A
Cultural Awakening in Swaziland
Daniel Stantus
©
Copyright 2019 by Daniel Stantus
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I
was a Peace Corps Volunteer from 1970 to 1974. It was a dream come
true for me ever since my hero John F. Kennedy introduced the program
in the early 60’s. The thought of travel to a foreign country,
living and working with the people, and raising the standards of
living for a third world people was so appealing to me. I came from a
family that had barely travelled to the next State, let alone
overseas. In fact I had never even been in a plane before.
After
teaching one year in Washington State I applied to the PC as a
teacher with a preferred location in Central America mainly because
it wasn’t too far from the USA. I remember eagerly opening my
assignment packet and seeing the name of the country I was assigned
to - SWITZERLAND. I put the packet down, was puzzled, and wondered,
“I didn’t know the PC had volunteers in Switzerland”.
I picked up the packet again and looked more closely and saw the name
- SWAZILAND. My head spun and I said to myself , “I’m
going to Swaziland”! After collecting my thoughts, I then asked
myself another question, “Where is Swaziland”? I found an
atlas and quickly fumbled through it to find Swaziland - a small,
land-locked country in southeastern Africa. My family greeted the
news with a grimace, my friends with a laugh and a head shake. Things
moved quickly after that. I took my first plane trip to Philadelphia
for pre-training followed by the long plane trip to Johannesburg via
Frankfurt, and then on to Matsapha Airport near Manzini, Swaziland.
The world was opening up to me.
I
was with a group of teachers who were to be assigned to different
schools around the country. The first couple of weeks of training we
had orientation classes, instruction about the Swazi school
curriculum, and si-Swati language instruction. This was done by Swazi
professionals working for the PC who were fluent in English and
guided us through the training period. The final part of our training
was a live-in with a Swazi family which we all looked forward to with
excitement and anticipation.
A
bus was used to transport us to the little village of Gege in
southern Swaziland for our live-in. Our bus strained as it climbed
up the steep hills, and flew down them followed by a cloud of red
dust and screams from the passengers . The crowded bus was full of
young, eager volunteers who were happy to be released from the
tedious days of instructions, lecture, and learning. We were going to
be living with the real Swazil people, eating dinner with the
families, and sleeping in their houses. A chorus of “And it’s
one, two, three, what are we fighting for - I don’t give a damn, next
stop is Vietnam …. ” -a popular Country Joe anthem of
Vietnam War protest reverberated through the bus as we merrily rolled
along.
As
we arrived at Gege we were greeted by a group of villagers. They
brought us to the local school for a small ceremony. We sat in a
group on chairs while we were brought cold drinks which were a relief
after a long, hot, dusty trip. The village head then gave a lengthy
speech in si-Swati interspaced by a series of hand clapping and
laughter by the villagers. After the ceremony we asked the Swazi
staff what the village head said. The head staff member told us that
the village head was very happy to open their homes to us and in
exchange we would develop his village. He said that he knew that
Americans had walked on the moon, so they could surely develop his
village. And to start with we could build the village a “spring
box” (which is a concrete water collection tank to collect
ground and spring water for purification). This greatly disturbed us
because none of us even knew what a spring box was let alone how to
build one. “We’re teachers, not engineers”, one
volunteer complained.
We
were to live with our families for 3 weeks - attending a local school
for language instruction during the day, and then returning in the
evenings for sleep. During our free time we would help with the
chores, play with the children, or practice our si-Swati. My family
was the Kunene family. There was Jacob, the son, who was a student
who spoke some English and was my translator.. He had a two younger
sister , the mage (mother) and Luke, the father. Luke was an older
man who was a rural carpenter by trade. The skin on his hands and
bare feet was tight, hardened, cracked from years of physical labor.
We were
Kunene Family
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Kunene Home |
reminded by the staff of our promise to help develop the
village. As I couldn’t build them a spring box, I
decided to build my family a proper toilet. The one presently being
used was just a shallow hole in the ground behind the house
surrounded by walls and door of wattle (tree branches) tied together
with strips of bark. When the hole filled up they just dug another
hole and surrounded it with wattle walls and a door. I considered
this and found it unsatisfactory and unsanitary. I would build them a
better toilet and fully sanitary. I assumed that the first thing
needed was a hole in the ground. So Jacob and I started digging. I
surmised that the deeper it was, the more sanitary it would be. We
used a pick to loosen up the red, sticky soil, and then shovel it out
of the deepening hole. When it got too deep to shovel out we used a
bucket and rope to collect the loosened soil and someone above to
pull It up and out. Down we went deeper and deeper until Jacob could
no long be seen from the top in the darkening evening. Finally
darkness forced us to stop. I was pleased with my hole which was over
3 times Jacob’s height - or about 20 ft. deep. It then occurred
to me, “How is Jacob going to get out of this hole? The thought
of me trying to explain to his parents in my rudimentary si-Swat that
their son is in a 20-foot deep hole, and may have to spend the night
there was very unsettling. A ladder was out of the question, because
there were no ladders in rural Swaziland. Jacob yelled up to me, “Get
me a long, thick tree branch”. I wondered how a branch could
possibly help him, but I followed his advice and found a long, thick
one among a pile of wattle branches and lowered it down to him. Jacob
quickly shimmied up it and emerged with a large grin and I knew he
found the whole incident very amusing. I counted my luck for me not
being the one in the hole instead of him as I could not even chin
myself and would most certainly have had to spend the night in the
hole. The next morning was a new day and while remembering the night
before, I was excited to show our hole to Luke. As Luke and I walked
to the hole I noticed him eyeing the huge pile of red dirt which was
taller than him next to the hole. We reached the edge of the hole and
he peered down into the black pit. Luke’s eyebrows lifted up
and wrinkled his bald forehead. His eyes widened and bulged while
staring into the deepest hole he had ever seen in his life.. He
stepped back as if to prevent himself from falling in. But then he
approached it again, and this time leaning over the hole and trying
to see the bottom which was not possible. Luke looked up, turned to
Jacob and I, smiled and spoke in si-Swati to Jacob which Jacob did
not translate for me. For the next few days Luke would walk out to
the hole and stare into it. Now that the hole was finished I had
Jacob order a slab of concrete with a hole in it delivered to cover
the hole in the earth. Luke built the walls and door of wattle with
the skill of a rural carpenter. Other than digging the hole, I played
little in the actual construction. However, I felt proud that I had
instituted the construction and now the Kunene family had a very good
and sanitary toilet. The next day we packed our bags and attended the
final meeting with the village people. Long speeches in si-Swati
followed about the great things that we had done in spite of the fact
that the spring box was never completed. A short translation
followed. We were satisfied with the relationships we formed with our
families and the cross cultural understanding which ensued. Many of
us kept in touch with our families and visited them on a regular
basis. I visited the Kunene family after 6 months time, and they were
happy to see me. That evening I “felt the call of nature”
and decided to use my creation. The flashlight led the way to the
wooden structure that dark night. I shone the light down the dark,
deep hole which I helped dig. Cobwebs stretched across that useless
pit, and I smiled and thought, “I should have known”.
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in
Swaziland from 1970 to 1974.
After that I was an international teacher working in Turkey, Oman,
and lastly in Thailand where I lived for over 20 years. I am retired
now, living in Seattle with my wife and
son.
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