Dingleberries on the way to the shop

The Peace Corps has three principal goals that volunteers strive to accomplish during our service abroad.  Peace Corps Goal 2, for example: “Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.”

                And to be honest with you, I think goal two is one of the most important things that Peace Corps does abroad. 

                I guess maybe it’s not one of the most important things, but it’s something we do absolutely every day.  Every day, myself and my fellow volunteers in Lesotho deal with people asking us for money because we’re white.  Asian American volunteers have to explain that they aren’t Chinese; they’re from Korea or the Philippines. 

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to explain to a Mosotho person that California and New York are completely different, far apart places.

                It can be frustrating to be grouped into the “typical, rich white American” person category, even months after I’ve supposedly been integrating into my village.  I don’t want my national counterparts to see me as that white girl.  I want them to understand and accept what it means to be an American.  I want them to call me by my name, not by “whitey”! 

   

                But however frustrating, goal two is also one of the most entertaining parts of the Peace Corps.  Especially when it comes to language barriers. 

    

Maphoka is my host sister and my best friend in Lesotho.  She’s 19-years old and goes to school at Mahloenyeng High School, which is about a five minute walk from my house.  She’s about 95 pounds and absolutely beautiful, with a shaved head and big, full lips.

Maphoka is hilarious.  She has a really dry sense of humor, which is even funnier when she speaks English, for some reason.  And whenever something really funny happens, she’ll fall down dramatically and pound her fists on the ground from laughing so hard.

                When I first met Maphoka, she was very shy.  My first few weeks in village, I tried my hardest to be outgoing and bubbly and friendly to everyone I came across.  I’d knock on my host family’s door at least three times a day just to “chat” and awkwardly hang around their house, getting to know them.  Maphoka would always linger quietly in the kitchen, cooking something for her mom or sweeping up the back corners of the room.  I tried several times to joke around with her or ask her questions about school, but she was always hesitant to talk to me.  And whenever we did talk, her eyes would carefully scan the ground instead of meeting my own.

                I knew I could break her.

                Every day, I’d ask her one thing she did at school and one thing she learned.  It was like pulling teeth at first, but eventually she started opening up.  She started gossiping to me about her bitchy friends or the boy she was crushing on.  We finally got to the point where she’d meander over to my hut when she was bored and pretend like she needed to ask me something important, only to hang around and chat for a few hours.

                Now, I don’t go anywhere in my village without her.  Whenever either of us needs to go to the shop, the other walks along just for the company.  I think some of my best conversations with Maphoka happen during these walks.

                Last week, on our way to the shop, I had an uncomfortable wedgie.  I’m sure you’ve been in the same situation in public.  You need to pick the wedgie, but you can’t just reach back and yank it out.  You have to back into a corner so no one can see what your hand is doing behind your back.

                Well unfortunately, I found myself in such a situation last week, and we were walking down the middle of a road in the middle of nowhere.  So I did what any other self-respecting girl would do.  I took a few quick steps ahead of Maphoka and used her as a human blockade while I hastily took care of my wedgie.

                This brought us to the cordial conversation of wedgies and how they can make your butt itch.  I explained to Maphoka that along with wedgies, there are several factors that can contribute to an irritated bottom, one of which being forgetting to thoroughly wipe after you do your business.   

                Which then brought us to the topic of dingleberries.

                As graphically as possible, I explained to Maphoka what a dingleberry was.  I even used some berries hanging in a nearby tree as a reference.  I also had to explain the difference between dingleberries and skidmarks (an essential fact to know). 

                Along the route to the shop, we both took turns falling into the ditch from laughing so hard.  Maphoka completely and immediately understood what a dingleberry was (I was so proud!) and she even taught me the word in Sesotho. 

                Maphoka was very pleased to have acquired two new English vocabulary words.  She told me that the word “berry” sounds very pleasant in English, and she thought that dingleberry could be used as a term of endearment for her friends. 

She typed it in her phone so she wouldn’t forget to call her friends dingleberries at school the next day.