Quality Time With Family

Morning...

Let me first start off this post with a clarification from my last one. When I said I won't openly tell people I'm an American because right now I see more cons than pros, that (by no means) doesn't mean I'm "ashamed" to be an American here. I want to blend in as much as possible in my new village, and in many situations when I tell people where I'm from, I get the same responses: "oh...you must have alot of money", "really....then why come here, we all want to go to America", "mmph....you're such a nice young lady, we should find you a husband here". I do enjoy explaining why I'm here, and what I'm doing as a volunteer here, but often times the conversation doesn't necessarily lead that way. So....even though it's obvious that I'm not from around here, I've decided to try a little experiment. When people ask where I'm from, I'm just going to tell them the name of my village. I'm curious to see which direction the conversation will lead. They clearly hear that my Sepedi is different, but not so different that they can hear an American accent.

I just wanted to make that clarification. Interestingly enough, I've actually grown more patriotic since I started traveling overseas several years ago, and I see it happening here as well. Being in a foreign country, and engulfed in a completely different culture, helps me feel more connected to my own country and culture in America. Traveling opens my eyes to the good and the bad of ALL countries, but it always leads me back to being proud of who I am and where I come from. That's not to say I have all positives to say about my country, but I do begin to understand it more....for better or worse (if that makes any sense).

Yesterday I spent more time with my family and host brothers and sisters. I'm so blessed to have a family that openly invites me into their home. There is a show here called "Jiga Ma Jiga", and it's like a dance version of American Idol; except they choose a winner every night and the young people are dancing a unique style of dancing. It's like a mixture between break dancing, crunk dancing, and street dancing. IT'S AWESOME!!! Some of the dances are so trippy. It's a very popular show, and several of us (volunteers) are picking up on some of the styles.

I've also begun to watch nightly soap operas (called soapies) with my family. I began to do this during training, and the shows are pretty addicting (like all soap operas). The most popular one is "Generations". It takes place in Jo'burg and revolves around the lives of Black South African professionals. I LOVE the fashion on the show, even though the acting can be bit cheesy at times. Sad to say....I'm hooked and it's a great opportunity for me to spend time with my family every night at 8!

There is another soapie that comes on later at night called "Muvango" and I love this show because it is a great example of South Africa's traditional and modern worlds colliding. It revolves around several Venda families struggling to keep family ties close, traditions strong, and business relations powerful. It's pretty cool.

One last thing....I ran into two young girls at the bus stop yesterday in the nearby (big) town with the most unique English accents. The young South African girls lived near me in my village, but there English had a very distinct British-ish accent! It was so crazy. After speaking with them for a while, I found out they attended a private school in the (big) town and there teacher was Afrikaans. They couldn't be more than 12 years old, so they've obviously picked up their teachers English accents over the years. Sometimes when I speak with Afrikaners, I'm not sure if they are British or not. But these young girls definitely had a British accent, and it was tripping out me and my other volunteer friend. One of them was reading a novel as she waited for the bus, and that was the first time I saw a child here leisurely reading a book. Anywho....we had a nice conversation while waiting for the bus.

It will be interesting to see if the young students I work with will pick up my American accent over these next few years. I've already been told I have a "deep American accent". I had no idea what that meant, but my training host family had some difficulty understanding me because they said my "O's" sound like "A's". Like when I said "hot" they thought I was saying "hat", and this caused a lot of confusion and laughter. They understood one of my other volunteer friends better, and she was from Wisconsin. I had to learn to speak my words more clearly.

Children at young ages absorb so much, which is probably why it's easy for them to pick up a second language if they are around it all the time. In the past, Peace Corps has gone to villages to see some volunteers, and they'll run into a young kid with a distinct Southern accent. Come to find out, the volunteer who'd been working with them was from Kentucky (hahaha). I also remember while I was in South Korea, one of my friends was taught English in Britain so spoke with a British English accent; while another was taught English in Germany, so had an interesting guttural-ish sounding English.

Anywho...till next time......