Is it culture shock? I don’t know. Is it homesickness? Probably not. What it is/was I still don’t know. The last few weeks have been rough. Not only was I physically ill but I think emotionally I was suffering. You see I, like most, joined the Peace Corps with some idea of living in a hut with nothing for two years, totally immersed in a community and culture and through my interaction and health programs in a sense begin to change the world. Being here is well-far from that. I don’t think my culture shock is from Namibia being different from America but more from my life in Outjo being not at all what I had expected. They tell us to come with no expectations and in a sense I didn’t. I also gave no preference when PC asked where I wanted to live and what I wanted to do. I guess I figured by giving no preference and openly saying I’ll live anywhere I figured I would get the job (no one really wanted) completely isolated from the world, in a hut with nothing and no job purpose, expected to make it up as I go…what I didn’t realize is that is the life I deeply wanted and I should have spoke up. I never expected to be in a town, a real western type town, completely separated from the community I’m trying to integrate into to, living in an Old Age home with hot, running water, electricity and security guards or doing graphic design type work at a hospital that doesn’t have the capabilities to even do that. Basically I never ever imagined THIS and well dealing with the reality has been hard, harder than I ever thought. I was told that sometimes being a PCV in Namibia is hard for that reason, people often feel guilty for their situation or depressed that they aren’t “roughing it” more. I have learned this the hard way.
Being the first PCV Outjo has ever seen and one of the few volunteers that have ever (any organization) lived here I have a lot of ground-work to do. People need to get used to a volunteer from America for one and two they need to get use to a PCV, someone who not only wants to work here but live here, be apart of Outjo too. For the most part Outjo is separated in three areas: town, location and squatter areas. Town is largely white, wealthy people, location is the working black population and the squatter areas are people who have almost nothing. There are some black families in town and they are the wealthier ones, doctors, nurses, judicial people etc. It’s unlike a lot of Namibian towns/villages because it’s small but very developed. It’s also a tourism spot since it’s the south entrance to Etosha so there are lots of lodges around, stores, paved roads, bakeries and such which are not common in the rest of the towns in the Kunene Region. Often times it doesn’t even feel like you’re in Africa. My reasoning for painting a picture of Outjo is to understand that the location is very far away from town, in all aspects. Not only is the location less developed and full of shebeens (bars) it’s up a hill and rests on the plateau that rises above Outjo. You can’t see the location from town, you can only see the road up into it. Town and location are completely separated which was probably the purpose in the set up years ago during apartheid.
I live in town, well the outskirts. It kinda goes me (town on the side), the in-between area, location and then the hospital. Outjo is rumored to be an “unsafe place” in Namibia, so I am not allowed to walk around at night or around the squatters areas. I try to walk through the location as much as possible but each day I return to town and leave the community that I’m trying to integrate into behind. This has been hard, really hard. I am trying but it’s just frustrating, and well I get depressed. I wish I didn’t live in a big town where it’s so hard to meet everyone or anyone for that matter. I wish I lived in the location so people would see that I’m here to live with them rather than just to come in for health functions and what not. I wish my language skills were getting better but town speaks a different language English and Afrikaans than the location (Damara) so I sort of don’t speak any language but a smile.
The feeling of being useless at work is just magnified when everything outside of work is also slow moving. Needless to say I got in a funk and well it was hard to get out of it. Of course once I started feeling better physically and was able to get back out in the community and walking around my attitude began improving. There are somethings I was prepared to struggle with but the feeling of complete uselessness and isolation from the community I’m trying to integrate into weren’t them.
So why my pointless venting, why share with anyone reading my blog about the trouble coping in Outjo. Some people have commented to me that the PC life looks tough (sarcastically) because of pictures or stories I’ve posted on facebook and this blog of my living arrangement and my recent vacation. They are right. First, I don’t take pictures of my time in the location, squatter areas or out in the bush. These are people, not a scene out of National Geographic and I am not going to put them on display. For many the only white person they have come in contact with is a tourist and I’m trying to give them a different view so I keep my camera for fun times with other PCVs of my co-workers children. Second, I’m hardly living the hard life but that in and of itself brings on a whole new set of difficulties. Trust me though, not a day goes by that this is “easy” and if I need a nice vacation to bring back some normalcy to my life or recharge my mental state well so be it, luckily I live in a beautiful country where that is always a possibility…basically, if you aren’t here, you don’t get to judge.
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