Friday, April 29, 2011

Last week of training

Training is finally ending next week, and we will be officially swearing in on May 7th. Today, we had our Final Language Proficiency interview. I had a role playing situation for my interview in which I had to explain to a village headman what I was going to do in the village and why I was there. The good thing was, when I visited my village a few weeks ago, I was faced with that exact situation in real life. I am very anxious about getting to my village. It's the situation I have been thinking about since I decided to apply for Peace Corps; getting dropped off in a village and being there for 3 months until you can return to civilization. I'm very excited about getting used to being there. I have been selected to give a speech in Lunda at the swearing in ceremony next week in Lusaka. I will be thanking everyone involved in training us. Here's the speech I have written...

Budidi mwani. Atwimushi mwani.
Ijina dami yami Larry Maurin. Kwimenaku mabwamu jami akashikola mu Peace Corps, tunazang'alali kwikala kunu.

Tunakukeng'a kusakilila mfulumendi ya United States of America hakututemesha kwinza nakuzatila mu Zambia.

Chamuchiyedi, tunakukeng'a kusakilila mfulumendi ya Zambia ha kutwiteja kwinza na kuzatila kunu.

Chamuchisatu, tunakukeng'a kusakilila ankong'i ejima amu Peace Corps, swejee antang'ishi a madimi, chisemwa, na Technical ha kuwunda kwanyichima yawu hadetu.

A Lunda ahoshang'a nawu: Winu wambachi wekala mukachi.
(This means: The dance of the tortoise is within)

Nasakilili mwani.

I will be getting to the provincial house next week, so I will be able to post some more pictures. I have photos of my house from my visit to my village. My house is not quite a hut; it has 5 rooms and glass windows, something not common in villages in Zambia. It's the nicest volunteer house I have seen in this country. My host is a pineapple farmer with 8 acres.

I have a new address effective now:

Larry Maurin
Peace Corps
P.O. Box 13
Ikelenge, Northwestern Province
Zambia, Africa

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Some pictures, and hello from Solwezi

 
I have made it to the Northwestern provincial house in Solwezi. Here are a few pictures finally.
My homestay family in Chishiko. In front Gloria and Grace. In back, Mary, Ataata Ozwell, and Amaama Jessica.
My itala


This chameleon was going as fast as I've ever seen a chameleon go to get away from me. Chameleons are bad juju in Zambia, so people often kill them.

Visitors from our villages in Northwestern Provice. From left to right: Me, Kelly, Bozwell from Kawiko, John, and Dominic from Kelondu. Dominic is a shop owner and a pineapple farmer.



During technical training on this day we were learning about some of the agroforestry trees being used in Zambia. This big tree is a musang'u or acacia. It's very useful for farmers because it fixes nitrogen.
 
Cattle x-ing

This is one of the basic schools in Chalimbana we went to for world forestry day. A really big storm was rolling in when I took this picture.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Heading out to Kelondu

Hello everyone, tomorrow is a day I have anxiously been awaiting for what seems like a very long time. We are driving out to see our post villages for the first time. The name of my village is Kelondu. The name is derived from the word Kelong'a which is Lunda for river or stream, but not a big river. Last week, Peace Corps sent a representative from Kelondu down to Lusaka for a two day session with us. His name was Dominic Kashimoto, and he runs a shop and grows pineapples. We talked a little bit about expectations from both sides. The idea is that he will go back to the village for a few days and talk to people before I get there on Thursday. The drive from Lusaka to Kelondu is about 17 hours, so we will stop and stay in Solwezi tomorrow night. Solwezi I'm told is an interesting town in the heart of the mining areas of Zambia. Northwestern province will be one of the fastest changing regions in Zambia in the next two years because of the mining industry. There is talk of a Chinese uranium mine opening in Mwinilunga district and the building of a new railroad from the Copperbelt to Luanda, Angola for export of copper and minerals to the Atlantic. I have heard a story about villagers in Mwinilunga finding diamonds and rubies on their land.
I was very excited to finally get some details about my village. I will be about 500 meters from a middle school, and about 1500 meters from the source of the Zambezi River. There is a lot of beekeeping going on in the village, as the region is famous for its honey. You can buy honey for about 10 cents a pound there! I expect I will be doing some teaching and working with farmers a lot. I am so excited to get there. The education volunteers who returned from their site visits to their villages had giant smiles on their faces.
Training has seemed very long. My homestay family has been great, but I am very ready to be done with training and get to my village. The endless power point and flipchart presentations are numbing me. The hardest thing has been that nobody in Chalimbana, where I'm staying, speaks Lunda. Nyanja and Bemba are the languages here, so it's very difficult to practice Lunda. Another thing that has frustrated me is that I haven't seen any wild mammals in Zambia other than rats. Really, they should take us to a game park the first week of training. I am excited to have Nchila reserve near my village because it has some of the only true forest in Zambia and the richest bird life of anywhere in the country. I heard there are a lot of bush babies around there. I can't wait to see those big eyes! So awesome! I got lucky a couple of weeks ago and saw a Schalow's Turaco in Chalimbana. The rain is definitely dying down and the first signs of the cold season are here. We have crystal clear, windy weather, and you can see your breath sometimes in the morning. I am going to try to post some pictures here tomorrow. We'll see how it goes because the internet is pretty slow. Until then, keep sending letters and postcards, even if you have nothing to say. Postage is 50 cents for postcards and a dollar for letters. I promise to write back. Much Love.
Larry Maurin
Peace Corps
P.O. Box 50707
Lusaka, Zambia