Packing Your African Bug Out Bag

I recently received a note on one of my blog posts from my friend Lisa who said that my daily stories provide excellent dinner table conversation for her and her husband.  She mentioned that her family was preparing to move to a natural disaster zone where there were occasional snake problems.  Having read about my experience with the cobra she was concerned about how to handle the situation if a snake entered her home because she couldn’t call the Botswana army to do a snake extraction in Florida.  Lisa recounted a conversation with her husband in which the two of them wondered, “What else do you think Kelly would recommend for survival in a natural disaster area?”

Back in Texas we have a faculty member on staff who is always talking about emergency preparedness and “honoring the threat.”  I’m afraid to visit his home because he describes it like a James Bond type of hideout.  Apparently he has a giant knife, hand grenades or a rocket launcher hidden behind every door, including under the sink of his guest bathroom.  In addition, Dr. Bond likes to discuss the importance of a Bug Out Bag in his classes.  For those of you who may be less familiar, a Bug Out Bag is basically a bag which you always have packed and ready to go at a moment’s notice in the event you have to evacuate unexpectedly due to an emergency.  Here are the contents of my Bug Out Bag, which I also travel with, here in Africa:  

1. Duct Tape.  Duct tape can be used to plug holes in screens to keep the mosquitoes out, to hold your luggage together when it gets ripped, or to keep you from bleeding to death.  I once cut my hand badly on a tin roof.  It was a Sunday afternoon so there were no hospitals open and I was leaving on a flight to Amsterdam the next morning.  No matter what I did the cut wouldn’t stop bleeding.  I duct taped a washcloth around my hand until I got to Amsterdam and could get stitches. 

2. Wedding Ring.  Since I can’t travel with my fake husband I can at least travel with my fake wedding ring.  I am also 11 weeks pregnant and have been exactly 11 weeks pregnant for over a year now.  Fidelity is not taken seriously here, so saying you have a husband and showing the ring as proof does not deter very aggressive, unwanted advances.  But motherhood is highly respected.  Plus research shows that if a woman tells her rapist she is pregnant her attacker is less likely to complete the assault, so I have used this little fib as a preemptive warning in a few particularly scary situations.

3. Hand Sanitizer and Toilet Paper.  Nine times out of ten it is more hygienic to use a bush to relieve yourself than to use a public toilet if you are outside the confines of your home/hotel.  But when you are in the middle of the African bush there are no toilets anyway, so you have to use a bush regardless.  Might as well be prepared. 

4. Needles, Malaria Medication, Vaccination Card, Water Purification Tablets.  Fortunately I haven’t had to use the needles yet (fingers crossed I will make it out of here and not need to), but I always bring them with me because you never know what kinds of medical supplies will be available in the event of an emergency.  

5. U.S. Dollars in small denominations.  I think I’ve mentioned corruption a few times before.  The good thing is, if someone is going to bribe you they are more likely to accept U.S. dollars than any other currency.  When I came to Africa this time I brought $5,000 in small bills; I’ve used most of them.  

6. Head Lamp and Lighter.  You may have heard in passing that we have problems with electricity.  Or you may be stuck in a four-star hotel with electricity, but no light bulbs in the sockets.  If you can’t find something safe to set on fire with the lighter then you can always use your headlamp. 

7. Facial Wipes and Goggles.  I think I may have also mentioned once or twice that we have lots of problems with water throughout Africa.  Sometimes you have water, sometimes you don’t.  Sometimes you have water, but it’s dangerous if you get it in your eyes.  In that case you wear goggles in the shower and then wash your eyes out with bottled water or use facial wipes.  

8. Laundry Detergent and Sink Stopper.  The important instruction here is DO NOT USE WHITE LAUNDRY DETERGENT!  White powder=drugs.  So I use blue laundry detergent.  Depending on where I am travelling I often take only three or four sets of clothes and wash them by hand in my sink each night.  But you need to be careful because in many countries you have to iron ALL YOUR CLOTHES in order to kill the mango fly eggs.  If the mango fly eggs hatch on your clothes they burrow under your skin and you can literately feel them moving around underneath the surface.  Then you have to go to the doctor to have them cut out. As a general rule this is not fun. 

9. Sporf, Pens, Tweezers and Nail Clipper. It’s always a good idea to travel with a sporf (spoon-fork-knife combo), because you never know when you might need an eating utensil and there won’t be any available.  Same goes for pens.  Somehow, no one EVER has a writing instrument.  If you don’t bring your own don’t bother asking for one because no one else will have one either.  Since you can’t travel with scissors, tweezers and nail clippers are good alternatives; you can use them when you need to cut something.

I think that pretty much wraps up my African Bug Out Bag.  Though I would recommend snacks as well.  With all the food shortages we have here you can’t be guaranteed you will find something you want/need when you want/need it.  With that being said, here is one final piece of advice concerning snacks:  If you are driving down the road and see a lone orange tree off to the side with giant oranges on it that look SO GOOD just keep driving.  There is a reason no one else has come along and picked them off sooner.  Why?  Land mines.

HAPPY PACKING!

A Thank you/Love Letter

As the semester is beginning to wind down at UB, I have begun thinking about how much I am looking forward to returning home.  This is particularly the case when it comes to work.  While reflecting on the conveniences I’ve missed I thought I should take this opportunity to write a half thank you-half love letter to my home institution.  Here it goes:

Dear Texas Tech,

How do I love thee.  Let me count the ways: 

To the Academic Support & Facilities Resources department- Thank you and I am sorry.  I know I tend to be a high maintenance client, but I feel compelled to get just the right classroom for each professor and every class in my department.  But I appreciate your patience with me.  I know more than once I’ve asked you to allow me to enroll 51 students in a classroom with only 50 seats.  “But there will never be 100% perfect attendance- I promise!” Now I understand and desperately wish other institutions were so diligent.  I also now LOVE the “Don’t remove desks from the classroom” rule.  I currently teach 73 students in a classroom which should really only accommodate about 20 (by your standards).  Sometimes I walk in to teach and there are 200 chairs piled up to the ceiling.  Other times the classroom is completely empty- no tables, no chairs, nothing.  I truly bow down before you for the dedicated logistical planning you do for everyone across campus.

To my administrators- Thank you for planning ahead.  I don’t always like meetings, but at least you tell me in a reasonable amount of time when a meeting will be held, the location, the agenda and what I need to do to prepare.  Here I get a phone call on my personal mobile telling me to report to the Dean’s office in five minutes.  When I get there I’m told there is a meeting about faculty candidates.  Then I get reprimanded for not having reviewed the two binders filled with CVs.  KVP: “I’m sorry sir.  I didn’t know there was a meeting or that I was supposed to have prepared ahead of time.” Dean: “You should have known!”  Thank you TTU administrators for realizing I don’t read minds.

To the mailroom- Thank you for delivering the mail.  It is comforting to know that every day at 2pm I can expect the mail.  My mom sent me a Christmas card in November.  I still haven’t received it.  Thank you as well for going the extra mile and hunting me down on campus when there is a package for me and you aren’t sure where to send it.  Not too long ago a package came to my office and I wasn’t there to sign for it.  The secretary sent it back.  KVP: “I don’t understand!  Why didn’t you sign for it?”  Secretary: “It wasn’t addressed to me.”  It took three days and visits to five different offices across Gaborone to get hold of my package.

To the support staff (admin assistants, business managers, etc.)- Thank you for taking some amount of initiative and figuring out how to solve the problem.  Last week I tried to get an exam copied.  I took the exam to the secretary who does the copying.  All the copy machines were running at the time so she refused to accept the exam because she didn’t want to be responsible for it.  She insisted I take the exam with me and return 20 minutes later.  Upon returning 20 minutes later she wouldn’t copy the exam because she had run out of paper.  She told me to go find paper and then bring the paper and the exam back.  I then went to secretary #2 who said she would get me some paper.  I told her I had a meeting and asked if she could deliver the exam and the paper to secretary #1.  She agreed.  An hour later while in the meeting in my office secretary #2 said she had the paper and I could take the paper and the exam up to secretary #1 to be copied.  KVP: “That’s the whole reason I gave you my exam in the first place.  So you could do it! I can’t; I’m in a meeting.”  She agreed to take care of it.  Three hours later I hadn’t heard from her.  I returned to her office and asked whether the exams had been copied.  She had forgotten about it since she had gone to lunch.  I took the ream of paper and the exam to the copy room.  Turns out the copying secretary had left early for the day.  Seven hours of effort and still no copies!

To the IT Department- Thank you as well for taking initiative and solving the problem.  I know I’ve had to use your services about half a dozen times while I was in Africa and you were in Lubbock, but you’ve still been able to help me!  All that distance and you can still help me! At the beginning of the semester I entered my new classroom to discover the computer at the podium wasn’t working.  Contacted IT, they said they knew about it.  They didn’t offer to fix it though.  I went out, purchased my own cables to hook up my laptop to the projector.  Turns out the bulb in the projector didn’t work.  Went to IT, they didn’t have a bulb.  The third week I bought a bulb for the projector, screwed it in, and by that time one of the wires from the projector to the power source had been poached to use in another room.  Reported it to IT, they said they didn’t have time to fix it.  You know that saying, “The buck stops here?”  Yeah, that’s not the slogan for the UB IT department.  I’m pretty sure their slogan is “Pass the buck.”

Yes, Texas Tech, you have been good to me.  I know I haven’t always been forthcoming with my feelings, but sometimes I’m a little shy.  I hope it isn’t too late for me to express my appreciation and love at this juncture.

Yours Truly,

Kelly

The Art of the Queue

Africans have an incredible amount of patience.  I sincerely believe it is a trait which is instilled from birth.  They don’t really tend to complain much and they have an amazing tolerance for inefficiency and lack of performance.  This always stands out to me when I go somewhere and I have to wait in line.  I once walked into the Post Office to buy a stamp.  There were easily 100 people waiting in line.  I took a look around, asked someone towards the front, “Is this really the queue?  All these people are waiting?”  When she replied in the affirmative all I could say was, “You’ve GOT to be bloody kidding me?!?”  And then I turned around and left, sans stamp.

No one thinks twice about waiting in line for hours.  No one questions it or gets irritated at the wait.  It is accepted as a part of life.  It is such a natural state of being that people, and companies, have adapted to this culture of “Don’t hurry, ‘cause you’re gonna wait anyway.”

The reason I say everyone has adapted is because any time you walk into an office lobby it is typically overflowing with chairs- to accommodate the queue.  I remember the first day I arrived I was immediately taken to the Water Company to transfer the bill into my name and pay the deposit.  I went in and stood behind the person at the counter.  Someone came up to me and instructed me that I was jumping the queue.  Apparently the 20 or so people sitting in chairs were all in the queue.  I didn’t exactly understand this concept until I saw the person at the counter complete his transaction and leave.  The person in the chair closest to the counter rose and approached the now available customer service representative.  Then everyone sitting in the chairs got up and shifted one chair to the right.  I was stunned.  I went to the first empty chair on the far left and then as each person ahead of me moved, I moved.

For months I have been sitting in queues wondering why no one institutes a number system, like you have when you go to the deli counter, to avoid the massive queues.  Back in January I went to get my Botswana driver’s license.  The office was scheduled to open at 8am; I arrived at 8:17am.  I was delighted to see they utilized a number system.  I took my number, number 142.  I figured there was no way 141 numbers had been distributed in only 17 minutes.  I figured they were carrying over the numbers from the previous day.  Sadly, that was not the case.  The electronic board announced number 12 was being serviced.  I did a quick calculation and figured 12 people in 17 minutes would mean that I should be helped in about three and a half hours.  I left and returned at 11:45am, just as number 121 was being called.  Fortunately I only waited about another 45 minutes before being helped.  In reality this was a record GOOD time!

I’m pretty sure when Mr. Miyagi said, “Patience young grasshopper” he was not referring to queuing practices in Africa.  Nevertheless, this has become a sort of mantra of mine here.

Here is a photo I took of students waiting in “line” at the beginning of the semester to register for courses.  You may also notice that there are no advisors sitting at the desks with the computers to help them.  The advisors were on their lunch break.  But the students patiently sat there for over an hour until they returned: 

Applying Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Theory to Botswana

In 1943 Abraham Maslow published a paper which stated that all human beings are motivated by a spectrum of physical and psychological needs which are hierarchical in nature.  Basic human needs (food, water, shelter) must be met before a person can be motivated to pursue a higher degree of needs, such as relationships, self-esteem or social status.  In other words, if you have an employee who is homeless you cannot expect to get that person to work harder with the promise of a promotion.  Your homeless employee doesn’t care about a promotion because he needs a place to live.  Here is Maslow’s Hierarchy if you are unfamiliar with it:

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is typically taught in Organizational Behavior, Management and Human Resource classes in order to help students understand how people think and how they can (and cannot) be motivated.  I’ve taught this topic for years but I’ve never truly understood what it is like to be in a position to not have those basic human needs met.  When I used to teach about Maslow I would admittedly almost gloss over the bottom rung of the pyramid because my college students obviously were being fed and housed, they had families who were paying their tuition and taking care of them, and so they were at the bare minimum mid-way up the ladder.

However, my recent experience in Africa has made me realize that I need to pay more attention to the basic physiological needs because you never know when that will be your (or your employee’s) motivation.  Right now the most basic needs are my motivation.  I don’t care that I have money because I can’t use it to buy what I want.  Very few faculty members here are professors, most are lecturers.  Everyone calls me “Prof” as a sign of respect for the social standing I have attained.  But I don’t care about that either.  The ONLY thing I care about right now is food, water and shelter.

I do have a home here in Botswana.  And it is very nice.  Much nicer than I ever expected, or than I really need.  But I’ve come to realize that having a home and enjoying your home are two different things.  I’ve mentioned before we have water rationing.  I only have water in my house on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.  Of course, I can’t drink the water anyway, but I do use it to take showers, wash clothes and clean.  Water rationing is inconvenient, but bearable because it is on a pretty reliable schedule and they seldom turn off the water on the three days we are assigned to receive it.

Electricity is different.  We have had unpredictable rolling power outages since I arrived in Botswana.  Over the past two months electricity has become even more inconsistent.  For the past two weeks we have only had about four hours of electricity a day (if we are lucky), normally between midnight/1am until about 4/5am.  But those four hours a day are not guaranteed.  We have had several days of 24hours+ of no electricity.  The longest was 74 hours with no power.  The challenge with the power is you don’t know when to expect it, so you can’t plan ahead like with the water.

The lack of power makes it impossible to cook as everything is electric.  But, even if you did cook something you would have to plan to eat it all immediately as the refrigerators don’t stay cold because they are off more often than they are on.  Of course, a lot of the stores don’t have fresh food available anyway because they can’t refrigerate it, and no one is buying it.

Today I went to the food store and was at a loss for what to do.  I didn’t want to buy anything perishable because I wasn’t sure when I would be able to cook it, I didn’t have anything to store it in until the electricity returned, and for that matter I wasn’t sure whether the food was actually good because I wasn’t confident it had been consistently refrigerated.  Of course, the options were pretty limited to begin with.

In the end I bought 7 avocados, 2 bananas, a bottle of cold water because I haven’t had anything cold to drink in I can’t even remember how long, a jar of pickled onions, a jar of pickled peppers, and two cans of tuna fish (no mayo because I can’t refrigerate it).

I attempted to follow Dorothy’s lead today, clicking my ruby red (pink?) slippers together three times and chanting, “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.”  In the end it didn’t work.  If nothing else, this has been a VERY educational experience.

***For anyone out there asking themselves, “If she has no electricity how does she post on her blog?” I write them ahead of time and then pre-schedule several blog posts when the electricity comes back on. 

Will Africa Ever Host the Olympics?

In my former career as an event planner I thought I had seen it all.  There were a lot of close calls and a few dicey situations which would make even the calm, cool and collected sweat.  Over the years I was pepper sprayed in the face, knocked unconscious, had toes broken, broke up a fight between two rappers who pulled knives (and then guns) on one another, almost had a horse fall off a stage (with a famous country singer on his back), had an elephant die 20 minutes before we opened the doors to a show with several thousand people waiting outside, found a dead body, assisted with a hostage situation and convinced the Las Vegas Police Department NOT to arrest Ted Nugent when he brought a gun into a casino.  I’m sure there are others which I am forgetting, but these stick out as most memorable.  In retrospect, these were a cake walk compared to my current project.

Right now Gaborone is gearing up to host the 2014 African Youth Games.  Between May 22 and 31, we will play host to about 2,500 youth athletes from all 54 African countries who will be competing in 21 different sports.  No, bobsledding is not one of the sports.  Thankfully it looks like we won’t have the challenges Sochi had during the Olympics.  We will just have slightly different challenges.

Since Gaborone is less than four hours driving distance from Johannesburg, South Africa, the host of the 2010 World Cup, the city hoped to cash in on the close proximity.  So in 2008 (two years before the 2010 World Cup) Botswana decided to renovate its National Stadium.  The plan was to have the stadium available for practice sessions and scrimmages for teams arriving in Africa early.  The renovation was finally completed in October (of 2013).  Welcome to Africa! Better late than never.  Thankfully the poor planning for the 2010 renovation is now benefitting the 2014 event.

One of the fortunate things about the Youth Games is that we aren’t building any new facilities.  We are using several venues on the UB campus, the National Stadium and other national arenas, the Gaborone Golf Club and the Gaborone Dam.  There is a slight possibility those last two venues could be a challenge though.  I don’t know how the handicaps are calculated when the monkeys steal your golf balls and warthogs don’t repair their own divots.  I suspect the dam will also prove problematic.  Last week I mentioned the dam is at less than 10% capacity.  I have to believe rowing through mud will take a lot more upper body strength than rowing through water.  And with 85 days to go we will likely have significantly less water in the dam by the time the games begin.

A student recently asked if I thought any African country would ever host the Olympics.  I hate to be the downer, but I told her realistically I didn’t think it would happen.  Months ago I had asked a friend who was on the 2010 South African World Cup committee if SA would consider an Olympic bid.  He said absolutely not.  And after seeing the limitations in trying to plan something much smaller like the 2014 African Youth Games, I can’t imagine any African country being prepared to host something larger.  There has been a lot of speculation about what will come of the infrastructure built specifically for the Sochi Games.  Countless former Olympic hosts have been unable to utilize their facilities after the games, leading to venues either falling into disrepair or being completely abandoned.  In fact there are currently talks going on regarding demolishing the Cape Town stadium which was used during the World Cup since it costs more than tenfold to maintain it annually than it generates in income.

There is speculation that the U.S. will put in a bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics, which would make it more than two decades in between hosting.  Of course, the International Olympic Committee is more concerned with awarding the games to new, up and coming destinations which have never hosted.  This means the U.S. could be knocked out of the running rather quickly.  Maybe that will be my next event, once we wrap the 2014 Gaborone Games of course.

Base to Kelly. What’s your 20?

Over the last several days I’ve received a number of emails, Facebook notifications and Skype messages asking, “WHERE ARE YOU?”  Apparently everyone that I normally communicate with is concerned that I am lost.  Rest assured; I know exactly where I am.  I just can’t tell you.  No, it’s not a secret.  “What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate” a la Cool Hand Luke.

For the past week things have been unusually dicey around here.  More so than usual.  I know I’ve mentioned power outages and rolling blackouts in several previous posts.  But for the past 9 or 10 days the load-sharing as it is called here has really involved no sharing at all.  Instead it’s more of a no-load situation.  Yesterday I had no power in my house from the time I woke up around 6am until about 9:30pm.  The power came back on for about 5 minutes and then it was back off again.  I’m not sure when it came back in the middle of the night, but when I woke up this morning there was power.

When I woke up this morning to power I was thrilled.  Until I realized the Internet wasn’t working.  I couldn’t do any work at home, so I came to the office early only to find…. The Internet wasn’t working at UB either.  After four hours in the office I was finally able to connect to the Internet.  I checked my email and found the following message in my Inbox:

Colleagues,

Please note that throughout the day you may experience slow responses or limited access when working on the Internet.

We have been informed by Botswana Telecommunications Corporation (BTC) that they are experiencing problems due to a cut in the fibre at Karakubis where there is the line connecting Botswana to the world through Namibia, resulting in slow access.

We apologise for any inconvenience and will continue liaising with BTC to monitor the situation.

Thank you

Seretse Bagopi (Mr)

Deputy Director, Information Technology

University of Botswana

I’m so glad they EMAILED us to tell us the Internet wasn’t working.

So to recap, we get our power from South Africa and that’s not working out so well right now.  And I just learned today that we get our Internet from Namibia.  I’m not entirely sure why we get our Internet from Namibia.  A few months back a friend from Namibia sent me a postcard.  It took 51 days from the time he mailed the postcard for me to receive it.  Better late than never?  But if that’s how long a postcard takes, I can’t say I have a lot of hope for our Namibian Internet connection.

TIA.

By the way, I have been trying to upload this blog post for over two hours now.  The Internet keeps timing out and I keep losing all my work.  Thank goodness I wasn’t trying to post something with a photo!

Back to Square One

Remember last week when I was so excited to have received some gifts from the U.S. and my luggage that was lost back in November in Ethiopia?  Well, now everything is gone.

On Saturday morning I went to the Johannesburg airport for my flight back to Gaborone.  I was so excited to go home.  I had finally received my luggage that had been missing for over a month, and on top of that I had seen a friend from the U.S. who had brought me a few goodies I had been unable to purchase here.  All I needed to do was fly 40 minutes back to Botswana and then I could enjoy some peace and quiet, and my STUFF!

But an easy 40 minute trip is never easy in Africa. The first problem came when I arrived at the airport.  I’ve seen this phenomenon in China and I hate it: You arrive at the airport and someone approaches you and asks where you are going.  This is typically a well-dressed person who appears to be someone official, as if they work in the airport.  Well, they don’t.  They “help” you and then either demand a very large tip, or they just flat out rob you.  The problem is, the airlines know about it, security knows about it, and nothing is done to save unsuspecting tourists from a dire fate.

I’ve seen these people before and since I already known the scam they intend to pull I avoid it.  Normally threatening to scream helps, “Get away from me! I know you are here illegally! If you don’t leave me alone I will scream! Go find someone else to rob!” If you are nice they will rob you anyway, so you have to be overly aggressive and downright mean to get them to back off. This time I misjudged the situation.  The scam artist cornered me as I was getting off the escalator with my trolley full of luggage.  I gave my well-rehearsed and frequently used line and he said, “Ok.”  Then he proceeded to wrestle the trolley away from me and push it back down the escalator.  Despite my backpack (which contained my laptop) falling a good 50 feet or more, the only thing that happened was that the battery popped out, which I was able to jimmy back into place.  Crisis averted. However, it still made me mad.  Here’s why it really made me mad:  I went back down the escalator, retrieved my things, but my bags back on the trolley and returned upstairs.  When I got there two security guards were talking to Chris (the scam artist).  Point being, THEY KNEW HIS NAME! This guy was a regular!  Couldn’t they arrest him for something? Anything? Destruction of property? Trespassing?  In India you cannot enter the airport without a ticket.  I would love for them to implement that rule here.

Despite the security guards hanging out with an obvious criminal, likely talking about last night’s cricket match, I continued to the check-in counter, got my ticket, handed over my bags, proceeded to security.  As I was standing in line at the passport counter I turned my ticket over and realized my claim ticket had the surname Mwai listed, along with Walvis Bay (which is in Namibia) as the destination.  Once through passport control I looked closer and realized I had two different baggage claim tickets, one had my name and destination, the other was for Mwai.  I went to the South African Express information desk, explained the situation with the wrong bag tags and was told to go to my gate.  Went to my gate, explained the situation and was told to return to the SA Express transit desk (on the opposite side of passport control).  At the transit desk was told to return to the main check-in counter.  At the main check-in counter I talked to another person (the man who checked me in was gone when I got there).  She made four phone calls and was told they could not issue a new bag tag, so they would just move the bag to the correct pile of luggage for Gaborone.  Yes, I agree, this sounded very official (insert eye roll here).  Turned around to head back to security so I could go back through passport control again, and who did I see?  That’s right, Chris!

Fast forward to boarding the plane.  The plane was packed.  The planes between a lot of the shorter African destinations are smaller prop planes, but they can still hold a fair amount of people.  My plane was sold out; every seat was full.  This meant there had to be at least 60 people on the flight.  After we boarded we sat on the tarmac for almost an hour before we took off, which was unusual, but not exactly the end of the world.  Of course, it was 100 degrees out, and therefore uncomfortable, but sweating is my natural state of being here, so no big deal.

When we arrived in Gaborone I did what I always do and sprinted across the tarmac towards passport control in order to be first in line.  Then I went to the baggage carousel to retrieve my luggage.  Normally I get my luggage and depart before everyone gets through passport control, but this time the wait was so long everyone was milling around.  The baggage never arrived.  Finally a lone baggage handler appeared and said, “It’s ok, come over here.”  Since there is only one baggage area I literately thought maybe he was taking us back to the plane to offload the luggage ourselves.  I would have been ok with that.  But it was not to be.  Instead he took us to the check in counter and then disappeared.  Then another person arrived and said no luggage was loaded onto the plane at all.  He needed everyone to fill out paperwork regarding lost luggage.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!  THERE WERE 60 PEOPLE ON THAT PLANE.  NO ONE? NO ONE THOUGHT SOMEONE, ANYONE, MAYBE ONE PERSON WOULD WANT TO TAKE A BAG WITH THEM?

Long story short, they never loaded any bags on the plane at all.  Not quite sure where the common sense was in that decision.  I would like to think one person who worked at the Joburg airport would have questioned the fact there were no bags to load.

In the last 48 hours six South African Express planes have arrived in Gaborone from Johannesburg.  They can tell me with great certainty that the bag tagged for Mwai never made it to Walvis Bay.  But they also can’t tell me where it is.  Maybe Chris has a deal worked out with the Johannesburg baggage handlers as well as the security guards.

How to Make a Speech (in Africa)

In Africa people take themselves very seriously.  There is a lot of pomp and circumstance and reference to protocol.  Back home informality is considered more friendly, personal and preferred.  Here, you don’t dare call someone by their first name unless they invite you to do so.  Instead, you must greet them with their surname and the proper title (Mr., Dr., etc.).  It’s not really my style, but you get used to it to an extent.

Given the preference for formality, speeches are VERY important.  If you invite someone to speak at an event there are certain rules to be followed, and failing to do so is considered uncouth.  In case anyone reading my blog plans on taking a trip to Africa in the future and making any kind of speech or presentation, please follow these instructions:

1.      Acknowledge and thank EVERYONE.  Before making a speech you find out everyone else who will be addressing the audience and you acknowledge their presence, as well as whoever invited you to the event and any ‘dignitaries.’  Keep in mind just about everyone is a dignitary of some kind.  I often record events which I attend so I make sure when I quote someone it is 100% accurate.  In a recent conference I attended the first person who spoke on a panel said the following, “Thank you to the University of Botswana, the International Tourism Research Center, the Faculty of Business and the Department of Tourism for inviting me to talk today.  I would like to especially thank Mr. Mongokoki for organizing this event; Mrs. Siya, the chair of the Tourism Department; Mrs. Mahachi, the coordinator of the Hospitality program; Mrs. Tsheko, one of the esteemed lecturers in the Faculty of Business; Dr. Ketshabile, the Associate Dean of the Faculty of Business; Dr. Pansiri, the Dean of the Faculty of Business… [he named about 6 other UB administrators I won’t mention here].  I would also like to appreciate how honored I am to be in the company of so many other wonderful presenters, such as the Director of the Department of Tourism, the lady from the Department of Wildlife, the Minister of Tourism… [as well as 3 others].”  Not an exaggeration, I still have the tapes if you want to listen to them.

2.      Observe protocol. After acknowledging everyone you then recognize that protocol has been observed.  Literately, that’s what you say.  The guy who made the above introduction followed it by saying, “Protocol observed.”  Every time I hear this it makes me laugh inside a little bit.  I sort of equate it to eating dinner and then formally stating, “Dinner has now been eaten.”  Maybe only I see the humor in this.  Please excuse me if you don’t appreciate this as much as I do.

3.      The speech itself. Once you have made your introductory statement and announced “protocol observed” you may then begin making your remarks.  Again, there are more rules associated with making remarks:

a.       You must time your predecessors’ remarks and make sure your statement is the same amount of time, plus you must add 10%.  If the speaker before you spoke for 10 minutes you must speak for a minimum of 11minutes.  This is particularly important if you have a direct counterpart.  For instance, if you are Vice President of Botswana and the Vice President of Zimbabwe is also in attendance, you MUST speak longer than the other VP.  If you have the bad luck of speaking first then you are out of luck because the Zimbabwean VP will basically take everything you say, repeat it and then say some more stuff to make sure he speaks longer than you.  This is definitely an example of “first is the worst, second is the best.”  You want to speak second so you can prove you are better than whoever went first.

b.       If you are given a time limit for how long you are permitted to speak you absolutely must ignore it.  I spoke on a panel where all the speakers were told we should limit our comments to four minutes or less.  I spoke first for three minutes exactly.  The other speakers on the panel spoke for between 10 and 26 minutes.  Yes, I timed them.  So, the panel which was supposed to be precisely 30 minutes lasted a full two hours.

c.       Feel free to ignore the start time for your presentation.  You might be told you are presenting at 8am.  No one will be there at 8am to watch you.  In fact, your host won’t even be there at 8am.  Come to think of it, the building won’t even be open at 8am, so you will be standing outside, by yourself.  If you are delegated an 8am start time no one expects you to arrive before 9am and no one else will be there before that time either.

4.      In conclusion… At this point you have acknowledged and thanked everyone, noted that protocol has been observed, and talked for as long as you want about whatever you want.  Ready to wrap it up now?  At the conclusion of your speech you must state that you are concluding.  And you are permitted to be as long winded in your conclusion as you like.  You are also encouraged to use the term conclusion as much as possible.  At a speech during the UNWTO conference, the Zambian Minister of Tourism stated, “In conclusion…. Thus I can conclude by stating…. A concluding thought I advise you remember…” She used the words conclusion, conclude and concluding no less than 9 times during her 21 minute conclusion.  When I first arrived in Africa I would always look forward to someone stating, “in conclusion” with great anticipation thinking to myself, YAY! This is almost over!  I have since learned to ignore “in conclusion” as it means absolutely nothing.  Now it’s more like a tease because you know you are no closer to the end than when you started.

To recap, don’t start on time, ignore time limits, say hi to everyone, observe protocol and make sure you note when you are getting ready pretending to conclude.  Happy speech writing!

Police Report: White Woman Causes Accident on Shashe Rd

It’s really hard to be popular.  I’ve mentioned before my attempts to blend in here in Botswana have been ill received.  White people in Africa are sort of like unicorns.  You hear about them, but you can go your entire life without actually seeing one in real life.  So when you do see one you have to seize the opportunity. For Rra Mmanokowa, he finally saw his unicorn/lekogwa/white person last week.

I do not own a car, so I typically walk everywhere, take a combi, or occasionally use a taxi if I’m travelling a long distance.  Many people here walk, so this is not uncommon.  Last week I was walking to the store to purchase my groceries.  As I was walking along I saw a man driving by, practically turned all the way around in his seat to look at me.  Again, this is not uncommon.  I’ve asked other lekogwa about this, but few seem to report this phenomenon.  Apparently I am special.

However, this time I was a little bit too special.  As the driver was looking at me, he swerved into oncoming traffic and hit a car coming in the opposite direction.  You know how you are supposed to check to make sure everyone in an accident is ok?  That is the moral thing to do, right?  In Africa that is generally a bad idea.  No one here drives particularly fast, so both drivers were fine.  But as I was getting ready to continue on to the store the police arrived and insisted on taking statements from all of us.  That’s when the trouble started.

The police wrote up the traffic report stating that “a white woman walking along Shashe Road caused a traffic accident.”  Excuse me?  I most certainly did not.  How is it my fault?  Mr. Mmanokowa claimed I distracted him.  I didn’t yell anything obscene, run across the street right in front of his car or take my shirt off.  But that was how the traffic report was written.

After the accident I was required to go to court to determine whether or not I was guilty and if I should pay a fine.  Are you kidding me?!?!?!  I do have to say that court was quite an education.  After a lot of back and forth the judge finally decided I was innocent and let me go.  I’m not sure who in the end was found guilty or what kind of fine he had to pay, but I just wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible before they changed their minds.

I should mention however, that as I was sitting in court waiting for my trial a man was being tried for murder.  He was found guilty and made to pay a 400 Pula fine.  That is equivalent to about $50.  Nope, I did not misinterpret the sentencing or the penalty.  Though I certainly didn’t understand how murder would only cost you $50.

I started asking around about murder and the “low cost” penalty.  Apparently this is the standard practice.  Someone told me that in South Africa you have to pay about 250 Rand a month for a television license.  Inspectors randomly show up at people’s houses and if they find you have an illegal television you have to pay a 1,250 Rand fine.  However, the penalty for murder if you are found guilty is only 500 Rand.  In other words, don’t bother getting a television license and don’t worry about getting caught and having to pay the fine.  If the Inspector turns up, just kill him and pay the equivalent of two months of television licensing for the murder charge.  Yet again, TIA!

Obtaining a Beef Permit

Remember when I said I finally got a mailing address and could receive mail?  I take it back.  Please do NOT send me mail.  If you decide to risk it and send me anything, I would recommend you send something small, that if I never receive it I won’t be upset, and neither will you.  If you are brave enough to send me something I hope it’s nothing with an expiration date.  My boyfriend sent me a postcard from Namibia, you know, the country right next door?  He sent it on October 23^rd.  I got it today.  Nothing like 50 days to receive a postcard.  If it had been a Christmas card I probably wouldn’t have received it until Easter.

If you really love me (Don’t worry, it will NOT hurt my feelings at all if no one loves me.  In fact if the roles were reversed I wouldn’t love me either.) and decide to send me a box you MUST have it tracked.  The biggest reason for tracking packages is because there is a high likelihood that customs will seize the package.  I’ve had two packages sent to me and customs seized both.  But at least if the package is tracked than the shipping company (normally Fed Ex) will contact me and tell me what hoops I need to jump through in order to get the package.

Recently my amazing graduate students sent me a package.  Once it actually arrived in Botswana it only took 13 days, three trips to two different offices, seven phone calls, and a slight decrease in my sanity to receive it.  When you send packages to Botswana you are required to list the full contents of the box on the customs declaration paperwork.  In my package there were a couple of t-shirts, a mouse pad, a few personal necessities I can’t buy here, and some beef jerky.  In a country where one of our primary exports is beef, customs threw a fit when they saw beef jerky listed.

Since I was “importing beef” I was required to go to the Ministry of Agriculture to obtain permission.  Despite the fact this was for personal consumption with no intent to sell, I still had to get approval.  I showed up to the Ministry to find about a dozen men all dressed in safari khaki waiting to talk to the one office clerk who was processing applications.  Being adorable, and obviously out of place, I took the opportunity to strike up a conversation with one of them.  It turns out they were all cattle ranchers and being that we live in a pretty small country, they all knew one another, which was why they welcomed making a new friend.  Since I had no idea what half the questions on the application meant, one of the ranchers helped me fill it out.  Then I had to go through a line of questioning.  Here was the conversation:

Clerk: We don’t import beef into Botswana.  What is this you want to bring in? What is beef jerky?
Kelly: It is the same as biltong (the name for beef jerky here in Botswana, but here it’s pretty gross).
Clerk: Why don’t you just eat the biltong we have here?
Kelly: Ummm… Here’s the problem, customs has my box and they need approval for the beef jerky, otherwise they won’t give me anything in the box.  Can you please approve the permit?  I’m not going to sell it; I’m only going to eat it myself.
Clerk: Well, how much beef jerky do you want approval for?
Kelly: One kilo.
Clerk: One thousand kilos….
Kelly: No, no, just one kilo. (clerk looks at me quizzically)
Clerk: One kilo? (looks at everyone else in the room and they ALL collectively laugh)
Kelly: Yes, as in, the same amount of food I will probably cook for dinner tonight.
Clerk: Well, this is a lot of work for one kilo of beef jerky. 

When he said that all I could think to myself was, EVERYTHING in Botswana is a LOT OF WORK!!  Need a faculty ID on campus?  That takes two weeks and countless visits to the same office.  Need to have a meeting?  Plan to spend your entire day there because no one will show up on time and then they will break for tea, so they can’t be rushed.  Need your residence permit? You will get it the last possible day you are legally in the country about an hour before they decide to deport you.

Clerk: Ok, I will process the paperwork.  You can come back in the morning to pick it up.

The following morning I excitedly woke up and returned to the Ministry to collect the permit.  Guess what happened when I got there.  That’s right, no permit.  I had to see a second person who questioned me and then informed me they don’t grant permits for fewer than 10 kilos of beef.

Kelly: Ok, then can I please have a beef permit for 10 kilos?
Ministry Director: No.

After another thirty minute inquisition the Ministry Director wrote me a note stating that I had permission to import the beef jerky.

 

I love Africa. There is no such thing as a dull moment here.  And in the end, my beef jerky sure was good.