Coming or going?

In the picture is a trail that a snake
made not more than 1 meter away
from the front of my door.
I've been lucky and have had really
just a few sightings during the 20 months
that I've been here in Namibia. Some of
my fellow volunteers have stories of
snakes making their residence under their
beds.
When I was in Senegal I can remember at
least three young men from surrounding
villages dieing as a result of a snake bites.
I believe that in each case they actually
stepped on the snake while walking through
the bush.
Here, I haven't heard of anyone even getting
a bite, yet.
What I've seen is that in general the snakes
kind of go their own way.
But sometimes at night I can hear a snake
chasing down a mouse on the top of my
roof. The roof is made out of zinc sheeting
so it can get a little loud but, no problem.

As far as the village is concerned everything
is going along and without much drama.
The school is going into their examination
schedule so they are involved mainly with that.
Something new concerning the school is in the
works. Another volunteer should be coming out
here to the village within the next few weeks.
She will be teaching at the village school. She
came out for a site visit about a week ago and
I think that she'll do great here. She has the
perfect personality to thrive in this village.

The clinic work has been slow and I have just
re-arranged the clinic's pharmacy and that was
a fun little project. It looks great and the question
is ... how long will it be in the pristine shape ...
no problem, I'll just keep an eye on it and after
I'm finished here, it's up to them.

The young San cultural group is still at it but at
a slower pace. All but one is in school so they
will be occupied with the exams this month. But
we have this idea to make a sample DVD that
we can pass out to a few of the lodges in the
area (70 km or more away). Hopefully they will
get some calls to perform and I know that the
tourists would just love these guys.

Most of the time now has been occupied with
writing little proposals for things like supplies
for the support group vegetable garden and
most of the actual work is following up on them.

I've found that in many cases that the proposals
are actually detrimental to the development of a
project. Reason being is that people are just waiting
to see if the stuff is going to come instead of just
plain getting to it.

In Senegal I was lucky that the village wasn't spoiled
with proposals or handouts and I spent hours trying
to explain that the only way to do it ... was by ourselves.
In the end they got it and they were making things
happen, somewhat. It was really satisfying to see it
in action, people helping themselves. It wasn't totally
perfect but it was the concept that I really wanted to
leave. People can really do about anything, it is just
the wanting to do. It also isn't just about education
or resources (though they help) but it is about the
concept of helping yourself that changes things.

It has been fairly slow but I have been lucky to find
something to do daily. It is just walking around the
village and usually someone has something that they
need help with. It not only gives me a chance to feel
that I am somewhat productive but I do get to spend
a lot of time with the different people in the village.

One of the craziest thing that's been happening over
the last few weeks is that people are starting to
address me by my name and not just by 'the makua'
(the white person). I don't know where they got
to know my name because I never told those specific
people what it was.

It is the way that it goes, just when it is getting time to
leave is when people start getting to know you. But
better to end on a high note, I am sure that one can
over stay their welcome if given enough time, n'est pas?