On the Farm...

In spite of the fact that it's a "working weekend" for us, we are having a good one!  Two weeks ago I described our weekend duties at GGA to be gruelling because we were working at the main site doing childcare.  Since then, it's been decided that we will do weekend duty out at Nansindlela, which is known as "the farm" and is where we will hopefully eventually be living (more about that later).  This is a working farm, with hundreds of chickens, 4 cows, and miscellaneous dogs and cats.  There are also some agricultural projects going on here, and the fruit and vegetables grown here will hopefully someday supply the kids at GGA.  In addition to "farm stuff", there is a small office building which houses the Outreach staff offices, a board room, some warehouse space (where some nice big rats live!), and a large room where the life skills and crafts training projects happen.  Several hundred meters from the farm buildings is the "accommodation block" where renovations are going on to make it livable for us and the future volunteers who will work in the outreach projects.  Eventually there will be accommodations for about 15 people, and a large communal kitchen, laundry, and recreation area.  This probably will not happen while we are still here, but the hope is that our "cottage" will be completed in the next few weeks.

The main hold-up is the new septic tank.  It needs to be dry to plaster the insides (and believe me, we want that puppy well sealed!), but the huge amounts of rain we've had have turned the septic pit into more of a swimming pool.  So, we're waiting for 3 dry, hot days in a row.  We're on day 2, and Dan managed to siphon most of the water out, so maybe the rain will hold and progress will be made.  As we've indicated previously, everything moves at a VERY slow pace here, and the construction workers can often be seen sleeping under a tree! 

We are being called the "pioneers" of this secondary site of GGA, and that's not without its challenges!  However, it's much quieter here than at GGA, and our accommodations will hopefully be a little nicer.  We'll see!  Micayla loves it back at GGA with all the kids and something going on every minute.  When we're here, she's a little bored.  Jessica however, loves the peace and quiet of the farm, and LOVES the animals!  Last week 400 baby chicks arrived, so the girls love to sit and cuddle them.  They're only a few days old, and still under warming lights.  There's also a baby calf just over 2 weeks old.  Jess has made friends with the sweet calf, and sits with it for hours.  This afternoon we had a bit of excitement...Jess was feeling sorry for the calf because it's kept in a small room apart from its mom until after milking time in the afternoons.  It was hot in the room, so she made a little halter out of an old rope, and proceeded to take the calf "out for some fresh air"!  The minute it smelled freedom, the calf ran out of the milking shed and made for the hills.  It called for its mommy, who answered loudly, and then it bolted towards the field where she's kept.  Jess ran after the calf and tried hard to catch it.  When that failed, she came running into the office in a panic, and the whole family went to round up the calf!  Yes, imagine 4 city slickers running around a farm after a cow.  Dan and I were thinking of how we're going to explain "losing" the calf on our first weekend of being trusted with the farm!  There is one Zulu farm hand that hangs around most days, and luckily he heard the commotion and promptly caught the calf for us.  Poor Jess was mortified!

In some ways, this week has been a frustrating one.  We see so much disorganization in GGA, and very little structure.  We are told that just over 3 years ago, there were only 3 or 4 volunteers at GGA and no real staff.  Today there are about 35 volunteers, and over a dozen staff and management.  It has grown too big too fast, and the framework is simply not there.  Communication is a problem, and because the volunteer staff are very transient, many projects are started and not followed through on.  The result of this is frustration among the volunteers, who feel that they are not being appreciated or used in their areas of expertise.  We have social workers, nurses, teachers, and other professionals, who simply baby-sit day in and day out.  The GGA children also suffer from this chaos, and are often disrespectful and poorly behaved.  They have very little respect for property or possessions, even though they have so little.  They would really benefit from more structure, and less of a "pack mentality".  Dan and I are thankful that we are working in the Outreach part of GGA.  These areas (the preschool, food parcels, fundraising, agricultural projects) are fairly new, and because they're at a different location, we can have more influence in these new initiatives. 

We are still in the process of trying to figure out whether we can have any influence in the larger scheme of things, or whether we just have to accept the way things are here.  Hopefully we can find that balance.

On the more positive side, we are starting to form some relationships with some of the "more mature" volunteers here.  Most of the volunteers are very young, but there are 3 couples (one from the UK, one from Germany, and one from Holland) who we have connected with more closely.  Last night we had them over to our kitchen to play "Dutch Blitz".  Some wine and some popcorn and a lot of laughs made for a great evening!

I'd better go...it's milking time and I'm off to take some pictures of the kids learning to milk a cow.  Our love to everyone!

Cathy
D