Pitsane

We have a grocery store, a petrol station, a hardware store, two take-away places, two ATM’s, three bars, numerous tuck shops, and a couple of chibines (moonshine houses). We’re more developed than most villages in the area. Although Good Hope boasts street lights and bumpily paved sidewalks, we have a nightclub—a stark white building with windows painted white, no door to speak of, and blockish black letters that read “TONY’S NIGHTCLUB.” It’s off the main road and literally next to nothing on the fringe of the village. Multiple people have invited me and I’ve politely declined. “I’m a Christian,” I say. In Botswsana if all else fails, blame Christ or the Peace Corps and because Batswana are respectful of protocol all things pious, that answer is enough. Case closed. Pitsane’s development is due to the fact that we’re right on the main A1 highway to South Africa, just 10 miles away, and lie near a town called Lobatse. Just by looking at Pitsane, you’d never know there were needy people. The houses here are beautiful. In my ward, they’re huge. One house looks like a two story fairy tale chalet with a thatched roof. The house behind me has an intimidating and immaculate garden complete with hedges, a dramatic walkway entrance, orange groves, and a large dog with no name. Across the road and to the right is a modern house in the shape of a traditional roundaval with a shingled roof overhead and marble tiled floor down below. The owner is very nice and just finished his Ph.D. in Cleveland. In comparison, I live humbly in my row of yellow and orange government houses with unswept yards. Since none of the civil servants are from Pitsane, and will likely be transferred somewhere else, they take as much pride in the outside appearance of their houses as, well, people in government housing. My house is by far the worst. Field mice and other vermin live in my matted lawn but I’ll sculpt it soon. Very soon because I don’t know the next time I’ll ever be able to happily live by myself in a two bedroom house with a yard. Soon my yard will be speckled with flowers and neatly swept shining with the same pride as the small houses farther out—the houses with neat yards and attractive xeriscape gardens. Houses that are well kept, despite their bare bone basic setup. I used to walk around Pitsane wondering where the destitutes lived. Last week, we did assessments. My counterpart and I went around the village inspecting houses of people who applied for assistance. Looking at the houses I’d think they didn’t need assistance—look at the pink peach tree blossoms—but once you step inside, the same rough cement brick that’s outside is also inside and light shines through the tin room above the crumbling homemade concrete floor; the roof stays on because of the weighted rocks that hold it at the corners. No electricity, no water, no standpipe in their yard, a pit latrine. Graceful landscaping. Thoughtful xeriscapes. How was I to know about the gizzards beneath the surface? It’s the pride in the well swept yards with attractive gardens that I saw. Faulty homes placed on a surfeit of neat, tidy beauty and widows who sign their name with a wobbly “X” because they remember a time before schools when Botswana was the Beauchanaland Protectorate. With only 42 years of independence, Botswana has built itself on the diamonds that slept underground in Orapa. Diamonds for development. Some people in Pitsane may not have much, but they’ve got pride and that pride outshines the situations themselves. There are no hills in Pitsane. The less fortunate live next to the decadent and the sky sits on top of it all welded together at the horizon’s waistline.