Blog #33 – WAR & Dog Camp

This past weekend was the most entertaining one that I have spent in Maun thus far.

It all started out with an early Saturday morning. I decided to tag along with Ashley and Maura (the documentarians) and their adventures for the day. Today they were heading to a local school debate tournament, hosted by WAR – WoMen Against Rape. It was held at a local school relatively close to my house and I couldn’t believe that the more than sixty students would give up their Saturdays to be here bright and early to debate against some very hot and politically loaded topics. It was a very inspiring sight!

The students ranged from junior to senior secondary level (ages 12 -18) and were arranged in teams of four. Each debate saw one school pitted against another either for or against a given motion. Given some of the work I am doing back in Guelph regarding sexual scripts, some of this was really entertaining.

The first motion was that, “men should always initiate sex.” This is one of the most basic questions when discussing sexual scripts. It was interesting to see these students debate on the topic. My first observation was that the one team against the motion was coincidentally all female. In fact overall about two-thirds of the debaters were female. The arguments that were used and focused on here most likely would not have even stood up back home, but somehow here were said with a note of finality. If men are the only ones who initiate sex then it will lead to marital rape. Or that, ‘men should initiative sex’ because that is a part of our culture and (as was quite interestingly put), “a country who has lost its culture, is no country at all”.

The second motion was that, “abortion should be legalized”. I was quite interested to see how this debate would go. Back home the pro-life and pro-choice are always going. Here the arguments were not so much based on the idea of choice, they were based on the fact that Botswana was losing lives, and fertile women to the current back alley options that were being taken. On the pro-life side there was no lack of religious argument and potency. “Abortion is an immoral choice and you are killing a living being.” Interestingly the most swaying statement against legalizing abortion for the people present was that if we allow abortion it would contribute to a lack of reason to use contraceptives, particularly condoms, and therefore completely contribute to the spread of STIs and more importantly HIV/AIDS. It is an interesting perspective to consider, given that the situation is very different here than back home.

To me, it seemed to come down to the decision between the freedoms of choice for one individual against fighting a pandemic that has claimed the lives of so many people already. Every Motswana knows someone who has died from AIDS, while it is still a stigmatized disease; it is something that has been forced into the faces and lives of these people. Unlike at home, it is impossible to be here and pretend HIV/AIDS is not a problem. Everyone knows it, even though they won’t always talk about it, but there seems to be general feeling of we should do all that we can to fight this disease – maybe even if it trumps a person’s individual rights and luxuries.

The last round of debating that we got to watch was on the motion, “HIV positive individuals should not be allowed to have children”. This was interesting, as it seems that the answer would be obvious. People have free will and free choice. Everyone has the right to a family. Here though, there are several other issues to be considered – and those freedoms are again weighed against the price that they come to for the country and the people.

Those in favour of the motion spoke of rights to live and the right to raise a family. They also talked about fighting the stigmatization that follows HIV, and if this motion were supported it just continues down the road of pigeon-holing HIV+ individuals. There final argument was of PMTCT – a program in Botswana to prevent mother-to-child transmission. It is fully funded and available to all mothers for free. It is an educational program but also gives them a regiment of drugs to knock their viral load down during pregnancy and afterwards during breastfeeding (even though they are not encouraged to breastfeed) helping to prevent HIV transmission to the child.

On the flip side, the students argued about the lack of effectiveness of the PMTCT program, which then began an argument based on statistics. How effective was it? Where do you draw the line of sustainable or useful as a program? Is it worth the funding? This seems to be the arguments that often consume people here – how much this treatment costs and whether it is even worth it. If they didn’t have to spend money on HIV/AIDS this country would look very different. Unfortunately, that isn’t the case. This side also argued about the economic impact of having HIV+ children – both on the medical system, but also due to the government support and orphanages that these children most often ended up in. Their main premise was that Botswana cannot afford to support the practice of having HIV+ babies – that the rights of those individuals were lost with their becoming positive. It sounds cruel and these students took a hard stance in the face of the most important social, economic and health problem that this country has ever faced.

All-in-all it was an amazing morning. It was great to see the proficiency of the arguments and thoughts brought forward. It was truly enlightening to see these arguments carried out in a completely different culture form my own – and how those difference can set apart the results and resolutions. To me, Botswana seems torn. They want to respect and give their people the individual freedoms and rights that we are privileged to have back home. However, they are faced with confronting massive economic drain and attrition of life. Which would you choose?

Anyways, the debate was definitely food for though and it was really quite emotional when you think about what these people have went through – and still are every day.
This afternoon we packed up and got the car ready to head out to the bush. We were going to spend the rest of the weekend at the Botswana Predator Conservation Trust’s research camp. The drive is about an hour and a half. The first leg of the journey is getting out of Maun and passing through the many villages on the way out, lastly being Shorobe. Shorobe is also where the pavement ends. After that is it dusty road for another twenty minutes. Following that we pull off the road and wind our way into the bush on sandy poorly maintained paths. As always we have to stop at the veterinary check-points and make sure that our tires and feet are sanitized for foot & mouth disease. Then we continue on our way. We get to camp about an hour before sunset.

Camp is an amazing place! It is an intricate network tents and small hut-like buildings. There are around a dozen people who work and conduct research at camp. Each of them has their own tent. These aren’t little tents. They are almost like one room houses, with furniture, beds, lanterns and whatever other luxuries they have brought out. At first I thought this was quite lavished. Then I realized that these people live out here for the majority of two or three years while they are doing their projects (maybe more). I think they are definitely permitted a little comfort.

There are some really nice common areas as well – with strings, gymnastics rings, hammocks and day beds. This would be a really cool place to hang out for a while at, even though I was only spending one night, I knew that it was going to be fun! I spent the remaining hours of the day (and the sunset) reading on a little deck that opened up onto the flood plains. It was a beautiful spot and just like relaxing at the cottage – but instead of having a lake, there were antelope, elephants and god only knows what else! Haha!

Dinner was really good: pasta and sauce, sausages and a vegetable salad. I think it was also so good as it was a combination of being really hungry from the drive and day, but also that this food would have compared to anything served back in Maun – except that is was out here in the bush! It definitely blew my expectations out of the water and this was when I knew that I would be okay doing field research if it was like this – comfortable living and good food – this was definitely not the norm for accomodations, but I wasn’t complaining while I was staying there.

After dinner we hung out around the campfire. It was a nice picturesque evening and we decided that heading out to the small deck to look at the stars would be a good idea. We got out there and brought some logs to start a fire. After being out there for only five minutes, one of the researchers came out and told us this might not be the best idea. There were leopards that prowled this area as well as hyenas – so we didn’t need to put ourselves in unnecessary danger. We were all a little shocked and shaken and decided instead to call it a night. We headed back to our tents and crashed for the evening.

I didn’t have any problem falling asleep. It was comfortable and cozy under the weight of my blankets. I was staying in a guest tent by myself, so it was a little quiet. My tent was a little way into the bush, and there were no other distractions, so I could hear everything perfectly. I eventually drifted into a light sleep, only to be awaken shortly. There was a definite rusting right around my door. Was it some animals trying to nose its way in? Hyena’s are quite curious – Crap! After hitting the side of my tent and spending some time to listen if it came back, it did! I grabbed my flashlight and saw that it was a little mouse that was stuck between the mesh and the outside tent canvas, haha! After that it was much better and I had a great sleep!