Hello Free State

Friday, May 29—
Before me a rabbit stops munching on grass and holds his nose up to the wind as it rips through Matol farm, where we have the pleasure of staying for one night and a day on our way to Bloemfontein to meet with the University of the Free State (UFS) for a collaboration meeting. Guinea fowl chatter and shriek with hysteria, reminding me of wild turkeys in upstate New York.
Beyond the bunny are grazing sheep and beyond them, brown and white cattle. To the left of this, and as far as the eye can see, is maise – fields upon fields of dried up brown corn that will be harvested in about two weeks. It took me awhile to get it—he--ll--o?—that here in the Free State Province, the maize basket of the country––corn is harvested not when it is yellow and ready to eat fresh, but, when it is older and ready to be converted into the maize, from which pap, the staple food of the country is derived. On a quick tour of the farm this morning I almost cried as Elma showed us a long row of pomegranate bushes with many dried up pomegranates that were not harvested. I would have had to be here in February (drat!) to be as greedy as I would really wish—and not only pluck them off randomly to munch on a long walk, but to make juice (now we are really into deep fantasy). How does one make pomegranate juice anyway, without making a weeklong mess of it?
I digress.
Faith and I both slept in—until about 8 am--and by the time we were up, one of the sons in the family had already taken tails off about 7 lambs—a process, which he assured me doesn’t seems to bother most of them. Ahemm. For those who are curious, it prevents infection, so flies don’t congregate under the tails. Anyway, later in June our whole team will return to Matol’s for a 5-day respite to de-brief the entire two-months of the project rollout and write a grant with folks from the UFS. I for one can’t wait.

So to be here in the Free State means we finally finished with the East Rand—at least for now. The training was again powerful, with a somewhat more sophisticated crew, in terms of HIV/AIDS, and the “under threes” as we are now calling our work, due to complex differences in language referring to infants toddlers and twos. Most of the crew spoke and understood English, so the lack of translation made for shorter days, which was lucky, as we continued to get lost daily. An interesting moment occurred when we were discussing how to implement principles of attachment in group care when we learned from two mothers who had delivered premature babies, that the local hospital in Katlehong had a wonderful Kangaroo Care program for preemies. They demonstrated, and in doing so helped teach the module.

The videos we took of daily practice as part of our situational assessments have proven to be the very best training videos we could have. In one way or another, each one brings home one of the most important message of our “under 3’s” work: that no one, regardless of experience or expertise can be responsible for over 12 infants and toddlers, much less have relationships with them and help them develop and learn from each other. Each community will have to figure out solutions to this problem In the HIV/AIDS area, the factual and emotional content builds over the training. The second to last day with a session on having difficult conversations with your child. So far, this session begins with silence, and ends with wild stories in which participants indicate that that know that their 4 and 5 year-olds know what condoms are, so why can’t they talk about these issues with them in more frank terms? The last day we watch a most powerful film called “Thing with No Name” about two rural SA women who have HIV/AIDS. Finally, a mentor mother from Mothers 2 Mothers visits and talks frankly about her own situation as a positive woman living with HIV. This woman was so upbeat about her life we were able to incorporate her talk as part of the ending celebration. Some people disclosed their status privately, and others made pacts with each other to go for testing. It is so very clear to us that all the training in the world about the “under threes” will be for naught if these women do not live to carry out the work.

After our second meeting with the UFS folks Sunday morning we drive for 7 hours to Mpumalanga, where we finally rendezvous with the three other members of our team.

If it is possible to be exhausted and exhilarated simultaneously, that describes my state of mind quite well.

More soon, va