Saturday, April 3, 2010

Quick Updates

The last week has been a bit hectic. Last weekend Mel, Mike, Meg and Nicole went up to Butha-Buthe (BB) to go to the reception for one of our Masotho friends, Tabo. We’ve all known Tabo since we arrived in BB. He owns a local photography shop and has become a trainer for various PCV camps and workshops. None of us knew he even had a girlfriend until 6 weeks ago when he told us he was getting married. Luckily we all got to head up to the reception at the new house he’s been building. As you can see from the pictures he’s very involved with youth in the area.
We met Tabo and his new bride in town and took some pictures next to his shop before heading out. Unfortunately I didn’t get any good pictures of them in their matching ‘Seshoeshoes’.



There was a procession to the house and Tabo and his bride were all smiles. The youths in the procession were singing quite loudly.




This is Tabo’s Ma. She had a perpetual smile and a tight sweater.



Nicole was taking pictures like crazy. There were a lot of great scenes to catch.


This kid was eating his shoe.



There was a kind of square dancing going on. Mike got right into it.


These guys wanted pictures taken. I gladly relented.





Mel and I headed back to her place and explored around her village the next day. She did a grant that was funded by the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) that is earmarked for volunteers. The grant is paying for land, seedlings, a water pump, etc, and the school is going to be growing vegetables for the school, over half of which are orphans due to HIV/AIDS.

This is Mel pointing to the school’s plot.


Here Mel is showing some affection for the cabbage seedlings

The plot is right next to the river, which is gorgeous right now.



I was astounded by the height of this corn and made Mel stand in front of it to give some perspective. She rolled her eyes heavily at this.




This is the view off of Mel’s front porch. She lives next to the school now.


There was a lot more craziness that went into the week, but I’ve lost my blogging motivation. I’ll add more this weekend.