Common Ground: Homestay Update 1: Settling in

(This blog post was written on August 21)

A picture from my neighborhood. I am staying just up that hill.

I have been in my homestay for about two weeks now, and every day brings both new surprises and an increased sense of comfort (usually). The food is getting more familiar, and actually is not as scary as I anticipated. I’m trying to give up my vegetarianism while in homestay in order to experience the culinary culture, and I have definitely jumped in the deep end a little. We have goat most nights for dinner, and there is an entire goat head sitting in our freezer….not sure what it is waiting there for…. This culture also places a LOT of value on the starches. I’ve been eating lots of phaletshe (an almost grits-like corn-based food) and sorghum (a dish called “mabele,” which apparently also means breasts if you say it with the wrong intonation….so watch out). While hearing my name dropped in the middle of a mile-a-minute Setswana conversation (often followed by laughter) is still disheartening, establishing my routine is making things a bit easier.

A typical day right now looks something like this:

6:30—wake up, breakfast, pack lunch, get ready for school
7:30-9:30—Setswana lesson
9:30-5:00—School (we have lots of different sessions on health, safety, culture, international development, public health, etc)
5:00-8:30—time spent with host family (includes dinner, then we usually watch TV and they talk a lot…while I try to maybe catch a few words of what they are saying…)
8:30-9:00—me time (study Setswana, do homework for school, blog writing, read, etc)
9:00—if I’m still awake, it is absolutely time for bed.

I seem to be picking up Setswana fairly easily, which has been a relief for me. It is nothing like English or Spanish (no shock there), and direct translations are sometimes hard. There are about a million tiny words (“ke” “ka” “ko” “kwa” “mo” “ba” “le” “la” “me” “fa” and on and on and on) that mean different things in different contexts and depending on the way you say them. Setswana is a tonal language, which makes it beautifully melodic but also complicated. For example, the letter “o” by itself could mean “you” or “him/her/it” depending on the intonation with which it is said. So that’s really not confusing at all. And on top of that there are 18 different ways to make words plural, depending on seemingly arbitrary grammatical groupings of nouns. But, that aside, I am starting to be able to pick out words and sometimes small phrases from my host family’s conversations. And when I lose confidence in myself and am frustrated by my lack of understanding, I usually just play with one of my one year-old twin siblings, which requires no Setswana and only funny faces. Here’s a small sample of some of my basic Setswana for those of you who are interested:

Dumela! Leina le me ke Maureen. Ke nna mo Serowe kwa go Merapelo. Ke tswa ko America mo Washington, DC. Ke moithaopi wa Peace Corps le ke ithuta Setswana le ngwao. Ke tla go bona kgantele!

Translation: Hello! My name is Maureen. I am staying in Serowe with Merapelo. I am from America in Washington, DC. I am a Peace Corps Volunteer and I am studying Setswana and culture. See you later!

It’s pretty cool to think that all of that would have been gibberish to me a little over a week ago!

Until next time...