The People of Botswana: good and bad

THE GOOD

As I said in my last post, the people here are so friendly and welcoming! Everyone is always saying “Dumela” and more than happy to answer any questions. At meals sometimes I go sit with random locals instead of at an empty table or with just international students. The girls here love telling me about their culture, and about the villages which they come from (everyone says that no one is from Gaborone, everyone is from a village and they come to Gaborone for school or work). By the end of the meal we will be practicing saying each others names and exchanging phone numbers.

Yesterday I was sitting on a bench eating lunch from a street vender with a few other international students and could hear three or four girls sitting on a nearby bench listening to “How You Remind Me” by Nickleback. Of course I sang along for a little while and at one time made eye contact with one of the girls who were also signing along. After we had finished and were walking away the girl game running up behind us and said, “I like you”. We smiled and I started to say, “I like you too!” with a giggle. Then she continued, “What I mean is.. I want to be your friend.” She had such a sweet and innocent face, and it was such a happy moment that someone who did not know us had the courage to come up and talk to us and say she wanted to be friends. Later I thought about how I have never done that to international students at my school (although here it is a little easier to tell who the international students are). But what I mean is, I feel that only during freshman orientation is it normal for someone to walk up to someone that they do not know and start a conversation. Here, it happens all the time.

Last night another girl stopped me to talk as I was walking back to my dorm, we ended up exchanging phone numbers and she invited me to go to church with her because “international students come here knowing God and Jesus and then once they get here they go party and drink”. This girl said she made it a goal that this semester to invite an international student to church with her, so maybe that wont happen. I thought that was so fascinating, and I hope that I wont be a disappointment to her when she finds out that I do like to go out to clubs with all my friends.

During our orientation it was explained to us that the relationship between men and women here are different. Guys are really only interested in talking to girls for some type of relationship, dating or sexual.. not friendship. It is not common for girls and guys to be good friends here like it is in the States. But so far, my friends and I have found that not always true. There is a local who studied abroad in the states last semester who is so willing to help, talk to, and be friends with any international student. Also, we have been hanging out with a group of local guys who are friends with another international student from France who has been here all year. These guys are very protective of us and make sure that we are safe at night. They talk to us and we hangout just like I would with guy friends from home. One guy that goes to the clubs with us even acts as my “fake boyfriend” (thats what I call it). Whenever he sees a guy that we do not know talking to me for too long or trying to dance with me when I do not want to, he comes over, grabs my hand and pulls me away (basically is my new Jordan and the rest of my girlfriends at home that do that for me haha). But not once has one of these guys crossed the line with me, they are very kind and I am glad I have locals to help protect me and some of the other international students.

THE BAD

We have been told a million times about being extra cautious of danger during our time here. Botswana is considered the safest country in Africa, a lot safer than even South Africa. I have made sure to always lock my door, even when I just run to the bathroom really quickly. I always walk in large groups at night that have some guys in it, and if not, we take a cab. And I go nowhere at night by myself at all. But not every international student has been as cautious and even so, there is still danger.

This weekend many international student went to Lizard Lounge, a local club. The streets you have to walk to get there and back are not the safest, but I walked in a group of about fifteen people, including five or six locals, some of which are big black guys that I know can protect us. Even so, I was cautious walking down the streets, and did keep my pepper spray with me. Another group of international students were going to take a cab back to campus but the driver would not let all six of them squish so the two guys let the four girls go in the cab and they walked back. When they arrived at the campus gate, there were four men trying to open the gate, they said it was locked. One international student tried to open the gate right as one guy attacked him from behind. The student tried to fight back at first because he was not a small guy himself but they continued choking him until he blacked out for a short period. By that time, the other guy that was with him had already been taken down and the attacker had taken out a knife and cut his neck, right below his ear. They took money, cell phones, and a camera and then left. As I already knew.. muggings are common here, but violent muggings are not. These four men were violent towards the two international students before they had even asked for their valuables. The first student who had been choked was fine, maybe having a couple bruises. And although the cut on the other students neck was small, he was bleeding, and no one can know for sure if that knife had been used before on others that may have had HIV/AIDS. This guy was taken to the hospital and is continuing to take preventative HIV treatment. His tests for HIV has come back negative, but he continues to take medication for about a month.

This was a scary event which the university took seriously, having a meeting about it with us on monday. I hope that it scared others into being more cautious. Those guys NEVER should have walked back at that time of night by themselves, I only felt safe because of the number of people I was with and who they were.

I am not trying to scare everyone back home, I just thought it was an interesting story. Most people are kind, some are not.. which is just like in every country. But I do feel safe here. I am not going to live in fear all of the time because that will just hold me back, but I will always be cautious and think about my safety with all the choices that I make.