REESE MATTHEWS
While I was walking to church with Grace and Cub last Sunday, we passed a group of folks returning from a funeral. A man in his 30s asked me if I knew Reese Matthews; I told him that I did remember him, though I had not seen him for many years. Reese was a Peace Corps Volunteer teaching at Mdzimba High School in the early 1990s. The man happily told me that Reese had taught him science, and that he had earned a credit in that subject on his O-Level tests. If anyone has contact with Reese (I'm thinking of you former Swaziland PCVs), let him know his efforts bore fruit. I suspect many of us, PCVs and otherwise, have had long-term positive impacts on people, whether we know it or not.

TO CATCH A THIEF
Well, not exactly. On the same Sunday we learned of Reese Matthew's good influence, we spent an hour or so with the Mubiru's at their home at Mdzimba High School. Mrs. Mubiru was the last one out of the house as we prepared to return to Nsukumbili, and Mr. Mubiru asked her for the car keys. A moment of dismay ensued; she thought he had the keys, and so she had locked the house. The bunch of keys which had the car keys on it was locked in the house, and that bunch was in the back door door lock, 15 feet from the front door. We could see them, but we could not reach them. What to do?

We went around the house, looking for a way in. All the windows have burglar bars on them, and most of the windows were latched shut-except for one. If we could find a child small enough to fit through the burglar bars, they could take the keys out of the back door and we'd be on our way.

Hope, our youngest, would easily fit through, but we thought it doubtful she could follow our instructions well enough to get to the keys. We then checked if Cubby's head would fit through one of the diamond-shaped holes in the burglar bars; it did. In she went! When her entire body was inside, she turned around and faced us and had an absolutely radiant smile on her face. I wish I had had a camera. She collected the keys, we breathed a collective sigh of relief, and we got back to Nsukumbili without further incident.

FIRST SIBHULUJA
Sibhuluja is SiSwati for "ear of corn". We were wandering around the school garden with agriculture teacher Mr. Khumalo, discussing with him where we might put in a fenced-in area for fruit tree trials. Why would we put a fenced-in area inside a fenced-in area? Because the students use the school garden, and if a half-dozen fruit trees were there, they might find the temptation to partake of the fruit too tempting. This of course would throw off our agricultural trials and give us cause for generalized frustration and suspicion of students. We don't want either of those, so we asked Khumalo if we could put in the fence. He was enthusiastic.

I figured we would give him one of the ears of corn from our small corn plot as a token of appreciation. I simply pulled one off its stalk and husked it. It was a deep red color, because a couple years ago a student gave me one such corn cob. I really liked that color, and so we planted some of the seeds (see photo at http://poglitshphotos.blogspot.com) Ruth said we couldn't give it to Khumalo because we neded to weigh it first, and Khumalo was understanding. I really liked that sibhuluja; I think "Indian corn" is really neat. Turns out this was one of only a few such corn cobs with this color.

OPERATION BURNING SPEAR
The day Khumalo and Ruth and I went to the garden to site the proposed fenced-in area, a few wasps left their nests on the outside of our house and came after me. I prefer to leave wasp nests alone, as long as they do not bother us. Ruth says they eat caterpillars that would otherwise eat plants in her garden. Once they get aggressive like this, though, it's eviction time.

The next morning I took a stick and wrapped a rag around one end, fastening it with a bit of wire (see photo at http://poglitshphotos.blogspot.com) I then doused the rag with lamp oil and lit it up. I then held my burning spear just below the wasp nest. The wasps, naturally, begin to flee their building; as the come close to the fire, they roast their wings and fall to the ground. After the nest was empty I dispatched the fallen wasps with a can of Doom (like Raid). We have had no further problems from the wasps on that side of the house. Interestingly, the other side of the house has even more nests and more wasps, but those on that side never give us problems.

CULINARY ZOOLOGY
Sounds like an upper-level elective class at a small liberal arts college in the northeast, right? Actually, it was a 10-minute seminar class my form 5 biology students gave me this week. We are going over the classification system of plants and animals, and I am using a full-color book chock full of great pictures of animals from around the world. After class the students wanted to see photos of the mongooses. My only real connection with mongooses is the Rudyard Kipling story of Riki-Tiki-Tavi, the Indian mongoose which takes on some nasty cobras. This area has mongooses, though, and the students wanted to see photos. Turns out the mongooses here are a bit of a pest. They found the photos and excitedly said "Ah, there it is!" After a few comments, they said "It is delicious." They chow those things! In a book which frequently mentions the endangered status of various anmimals, they were commenting on how, in fact, there is room for all wildlife in Dlangeni; right next to the corn porridge and cooked greens. This served as a fresh reminder that even though this is a high school, the surrounding culture is different from the one I grew up in.

CHIPPIE BUMPS
After our evening Bible reading and prayer, we all give each other hugs and kisses and then pack the girls into bed. Ruth is getting quite big now-Dr. Wasswa says the baby could come anytime now-and the latest Poglitsh edition makes his or her presence known with various moving bumps in Ruth's belly. The girls look forward to meeting "Chipmunk", and until that time they give Ruth a kiss on the belly. The girls like to see if they can find a "Chippie bump" to give a kiss; if they find an appendage making its appearance by causing a small distension of Ruth's stomach, they quickly give it a peck. It reminds me of that game "Whack the Mole" you can occasionally find at amusement parks, where a half-dozen mechanical moles randomly poke their heads out of holes and you earn points by whomping them down with a thickly-padded mallet. Our version is, of course, a little gentler.