Jimerica!

Tsunami-Dog out, Jimerica! in. I have a new blog. You can find it here:

http://yeajimerica.blogspot.com/

A Quick 2 Years

I suppose it’s about time to bring this blog back to life.  My last post was exactly two years ago today.  I was living in Namibia and I was fighting an illness that I didn’t understand and wasn’t going away.  My doctor in Namibia told me I had mono. I didn’t have mono.  I spent most of my last 4 months in Rundu in bed, each week my symptoms got worse.  To be fair to my Namibian doctor, I wasn’t forthcoming with my deteriorating condition because I didn’t want to be sent home and was hoping that I would eventually recover.  But, when my illness got so bad that I was struggling to even get to the market for food, I finally filled Peace Corps in on how things were going. 

A week later I was in a hospital in Windhoek.  I had a hospital bracelet on that had my name, date of birth, and the words “multiple sclerosis”.  I don’t have multiple sclerosis.  But for one very long weekend, I thought that I did, and so did they.  It seemed plausible.   I’d had an MRI on a Friday, the neurologist told me his initial thoughts and even mentioned ALS, and said we’d have to wait to see what the radiologist had to say on Monday.  Long, long weekend.  I had some visitors.  The Peace Corps nurse, Kate, a South African, very dedicated to her job and to the volunteers she served, came to me to visit me.  My PC brother Rob came to visit me as well. 

And so, there I was.  I was in the best hospital in Namibia.  A nice hospital.  Private room.  I had a balcony that gave me access to a roof top patio with fountains.  The room was white, of course.  I had a small bed, and a private bathroom.  There was a crucifix on the wall next to a wall-mounted television and that was about it.  The nurses didn’t like me.  I wanted to check myself out and go stay at the Peace Corps housing, but they insisted that I stay.  My thoughts were pretty much these: I’m either dying, or I’m going to be permanently limited physically for the rest of my life.   

After the initial shock, I had the opportunity, for the first time in my life, to reflect on my life as if it were actually ending.  I figured, one way or the other, it was ending.  Progress would be replaced with either death or maintenance.  I would either die or depend on others from here on out.  Those thoughts then turned to reflection on what I’ve done in my life and what I felt about what I’ve done in my life.  What I found was a patchwork of efforts that were not easy, but also never brought me in a direction that I actually cared about with the exception of Peace Corps.  I had some awful years before Peace Corps, and I thought about them.  I then started to think about other things in the world that interested me, but I neglected.  I’d always been interested in the sciences, like biology, physics, medicine.  I wondered why I never pursued those things.  I’d spent the last year in a country surrounded by people that would never have the opportunities that I have here in America.  Promising young boys and girls that would likely never find themselves in a position of empowerment similar to what we take for granted here in America.   Yet, I never pursued the things that I really wanted to, and I had no excuse for why I hadn’t.

Four months later, I was still in bed.  But at that point, I was in my parent’s house in Bethlehem, PA.  Each scary diagnosis had been ruled out.  I’d been staring at ceilings or sleeping for nearly 9 months at that point. I knew this was hard on my parents, but they never showed it.  I’d seen more doctors then I care to recount here.  They all agreed something was wrong, and they all had no clue what it was.  I was thankful for the few visible physical issues I had, swollen joints and some others I won’t bore you with, because I believe they were the only things between me and a diagnosis of “crazy”.

My sister, Mary, had been asking me to see her doctor in Virginia for a couple months at this point.  That would mean a long trip, and I didn’t have much faith in doctors or much of a stomach for a 4-hour drive at this point, but I went.  This was in May, 2013.  Everything about her doctor was different.  He tested for parasites, allergies, vitamin deficiencies, hormone levels, everything.  I followed up with him a month later and he asked me “are you aware you’re allergic to eggs and gliadin?”. I wasn’t aware and, in fact, eggs and gliadin were pretty much my entire diet.  He then patiently went through all of my test results, informing me that I was (paraphrasing) a mess.  He didn’t have any definitive thought on what triggered all of this, but he had thoughts on how to get me out of it.   He put me on a very strict diet, supplements, and a few weeks of antibiotics.  After two weeks I was putting in a small garden at my parent’s house.  A couple weeks later I started pre-med courses at Penn State.  I completed my pre-med postbac this past December.  Six weeks ago, I took the MCAT exam.  Next month, I will start working as a medical scribe in the ER at New York Hospital in Queens.  In June, I’ll begin applying to medical schools.

I turned 42 a couple weeks ago.  I’ll be moving from State College, PA to Queens in a few weeks.  Things are good.  Thanks for reading. 

update

Hello Friends.  After 6 months of trying to get my health issues figured out here in Namibia, Peace Corps has decided to send me state side to see if the doctors there have better luck diagnosing me.  It turns out that the mono diagnosis was incorrect.  Having to go home half way through my service sucks, but it's the right decision.  My goal is to get better and to return to Namibia as quickly as possible.   I appreciate the notes of encouragement I’ve received from so many of you.  I also appreciate the support I’ve received from my friends here in Namibia.  I’ll post an update in a few weeks on my progress.

Hiatus

Hello Friends.  I know I haven't been posting very frequently in the past few months. The issue is that I’m still not well and the sickness is significantly limiting my mobility, which limits my experiences here, which limits what I have to write about.  I’ll likely be heading back to Windhoek this week to see a doctor there. I won’t be posting much until I feel better unless I have something significant or interesting to share.  Here are some photos from my walk to work this past Friday.

I pass these kids most days.  This abandoned car is their clubhouse.

I never thought I'd get used to constantly walking through sand, but I barely notice it anymore.  It's always in my shoes and pockets, often in my bed, and sometimes in my food.  I won't miss sand when I leave here.  This is a small part of the long sandy walk to my office.  It's rainy season now, so everything is very green.

 My entourage.

Part of my walk takes me through a big school yard.  There's usually about a dozen kids taking turns doing flips off this wall.

 

The Churn

Hello friends.  Not a good post for kids.

I see a lot of strange things out of my kitchen window.  A completely naked man walked past my house the other day.  All he had with him that he wasn’t born with was a t-shirt that he had slung over his shoulder.  He seemed unconcerned and quite at his leisure.  Possibly drunk, possibly mentally compromised.  Mental health services don’t exist here, or at least the lack of capacity makes them constructively non-existent. 

A few days after the naked man’s stroll, there was person sleeping inside of a discarded section of a large drainage pipe that sits across the street.  A day later, two friends had moved in with him.  They slept practically in a pile and reminded me of how my dog and his friend used to sleep on top of one another (the things that make you think of home).  The morning after that, my drain spout neighbors disappeared, and a woman in dirty purple dress replaced them.  She didn’t look good.  She was just standing there looking around and talking to herself.  When she’d turn I could see that the back of her dress was torn wide open.  She looked like she was maybe 20.  I was considering asking her if she needed help when two men in matching blue shirts arrived on foot.  Behind them followed an older woman and two children.  When the men spoke to the girl, she got irritated and started yelling in Rukwangali.  I couldn’t make out much of what she was saying besides “kembo” and “kapi tani diva” which means ‘home’ and ‘I don’t know’.  The men seemed flustered yet mildly entertained by her while the older woman showed no emotion at all.  The girl appeared quite drunk.  A cab pulled up and one of the men opened the door and the other took the girl by the shoulders and tried to guide her into the back seat, which made her erupt.  She fought and screamed and the men laughed and retreated.  They appeared to be friends or family and no threat to her.  The older woman just watched blank-faced, as did the children who now stood atop of the abandon drainage pipe.  The girl walked away crookedly, yelling while the men watched and smiled wearily and spoke to one another.  The cab pulled off and the group stood there, obviously uncertain of how to deal with their friend. 

The other night I was walking home from a friend’s house when a woman offered me a ride.  It was late, just after 11PM, but I was in a pretty safe part of town.  Though I’m recovering from mono, I still have moments of weakness and dizziness and about 3 blocks into my walk the whole world started spinning and I had to lean against a wall and wait for it to stop.  She said she’d thought I was drunk because of how I was walking, which is reasonable given the amount of drinking that occurs in Rundu during the holidays.  I explained to her I wasn’t drunk, but was just a bit weak from a sickness.  She was in town to spend time with her sister whose son had killed himself the previous day.  She said she’d passed me in her car and thought to herself that it wasn’t safe for me to be walking out here alone at night and so turned around to come collect me.  She spoke about Jesus and helping others while I sat there feeling like shit and trying to maintain the conversation through my headache.  Her name was Ester and she asked for my number and then texted me for the next few days to see if I was feeling better.  The fact that she was in town for such a reason as a family member suicide didn’t shock me. 

It’s not unusual to hear of the death of somebody’s friend or family member.  Pickup trucks full of the mourning friends and family of some recently deceased person are a weekly sight (and often multiple times a week).  Car accidents and suicides top the list of the causes of deaths that I’m actually told about, though far more often than not no explanation is offered (likely meaning HIV).  One day, I think in September, a gentleman came to my office seeking help in creating a funeral program for his young nephew.  The boy was only 7.  After completing the program and printing copies I told him I was sorry for his loss.  He said, “These things happen”.  I asked what happened.  He said, “He was sick”.  I left it at that.  Life expectancy in Namibia is 52 years, but in the Kavango, Namibia’s poorest region, it’s 42.  

Coffin making is a big business here.  There was a month-long coffin making training just outside of my office window.  They started it a few days after I’d hung a Halloween skeleton in my window I’d received in a care package.  The skeleton stood smiling and waving over the coffin making students for a month and I came to see it as their school mascot.  I probably should have taken it down, but I didn’t.  

For a kid, the death of a parent is often far more than just an emotional hardship.  Family members sometimes swoop in to claim ownership of the deceased's property, the traditional authority often supporting these claims (*a brief explanation of difference between traditional and government authority at bottom of this post).  Sometimes kids simply get kicked out to find their own way.  Recently, my friend Anneke had a young girl (16 years old) staying with her for a few nights.  The girl’s father had died and, since then, she’d been kicked out of three successive houses in a matter of weeks.  The girl then hiked to Grootfountain, a town about 150 miles from here, to stay with an Aunt.  Anneke hasn’t heard from her since. 

One of my closer friends here, Klemi, lost her father when she was 13.  He contracted a lung disease after working for many years in an uranium mine.  While she, her mother, and siblings were away for the funeral, her great uncle (and oldest male relative of the deceased) emptied their house of all of their belongings except for their clothing, which he left on the floor.  He found the father’s will and destroyed it.  He then took claim of the father’s business, a restaurant, and property.  He even tried to kick the family out of the house, but the community stepped in to stop him.  He left them with nearly nothing and there was little anybody could do about it as the traditional authority dictates that ownership goes to the oldest male relative.  Klemi, her mother, and her siblings would have been in a position of abject poverty if it weren’t for her late father’s boss, who helped to support the family and hired her oldest brother to work for him. 

Klemi is part of the Kwanyama tribe, which comes under the larger tribal group known as the Ovambos.  Many Namibian tribal traditions and ceremonies are beautiful, complex, and interesting to witness and take part in.  Then there are the customs that leave your jaw on the floor in utter disbelief, such as Okufukala.  Okufukala is the Kwanyama tradition of taking 16-year-old girls and parading them nude (except for a “tiny skirt”) in front of men who then choose a wife from among the selection.  When the time came for Klemi to participate in Okufukala, she snuck from her home and walked 30 miles to her grandmother’s village where she hid for a month.  I asked her what would have happened if she had simply refused to participate.  She said, “They would have come into the house and taken me.  You can’t refuse.  Even my mother wouldn’t have been able to stop them.  The men would have come and taken me.”

Klemi’s flight from Okufukala occurred 10 years ago.  In recent years, Okufukala has become the controversy it ought to be and its practice is diminishing.  However, it still occurs in some of the more remote communities. 

That’s all for now.  I realize this is a bit of a dark post.  Namibia is a beautiful place full of friendly, welcoming, and often very happy people.  I’ve been treated well and have never once feared for my safety.  There is, however, the poverty, disease, alcoholism, and the sometimes-troubling aspects of Namibian culture that result in a lot of despair for a lot of people.  The frequency of tragic and otherwise life altering events is greater here than in a more developed country.  There is a great sense of stability in the states where, here, there's a constant churn in the foundation upon which people establish their lives.  As I become closer to the people in my community and hear more stories of their lives, I start to get a better sense of the often treacherous and painful path of a typical life in the Kavango.  Thanks for reading. 

*Traditional Authority vs. Government

I am no expert on the complex relationship between tradition and government authorities in the Kavango, but the basics go something like this:

The three biggest tribes in the Kavango region of Namibia are the Thimbukushu, the Romanyo, and the Kwangali (that’s my tribe).  Within each of these tribes there is a power structure (“traditional authority”) that is headed by a Chief, or “Big Man” (except for the Thimbukushu Chief who calls himself the “Fumu”, which I’m told translates roughly into “God”.  Historically speaking, men who call themselves God tend to be dicks.  The Fumu is no exception.  I’ll delve into that one on some future post.)  When it comes to who makes the rules and who calls the shots, the Kavango is a bit schizophrenic.  There is the established government authority, which in the Kavango is the “Regional Council”, and then there are the unofficial tribal authorities noted above.  The Regional Council claims ultimate authority, but they go to great lengths to keep the peace with the traditional authorities and often work directly with them on development projects, protecting the environment and wildlife, and health initiatives.  However, in cases regarding issues such as petty crime, property ownership, land disputes, and disputes between families, often these things fall to the traditional authorities to deal with.