Unexpected Weekend in Vryheid

After a great trip touring Zululand last week with our US pals, we decided to stay at Mountain High Hospital for the weekend and catch up on our reading. (our replacement ATM cards from the US have not arrived and the Peace Corps stipend of $250 does not stretch very far). Easter plans include a trip to the Cape so we will be traveling again in a few weeks and were content to stay at our site.

However, the water woes continued at Mountain High. No water poured out of the taps every morning this week. As good Peace Corps Volunteers must do, we practiced patience and flexibility, changing our water usage (showers, dish washing, filling pots and pans with water, hand washing) to a short period in the evenings when the students in the high school are in study hall and the demand is lessened. Friday night arrived and we celebrated by making pizza. Alas shortly after taking the pizza out of the oven the taps ran dry. We had forgotten that there is no study hall on Friday night. The dishes from the day had piled up in the sink and our pitchers were depleted. All night the faucets were as dry as the bones in Ezekiel.

We got up at 5am on Saturday morning and found the same dry conditions so we changed our plans, packed up a few things and hurried to the only taxi that goes directly to town each Monday through Saturday. To our surprise we were the first passengers to arrive at the cement bench that serves as the taxi stand. The morning had a touch of fall in the air and the sunrise was shrouded in a pink mist. The days are growing shorter with sunrise at 6am, contrasting with the early sunrise of 430am during the height of summer. Life as a poor person in South Africa is a series of “Hurry Up and Wait” as an inordinate amount of time is spent waiting for the taxi to fill, waiting in the long lines at the bank (all bills are paid by deposits into the creditors bank account), and the long lines at the discount grocery stores with names like Boxer, Score and Shoprite. If one has electricity or a cell phone, queues are required to purchase pay as you go coupons that seem to run out very fast. Life is spent catching up. Most rural people do not have spares of household items or stockpiles of food in the larder. When they run out of food, light bulbs, toilet paper, propane, or kerosene, it is an all day trip to town to buy the necessary item. Substitutions are made during tough times – phone books and magazines work as toilet paper.

Many of the Mountain High residents are almost self sufficient, cutting down trees in the forest for firewood for cooking, growing mealies (corn), raising cattle and goats. They walk around with their long heavy knives swinging from their hands, which was a little menacing to Peace Corps volunteers at first. The women also cut down trees and use a turban on their heads to balance the heavy hard wood trunks, which must be hauled down the steep paths to their homes. Water is transported in plastic carboys balanced on their heads. Much of the day is spent fetching water, wood and livestock. The children of the local community are disadvantaged compared to the boarding students as have to 2 hour hikes each way on rough trails to get to school and then must tend cattle, haul water and wood when they get home. The quality of life would dramatically improve if rural residents had easy access to water and electricity. A large part of the day is spent in basic maintenance, rather than school work or leisure.

The Saturday morning ride to town is always an upbeat experience as the scenery is gorgeous and we are delighted to return to the first world for a break from the stresses and discomforts of the Hospital. We check in at Rita’s Guest House at 730 am and are greeted as family. There is no equivalent to Rita’s in the US as it is a 29 room guest house that is also the residence of the owner. She is a lively woman who loves to tell stories about the strange habits of her guests. The facility is also used for meetings and weddings- functions as they are called here in SA. The staff complains about weddings where the guests are boisterous and also about the weddings where no one drinks and the party is a bore. Rita is also a travel agent and knows every inch of SA, a country she deeply loves. She knows all of her guests by name and their favorite room, which are all individually decorated in Rita’s flouncy style. The lounge and halls are covered with African art, needlepoint, carved animals, Dutch kitsch and more. We spend hours sitting out in the beautiful garden and pool area planted with familiar and unfamiliar flowers and trees. Birds are also her guests-we are awakened each morning by the screeching Hadeda Ibis’s looking for grubs in the grass. All this for R380 ($50) a night, including breakfast.

Happy Birthday to my sister Lillian, who has been a faithful correspondant each week since we arrived. You are loved and appreciated. Thanks for your support.