making clothes

Our Young San Cultural Group uses as
their clothing, skins, just like in the old way.
The San cannot hunt anymore as was their
cultural/ancestral way. So to get skins it's not
like the way it used to be where the hunters
would go out and of course bring them back.
Now, how one gets a hold of skins is to
request it from the local game farms or
from the game hunters.
There is game hunting allowed and it is done
in a controlled manner so as to not deplete
the animal population.
Our cultural group has grown a little and we
were in need of a few articles of clothes for
the boys.
In the picture you can see one of the managers
of the group sewing a skin into a piece of
clothing.

There were a few things that happened this
week. One actually happened and the other is
a promise for something to happen.
First, the promise of what may happen. That is,
that we may get the opportunity to take the
cultural group kids to a game park. This will
be accomplished with the help of one of the
Lodges which are along the Okavango river.
The owners are from South Africa and they
are interested in working and supporting the
San people.
They have promised to provide two game
watching vehicles and the kids ought to be
looking pretty important riding in those. None
of the kids have seen many of the game animals
and this should be a huge treat. Here it is a
bit different as there isn't much transport
available for these types of activities.
To say the least, this will be big.
As a way of saying thank you to the Lodge
owners we are hoping to go to the place
itself and perform an appreciation program.
This will also get the kids to see this Lodge
which is a really nice one.
So, as it goes time and time again. This is a
promise and nothing has happened and
seeing is believing but this one seems a
little more sure than usual.

The thing that did happen was on the 7th it
was National HIV testing day. Man, there was
at least 150 people that showed up. The other
years there were like 15 tops. Don't know
what happened but it was crazy.
Knowing one's status really is the only way to
plan.
If one is negative they can continue to protect
themselves, or, if they were just plain lucky, then,
they can think seriously about protecting
themselves.
For those who have contracted HIV, then, they
can be monitored until or if, they may need to
start taking ARVs.
But to have that many people come out is
close to a miracle.
It was a good week and really pretty satisfying.

Rollin

In the picture is what is for dessert
today.
The weather in the southern hemisphere
is starting to change and the sun is
beginning to get a bit stronger day by
day.
This gives us the opportunity to get more
creative with our solar oven menu as we
have more heat to work with.
What me and my site mate made were
these rolls. There are two types thanks
to a care package. We have blueberry
and raisin.
With the limited supplies we have out
in the bush it takes a little creativeness
to put anything other than rice and sardines
in our plates.
It is a simple recipe and if anyone is interested
here it is ...

-1 and half cups of flour
-1 package of cinnamon oatmeal
half teaspoon of salt
-1 to 1 and a half tablespoon(s) of yeast
- over room temperature of water or warm to touch

knead that together and let sit in warm place for
about half an hour.

Then the key to this is to roll it out using an old
ketchup bottle into a semi thin sheet. (The
bottle is the only thing we had to roll the
dough out). Just joking and anything to roll
out is obviously ok.

Next ingredients are ...
- cinnamon
- sugar
- blueberries
- raisins

Sprinkle a generous amount of cinnamon and
sugar on the top. Then add the raisins and
blueberries. Roll them up them cut them into
pieces like in the photo.

We put them in the solar oven for a few hours
but now the sun is overhead and the oven
is really hot. So don't know how that would
translate into a regular oven temperature.

But it came out great, it is a little treat and
despite being out here in the middle of nowhere,
with a bunch of sun, it can be done.