Book Sorting Update

Still seven boxes (out of 23) left at the end of the week.
The sorting system was using chairs at the back of
the room.

Last November, my school was a part of a Books for Africa delivery that supplied us with 23 boxes of children’s and young adult books to add to the school library. When the books arrived, it seemed best to wait until the new school year so that I could train people from the community to help sort and catalogue everything. At least that is what my principal suggested – and I agreed. If I did all the work, there wouldn’t be anyone who knows the system when I leave. But when the school year began in the middle of January other things seemed to take priority and before I knew it, it was the middle of February and the books were still in the boxes, sitting in the computer lab, almost completely untouched since they arrived three months ago. The first few days of the school year, when the learners came to pick up their stationery, I sorted a few boxes, since there was not much else going on. Since then, however, nothing has happened. It was also hard to say if community volunteers were ever coming to help. Although several CVs had been collected, no one had yet to be contacted by the principal.

It is going to take a few more months
before all the books are catalogued,
labeled and ready to be checked-out.

At the beginning of this week, I decided it was time to take the plunge and get things going, with or without others involved in the process. I figured if I got through four boxes a day, I would be done by the end of the week. Turns out that was a totally unrealistic plan, as it took at least twice as long as I anticipated to sort through all the books in one box. I seemed to forget that children’s books are rather thin. And even though it was not difficult work, it was draining. At best, I got through three boxes a day, and for a couple of days, I only managed to sort two. The good news is that what we received is fantastic and has practically tripled the size of our collection, it is just going to take another week of sorting, and then likely a few months of cataloguing and labeling to actually get all the books on the shelves for the kids to use. In the mean time, since we are short on storage space, the books are being kept on the empty shelves in the library with tape in front of them to indicate that these books cannot yet be checked out. And while it is a shame that I didn’t have anyone around to teach the system, I did things so quickly, I couldn’t say that there was a very exact science to the process anyway. In the unlikely event that the school secures another donation of books after I leave, they can put them on the shelves in the manner they think is best. Otherwise, I want to make sure that this batch of books is available for use as soon as possible.

Voter Registration

My school was the site of a voter registration center.

South African elections are coming up soon: 7 May to be exact. In preparation for the event, the second weekend in February was the last time that South Africans could register to vote. Of all of the things that I have seen organized in this country, this campaign may have been one of the most impressive. My village had a voter registration site located at the primary school, open from 8am to 5pm on both that Saturday and Sunday. There was a huge banner posted outside the school and very professional posters in the shape of arrows posted around the grounds to show people the way to the room where registration took place. Inside the registration room there was a handheld scanner that scanned people’s ID books (similar to a passport) and then printed out information on a sticker that was stuck inside onto an official registration paper. The whole thing was run by two teachers who had been trained how to set everything up and run the registration. When I stopped by on Sunday afternoon, they reported that about 90 people had registered on Saturday and another 75 had registered thus far that day.

More than 160 people came to register
during the Saturday and Sunday period.

Although that may not seem like an overwhelming number (my village is actually quite large), I would venture to say that nearly none of those people would have registered if the only location was in our not-so-nearby shopping town. Certainly my host sister would not have done so. She is 20 years old now, so this is the first national election in which she is eligible to cast a vote (the voting age is 18 – the last election was in 2010.) So the outreach that was being done in the villages by the Electoral Commission was admirable. Just as in America, there is plenty of apathy towards the entire process, but those that complain cannot say that no effort was made and that they were made to feel left out. From what I can see, every effort was made to include everyone in the process and even better, there a quite a few citizens that are taking part.

School Supply Room Reorganization

Most people that know me would (I hope) use the word “organized” if asked to give a description of my best qualities. For me, organizing things isn’t a chore; it is an enjoyable activity – like skiing or cooking for other people. In any case, since the day I arrived at my school, I have wanted to help organize the storage room where they keep all of the stationery (aka: school supplies). The place is the size of a small office – in fact the door to the room says “Deputy Principal” because apparently back in the day it actually was an office – and simply put, completely full of shit. It was essentially 18 years worth of half opened boxes piled up to the ceiling with random other garbage on shelves and in cabinets. No one in the whole school could have told you what was in there. Or even if they could, it was absolutely impossible to find. I wish I had taken a picture.

The new and improved school supply room.
Enough exercise books for several lifetimes.

I had casually mentioned about a hundred times last year that I would be happy to lead the way in cleaning out the room, but there never seemed to be a good time, and I knew I was going to need a lot of help. At the very end of the year, when the school supplies were delivered for the next school year, there was absolutely no way to fit them into this storage room, so I was asked if they could be put into the computer lab. I semi-reluctantly said yes, knowing that the only way they would ever get out of the computer lab is if the storage room was cleaned. So when school started this year, I took a stand and said that there was no way I could have students come in to use the computers until everything was cleaned up. Now, this was obviously a lie, but it is the kind of lie that works quite well here. Having things be neat and orderly in your work area is highly valued in Zulu culture, so everyone fully believed that I could not possibly do my job with a bunch of boxes piled up against the wall. Whatever it takes.

More exercise books, as well as basic school supplies
like pens, pencils, glue, and chalk in the cupboard.

After weeks of moving boxes and discovering supplies that teachers have been asking about for years, at the end of the first week in February, everything was finally finished. I was able to clean out one whole cabinet and then fill it with basic school supplies like pens, pencils, erasers (I found over 1000), chalk (nearly 400 boxes), glue (maybe 700 sticks), scissors, markers (at least 600 packs), and the list could go on and on. When the principal saw it, she immediately declared, “We are rich!” and then had a lock installed on the cabinet door so no one would steal anything. Classic. On the same side of the room as this cabinet are two tables that now have quite a few art supplies under them (think hundreds of paint brushes and buckets of paint) while on top of the tables sit 25-30 boxes of notebooks sorted by size and number of pages. And on the other side of the room sit more boxes of notebooks (60-70) sorted by size and number of pages. What I found most interesting is that when teachers came in to see the room, they commented on what a good idea it was to put all the boxes with say notebooks with 72 pages, size A5, together (there were 16 of them) and then next to those boxes I put all the boxes with notebooks of 48 pages. Since this seemed like the only logical thing to do, in my opinion, I had to ask what they would have done instead. They said they would have piled the boxes on top of each other in whatever order they picked them up. And there you have it.

This may sound crazy, but of all the things that I have done here, I actually think that organizing this storage room is one of the most important and sustainable projects I have completed. For starters, the principal has already said that there is no reason for the school to spend any money on supplies for next year, or maybe even the next couple of years, so they can use that money for other things that they have been wanting to buy – like a new copy machine and more tools to use in the school garden. Second, I think that the teachers are generally excited that they have the access to the supplies they need to do their job. We shall see. I gave the LTMC (Learning and Teaching Materials Committee – yes, that exists) a tour of the room and said my job is done. It remains to be seen what it will look like in a few months. I’ll have to make sure I keep in touch with the next volunteer to see whether it deteriorates back to its former state by the end of the school year. I do hope not.

The Boss

At the Bruce Springsteen concert in Joburg.

What a great start to month of February! Yesterday I went to see Bruce Springsteen in concert in Joburg. Not exactly sure what possessed me to do this, but when I got the invite in October, I jumped on board and never looked back. I met up with seven other volunteers yesterday afternoon (many of whom made some pretty nice signs) and headed out in the early evening for the big show. Upon entering the stadium, the ticket collectors took our entire tickets and gave us wristbands. We were horrified. What about our ticket stubs – the ultimate proof that we attended! What an injustice! Well, never fear. We managed to find a ticket collector who sensibly ripped off the stub of several tickets and gave them to us after we desperately pleaded for the souvenirs. Not surprisingly, we received quite a few strange looks from other concert-goers, but most people just rolled their eyes and mumbled “Americans” under their breadth. 

At the concert listening to all the hits.

Otherwise, the concert was incredible. I have no idea how old The Boss is, but boy can he put on a show. He was up on stage jumping around, telling stories between songs, bringing people up to dance, and of course, singing the hits. About midway through the concert the skies opened and it poured for about half an hour, but the music never stopped. None of us had jackets or ponchos – which pretty much makes us the worst Peace Corps Volunteers ever for being so unprepared – but we stuck it out until the end, which was surprisingly not until after midnight. Every time we thought it was the last song, he would change guitars and count off the band to start another classic. A good time was definitely had by all. And my ticket stub is prominently displayed on my wall at home J