Sunday, October 5, 2008

42 Years of Independence

Well Lesotho celebrated its 42nd birthday yesterday (Saturday). It goes down here a little quieter than the 4th of July. The big national holiday is Moshoeshoe's Day (in honor of the 1st King), which is celebrated in March. For Independence Day, all the schools are out on holiday for a week, so there is more activity than normal, but around here people tend to do their celebrating only at month-end because that is when all the civil servants and textile factory workers (the two main sources of employment outside of subsistence farming) get paid. There is a big arts and cultural festival at a cute town to the south of Maseru and since the Ministry of Tourism and Culture (who runs the archives) is a big sponsor they closed down on Friday. So I decided (with a couple of other Americans here) to stay up and watch the Vice-Presidential debate on the satellite television. Besides, when else in life will I have the chance (or half the desire) to stay up for a debate that starts at 3AM???
So that was my 'American time' for the week. Otherwise, I had a good week research-wise. I stopped in at the Catholic newspaper offices and they said I could take a look at and make copies of their photographic collections from the 1950s and 60s (very exciting). So I told them I would come back next week when I found a scanner so I will be heading over there sometime this week. I also have an interview set up with a guy who currently teaches at the Teacher Training College who was heavily involved in youth organizations in the 1960s for this week, so I am starting to move beyond the archive, which is good. I have plenty of work to do there, but that stuff isn't going anywhere and the most interesting part of my work will come from interviews and photographs I can find, so it is good to have some of that going on alongside my other work.
What else? Spring is finally in the air here. We still haven't had the end-of-winter rains yet which means people can't really plow and plant (so people are starting to get nervous...they usually come sometime in September), but the last two days have been overcast (itself a rarity) and humid, so hopefully the rain isn't far behind. It will be nice to have all the fields and plants explode in green as well...the brown, dead grass of winter is getting a bit old. That's the news from here for now. Take care.

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