RIP baby calf

Today when I got home from class, I sat outside with the family doing laundry and eating mangos. Then, I look toward the gate to see Mama wheeling the wheel barrel toward the cow pen. she called Sara and me over to watch... And low and behold one of the baby cows died. Mama dragged the baby cow onto the barrel and instructed me to begin wheeling it down the dirt road. With no shoes on, I began wheeling the dead baby cow away toward the bush. After a very long walk in the sun, mama took over and discarded the cow in a small ditch in the middle of no where. We offered to make a little funeral but they just laughed. Oh well, its Just another day in the life of a Welverdind villager.

The stars are so beautiful in Bushbuckridge!

Happy Wednesday!

On Saturday, I went with the group to Blyde river canyon which is the 3rd largest canyon in the world. I saw some beautiful views, amazing rock formations, and got to swim in waterfalls there too! For dinner, we ate at a 'pancake' place that is very popular in the area. The pancakes are kind of a mix of a crepe and a pancake stuffed with either sweets or savory treats. I got one stuffed with butter nut squash and feta. Yum!
Church! So great. This week I went with Eulanda, my older host sister, to her church (a different one from last week) called Zion. Again, I dress extremely modestly - hair covered, long sleeve shirt and long skirt. Most people dressed in the church colors, blue and white, however, we did not get the memo. As soon as we entered the church, the pastor welcomed us and thanked us for joining them as the first white people to pray with Zion ever. He told us that we are like angels to them and that we (Lan Sara and I) are lights on to the world. I felt extremely flattered despite the slight discomfort of so much praise.

A passage from the bible about love was read in Tsonga and translated to English for us. The remainder of the service consisted of various church members rising and sharing what their interpretation of the passage was...and low and behold most people drew connections to Valentine’s Day! (everyone is obsessed with Valentine’s Day here!) At the end of the service, they did a prayer for the sick where everyone formed a circle around the periphery of the church and in the center the pastors blessed the sick. During this time, all of the little kids came to stand near us, so we chose to play with them and hold their hands to make them feel comfortable with seeing white people probably for the first time. As we left, tons of church members approached us to shake our hands.

In the afternoon, I went with my host family to a traditional tribal dance festival. It was awesome and cool to be part of a local festival.
I've made quite a few observations about the Shangan community I'm living with from conversations with family and hearing from speakers.

According to my host sister, 3/4 of all girls here get pregnant out of wedlock - which is totally acceptable and due to many factors. Some girls do this to receive a money stipend from the government for each child they have (about $35 / month). Some get pregnant because many boy-friends refuse to use condoms in order to make sure their girl friends are faithful -which many times leads to pregnancy and spreading disease - another reason why the prevalence of HIV is so high here. Despite the high rates, there are many stigmas for HIV and few people get tested and disclose their status in fear of social discrimination.

Many interesting gender roles exist in the community. Polygamy is a widely accepted practice and many men have multiple wives that live in separate homes (usually without the husband at all). Many other men leave the village to find work elsewhere in order to support the family. The combination of the two factors, leave the village with very few male figures. The women raise the children and completely run the home, and family friends and neighbors play a large role in helping one another out. Especially in such a poverty-stricken area, families who have more food feed others and grandparents often look after the young. Mama Ivy is constantly feeding tons of people and cares for babies of villagers who need help. Because of this, there is s strong sense of social parenting in which all members of the community contribute to disciplining and raising a child.

The primary school system has much to be improved which is currently in the works of reform. There are no newspapers, no library, no internet café, and no community center. If anyone would like to have any of these resources, they must take a taxi to a bigger town 30 minutes away – which most people cannot afford. All politics are run by councilmen who are very stuck in the past and do little work for the underserved village people, and the chief is born into the position so there is no democratic process in choosing him. A lot of people I’ve spoken to think these men are corrupt. I have also been learning more about the resources here. Water is very scarce and not enough to support any large scale agricultural industry. Also this season it has not rained enough and consequently many of the crops have died. Yesterday, the group went to the district hospital about thirty minutes from the village. The road to get there was extremely bumpy and not super accessible. The hospital is highly understaffed, underfunded and with little resources. In the whole hospital, there are only 8 doctors! While touring around, I noticed so much overcrowding in the rooms. Many of the patients are there for TB, HIV, malaria, and chronic illnesses, and for the children, many suffer from diarrhea and respiratory infection. They claimed that the average stay of women in the maternity ward is 8 hours, including entering the hospital, birth, and post birth.

On a more positive note - I am treated more like a daughter now. I helped fetch water from the bore hole with a wheel barrel, helped mama cook, helped with the laundry... And now I am in the process of getting my hair braided from my host cousin Carola! Each day I love the family more and more. They are so wonderful and I really respect Mama and the daughters as being such kind and strong women.

Shab! (bye!)

Jess or Sinhle (my Tsonga name meaning beauty, also Eulandah's first name) or Jeska (my Tsongalized name, given by my host sisiters)

Mijani,

Home stay time!
Wow. So much to say!

I will start this post by sharing that every morning I wake up to cow bells, moo's, and cock-a-doodle-doo's. And yesterday I almost got run over by a cow in the middle of the road!

I moved into my home stay on Thursday. I am staying with my friends Sara and Lan. We are living with the Masuku family - with mama Ivy, and her two daughters eulandah (22) and Amu (18). Their husband and father passed away in 2007. Both ivy and eulandah are currently unemployed and amu is a senior in high school at a private boarding school in acornhook, a town about an hour away. She was the one who decided to host us and she has amazing English so we can communicate most easily with her. She keeps saying over and over again how happy she is to host wonderful white people (Valungo).

when we arrived to our village, all of the relatives and neighbors came over to greet us! The whole community is truly so excited to have us.

The house grows mango trees and peach trees and peanut plants, corn, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, onions and spinach. And we have 15 cows and a couple of chicken!!! This is all so cool - I'm loving it! This morning we all just picked mangos off the trees and ate them...I could really get used to this!

Breakfast consisted of pap - a soft porridge (it will take some getting used to). They don't really understand me being a vegetarian but are very accommodating.

I took my first of many bucket showers (which I will be doing for the next three weeks because there is no running water)! Also - going to the bathroom consists of the outhouse or in a bucket for the middle of the night.

the people in the village rarely interact with white people so it is an especially big deal that we are walking the streets and talking villagers. as you can imagine - all of the boys are trying to hang out with us and coming over to visit, and all of the grandmas want to set us up with boy-friends so we will stay!

I am already learning tsonga - the language the shangan people speak here. Its a challenge but I want to communicate with mama Ivy and it is really fun to impress the locals with a few words!

Yesterday, I went to church with the girls and the Masuku's. I had to cover my hair knees and shoulders. Amu wrapped my hair so I would fit in. though we were told that church began at 230, we arrived at 1. Little did we know, singing and dancing in circles of women and men separate took place from 12 to 2. After a few minutes of watching on the side, we joined in the dancing circle and tried our best to sing along. At a certain point, we lined up so the priest could sprinkle holy water on us. It felt great because we were dancing outside in the boiling sun. We were then introduced to a priest as visitors. Once we entered the open roofed church, women sat on the ground on the left and men on the right. The priest translated the whole service for us to make us feel welcome. He read a passage from the bible about the importance of welcoming visitors to your home because you never know if they will be angels. He then introduced each of us and asked us to wave when he called our name. Everyone was clapping and truly so happy to have us. It was such a wonderful experience.

I've loved playing with all of the little kids in the village (who keep coming over to see the white people) and talking to people my age and older. I'm slowly getting the hang of life here and really appreciate how communal it is. Everyone welcomes everyone else and feeds all visitors. All people treat each other as family (which I noticed when no one knows exactly how they are related, or if they're related!) I believe much of the community and sharing and taking responsibility of one another stems from the poverty present in the community. Because of the poverty, the people live much more sustainable lives.

Although this is only my fourth real day in the community, I already feel the warmth and comfort of living here, and am greatly enjoying changing the conception of whites to the village people. Maybe I will help them realize that in the end skin color is just skin and deep down we are all just people.

oh yeah- I saw elephants and giraffes on the way to class today!!!!

ayoba, cool. I hope you enjoy!

Shabb (bye in slang )

Jess

Lion King Style

I went on a 6 am run this morning along side zebras and baboons! Love rural SA.
:)

On my way to Bushbuckridge!

Hey all!

Currently, I am on an eight hour drive up north to Bushbuckridge..so long joburg! Since I last wrote, so much has happened in traveling and with in the group! Over the past few days, we've learned more and more about wilgespruit, the town we are living in. It played a huge role in the anti apartheid movement, and during the apartheid served as the only multi racial institution in all of south Africa. Many refugees and activist groups were based in wilgespruit. It was wild to hear some of the stories from the anti apartheid struggle and from members of the black consciousness movement. our group visited soweto, the largest black township in all of Africa, and the area that all many blacks had to move to during the apartheid. The houses are tiny and all packed together, and as we walked around the streets I could feel the strong sense of community amongst the people. During the day, I spoke with Shakes for a few hours about his experience growing up in an integrated society and how his generation feels about the apartheid. He also taught me a lot about Zulu culture and traditions and i realized that many of his traditions are similar to that of Judaism. So cool! At night, he took our group to a club in joburg to experience some of the night life, which was great.

On Sunday morning I went with some friends to the Rose Bank flea market - so amazing! Filled with tons of beautiful art work, jewelry, delicious local foods, and fun crafts. I hope to find many more craft markets here in sa and in the other countries as well. In the evening, we had a panel with 4 people who played very different roles in the apartheid - a black reverend, a member from the black consciousness movement, a white woman who fought with the anti apartheid movement in black neighborhoods, and the former minister of defense from the apartheid govt. Hearing from all four of them was fascinating. One thing they mentioned that really affected me was that when most of us walk around the streets here, no one can tell were American, we will just be seen as descendants of oppressors solely based on the color of our skin. It is very evident how clearly many people view everything as black and white here. At the end of the panel, rev Trevor challenged us as Americans to be more humble and evaluate why we are oppressing so many in the world and occupying countries and consuming 60 percent of the worlds resources. This was really heavy and provoked a lot of thoughts on what my role and all others in my groups role is in all of this.

Two nights ago, our group did an activity where we each shared our 'river of life', the story of how we got to where we are now, in small groups. My group of six ended up speaking for over three hours and I was so impressed with how open and willing everyone was to share with each other. It was a really special experience and I can tell that everyone feels much closer now from this.

Yesterday we watched an extremely powerful film 'long night's journey into day' which depicted four out of the thousands of trials during the 90s held by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. These personal stories brought various sides of the apartheid more alive for me and made me think a lot about the process of healing and forgiveness. At night, the staff of wilgespruit made a Braai, festive south African bbq, for us as a last night celebration before we left for the north. All of the meat eaters said it was delicious (and the veggies were great too) and we had a great time dancing to local music outside. As a group, we presented a song to the staff to say thank you for hosting us -which they loved! And this morning, they prepared a song and sang back for us.

All in all, my week in south Africa has been wonderful, very eye opening, thought provoking, and filled with many intense conversations. The hospitality is amazing and everyone is so kind and happy to have us in their country. I am so excited to meet my host family and live in the very rural and tribal Bushbuckridge, and experience another side of south Africa.

Stay tuned!

Jess

hello from Johannesburg!

I have only been in SA for a day but it is already amazing!

The last two days in DC were great. On Monday, our HIV/AIDS theme day, we watched the film 'sex in an epidemic' which was co produced by out professor shanti - which looks at the stigmas and misconceptions associated with HIV over the last two decades. After, we spoke to four different NGOs which work on HIV and sex related issues in DC. At night, we had a great dinner at almaz, an etheopian restaurant on u st, with Ihp alumni that live in the area. I sat with s man who went on Ihp in 1968! It was great to hear the stories memories and advice. On Tuesday, we lobbied with our senators to pass a legislation that prohibits child marriage in the developing world. Learning about the issue and lobbying on the hill was a great experience. At night, we had a final group meeting and check in before we left for SA. during this talk, we discussed our privileges and how they influence our lives now and the role we will play while were abroad. We also acknowledged how diverse our group is and how this will be a unique exciting and sometimes challenging experience for us all - a huge cultural experience in and of itself. I feel really fortunate to be part of such s diverse group, filled with all races religions and ethnic backgrounds.. I know I will learn so much from everyone. I went to Gw to say my final goodbyes which really set in the reality of my beginning.


After a long 16 hour flight I finally arrived to SA! We are staying in a community called wilgespruit west of joburg. A lovely woman named Anastasia who runs the community gave us a welcome speech about the place we are staying and about SA in general. Fun fact - SA has 11 official languages and most blacks here speak at least 6 of them. The food has been great and so accommodating to vegetarians! And the rooms are so nice, suite style..with bathrooms - so no bucket showers yet! Anastasia introduced us to her nephew 'shakes' who is 22 and is our groups party man because he is planning to take us all out tomorrow night! The landscape and weather is great as well. This afternoon, we went to the apartheid museum in joburg which helped me learn so much about SAs rich and sad history. It was really upsetting to learn that apartheid began right after WWII ended and that it lasted all the way through when I was born. Really sad. Everything is so exciting and I'm loving every moment of it. I will be in the joburg area for the next few days and will leave for very rural Bushbuckridge on wednesday.

Happy readings!
Jess

Stop 1: Washington DC

Hello from DC!

1 week down. 33 new friends. Filled with extremely packed days!

What a crazy, long week and a half already! I arrived to DC last Thursday with my mom to a room full of unfamiliar faces, my future travel buddies. After a quick family orientation, I said bye to my mom for the next four months and joined the other 33 members of my group in the William Penn hostel in Eastern Market, our home for the 2 weeks in DC. Right away, we all began to feel comfortable with one another and as a group set the standards for our group dynamic as we travel, grow, and learn together for the next few months. It almost reminds me of camp how quickly everyone is bonding when we all spend such intense time together!

A little about the group and program. My IHP Health and Community program is comprised of 34 students, 29 females and 5 males, and we happen to be the most diverse group ever! The group is filled with students mostly from schools in the Northeast and of every religion, race, and ethnic background. I already can tell that I am surrounded by an awesome group of people and will learn so much from each and every member of the group.

Through the semester, I will be taking 4 courses, taught by 2 traveling professors. The classes are: Health, Culture, and Community, Research Methods, Globalization and Health, and Public Health: From Biology to Policy. They all seem extremely interesting, and both of the professors, Sara and Shanti, have fascinating backgrounds. Because I wont have a computer, I will have to write all of my assignments by hand (cool and weird at the same time)!


For the first three days of the program, we had a very intense orientation, filled with discussions surrounding preparation for abroad, getting to know one another, and setting the rules and expectations of the group.

Each day begins around 8:30 and ends after dinner, and is filled with a mix of classes, guest lecturers, and site visits.

We officially began the IHP program this past Monday with MLK Day. Our group divided up to volunteer around DC as part of the MLK day of service. I volunteered at the DC public library dusting shelves, so fun! Other highlights of the week include: hearing from Ruth Levine, a global health figure from the Center for Global Development on Tues 1/19, meeting with the N St. Village and Africa Fighting Malaria NGO on Weds 1/20, hearing from Stan Dorn at the Urban Institute talking to us about the US Health Care reform on Thurs 1/21, hearing from guest lecturer, Robert Hecht who gave us a Global Health 101 (great speaker!), having a Q&A during dinner with volunteers from Metro TeenAIDS organization, doing neighborhood visits, and having a Q&A with Joni Podschun from So Others May Eat.

It has been such a great opportunity to hear from all of our guest lecturers. I especially loved our visit to the N St. Village NGO that provides housing for low income middle aged women of DC - we got to join them for an aerobics class! (I may try to teach a dance class for them next year when I'm back). I also greatly enjoyed hearing form the Metro TeenAIDS volunteers who do outreach work to youth of DC to inform them about how to stay safe and avoid getting HIV - also another organization I may want to get involved in.

We had a free weekend this weekend - so nice to relax and see Ariel and all of my friends at school! Everything is really intense, but I am loving the program and people already, and can't wait for all of the adventures I have ahead of me. Time is already flying by and by Wednesday at 5:30 pm I will be on a plane to South Africa!

Happy Reading,
Jess

(email me to keep in touch - jbscheer@gmail.com)

Welcome to my travel blog!

Hi all!

As you know, this semester I will be participating on a comparative public health study abroad program, the International Honors Program (IHP) Health and Community track 2 - traveling to Washington DC, South Africa, Vietnam, and Brazil during the course of 4 months. I will be exploring how people in these three very different countries create varied solutions to the common health related problems they face. I will be doing a lot of experiential learning, through site visits, case studies, and volunteer work. In each county, I will be living with a family in a homestay, which will enable me to feel more immersed in each culture. At the end of the 4 months, I hope to have a very good feel for all three cultures and their health issues and systems and be able to compare them to one another, and ultimately, discover where I fit into all of this and how I can make my greatest impact on the world. I hope to post frequently about my day to day experiences (including pictures and stories).

The best way to be in touch with me is to either post on the blog, or email me (jbscheer@gmail.com).

If you have any suggestions on places to go, things to do, or people to put me in touch with - I would love to hear it.

For more information about the program, check out the website:
http://www.ihp.edu/page/health_community/.

Wish me luck!!

Jess