When you come upon a small village 1.5 hours into a dirt road, you get a real sense of what it is like living on the outskirts of civilization. Here, the road takes on a different function. Almost no one has cars, so the road is generally used for walking. Public transport (kombis) may come by a few times a day, but other than that, it might take hours to sell maize to the next village. In these villages, the roads also function as the local community center. People gather around to talk, catch up on news, or just sit under a tree and watch the passers-by. For younger kids, most of whom have probably never seen a television, the road is a source of entertainment. I'll never get tired of driving through these villages and waving to the groups of children. Most of the kids give a  huge smile and wave back enthusiastically, as if I just made their afternoon. Its great.
   
Roads also serve as a communal rest stop. If there was a national Swazi pastime, it would be peeing on the side of the road. Its almost impossible to drive down the highway without seeing a man on the shoulder of the road relieving himself. People don't seem to be worried that they will get caught by the police... probably because the police are the largest perpetrators. Some people have even developed a roadside urination game, where you get a different amount of points depending on what you see (1 point for seeing the man, 3 points for seeing the stream... you get the point).

As I mentioned before, most of the roads are pretty good around here, but if you get a little bit off the beaten path, you start to get into pothole territory. I saw a sign the other day that said "Potholes Next 60 Kilometers" and it didn't seem that unusual. Depending on the destination, a significant portion of the drive time may be spent zig-zagging around large craters in the asphalt. A friend here told me that that there is a saying here in africa that goes "In the USA, when you see a car swerving all over the road you know that the driver is drunk... in Africa, you assume the driver is drunk if he is driving in a straight line"

Potholes aren't the only road hazards one has to watch out for. Animals on the road are actually one of most common causes of accidents in this region. Cows are by far the most common, and the most dangerous, but I've also had to swerve away from goats, sheep, dogs, chickens, and even the occasional monkey. In some areas, there are much larger things that you need to worry about (See picture below)

Venezuela 2009 - The Gringo Chronicles from Jordan Meyer on Vimeo.

I have also managed to get a few gigs as a product photographer. My first project was taking pictures for Eswatini, a jam and chutney maker here in town. I have also started taking pictures for 4-5 hand-craft companies that are putting together a corporate catalogue. Product photography is actually much harder than I thought it would be. Picking the right backgrounds, getting the lighting right, and even choosing the angle you are going to shoot from all make a big difference in the final output. I'm certainly getting good experience that will come in handy if I ever want to do this down the road, and I also get to see all the best hand-crafted items from around Swaziland.

    I know I promised before that I would write about some cultural observations. I'm half way through writing another post that I hope to get up this week, so stay tuned. Hope all is well back home, and let me know if you have any questions or would like me to cover specific topics here on the blog. Comments are always welcome.

Swazi Reed Dance from Jordan Meyer on Vimeo.

I've now been in Swaziland for a little over a month. Time is flying by, and I have been trying to make the most out of what this region has to offer. Most week nights here are pretty relaxed. I have the time to go to the gym, play guitar, make dinner, read, write, etc. We have weekly dinners with all the VolCons, and Ultimate Frisbee is on Wednesday night. Weekends, on the other hand, have been very fast paced and exciting. Over the past 3 weeks, I have been able to explore 4 different countries (including swaziland), and I thought I would share a little bit about these experiences: 

Swaziland: Our Swazi weekend started off with an overnight trip to the Mkhaya Rare Game Reserve down in the lowveld. We stayed in a lovely thatched roof, open-air room and went on 3 game drives and a hike. We saw almost everything the park had to offer, including rhino, elephants, giraffes, hippos, zebras, and a bunch of little guinea fowl that had little feather pompadours.

The afternoon hike in the reserve was the most exciting part of the trip. At first we didn't see anything at all... we were just trudging around in the mid-day heat. Our guide was very nice, but didn't say all that much, so it felt like we were aimlessly wandering around the reserve. At the time, I wasn't really convinced that strolling around the game reserve was all that good of an idea... after getting a fir
st-hand look at a rhino during the morning game drive I thought that it would probably be best to avoid face to face encounters. Thats why when our guide stopped, cupped his hand to his ear to listen, then started quickly jogging in the other direction, we were all quick to follow his lead. We scrambled around the side of the lagoon just in time to see 15-20 elephants emerge from the bush for an afternoon romp in the pool. The elephants, especially the younger ones, looked like they were having a great time splashing and climbing all over each other in the water. There were also two rhinos, a mother and her baby, hanging out in the shallows trying to cool off. We watched for quite a while before quietly backing away and heading towards camp.

That monday was a national holiday for the Umhlanga Reed Dance, a celebration where the King has the option of choosing a new wife (I think he's up to ~14 now... a far cry from his father, who had ~80). The dance is held in a small stadium at one of the King's palaces and involves women from all over the country. I knew the gist of what was going to happen, but I didn't quite realize the scale of the whole operation. All week long, truck loads of women (literally) were shipped to the festival grounds. By the time of the ceremony, 80K half naked women were parading in front of the king. Each village had its own uniform and a unique dance set to the official reed dance jingle (sung on loop for most of the 4 hour ceremony).
    While most people watched from the bleachers, security was relaxed enough that I could actually get down on the field to take pictures. I was amazed at how close I was able to get to the King, who jogged around a group of women standing 20 yards from me (that said, I guess if you take into account the actual number of people that Mswati governs it would really be the same as getting within 20 yards of the mayor of Berkeley). One unexpected consequence of the relaxed security was that all of the Swazi princesses were swarmed by Taiwanese bystanders. For various reasons, Taiwan has close diplomatic relations with Swaziland and there is actually a sizable representation here. I believe that every Taiwanese ex-pat in the country was present at the Reed Dance and the majority of their time was spent taking pictures of half naked swazi princesses. It was like some sort of bizarre combinatorics problem... how many different permutations can you have with each of the 40 princesses? I felt embarrassed watching it from the stands... first three of them would take a picture with one princess, then they would do individual shots with her, then switch cameras, then one person on each side, then one would want another solo picture with the princess because he forgot to give her bunny ears in the first solo shot (i kid you not).... it was amazing. The princesses were certainly more patient than I would have been, and didn't even brandish their ceremonial machetes that they were toting around.

Overall, the event was very interesting and included 3-4 hours of parading/dancing, 160,000 breasts, a brief jog by the King, several unintelligible announcements in siswati, and 4,000 repetitions of the official reed dance song. I don't know if I need to see it again, but I am glad to have witnessed such a unique cultural occurrence.

Lesotho and South Africa: The next weekend was also a three day weekend, so the VolCons decided to take advantage of the extra day to do a longer trip to the Drakensberg Mountains in South Africa.
    We decided to dedicate our first day in the Drakensbergs to a hostel-led tour of Lesotho, a small independent kingdom which is completely enclosed by South Africa. Lesotho holds the record of the "highest country in the world" because the lowest point in the country is higher than any other country's lowest point. Paved roads stopped as soon as we crossed the mountainous South African border and it was immediately clear that Lesotho is a very poor country. The Village consisted of a loose confederation of thatched-roof huts and the grassy mountain landscape was punctuated by the most beautiful pink cherry blossoms and electric green weeping willows (all in full bloom... remember, its the beginning of spring here).
    I usually have a bit of difficulty with structured village tours. On one hand, it enables you to experience many things that would otherwise be missed (talk with the grade school teacher, drink home-made beer, taste home-cooked food, learn regional history, etc.). On the other hand, I felt a little weird about showing up in one of the poorest countries in the world with two vans full of white people with expensive cameras. However, in the end, I wad glad that we took the tour. The village was certainly "authentic" and the entire experience was very eye-opening. I particularly enjoyed meeting some of the locals when we went to get the traditional maize beer (beer is a very loose term for what could also be called a sour-alcoholic-mashed-up-corn-smoothie). We played with some of the local kids there and witnessed a dance party in the small, dung-floored, thatched-roof hut. While the signs of poverty were all around, these people seemed happy and it was enlightening to see the simplicity of their culture.
The next day, two other VolCons and I embarked on the hike to the top of Cathedral Peak.  The hike is usually about 19km with a vertical ascent of 1500m (close to 1 mile), but our trip was probably closer to 25km after getting lost twice (the picture to the left was taken when we were already 1/2 to 3/4 of the way through the hike). While the hike was one of the most difficult treks I have ever made, the scenery was absolutely stunning... high jagged peaks, rolling grassy hills, and spectacular views of the valley kept me climbing up the near-vertical slopes. Unfortunately, the burning of the fields in spring creates a thick haze which made it very hard to get a clean photograph, so I don't have any pictures that really capture the feel of being on the top of that peak.

Mozambique:  Last weekend a group of us went to Mozambique for a friendly scrimmage with their ultimate frisbee squad. This Blog post is already way too long, and I am going to return to "Moz" in two weeks time, so I will just say that we had a great time in Maputo and I am looking forward to returning for more adventure.

• Agriculture provides ~9% of GDP, but provides employment for 70% of the population
• Of the arable land, only ~20% has access to irrigation. Of this, almost 90% is committed to sugar production
• The rest of the arable land is rain-fed, and the majority of small holder farmers subsist on their own maize crops

The current reliance on sugar and maize is not sustainable for Swaziland as global sugar prices decline and regional droughts intensify. A previously conducted study identified 10-15 crops that could help diversify the agricultural base and TechnoServe is taking a deeper look at 5 of these crops: dairy, beef, sorghum, cassava, and vegetable oil. The main goal is to develop rigorous analysis of each crop to answer questions such as: Where is the market for this crop and how big is it? Can it be exported? Do Swazi farmers have a competitive advantage? How do Swazi yields compare to competitors? How is the product distributed? What roadblocks are impeding the success of this crop? Etc.

We certainly have our work cut out for us. We are putting together a data-driven report in a country where data isn't exactly at our fingertips. Business is relationship-based, and most of the data has to be collected through one-on-one meetings instead of through internet research. Want data on cassava imports? Its not available online... you have to make an appointment and drive down to the government offices to get a hard copy. Furthermore, some of the numbers that are collected just aren't that trustworthy. Farmers don't accurately track their input costs and crop yields and export data is missing a significant portion of informal cross-boarder trade (In fact, I've heard that farmers will often lie about their yields and input costs, especially when asked by a white consultant). These challenges should make for an interesting few months as we try to piece together the numbers to come up with recommendations.

Outside of work I have generally been hanging out with other VolCons and expats from the Clinton Foundation, Baylor Medical Clinic, PSI, and Fullbright. It still amazes me how small and closely knit this community is... now I see what it must be like living in ethnic communities within the united states, where everyone knows everyone else, and you can live your whole life within the confines of a cultural bubble. Its something that I have mixed feelings about. On one hand, its great to have a built-in set of friends that engage in fun and exciting activities (e.g. parties, game nights, travel, ultimate frisbee, etc.). On the other hand, part of why I wanted to come to Swaziland was to get out of my comfort zone and experience a different side of life. As tough as it is to break out of ones own circle, it is even harder to break into a someone else's. Luckily for me, Swazis are generally very friendly, and while I'm sure I will never be 'one of the guys,' I hope that over the next few months I will have the opportunity to experience more of local life.

We are heading to the Mkhaya Game reserve this weekend, followed by the reed dance, so hopefully I'll have some good pictures to post soon. Here are a few pictures from our "Game Day" at the Mbabane Club a few weeks ago. Our team of six competed in Golf, Lawn Bowling, Pool/Snooker, Darts, Volleyball and Action Cricket. Tie breakers were decided by boat races (of the drinking variety).... good times were had by all.

The City - The Technoserve offices are located in the city of Mbabane, the capital of Swaziland which is more or less in the middle of the country. While the population is supposedly around 70-100k, the town feels very small and one can easily walk across the "downtown" area in less than 10 minutes. The city itself is more or less like any other city, with two malls (across the street from each other), a central bus station, supermarkets, a few scattered office buildings, and of course, a KFC.

 The city is more underdeveloped than most US or European cities, but I am by no means in bush. Since Mbabane is the capital, most of the office buildings in town are occupied by government agencies, nonprofits, and aid organizations.

Mbabane is located in the Hhohho district of Swaziland, which is in the Highveld. The city is about 4,000 feet above sea level and is surrounded by several large mountains which resemble haphazard rock piles. While the surrounding landscape is beautiful, it does not have a distinctly African look, or at least not the way I pictured Africa. In the valley below us, rolling hills with dry grass and sporadic groves of pine and eucalyptus trees almost make you feel like you are in San Diego. The deep red hue of the earth is the one thing that always reminds me that I am not in Kansas anymore.

One generally associates Africa with scorching, blood boiling heat, but the weather here has actually been very pleasant. I heard that it was actually very cold before I arrived (it snows here occasionally in the winter!), but I have enjoyed sunny afternoons and 70-85 degree temperatures. The only problem with the winter months is that the sun sets by 5:30-6:00, so even though we get out of the office at 5, we really don’t have enough light to do much afterwards. Hopefully this will get better as we move into the summer months.

My Apartment - I really didn't know what to expect when it came to housing in Swaziland. Would I have running water? Electricity? I knew I was going to be in a city, but I had no idea what living conditions to expect. My friend Zach is a has been living in Africa and has to use a car battery with a solar cell to power a reading light. Should I start looking for discount solar cells?

As it turns out, living conditions for a consultant in Swaziland are pretty much as good (or better) than they were back in the states. I live with two other volunteer consultants ("VolCons") in a three bedroom apartment that is probably nicer than anywhere I’ve lived since moving away from Berkeley. The apartment is in a gated suburb a little ways outside of town and everything is relatively new and clean. Looking at the cars in the neighborhood (Landrovers, BMWs, Audis, and Mercedes) you can tell that the Swazis that live here must be very well off, and are certainly not a representation of the general population.

The only issues with the house are 1) it is about a 10 minute drive / 30 minute walk from the center of town and we don’t have a car yet, and 2) there is no internet or TV to connect you to the outside world. I actually don't mind the absence of TV and internet, at least for now. It is nice being unconnected for a little while and I now have more time to read (i finished a 600 page novel already), cook, play guitar, and work on other projects.

The Office - Technoserve offices are located in the Lulunga House in the center of town. The building also houses the UN, USAID, an EU commission, and other nonprofit organizations. In addition to the 7 VolCons, there are a permanent / semi-permanent staff of around 20 comprised of locals and expats. The Swazi office has grown quickly, and space is a bit of an issue, but we all manage to squeeze into the existing space. There are two drivers for the office who drive us to meetings and pick us up in the morning for work.

That should give you a pretty good idea of where I am… hopefully the next post will get to more interesting matters about life in the Swaz.