An update on our site visit to Ramotswa. I think this will be a very nice place for the two of us. It is its own separate town of 25,000, so it is big enough to have services and some shopping, but definitely separated from Gabarone by about 22 KM (12 miles). Thus it has its own boundaries and feel, without being part of the “big city”. It takes about 30” to drive by car to Gabarone and about 45-60” on the bus depending on traffic and time of day. There is a fair amount of commuting in both directions during weekday mornings and afternoons.
Everyone has been extraordinarily friendly and welcoming, and seems genuinely glad to have us here. The District AIDS Coordinator (DAC) who is my counterpart and supervisor is a former nurse, as are most of the DAC’s. She has extensive experience with PC volunteers having worked with 6 of them at three different sites. She started in a small town 7 years ago and was been promoted to a larger post and now to Ramotswa. She is very friendly, easy to work with, and has spent much time making arrangements for us. We work in a mobile trailer (caravan) office, as do a number of the government workers here—there simply is not enough office space in the two Rural Administration Center buildings to house all the departments. Right now there are two offices for four of us, but a third office will be vacated next week. I suspect I will still have to share, but that is fine. The other two people in the office are Nthame, the Monitoring and Evaluation Officer and Duncan the UN AIDS volunteer. Both live in Gabarone and are quite affable and helpful. I will provide pictures and/or movies in a couple of weeks when we come back down for permanent placement.
Maureen is placed in the Kagiso Senior Secondary School (proniounced KA-HEE-SO) which has 1500+ students, 102 teachers and 52 ancillary staff. Her counterpart is the guidance counselor. They met with several of the other teachers and administration from the school, but the counselor had to be in Gabarone on Friday so Maureen came with us to meet the town dignitaries. She will get more integrated into the school when we return.
On Thursday we met the District Commissioner (known as the DC, and akin to the County Supervisor in the States), the Chief of Police ( who is a woman and who has actually been in Denver en route to a conference in Albuquerque several years ago) and the Deputy Kgosi of the town (the Kgosi herself was in meetings for the last several days). The Deputy Kgosi did not see much of the humor in the fact that my host Mother had given me the name Kgosi to go with her last name Seboko, since Kgosi Seboko is the exact name of the head Kgosi in this district, a female and his boss. Therefore from now on, I am going by one name like Sting and Madonna. I thought of using Rufus, but decided against it, since I could be nicknamed "Old Sheep's Eyes". I will just stick with plain old "Kgosi."
I attended a monthly Agency staff meeting for four and half hours Thursday morning. If you think four and a half hour meetings are long in the States, wait until you attend one conducted primarily in Setswana! The entire staff was there including the principle officers, as well as the secretarial staff, the cleaning ladies, the drivers, the night watchman and the switchboard operator-- a true multi-disciplinary staff. Periodically they would talk in English or “Swinglish” so I could follow some of the goings on. The Commissioner announced his resignation to the rest of the staff since he has reached the mandatory retirement age of 60. He bemoaned the fact that he had worked with several younger PC volunteers, and just when he finally had an “age-mate” (me), he was leaving. The Associate Commissioner will run things for a time until a replacement is appointed. The DC has been attempting to instill good meeting process including a meeting agenda, minutes of the previous meeting and committee reports. The officers all understand and comply, but some of the line staff don’t see the need for these changes and are resisting. For the first time the switchboard operator had a report, and was greeted with a round of applause. She handed out a written list of concerns/complaints not all of which I could understand, but when she found out that I was a psychiatrist, she volunteered to be my first patient.
On Friday we went to the offices of the District Health Team—the major outpatient clinic in town. We spoke for some time with the Matron (Head Nurse) and the Director of Public Health—he wore a woolen overcoat inside his office for the entire time we were there, even though we were roasting in short sleeves. I guess when you get used to the summer heat, 65-70 feels like Winter. We then went out to the Bamalete Lutheran Hospital, BLH. It was founded 70 years ago by the Lutheran Church, but is now co-run by the church and the government. It has one of the best reputations for quality health care in BW, and has 11 doctors and 127 beds for OB-GYN, General Medical, Palliative Care, ENT, Surgery and Pediatrics. Last year they had over 150,000 patient visits for inpatients and outpatients combined. They have a counseling department staffed by a pastor from Germany (one of the few other Caucasians I have seen here), a psychologist and three Social Workers. They handle the whole gamut of mental health problems of which HIV/AIDS counseling is just one small part.
I have been droning on for a while, so I will just mention a bit about our housing. We have been assigned to a 1 bedroom 475 sq ft freestanding brick house. It has hot and cold running water, electricity and indoor plumbing. It was the residence occupied by the previous PC volunteer and is just across the street from the Junior High School and a flower shop which has apparently just opened, but has been unoccupied since we arrived. It is an easy 15 minute walk to our work sites. We will be investigating the possibilities for a phone line and Internet service in the house, but for now we have Internet access at the DAC office. Pictures will be more descriptive which will be forthcoming in a while.
We go back up to Molepolole Sunday for the final 10 days of training, our final language proficiency exam and the swearing in ceremony which is very formal and impressive, we've been told. We then officially become "PC Volunteers" instead of "PC Trainees." We are looking forward to it.
Go Siame (in Setswana it means Goodbye and/or It is OK)
Kgosi
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