Interim blog post
Posted by Jason on August 11th, 2009
I am now close to completing my coop work term, I have learned a great deal since I first arrived and I have gained the experiences that I was seeking in coming to Botswana to fill a position with Students Without Borders.
Adjusting to living in Africa was difficult at first. I am living in a small village that is approximately 400 KM away from any city that provides full services. Shakawe is located in the North East corner of Botswana and is about 10 KM away from the Namibian border. The Shakawe way of life here is very relaxed. I appreciate the no stress attitudes of the people that I work with and the many other friendly people I have met around the village. They have taught me how not to worry about different challenges, and how one can easily survive in life with very little. A few examples of what I am talking about may help to describe what things I am referring to.
Almost every other week I have been journeying across the Okavango River on a 4 car ferry to the villages and communities that are involved with my project. The ferry is not always working; sometimes the ferry operators are not on time for work, other times it delays in being fuelled. In all of these cases no one in the line up to board the ferry becomes aggravated or annoyed; there is no need to become upset for being held up an extra hour or so, on any journey. In some cases the people in the line up have been required to wait over night for the ferry to catch up with the demand. It has been a nice break from the ordinary road rage and blown tempers over something so insignificant. Several times I have been travelling in a vehicle that breaks down, in each case things have always worked out. Whether we get by catching a lift with someone else or else waiting a while for someone to come and help us we always manage.
I have also enjoyed working on my project for the summer. I have been working with 5 communities in the Okavango sub-district that are populated by indigenous people. The Interactive Hiking Trail is designed to create employment for the people in these communities; the people are currently dependent on government aid for survival and have become highly marginalized since their way of life has changed so drastically. I have been going to the villages with my colleagues to negotiate the terms for tourist groups to visit their villages and for the villagers to perform traditional dances and other traditional activities for the visitors. Every participant in the project receives payment for their work; the visitors are treated to authentic and real cultural experiences; the villagers are also given a chance to preserve their culture. My responsibilities have been mainly focused on making preparations for the four trial groups that will be coming on the trail and for building a management plan and tourism license application for the cultural hiking trail. The tourism license will be held by the Teemeshane Community Development Trust that represents the villages.
July 1 – 2 was our first chance to host a group on the trail. WUSC volunteers based in Gaborone came on an abbreviated version of the trail. We also invited some representatives from the Department of Tourism to join us as they were sampling the trail as a tourism product as well. All of the careful planning and preparations that we made paid off in the end. The group hiked from Kaputura to Xakao, rode on a donkey cart from Xakao to Sekondomboro, enjoyed some traditional dancing, music and food in Sekondomboro and spent the night ther. The next morning they went on a Mokoro trip from Sekondomboro to Ngarange. The feedback from the group was quite positive and the villagers all followed through on their commitments. All preliminary indications show that this project can work and has the potential to become a competitive tourism product in Botswana.
I am enjoying my work term in Shakawe, I look forward to having the official full trial group come in the next week. The project has been going very well and I am glad to be a part of it.
