The Office Chronicles: Part III

MD would be unavailable and out of the office on the day my Associate Peace Corps Director or APCD (a woman from America) drove out from Gaborone to meet with my office, but that was okay my APCD said, because she had to go to Good Hope anyway to meet with Anna's counterpart (who avoided Anna shamelessly, like she was a tax collector.) It wouldn't be a problem at all.
In the meeting MD tried to intimidate (is that the right word?) Keitumetse and get her to leave.
The new District Officer is in the council chambers. Everyone is there. You should be there too, is what he told her.
But the APCD made it a point to say she came here for a specific meeting with KT, and that KT wouldn't have known the District Officer was around otherwise; it makes no sense for her to leave on account of that.
The plan was for me, KT, the APCD, and the Program Assistant (a Motswana man) to talk about my role as a Peace Corps volunteer and what the Peace Corps was. The meeting wasn't meant as a reprimand and the APCD made that clear. It was just a makeup session since KT, my counterpart, never attended any Peace Corps events. After meeting with my counterpart, the APCD and Program Assistant would meet with everyone who worked in my office: meaning me, KT, and MD. This is why MD said he'd be in the meeting with the Distict Officer until we finished and then he would meet with us all, thank you very much, and then he left. We waited for him for about 20 minutes before I called, and then we waited some more until he deemed himself ready to come meet with us. It was reiterated again, that this was not a reprimand but a simple clarification of my role as a Peace Corps Volunteer. The APCD and Program Assistant explained what the Peace Corps was and the concept of Capacity Building as well as my role in community outreach and MD elaborated that I don't come into the office on time, that he calls at 8am to see if I'm well---what if Gomolemo is sick? Then what do I do if she is my responsibility? And the meeting carried on this way, with MD missing the point and the APCD pulling him back on track. Other volunteers may say what they want about her, but the APCD came through when I needed her. When MD tried to monopolize the meting, the APCD wouldn't let him. When he implied that he was an authority figure, she corrected and explained that he was not a boss, or even my counterpart, but a colleague. After the meeting, the APCD seemed exasperated and I read the look on her face and offered an unwelcome/unprofessional answer: "Yes. He is always like that."
I had told MD before that the computer wasn't supposed to be in Pitsane, it was here as a favor to us but after he showed up at dusk, I put the computer in the back of a government vehicle, just to be an asshole, and watched it ride off in a flurry of dust. The following day I locked myself in the house, kept the curtains closed and confined myself to the cavernous emptiness of my bed. There would be no more computer lessons. No more movies or blogs. This was my life. I had melted from periodic waves of anger; burned to a stump like a candle. The rest of me laid where I had melted below; a flat, wax-blob of my former myself; I was disappointed that this was all I was made of. I confined myself for the entire day before I got a text message in the late afternoon from Julie. Is it true, she asked. She saw MD at the RAC and he said he didn't work in Pitsane anymore, that he now worked in Good Hope; and like that, my day began to look up.

Soon, I found out it wasn't true. Not exactly. After I'd had the APCD speak to MD, he was finished with me and so he conducted all of his affairs out of the offices in Good Hope to avoid further conflict. When pushed to our limits, when we couldn't make an answer, we reverted to our cultural norms. The Peace Corps volunteer strapped on battle armor and took up arms whereas MD, the Motswana, did whatever it took to avoid civil commotion. Keitumetse, I would imagine truly hated me for getting her involved, especially since her attachment to me was involuntary, but now MD was out of her hair too, although he was still on her couch some Friday nights. Eventually, KT was transferred for reasons beyond anyone's control (at least that's what she told me) and the new social worker, is allergic to the office. To work. To me. She'd likely been warned of my inflammatory talents, of my ability to draw tension from all living tissues around me, of how I'd pulled pus and moisture into a raised abscess which burst into a hot sore. I can't help but wonder how much more I've hurt my office than helped it. In his defense, MD was a genuinely helpful social worker and KT was lackluster but she also did her job and did it with limited resources; but now the door to the office is scabbed shut and taped off by a (white-people flesh tone) band-aid.
No Motswana will ever do much of anything directly. There will be a barbed wire fence of propriety, tight toothless smiles, but the next time MD needs transport, it won't appear; when he wants help with assessments, it will fall through. He'll find himself eating lunch alone. Everyone will collectively and silently disappear to eat together or go to a football game which he wasn't told about (read: wasn't invited to). When he speaks, demands, gives ultimatums they'll play along, shake their heads but nothing will happen. MD is a man who is (at best) tolerated among his colleagues, but never liked. It wasn't until months later that I began to better understand this and feel somewhat validated. In a lot of ways, we are the same, MD and I. Maybe that's why we couldn't get along; we both wanted results, to make things happen. But Setswana culture is about fellowship. It is within fellowship that you'll achieve results. With me it seemed that MD tried to push disrespect off as culture but with Batswana he pushes it off as western culture; modernity.

MD was transferred from the main office to an extension office in S&CD (a whole other department) for a reason, but MD and I were two-tone lions, conflicting prides that couldn't be in the same space. He came to Pitsane and was MD, Alpha-male Social Worker. He boomed and roared; but when I roared back he clutched his tail and unofficially transferred himself away to Good Hope, to the comfort and cordial tolerance of Batswana employees. All that's left in Pitsane is my solitary pride. I now sit alone under the office's naked jacaranda tree, my unwanted territory, and my bitterness has dissolved into loneliness and regret.