I started off my Friday morning with a french test that was a bit tricky. I continued on to my dynamics of savanna ecosystems lab. We played with dirt, watched a demonstration, and were informed that we didn't have to write a lab report. With that, I kicked off my weekend! I meandered back to my dorm and had a delicious salad with cottage cheese and beans. I decided to punt going to the swimming pool in order to take a nap. At 3:20, I met Nora and we walked to the Vet. It was one of the hottest walks I've had. I was a hot sweaty mess by the time we made it there. It ended up being a pretty slow day so the vet decided then would be a good time to check records and call patients who are overdue on yearly vaccinations. Guess who the lucky caller was.... ding ding ding. Moi! I made the new vet, fresh out of vet school do the first call because I was nervous. It went smoothly. I picked up the phone and called my first victim, I mean client. The lady's record indicated she had three dogs, all two years past due for their vaccines. Here is about how the conversation went...
Me: "Hello, this is Kaylee and I am calling from the Gaborone Veterinary Clinic. We were looking through our records and we have here that Jersey rose, sparky, and tinker are all past due on vaccinations.
Lady: "They are all deceased" in a quiet voice with a thick Indian accent
Me: "All three of them??"
Lady: "Yes"
Me "Oh.... I'm so sorry for your loss"
Lady: "Thanks:
Me "Well, have a nice day"
I hang up the phone and the room full of three vets and Nora all start cracking up. What in the world made me say "all three of them"!! I think I was hoping she has just said like "jersey rose" but ohhh nooo! So as my luck would have it, that was my first call. The second call was also a bit of a fail. The man had a dog who was past due. I called him, he answered, the conversation started as before. Except, he couldn't understand me. He kept saying what? huh? and I kept repeating myself. Finally, I handed the phone to one of the vets and he proceeded to speak to him in setswana. My third "successful" phone call (because several people didn't pick up) was with a very nice woman. The only problem was she wasn't actually the owner of the dog. She just happened to have the owners phone. She was kind of confused with the processes but I think I managed to get my point across to her, who will now hopefully actually tell the owner. Thankfully, by the time I finished that conversation it was time to go. Phew.
From the vet clinic Nora and I met our friends at an Indian food festival. It was located at the Hare Krishna Temple. The festival was great! We each bought several different types of food and pigged out! We then split an assorted box of sweets. They were okay... kind of different. The festival also had henna tattoos and things for sale. At the festival we met a very nice guy, probably a few years older than us, who told us a bit about the Hare Krishna movement and invited us back Sunday night for "philosophy talk, dancing, and food." More on this later...
After we had stuffed ourselves we decided to head back to UB. We started off towards rail park where we could potentially catch a cab. Then we decided to just walk the whole way since we were in a walking kind of mood and had quite a bit of food that needed to be walked off. Just a short distance past rail park we were stopped by two men. One had a police uniform on and the other had a bright orange vest. It ended up being the official deputy director of the police... or something like that. Moral of the story is that he was a big wig in the police department. They had been driving back from some meeting thing and seen the five of us walking. They were none to happy. He gave us a speech on how people think white girls have money and will easily target us. He went on about how his job was to protect us but how could he do that when we were walking around at night like this. We were really close to their destination, the main police headquarters so he grabbed his bag from the car and walked with us to the headquarters (with a gun tucked into his pants if I might add.) The other guy met us at headquarters with the car. From there, they dropped us at UB with another stern speech on being smarter. This experience probably was a good wake up call. It's easy to gain a false sense of security and get comfortable with a place. Botswana has become my home, I walk everywhere, I know the city pretty well, and you just become a bit careless. It was super nice of them to see us and care enough to stop and question/lecture at us. He gave us his card and told us to contact him if we ever had any questions or such. Again and again, I meet wonderful people.
Saturday morning Nora and I went to the vet and then met some others at the Cresta Hotel in main mall. We went to the restaurant and had tea and scones. It overlooks main mall. It was a neat place and a good experience but a bit too fancy for me. This was something on our check list because the main character would always go there for in the Number One Ladies Detective Agency Series. It's a series that takes place in Gaborone!
After high tea, we walked to Riverwalk. Riverwalk has a special crafts market on weekends. Vendors come and set up booths. I’ve walked by it before but I’ve always been
to cheap to buy anything. Plus I had “plenty
of time” to buy things later. We arrived
at riverwalk on a mission to pick up a few items. I got these great Africa earrings. They screamed Kaylee. I couldn’t resist. I also picked up a really cool bracelet that
says Botswana on it. I looked for a
small painting that I had seen previously but they were out of stock. The lady said there would be more next week. It has an elephant on it and says
Dumela Botswana. I may or may not have
picked up a few other things. :)
New earrings all around!
After buying large bottles of water we began our journey
back to campus. By that time it was
already 4:30. Where had the day
gone!? I went to my room, ate, took a
shower, and finished watching the Help.
Woaza what a touching movie. I am
so thankful that things are not like that anymore. How did we ever live like that? And better yet, why is racism still present? Eish.
But I feel this is another post all together.
At 7, I met people for a food party, ninja, and cards. There was pizza, watermelon, popcorn,
guacamole, and coffee liquor drinks.
Yum! Later some of us went to
Bull and Bush. I think I danced 3 hours
straight. By the time 2am rolled around
my feet were raw and my left knee was sore.
Golly Jee it’s hard being old… 22 just ain’t what it use to be… he he :)
I rolled out of bed around 10am this morning and mustered up
the motivation to clean my room. It was
getting a bit scary. I don’t like to
have my room dirty in such a small space. It drives me crazy. I met friends at 11:15 and by then my room
was sparkling. We went to café feggo
and had a study session. I had another
milkshake that tasted like Christmas and split a meal. It was indeed forced study time. I have a Setswana test tomorrow and the oral
exam Tuesday, so I needed to study but I sure didn’t want to!
From Feggo, we walked to the temple. There were five of us and we decided to go
check it out. The guy we met Friday
night took us under his wing. He met us
at the temple, told us about the hare Krishnas, and introduced us to his
friends. We listened to the equivalent
of a sermon and then sung and danced.
After lighting candles it was food time.
The food was amazing Indian cuisine.
The population is mostly Indians but there were also several Batswana there. I’ve never heard of Hare Krishnas
before. We were asking a bunch of
questions to learn about it. To me it
seems a mix of Buddhism and Christianity.
There is also the Hare Krishna Movement,
which encourages people to love, understand, and respect each other and to love
their lord no matter your religion.
It was a cool experience. The
people were very welcoming. I find it
interesting to learn about new religions.
It was great how they emphasized loving one another and not judging each
other off of culture, religion, color of skin, etc.
Don’t worry family, we didn’t attempt to walk home
again. Our new friend gave us a ride
back and sent us with leftover food. I
already can’t wait for lunch tomorrow!
Well, that's all for now! Time to skype madre!
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