These are some pictures of the hinter land between ga-phahla and the college

Worry not!

As some of you may have read, there is a national civil service strike going on here. I want to emphasize that I am OKAY! In a nutshell the unions (including the teacher unions) are demanding an 8.6% pay increase along with R1000 for housing. The strike has been going on in earnest for two weeks and there does not appear to be an end in sight. The negotiations are very day to day, luckily the Peace Corps is in constant contact with the teachers unions so we are cool. They know what we are doing and we are completing our training at a private college in order to separate ourselves from the schools. That has sort of thrown a wrench into the training schedule, as we were supposed to travel to site last week to meet our supervisors, but more on that later. Since my last post I have been to two weddings, seen two cows slaughtered, walked a million miles, learned more isiZulu, bought a cell phone, received my site assignment, and most recently traveled to the Apartheid Museum in Joberg. Despite the strike things could not be better. I got my site assignment two weeks ago and am super pumped. I will be placed in a remote village near Nqutu, KZN. Living in a rondeval without electricity and a cattle kraal in the front yard, I will be working with two local schools, one primary and one high school. They both have requested help with science teaching as well as setting up computers and community projects. There are three other volunteers in my cluster, all near Nqutu. I can't wait to get to KZN, maybe see some green. It has not rained since we arrived in July and so you can imagine the landscape is quite desolate. Apparently that will all change when summer rolls around and it rains every day. Again, can't wait. It is hard to really describe the season now as winter. While it did dip into the 40s at night when I first got here, it has been hovering in the 50s at night now and well into the 70s during the day. Because of the strike it is hard to say what is in store for us the rest of training, I am looking to get an update on that tomorrow at the college. Tentatively we are still swearing in on Sept 16 so we will see. If anyone has any questions or anything of the sort please feel free to comment. Oh and here are some pictures. The first one is my house, I live here with my mom, her two (of five) daughters, and four kids (ages 14wks, 6, 7, 16). Next is a great sign we saw while walking to another pct's house. Then there is a picture of Ryan holding some part of one of the cows, me drinking the traditional “home brew” (always served in a bucket), me with some of the LCFs at the Apartheid Museum, and if there's room I will put some pictures of the brushy hinterland through which I walk to get to the college some days during the week.

Some Pics

Hey everyone, I finally made it to the internet place. Here are some pictures so far. First is just a sunset on the way back from Pretoria. Next is me in front of the Voortrekker Monument in Pretoria. It is to commemorate the original settlers' trek from the cape area inland in the 1820s. After that is a picture of the classroom where we have been holding most of our training sessions. Unfortunately we are in the middle of a national civil service strike that includes teachers so we have been holding our sessions now back at the college. The next picture is of Sebenzile, she is my Language and Cross-cultural Facilitator (LCF). I spend about 4 hours a day with her and three other pct's working on learning isiZulu. It is going pretty well so far. I will update again soon. Oh the final picture is the view from my bedroom. Gotta love it.

I MADE IT

Howdy everyone. After an hour of playing around I finally figured out how to post with my kindle. Unfortunately it is very time consuming and cell coverage is spotty at best here. Speaking of here, I am in the village of Ga-Phaahla, near Siyabuswa in the northeast corner of Mpumalanga Province. I will be here until I complete training in September. In the mean time I am learning isiZulu and all about the school system here. Look for pictures and more to come in Sept when I can get some internet. Right now the nearest telkom phone is a 2mile jog into Siyabuswa. All the best to everyone at home