The Real Life Behind The View
"I packed the few things that I possessed and early one morning we set out on a journey to my new residence... Qunu was all that I knew and I loved it in the unconditional way a child loves his first home. Before we disappeared behind the hills, I turned and looked for what I imagined was the last time at my village... Above all else, my eyes rested on the three simple huts where l enjoyed my mother's love and protection. It was these three huts that I associated with all my happiness, with life itself, and I rued the fact that I had not kissed each of them before I left." - Nelson Mandela speaking regarding leaving his village in Qunu at 9 years old following the passing of his father (Qunu is about 50km from Sulenkama where I am based).
6 weeks in, here at the base of the Drakensburg mountains, where the rolling afternoon mist comes in like clockwork. Vast open spaces with lush green rolling hills and winding mountain passes - scattered with pastel colored huts - like old rondavels with little meringue hats. I'd imagine a state initiative in the area is reason for the Jojo-tanks fitted to each hut, and perhaps modernization for the simple rectangular houses scattered among them. There is no informal housing, everyone has a roof and water. Every few kilometers a herd of sheep or goats, or occasionally horses are seen meandering across the winding road, and one must slow to heed them way. Young children walk along the side of the road unaccompanied. They gather in groups on the sandy sidewalk - children seem to gather with children, most are unsupervised. Dogs have no owner. Time moves slower, and so do the people. The air begins smelling different as the fog begins rolling in for the afternoon, low to the ground. A constant drizzle is in the air. There is an air of great freedom, and a sense of peace - like one could run forever with only the setting sun to stop you. Although, life here isn't as idealistic as it may seem from the car window.
I'm beginning to realize that it may take a bit longer than anticipated to settlein here. Network is a daily battle here in Sulenkama - having two sim cards helps, and allows one to at least be contactable for emergencies - but network is far from thriving. Certainly one can not access Google, or Instagram, or Youtube, or other familiar platforms. For this reason, Ricardo has been unable to stay on hospital grounds during the week due to needing a stable internet connection to work. This has been tough. Separation was not an anticipated difficulty on our acceptance of the post. Currently we are living almost 2 hours apart, with occasional midweek calls if we can get the line to hold. This has been a difficult hurdle, one to which there is an unclear end point, and especially difficult while navigating many other changes and obstacles. It certainly complicates working life as well - calling for referrals, accessing bloods results and scans, can at times be difficult or impossible.
Sitting alone in the house in the evening, listening to the sound of the crickets and seeing the fog rolling in - unable to check my messages, or scroll social media, or do a quick google search - I realize that life is continually simple, and small, for these people. Life is not global, or inter- connected. The list of things to fill your time with is not endless. Digital distractions are not inevitable. Formal education is valued, for where else do you learn? And children are reared to leave.
There are other obstacles here too, such as, water. Water is not guaranteed here and often cuts for multiple days at a time, meaning cold bucket baths and questionable ablutions.
The closest safe grocery store that resembles anything in Joburg is about an hour away and I've been advised to not go alone, there are closer ones but the experience was a tad - uncomfortable (men walking up to you in the store, people turning around and pointing, people deliberately bumping into you? Guys that's weird - don't do that.)
Language has been another difficulty, about 60% of the patients do not understand English at all, another 30% speak a very broken English, and the remaining 10% can usually speak quite well. Communication has been tough, and gaining information and examining patients (often alone) often takes more time and can at times lack accuracy and depth. Patients often get frustrated when I can't understand them, and I get frustrated too. Doctors and nurses will speak Xhosa together while we're in a group, resulting usually in feelings of exclusion, and loneliness without Ricardo here. Network usually isn't strong enough to hold a call for very long - so while I may think to call a friend - often I just can't. Night time is often pretty lonely. I miss my pets dearly and long for the family to be together again. We certainly deeply miss our church, and our family back home. The challenges here have been quite stark, and the prospects of an entire year here is discouraging at times.
Work-wise however, on my side, it's not too bad - most days I work 8am-4pm with an additional 4-5 calls per month. Being on call is daunting - being only one doctor on call for the whole hospital for a 16 hour period managing the emergency department, the obstetric ward and emergency, as well as any issues arising from the male/female/paediatric wards. Luckily this place is nothing like Bara with regards to foot traffic, but generally the nights are tiresome. Currently in the day I'm working in the out-patient department (OPD)/emergency department (it's the same building so we manage both departments) where l'd say on average we see about 60 patients a day in the OPD and about 5 in the emergency. The area is run by 2-3 doctors depending on the day. In April I will transfer to one of the wards I believe.
Despite the many challenges Ricardo and I have had many moments of joy here, and the moments of hope lead us to believe that Lord willing, in time, the problems will be surmountable.
It feels like so much has happened in the past 6 weeks, Joburg seems a lifetime away. We were really blessed to have our friend Mandla travel down with us to the EC on December 30th, through the night. His sheer joy at pulling an all-nighter behind the wheel made me feel a lot less guilty spending the whole trip tending to (or trying to ignore) our relentlessly screaming cat in the back seat, who, ended up with a remarkably swollen nose from him banging his head into his crate all night - we dubbed him "Bennie the red nosed Kitty" - he wasn't amused. Let's just say nobody got any sleep, but in the end we all made it down to Maclear safely (the dogs were champs) and had a wholesome couple days over New Years with Mandla as we unpacked, watched the New Years fireworks and ate an ungodly amount of KFC (which is certainly not in shortage here in the EC).
We said goodbye to Mandla on the 1st as he headed off to his brother's coming of age celebration a couple hours away, and we headed off on the two hour drive to the hospital for me to start work the next day. Ricardo headed back to Maclear that night.
The next weekend we spent our time unpacking the Maclear house and exploring a little, Ricardo found a coffee shop/grocer down the road called The Dachshund that, literally, feeds my husband. It's quite quaint and there's fibre network there, it seems like the Dachshund and my husband were born for each other.
But we were by far most blessed over the weekend 10-12th Jan when we had the opportunity to travel down to East London and stay with a friend of ours from Heritage, Christelle (who herself moved down to the Eastern Cape for work a year before us, and understands the adjustment pains all too well). Christelle is actually such a darling and just spoiled us the whole weekend. It was such a refreshing weekend being with church family, and getting to visit Cambridge Baptist - which honestly feels like a little Heritage sprout lol (the pastor is an old Heritage member). We got to meet Sinethemba, and Thoko (also a former Heritage member) and had a lovely dinner with Sinethemba and Christelle at the Cow Shed where they serve roasted bone marrow - first time for everything! I got to visit Woolies (a month without Woolies is a long time guys!) and the dogs really, really enjoyed the beach (Theodore's new favorite word!). Just a taste of familiarity and home among it all!
Yet, please read our next post (written by Mr Banda himself) - to hear how the Lord has been working even among it all. We say we are in the middle of nowhere, but the Lord has shown us that really, we are in the middle of somewhere, and He has a plan and a purpose with this all. There were people down here, whom we never expected to be here. We have found means and provisions. And albeit we are seperated, Maclear has been a great blessing in keeping Ricardo's work afloat and settling the pets. We have a clearer vision of what we want our 2026 to look like, and Ricardo has developed a clearer vision of how and where He wants to lead our ever growing family (yes, in all of this we have obtained yet another dog, lol - more on this next month). We are growing in perspective, and strength.
Please be praying for us, we miss you all dearly.
And please enjoy reading my husband's entry.
Much love,
The Banda Family
