Summertime

School’s out and summer’s in full swing. And just like back home, students take summertime to enjoy hanging out and taking a break from school work. For a lot of students here, that means traveling. After getting their final results from exams and school they hit the road – they go back to their village or to a bigger city like the capital. They usually go work or visit other family. So now at the end of July, Banyo has just about no students left which can make doing work and activities a little difficult when you don’t have participants. However, there are initiatives going on that focus on educating youth. Here are some from this month:

- Vacances sans SIDA which was organized by a youth club and held sessions and debates at the hospital for a week

- Colonie de Vacances which my postmate and I organized to teach about HIV/AIDs and theatre. Participants created skits at the end of the week.

- Weekly activities such as learning to cook, sew and about HIV and STDs organized by the youth delegation

All the activities are meant to empower youthand alsoobviously give them something to do when there’s no school. The activities arefree and open to all youth which here a youth is anywhere from about 10 – 25 or older (kind of like as long as you aren’t married and have kids).It can be difficult sometimes because of student’s unpredictable schedules and also because everyday students leave for vacation. But for those who do attend, they really learn a lot and have fun. And with only about a month left before school starts again, students are really trying to make the most of their time left.

Hand Holding and more...

So I know it’s been a while – not much I can do about that. But it is summer break here now and pretty much that means everyone goes on vacation and I have lots of time to enjoy just hanging out and noticing the simpler things of life in Banyo. So here are in fact some daily habits from life here that would probably not really fly back home:

- the lack of tissues - people just kind of lean over and blow their nose into the air/ground. Oh and putting your finger in your nose is also quite acceptable.Pretty much tissues are strictly for wiping dust off a chair or bench before sitting down

- brushing teeth while walking around outside, maybe down the street – stroll and brush

- going to the bathroom in public – quite acceptable particularlyfor men to just go on the side of the street – I mean I guess when you gotta go, you gotta go and out in the open is probably cleaner and less smelly than a latrine

- hand holding between men – good friends like to hold hands sometimes right? This does not have the same meaning at all that it may have back in home

Now while some of these actions may be seen as inappropriate back home, there are things we do that are not really accepted here. Apparently for a woman to cross her legs has some negative meaning so important to try to remember that when meeting with big wigs. And then of course there’s the left hand – no eating or handing or taking things with your left hand which can be quite challenging to always remember particularly being left-handed. But at least sometimes after they reprimand you about it, they do point out that Obama is left-handed too.

Some good hand-holding shots