I’m in Serenje after a month long lockdown in Mpelembe. Some people from the new fish and HIV groups are here for site visit, so I got to meet them.

So one morning last week, I was awoken by pounding on my door early in the morning and Neighbor Lady calling that my goat had ukupapa-ed. I wasn’t sure what this meant, but it sounded urgent, so I jumped up still pajamated and followed her down to the village where Potato stays. There in their goat shelter were two dark wet little puppy-things. Ukupapa apparently means to give birth! (Which is hilarious, because it’s pronounced “pop-a” like they’re just popping out.)

Two little baby goats!!!! A girl and a boy! The girl, who I named Pegasus, is an exact replica of Potato. The boy, who is also the same except for white markings on his head, I named Spud. (Get it??) The naming of Pegasus actually created quite a stir, as apparently to Zambians the name is indistinguishable from “Peggy.” So everyone thought I named the goat after our neighbor Peg, and kept stopping by to ask me about it. (I’m not sure if it’s an honor or an insult.)

Anyways, of course I squealed with delight over my little baby goatsies, which bewildered the Zambians. (They really flip out when you hold an animal up in front of your face to look at.) So I carried them home in the dish bin, unable to wipe the smile off my face. My babies!! Eventually they dried off and fluffed up and looked better (like the chicks.) They’re just the funniest little things! Tiny little bodies on these long long wobbly knobby legs!! Big bunny heads and squished little faces with mouths that always look like they’re smiling. Just shiny little new pennies! Little hooves, perfect little pink tongues, velvet ears and muzzles, and soft little heads perfect for putting kisses on or rubbing against my cheek. (If you are ever unsure about whether something is “good,” or “very good,” just rub it against your cheek and you will know. Of course, I’ve never tested this hypothesis with pizza or chocolate, so it might not be one hundred percent accurate.)

They tried to start walking pretty soon, which was just too much. Teetering around, falling down, tipping over if they got their little tails going too fast. I’m convinced that goats are also from a different planet, because these little babies have not yet learned the law of gravity. They’ll suddenly “pop” straight up in the air or hover on one or two legs across the ground. They’re just as likely to prance forwards as backwards. Pegasus discovered the chickens and pranced and jumped and stomped her feet behind them. Just so sweet. I can’t stand it.

It took awhile for them to find Potato’s udder. Tried Potato’s knee, each other’s tails, my elbow. Potatosaurus hates it when they drink, but she sticks around ok and runs off the other goats, chickens and cat if they get too close. Sometimes she tramples the babies.

They have such silly little bleats and make this sweet little “umph” noise when I pick them up. They’re just cute as can be. I closed off the entrance to the insaka, which is now the kids’ pen (which means I have to muck it out several times a day (including the afterbirth) – yuck!) I set up my chair in the insaka the first day and didn’t move at all. Every day, I’ve spent several hours out there just watching them and putting them on my lap while I read. I love my little babies!!!!

I was worried about the supposed three week “secret” phase that I read about, where the mother hides the baby goats, but it hasn’t been a problem.

I’m going to be able to make them tame, which will be fun. Unfortunately, by the time Pegasus is old enough to make milk, I’ll be long gone. I still can’t even pet Potato, so I don’t think I’ll ever get any milk unless she suddenly warms up to me. It’d be easier to catch and milk a rabid rhinoceros. And I don’t think there’s even any rhinos in Zambia, so that’s saying a lot. (Haha, that reminds me of the mute woodcutter and his one legged blue rhinoceros!) I was getting extremely frustrated with her to the point where I was about to sell her before she even gave birth! She would escape every day and go stay at another village. She’s impossible to catch. It takes Joshua maybe ten minutes to catch their goats, but an hour to catch Potato. Everyone talks about how strong and difficult she is. She ate someone’s mealie meal and they wanted me to pay for it. She refuses to sleep in the goat house and knocked down every door I tried to build (even one Joshua deemed Potato-proof.) If I tie her up, she cries loudly all day. She tramples and butts me. She eats a ton. The milk project is doomed anyways. I still may sell her after she’s done feeding the kids in a couple months and just keep my babies, who knows. (According to the book, mothers and kids don’t form any lasting bond, so it wouldn’t be cruel.)

I miss the little goatsies already, being away for a few days. I hope no one beats them. When I told Joshua that maybe his goats wouldn’t run away if he didn’t beat them, he and everyone within earshot starting laughing like I said the funniest thing they had ever heard.

In addition to the two new goats, I now also have several hundred new bees. August was swarming season again, but after rebaiting the bee box and searching every shady tree I came across, I was unsuccessful in locating a swarm (mostly because school wasn’t in session for me to ask any classroom and have several little boys come forward with knowledge of bees.) Then, just the night before I left, the neighbors came over to tell me they had found an underground swarm in the headman’s cassava field. So we headed over there (Finnigan too) to dig them up. We even got a bunch of combs. Unfortunately, all my lights are dead, so I couldn’t figure out a way to attach them to the bars, so I’m not sure how the whole thing will turn out. Cross your fingers that they’re still there when I get back!

In Chicken news, I’m now down to three chicks. Chipmunk, “Doug’s” chick, was stolen while I was in Serenje last time for my foot injury. (Half of my tree nursery, which I was going to plant with students at the school, was also stolen.) There was a brick on top of the chicken house and the grass was spread, so I know there was some suspicious human activity going on, not just a hawk. When I told Mr. Chisenga about it, he said that the thief probably just put the brick on top of the spread grass so I wouldn’t notice the hole. This logic seemed logical to him, as well as to the thief apparently. Then I gave the two unnamed rooster chicks to Justin as a remembrance gift from Doug. So now it’s just Eggy, Wee Wee Wee, and Vulture left. (Sorry Brady, your name choice are null and void.) The chicks spend all day away and only come back at night, so I never even see them anyways.

New Chicken has let the chicks go on their own and has started laying again. The transition from motherhood to laying hasn’t been easy for her. She’s suspicious of the nest and spends all day poking around for somewhere to lay. She confuses the “I want to lay” call and the “I just laid” call and does them both nonstop all day no matter what is going on.

Corncob has also rejected the nest for my bed, which is pretty cute, except that she sometimes leaves me little presents in there as well.

I think that the problem with the rooster is that there’s just too many roosters concentrated in a small area than would occur in real life. Instead of crowing just ten times a day to assert its territory to one other rooster, Abraham has to challenge twenty different roosters all day because every household has a rooster.

At first, I was glad to have Finnigan as company, but now I’m not so sure. Every day, he becomes more and more needy. He cries all day. If I get off the chair to stand up, he starts crying because there’s the possibility that I might leave the room. If I give him food, he starts crying because he thinks whatever I’m eating might be a better option, even if it’s the exact same thing. I moved his food dish onto a shelf so the chickens couldn’t get it, but he refuses to jump up there himself and instead cries and cries until I pick him up and put him up there. Maybe Zambian cats have just not adapted to jump because there’s no such thing as tables or shelves.

I’ve been pretty busy finishing building projects and repairing things that have fallen into disarray already. I built two different goat house doors, repaired the chicken house roof, repaired the fence, finished the bathing shelter, and put up a new dirt flap over the bed. I got to play with mud and bricks again to make a step and trough for the goats. The goats couldn’t resist climbing onto the step and marked their footprints on it before the mud was even dry (like kids writing their initials into cement, I suppose.)

Things with the neighbors have actually been really good lately. Except that now that the man of the house is gone, nobody pays attention to the fence as a boundary. They just walk around it or open the gate and waltz right in, without even properly asking permission in Bemba. Frustrating.

I tried to start a tree nursery with Joshua and every time we planned a day, he didn’t show up. It’s so ridiculous. I have to practically beg people to let me do nice things for them (if it involves any input from them, that is)! I also wanted to make compost with him, but he was uninterested, saying he already knew how. Alas.

Falling Down Pants Boy must have read my blog, because one day he showed up in a new pair of overalls! I don’t know where they came from, but it’s pretty freaking cute.

The kids love it when I give them math problems, but then I just feel bad because they get so excited about it, and then get half of them wrong. I also made a game with letter flashcards that they have trouble with. Even when I go through the letters in order, they can’t get them right. They also think that “Zambia” is a letter, because in the alphabet song here it ends with the word “Zambia.”

One day, Joshua went running by with a kite he built. How’d he know to build a kite?!?! Is it some universal thing that all people are programmed to do? Fire, language, food, clothing, shelter, kite?

The headwoman has been sick lately. The headman told me (in front of her) that he hoped she didn’t die because then he’d have the whole family to take care of. It’s strange how people are so open with death here.

Most things don’t shock me anymore, but every once in awhile something comes up. I was over at the Mumba’s house and asked what they had done that day. Neighbor Lady said that they had been gathering something that I didn’t know the word for. I asked what it was, and she uncovered a bowl to show me a pile of dead rats. I tried to pleasantly say, “That’s nice,” while hiding my shock. It’s a good thing I didn’t say, “Oh, rats!,” because rats are vile creatures that invade houses, while these creatures were the delectable ones that live outside.

In work news, there’s no news. August was school break, and the start of the term was delayed because the country is in “national mourning” for President Mwanawasa, who officially is dead. (The new election will be the same time as the US election, so that’s kind of cool.)

I finally had my big meeting about the library, Life Skills, and community school monitoring, which I’ve been trying to hold for months. For what ideas weren’t straight out vetoed, it basically came down to – “just wait and see.” Frustrating. I don’t think that anyone would believe me when I say that I’m not exaggerating when I say that I’ve asked about these three things every week. That’s every week for a year about monitoring – which isn’t even some Peace Corps project, but his job. Every week for half a year about the library. Every week for four months about Life Skills. I have to think of new perky ways to waltz into the office and reword the same issues over and over. It’s all so dysfunctional.

Speaking of dysfunctionality, I was supposed to attend a several day teacher training in another village to teach about HIV, but it was rescheduled and they never bothered to tell me. So I showed up with my bookbag and blankets ready to go, only to find out the meeting already happened.

It was also not worth it to tell me that the clinic employee I’ve been working with will be gone for two months, which completely erases my community meeting plans.

I think after a year and a half, I’ve finally narrowed down the problem. It’s one of two things. 1) People need to be pushed over and over to do something or be given a handout, because self initiative is a bad thing. 2) There’s just a big cultural communication difference. Zambians care about words, while Americans care about actions. As long as something sounds good to a Zambian, it’s ok, even if it has no connection to reality. For example, it sounds good to say the mat will be done in a week. It sounds good that a person is interested in coming to my meeting. It sounds good that someone wants to use my bike to go to the clinic instead of the bar. It sounds good that Joshua wants to plant trees with me. It sounds good that the minibus is going to my destination. Those words are good enough for Zambians, even if the mat is done in three months, the person has no intention of coming to my meeting, the neighbor goes to the bar with my bike, Joshua never comes to plant trees with me, and the minibus is going in a totally different direction. What I consider straight out “lying” to them is just making peace by saying what you want to hear.

It seems I would have had an easier time if I had come here under the guise of a missionary. If I claimed that God said not to beat your animals, kids, and wife, and to make compost, then maybe they would listen. But if it’s just me saying it, they don’t care.

Besides Mwanawasa’s death, the other big issue is still the fuel shortage. First there was a twenty litre limit, then gas stations were only selling to people with “accounts.” The traditional festival I was planning on attending in Northwest Province was even canceled because of it all.

Wildlife is now appearing in Serenje boma!! The dogs started barking up a tree at Peace Corps House one night, so we went out to investigate and found – a genet!! It’s a cat/mongoose thing with a leopard print body and long ring tailed. Probably here eating rats. The problem with me and animals is that I can’t just look. I want to touch. (No, don’t worry, I didn’t climb the tree to touch the genet. I’m not saying I didn’t want to though.) Monkeys, goats, genets, you name it. I just want to hold them and play with them and make them my pets. I guess I should start some rescue farm for animals that were confiscated from their owners for being illegal or abused or something. That way I could have a house full of raccoons, de-skunked skunks, parrots, lizards, lions, tigers, bobcats, monkeys, tortoises, and deer, and not have to be the same as the people I’m confiscating them from cause I’m “official” and then I wouldn’t have to feel guilty about it!

In other wildlife news, my closest Peace Corps neighbor showed up in my village with some people from Kasanka National Park who were studying whether bats carry sleeping sickness. So I went with them as they set up nets and drew blood (rather violently) from the little batsies.

Doug took home the working clock, so I’ve been relying on a watch I bought in the Serenje market for the equivalence of about fifty cents. It has a picture of Osama Bin Laden and blinks “I Love You.” ?????????? Every day, it falls more and more behind, so I never know what time it is. This confusion is compounded by the fact that the first number doesn’t show up, so the hours between 11:00 and 2:00 in the afternoon are a mystery. Is it 11:00 or 1:00? 12:00 or 2:00? Sometimes I’m sure it must be 2:00, only to look at the clock later and it’s 2:00 again. It’s probably the closest to time travel I’ll ever get. Anyway, I decided a sundial would probably be more accurate, so I’ve been working the past week on building one. It seems simple, but it’s not. I’ve tried dozens of fin sizes, angles, positions and slopes. It took me several days to realize that half of my problem was that I’m in the southern hemisphere, so the whole clock is backwards. (Either that, or I’m even farther off than I thought!) I got it to work for several hours of the day, but I haven’t figured out how to make it accurate all day.

Hot season has officially started and I think I might melt. The thermometer said it was 121 degrees, but I think it was lying. Maybe not, seeing how the tippytap seal melted, the clothesline snapped, and my bike seat melted.

Thank you to everyone concerned about my injury. Maybe I should get injured more often so people leave me messages!! My foot is basically ok now. I can walk around on it just fine. It’s still kinda stiff when I try to bend my toes and the joint of the big toe still hurts if pressure is put on it. The toenail is still mostly unattached and black (actually, it looks kind of like Indian Corn), but rather than falling off, it seems to be growing. Guess I’ve just got to keep my citenge bandage on a couple more months.

I’ve read several good books lately. One was “Introduction to Permaculture.” I’m proud to announce that our house in Meadville is oriented correctly, even with the Maple tree and deck. (Of course, it’s just pure luck, because all the houses on the other side of the street are backwards.) I want to go around giving permaculture consultations now.

Another was a novel “The Poisonwood Bible” which takes place in the Congo. The quirky descriptions would probably amuse anyone, but for someone who has lived here, it’s just hilarious. She talks about nshima and chitenges and failed gardening. I swear she stole things word for word from my blog!

Warning: Rant Ahead Another is “Collapse” about ancient and modern societies falling apart because of intentionally or unintentionally destroying the environment where they live. It was interesting, because I recognize so many of the same things going on in Zambia and have written about nearly all of these things separately in my blog before, but now I’m going to bring them all together into one big rant.

I think that Zambia is generally summed up by the anecdote of felling one of the few large trees in the area because they wanted to eat the caterpillars living in the tree.

In specific, deforestation is a huge problem. There are no big trees in Mpelembe. They have all been cut for farmland, firewood, building supplies, and aesthetic value (contrary to in the US, in Zambia, it’s preferred not to have trees near the home.) This depletes nutrients for the soil because leaves don’t drop to rot and it severely decreases the soil’s protection from the sun, wind (you can’t even lay much if you wanted to!), and water erosion. The practice of chitimene – aka burning down the country ever year – is used to clear farmland as well as burn everything for fear of unintentional wildfires, as well as for aesthetic value. Slashing and burning also destroys the leaves and grasses that would naturally rot and add nutrients and again decreases protection from the sun, wind and rain. It burns down baby trees that never even get a chance, burns down flowers so the bees have less to eat and can then pollinate less, and destroys the habitat for insects which then move from the bush into the garden (as happened to us) and rats which move to the house (as also happened to us.) The soil is just so old to begin with that it’s like cement – in consistency and nutrients – so the clearing, burning and years of farming just put the nail in the coffin. The country’s un-native staple of maize (for nshima) is impractical because it can’t be grown without chemical fertilizer.

As for animals, nearly all have been over hunted. It’s rare to even see one in a “protected” park (where the employees themselves poach them.) I don’t know of the exact ecological “badness” of no more animals (besides overfishing decreasing predators for the parasite shistosamaiasis), except that it means even more agriculture needed for food. Birds and monkeys are eaten. Bats are killed for fun. Chameleons and snakes are killed because they’re believed to be evil. This wipes out predators for bugs that eat crops and rats that eat stored mealie meal.

Another “problem” which makes me sounds terrible is improved healthcare without the simultaneous practice of decreasing family size. Families usually have around ten children. Perhaps this was necessary traditionally to ensure survival, but now with vaccinations and medication (and fertilizer for the field), there are going to be too many people for this fragile environment to support. The cultural aspects of preferring traditional ways over change, not doing something different from your neighbor, and a general sense of letting things be rather than taking action, also compound things.

Now that I’ve finished making myself sound righteous and ethnocentric, I should say that I’m no ecology or agriculture expert. They’ve been living fine for a long time and there’s no immediate emergency. Certainly things like firewood, building supplies, and food production are all necessary, and I use them too. And while there aren’t a ton of big trees, there’s an endless expanse of bush and small trees a plenty to make house poles and tool handles. And there are certainly a lot of good practices in Zambia that others are not doing. Mainly, living closely with the land without an excess of manufactured things, garbage, cars, and pollution. Agriculture is done pretty sustainably, leaving stumps high enough to resprout and rotating farmland to allow the land to fallow back into bush and small trees. Burning also has its reasons for being done. It protects houses from fire, reduces habitats for snakes, kills weeds, and produces ash which has its own nutritional benefits for the soil. And while city folk (and me) prefer corn nshima, most villagers eat nshima made from cassava which needs no fertilizer or pesticide. Finally, condom use (mainly because of HIV) and family planning methods are being taught, and while rural families remain large, some city dwellers are starting to have less children. I don’t think that Zambia is alone in its problems, nor is it the most dire example by any means. I’m certainly more cynical about problems of overcomsumption and pollution in the United States.

I’m not against agriculture and don’t think that we should revert back to a hunter-gatherer society, as some propose. On the contrary, I enjoy it very much. I just don’t feel like it’s possible for agriculture to sustain a large population without destroying everything. I’ve thought about overpopulation before, but now I’m absolutely certain that it’s the biggest problem facing our world. Others – pollution, power struggles, clearing too much land, hunger, poverty, depleting resources – are directly because of thins. For a couple (anywhere) to decide to have more than two children, I now consider ethically wrong. In fact, for the next one hundred years or so, everyone should really only be having one child until we reduce the current population.

I think my experiences and observations over the past year and a half, as well as these recent inspirational materials on permaculture and societal collapse, have helped me focus my goals for the remainder of my Peace Corps service. Until I fully decide my position, I’m going to avoid agriculture and health topics that add to ecological problems and overpopulation (though that might offend or horrify some) and concentrate on ones that improve the situation, such as planting trees and promoting family planning. My other aims will be neutral and just promote a better quality of life, such as education, gender equality, being kind to animals, and treats like fruit and honey. I suppose that is pretty much exactly what I’ve already been trying and failing to do….. Hmmm…..



Pookie – Thanks for the pictures for the villagers. They’ll be so excited. And for the pens and hair things! You’re a lifesaver! I also accidently deleted the photo on here when trying to put a picture of the baby goats. If you're bored, you can try to figure out how to replace it. Oh boy!

Doug – You’ve made it onto the Peace Corps House picture wall. It’s this hilarious picture of you from the COS party. Your shoulders are kinda arched and you’re making this terrible face. Also, Summer had a dream featuring you, but you appeared as one of the guys from Saturday Night Live. Then the next day, we watched a bootlegged version “Hot Rod” (WORST movie in the world, I’m serious. The best part were the outlines of people in the theater) and that guy was in it! Sometimes I still get a “Muli shani Ba Douglassy!!!!!” as I’m biking. I also have two messages for you. One is from Master Finnigan. He would like you to fetch him his smelling salts. The other is from a mystery greeter who says, “Your friend is greeting you.” I’ll give you twenty guesses as to who it is and you’ll never get it!

foo – The package might definitely be lost in the mail, but I’m sure I’ll get it before I leave!

Jamie, Britt, Renee, and Stacy – Please send me your latest addresses! (And update letters, Britt and Renee!!!)

Jamie – I can’t believe it about your trip! Be sure to tell me all about it!!!

Anyone – Some things that would be useful are carabineers to tie up the goats, and rechargeable AAA and AA batteries.