2008.12.25: December 25, 2008: Headlines: COS - Swaziland: Christmas: Sacramento Bee: RPCV Pia Lopez writes: Memories of Christmas in Swaziland
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2008.12.25: December 25, 2008: Headlines: COS - Swaziland: Christmas: Sacramento Bee: RPCV Pia Lopez writes: Memories of Christmas in Swaziland
RPCV Pia Lopez writes: Memories of Christmas in Swaziland
When the year-end holiday came, everyone left to return home. Now everything was quiet, and nothing felt like Christmas. It was 95 degrees and humid. No evergreens, but lots of thorn trees and tall aloes, like soldiers standing guard. If I was going to be alone, at least I had to have a tree. Girl Scout training came in handy. I scrounged two magazines. Then I made two triangle folds to each page, a time-consuming task, and childhood Christmas memories flowed. Then I attached the two magazines together. Voila! A Christmas tree. I made a yellow star and commandeered geometric shapes from my math classroom for ornaments.
RPCV Pia Lopez writes: Memories of Christmas in Swaziland
Memories of Christmas: Pia Lopez
Alone but making do at Christmas in an African school
By Pia Lopez, Bee columnist
plopez@sacbee.com
Published: Thursday, Dec. 25, 2008 | Page 18A
My first Christmas away from family and home produced an unusual memory. I had arrived in Swaziland, in Southern Africa, in June 1981 as a Peace Corps volunteer. After five months training near the capital, we had been sent to our new homes for the next two years.
I was posted in the "low veld," far from any town. We teachers lived at the school, and students came from mud huts in the countryside. I shared a house with Thobekile Mamba, a geography teacher, and two children.
When the year-end holiday came, everyone left to return home. Now everything was quiet, and nothing felt like Christmas. It was 95 degrees and humid. No evergreens, but lots of thorn trees and tall aloes, like soldiers standing guard.
If I was going to be alone, at least I had to have a tree. Girl Scout training came in handy. I scrounged two magazines. Then I made two triangle folds to each page, a time-consuming task, and childhood Christmas memories flowed. Then I attached the two magazines together. Voila! A Christmas tree. I made a yellow star and commandeered geometric shapes from my math classroom for ornaments.
I ate a romantic Christmas dinner by candlelight – canned pilchards (sardines). Not quite home, but I appreciated simple joys.
Links to Related Topics (Tags):
Headlines: December, 2008; Peace Corps Swaziland; Directory of Swaziland RPCVs; Messages and Announcements for Swaziland RPCVs; Christmas
When this story was posted in December 2008, this was on the front page of PCOL:
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Story Source: Sacramento Bee
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Swaziland; Christmas
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