My Aspiration Satatement

When I was invited to join Peace Corps South Africa, I was asked to write an aspiration statement that answers five simple questions and (ideally) helps to place volunteers appropriately within the country. During an intensive room cleaning yesterday, I uncovered a copy of my answers and read over it again. It struck me that my expectations and attitude when entering Peace Corps were realistic and pretty accurate to many of the experiences I had. Even my answer to the last question about what is to come after Peace Corps has not changed significantly. So I decided to share my original aspiration statement:

The professional attributes that I plan to use, and what aspirations I hope to fulfill, during my Peace Corps service.

Having worked at a non-profit and having run my own business for several years, I bring knowledge of business strategies and tools, which may apply to the NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) that I am working with. But more importantly, I think that I will simply contribute a fresh perspective. So easily, such organizations can get bogged down in certain details or overextended by too many different programs. In addition, local business strategies may prove ineffective or insufficient for the organization’s goals. In all these situations, simply having a different perspective to draw attention to certain assumptions or overlooked choices can prove immensely helpful. On top of this, I feel that my time will be most beneficially spent by helping fill the needs of the organization. As much as I may see different ways of doing things, it will be important for me to help the organization achieve and carry out its existing obligations and programs. This will both help the organization itself, and will also help foster a mutual trust and understanding. Overall, I have tried to keep my aspirations realistic in terms of understanding that change may be slow or difficult to achieve. In this sense, I understand that my contributions to the organization may be slow to come to fruition. For this reason, I am eager to try to contribute in other ways, through secondary projects within my community, such as tutoring or IT work. (Of course these secondary projects may be no easier to implement, but I hope to try to contribute in multiple ways.)

My strategies for working effectively with host country partners to meet expressed needs.

After reading the assignment description and talking with other RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteers), I think the most important strategy will simply be patience. In order to instigate any change, it is fundamentally important to build trust and connections with coworkers in the NGO. Trying to instantly achieve change will be futile and insulting to people who have been working in these organizations for years. As a foreigner from an affluent country, I will be faced with the challenges of breaking down stereotypes and forming open and honest connections with others in the community. Without this, any changes I suggest will most likely end up ignored or will last only until my departure. In addition, even with the trust of coworkers within the organizations, it is important to seek change by providing guidance and making suggestions (i.e., let those closest to the organization instigate change, while I only try to help guide and shape the changes). This helps to empower people and will lead to longer lasting changes.

My strategies for adapting to a new culture with respect to my own cultural background.

My strongest asset in adapting to a new culture is a skill I learned back during high school. Going to a rather small, new school (only 37 in my graduating class), one is forced to be friends with all fellow students. With such a small student body, students do not form smaller groups as would happen at a large school, but rather learn to befriend everyone. This generally involves being unassuming, welcoming differences (rather then looking for similarities) and exhibiting a patience and genuine interest in learning about others’ ideas and views. Although the cultural diversity in my high school is low in comparison to what I will find in South Africa, I feel that my experience has enabled me to connect more easily with different cultures, beliefs or worldviews, and this skill will be invaluable when I am immersed in such a different culture.

The skills and knowledge I hope to gain during pre-service training to best serve my future community and project.

During the pre-service training, my primary hope is to learn about the culture and customs of people living in South Africa. Undoubtedly, much of this will be learned from actually living in the community and working within an organization, but I imagine that having a 'heads up' to the different customs will help me to better respond and better adapt. For example, after reading about the central role of religion within the culture, I would appreciate learning a respectful and quiet way of avoiding the topic of my religious beliefs. Although I am interested in taking part in religious events, I would feel uncomfortable professing false beliefs. Learning to negotiate such situations in advance will be beneficial and will help ease the cultural transition, minimizing offense and missteps.

How I think Peace Corps service will influence my personal and professional aspirations after my service ends.

In terms of personal and professional aspirations following the Peace Corps, I am very open. Primarily, I am confident that my experience will serve as a 'consciousness raiser' (the term is borrowed from Richard Dawkins), in terms of helping broaden my perspective and understanding of the current human condition. In this way, I hope that I will achieve some level of personal growth throughout my experience. As for professional aspirations, following the Peace Corps, I hope to attend graduate school and pursue a Ph.D.

Students' Writing

Today, during some down time at the local high school, I started reading over grade nine students' English assignments. One of the first assignments was a simple "who I am" list of questions, and I found the answers encapsulated many of the cultural values of rural South Africa. So I have decided to share a few excerpts:

My Favorite Food

The answer to this question always started with porridge (also called pap, a thick white starch made from ground maize meal), bread or rice. The food here places heavy emphasis on such starches as a way of gaining empty calories, as often meat or vegetables are in short supply.

My Hero

The two most common answers were: "God" and "my mom and dad".

Here we see both the substantial emphasis placed on religion and on family. But you can also look at this and see a lack of strong role models within South Africa today (in the past there have been Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela, but few new people are stepping up to take an important role as a model individual or hero).

Things I Like to Do Most

This one is divided by gender, with boys giving very generic responses (reading, playing soccer, etc). But the responses of the girl students all mirror this one:

"1. Wash myself
2. Wear clean clothes every day
3. Read my books
4. Cook for my grandmother"

I think that this response speaks accurately about a lot of the cultural values of the rural communities. The first two reference the very heavy emphasis placed on cleanliness, which is often associated with not being poor (people have often expressed to me that the poor wear dirty or wrinkly clothes). And regular baths are also a manifestation of this, with my family members often bathing twice a day – before work and before bed. You can see these values in other parts of life here, such as how dirt yards are often swept on a regular basis, to remove the slightest debris. Houses are also cleaned on a regular basis, with sweeping and polishing often happening weekly. I believe that this value of cleanliness stems from a number of sources, but it is a way of expressing control over one’s life and developing an outward appearance of success (especially in rural communities, where there are so few things to strive for or succeed at).

Describing My Family

Again, the answers here speak to the importance of families, with people often writing about their aunts and uncles as well as just their immediate family. These familial connections are extremely important here. For example, uncles play an important role in life, negotiating things like bridal lebola (the price a groom must pay to the bride’s father for her hand in marriage), but also stepping in if the father is absent from the picture. In addition, the answers to this question also emphasize the size of the family, with some children describing six siblings.

One answer:

"I have my younger sister her name is Asanda. And my big brother his name is Tshepiso. Also my mom and dad. They don't want to see me with dirty clothes or sleep without washing myself and dishes. And also my granny she wants me to cook for her."

This answer harks back to the previous description of the importance of cleanliness. But it also provides insight into how children are treated here. They are seen less as independent future adults, and more as helpers who can aid in the day to day activities. At home, young women are often put to work cooking and doing dishes and other tasks before they even reach adolescence. At school, teachers regularly ask the students to sweep or carry their belongings or go fetch them water, even during class.

Things I Like Best

I am going to just end with quotes from the answers to the last two questions, because I feel there are some very beautiful ones. One note first is that you see the work of the life-skills classes (classes that talk about everything from hygiene to self respect to preventing HIV/AIDS) in some of these responses, and it is nice to see that the message is sometimes getting through.

"Love myself the way I am"
"Respect the old"
"Eat too much"

My Greatest Ambition is

"Help people who are sick"
"Pass grade 12 and go to university"
"Believe god and love other people"
"To be proud of my culture"
"Be a pilot"
"To care for myself"

Photos of ga-Mathabatha

With the end of my service approaching, I have begun a new effort to capture photos of my community and some of the people within it. So today I uploaded 17 new photos, which show some of the destinations and people within ga-Mathabatha. The new photos appear at the beginning of my album called Peace Corps Site:

Peace Corps Site