Starting to Say Goodbye

The ending of this year has been an extended one. The Grade 10 learners left school in mid-October. The Grade 12s followed them about one week later. The rest of the learners will be completely finished tomorrow. The WorldTeach group held its End of Service gathering on Halloween, and at this event and most every week since then I gave a firm handshake or a hug to another volunteer or two whom I will be unable to see the rest of the year.

As the year closes I have also been ensuring that I do everything I want to before I depart. Last week I attended my first - and last - Oshiwambo church service, which lasted four hours, and this Saturday I plan on visiting one last town in the North that I have yet to see. Also, despite doing my best to remain busy, my to-do list at work has been dwindling. My class and I gave our room one final cleaning, and I finished the year-end library inventory. After taking on an overly ambitious schedule with gusto, yesterday was the first evening I had at school with learners present when I didn’t really have anything to do since March.

I spent long periods of time sitting silently in different spots on the school blocks (including some time on my roof) gazing passively while trying to wrap my head around my experience this past year. I tried to remember all of the sunrises and sunsets, all of the moonrises, all of the cloudscapes and starscapes, all of the pick-up truck rides, all of the long walks, and as many of all the other notable scenes as I could scrounge up from the foggy recesses of my mind.

Once during term one I was sitting on one of the concrete blocks looking at a dark black cloud far in the distance when I received a text message from my friend in Eenhana saying that she was in the middle of a tremendous storm. The cloud I was pondering was the very same one unleashing over her town approximately 50 kilometers away. The vastness and openness of the landscape is conducive to meditative moments, but that same largeness combines with the medley of my emotions and their magnitude to the point where they are difficult to contain. My next door neighbor, Meme Antindi, saw me leaning on our fence and felt compelled to ask me what was wrong. I turned to her with a smile, but although I tried to compose myself my voice still faltered when I told her that I would miss Oshikunde.

We spent the next ten minutes quietly talking as the daylight diminished. I was happy to share that time with her, and it made me remember how in the beginning of the year I sought out “moments” with each of my colleagues. If I ever was able to sit and talk or work closely or ride in a truck and chat with a colleague, I would gladly think that I had been able to get a little bit closer to that person. Of course I will remember the big trips and events, and all the lesson planning, marking, teaching, cleaning, washing, and cooking; but I find that my most moving memories are those times when I got to learn more about the people with me.

The WorldTeach group in particular is one to which I am so proud to belong. While spending four years at what is allegedly one of the better institutions of higher education in the United States, I found myself surrounded by individuals I did not even respect, let alone admire, and I emerged with three people with whom I hope to never lose touch. But this WorldTeach group; it’s a collection of people which represents to me the extraordinary possibilities attainable by thoughtful, responsible, motivated human beings when they unite. It therefore represents to my excitable and idealistic eyes the amazing potential of humankind. It is inspiring to be among them.

I have gathered some email addresses to stay in contact with the school and staff, I am keeping my class rosters to remember names, and our volunteer group has started compiling a United States cell-phone number list. In a week I will part with Oshikunde and its people, probably for the rest of my life, but I am fortunate enough to have gained the possession of memories, thoughts, and a few friends with which I hope to never permanently say goodbye.