The One With All The Firewood (11/17/2012)

November is apparently the “short rainy season” so we have still had a number of sunny days here in Kafule.  But the “long rainy season” is immanent and so the community is busy making preparations.  In my incredibly privileged life here I get to cook with charcoal.  That means that I don’t have to hike into the forest, chop down trees, cut up the wood, and carry it home to build a fire to cook over.  Instead I ask around to find out if anyone is selling charcoal in the area and then I have it delivered to my house.  I really am amazed at how blessed I am!  But most people here, Elizabeth included, cook over firewood.  Behind Kafule Secondary School there is a small forest.  The school is continually planting new trees and cutting down the bigger ones to sell as timber (which unfortunately means that sometimes classes are canceled so that students can help cut and carry the wood.  Occasionally there is a knock on the doorframe of my classroom- most of the classrooms don’t have actual doors- and I am told that the students are needed for “economic activities”.  The challenges of teaching in Africa…).  Anyway, I am not sure if they do this every year or if there are just more trees than usual this year but the school is allowing people from the community to take some of the trees to use for firewood.  For a few weeks now there has been a pretty consistent stream of women coming to cut and carry (on their heads) all of the wood.  Everyone is stocking up to last through the rainy season.  It seems like all anyone has been doing lately around here is collecting firewood.  Elizabeth, knowing my eagerness to learn to carry things on my head, asked if I wanted to help her.  So this morning I got to learn to carry wood on my head.  For those of you who are wondering, yes it is as hard as it looks.  I am so impressed with all of the women here who do that daily!  But I was able to make it from behind the school the 15 minute walk to Elizabeth’s house without dropping it!  Everyone who saw us could not stop laughing at the sight of the crazy white girl trying to carry wood, but I got a ton of congratulations from everyone for “learning to be an African woman”!