gaborone so she could then attend on her own in the future. While traveling, I inquired about school. She said she was upset because the teachers treated her differently ever since she left her back pack in the classroom and someone must have found out she was HIV positive. Now the teachers and students stare at her when they talk about HIV.
When we arrived at the teen club early Saturday morning, we found out the topic for the older teens to discuss was the disclosure of one’s HIV status-how fitting! I attended one of the groups as an adult counselor and she was in another as a student. We began by listening to an excellent panel of adults present how they learned their HIV status and also their decision to go public. The presentation was followed by questions from the students.
We then moved in to small groups to discuss further and plan well designed scenarios for each group to present on different ways disclosure might occur. My group had two volunteers who should us how they would play students returning from gym class when some medication falls out of a bag. The denial and eventual disclosure was very well presented. When we returned to the large group, we saw some amazing acting and convincing school scenarios that everyone could relate to immediately. There was also lots of laughter watching students play the roles of teachers, students, boyfriends and girlfriends. More discussion followed.
I saw my student after the session as asked what she thought. Her reply was “Perfect.” I then inquired if she wanted to see a counselor to discuss her situation at school. She said yes. We arranged for her to see the counselor before lunch at the teen club. With the student’s consent, I then talked to the counselor to find appropriate ways for dealing with the situation. Hence, the student was helped with a very immediate problem and I was given possible strategies
Thanks to teen club, we had a perfect timing so my student’s could deal with her problem in groups, receive individual counseling on an important and connect to the Gaborone teen club where she can feel open about discussing HIV issues with fellow members.
Since that meeting we have had several follow up meetings in our village a social worker from the hospital and the school counselor. Her mother also came to some of the meetings. As of now, our teen club member has great ambivalence about staying in school. However, at our local teen club, members have talked to him about finishing the year and then looking for another school. So we shall see what happens…