Jan's first week in Botswana

For the most part during my first few days here, I’ve been getting oriented and setting up the kitchen in our new home. I’ve spent a lot of time (too much really) surfing the web and using Facebook to virtually discover what’s available here, but I’m also getting out and about to check things out, in the real world.

Check out this crazy flower on a tree in my neighborhood.

On Monday and Tuesday, I opted to stay at home, while Rishi headed over to the University for his way-too-early 7 am class. That afforded me time to catch up on emails, read, write last week’s blog post, spend lots of time on the web as mentioned above, and walk around our neighborhood. Per my pedometer, a loop around the main circle in our development covers 0.3 miles. A brisk ten times around takes me just under an hour and nets a 3-mile walk. Our neighbors' landscaping varies from raked dirt and pavers to some interesting xeric gardens featuring a wide range of succulents, thorny plants and strange trees, most of which I've never seen before. It’s making me miss my Boulder walking companions, though!

Same flower, side view.

Another plant that's new to me.

On Wednesday, after dropping Rishi at the University, I drove over to the nearby Riverwalk Shopping Mall. The first stop was Barclay’s Bank for a debit/ATM card. The bank was busy, so it took a half hour or so for me to get through the three people who had to handle some part of my getting the card. First was the customer service person who had opened the account for Rishi the previous week. She rifled through the stack of papers on her desk to find the forms with our account information. After she authorized my card, I waited for a second person to issue the card, enter the card info into her computer terminal, but also hand write my name, account number and card number into a ledger that I had to sign. Finally, once I had the card in hand, a third person operated the machine that allowed me to set my pin number. I’d recently opened a new bank account at home and though that process probably took just as long, only one person handled everything and of course all of the data entry and record keeping was electronic, except for the signatures. In the U.S. I had to wait for the card to come in the mail a week later, whereas in Botswana I walked out of the bank, card in hand. I have the impression that hardly any business is handled by mail here.

After the bank, I stopped at he nearby store of Orange, one of several cell phone service providers that serve Botswana. Here I waited as well, while the staff dealt with the long line of customers ahead of me, many of whom were there to pay their bills (no checks in the mail?). But once I reached the front of the queue, the service was great. The man who waited on me inserted a test SIM card to check that my AT&T Iphone had been unlocked before inserting a new local SIM card for my number. He clearly explained the various payment plans available to me. Once I chose a plan, he walked me through setting it up, which we quickly did using the phone itself. I walked out of the store with my phone working perfectly. I should mention that getting AT&T to unlock the Iphone was a real pain, involving a visit to their Boulder store, an online chat, and numerous irate phone calls. So at the moment, I’d rate Orange’s customer service way ahead of AT&T’s.

Having handled those two bits of business, the next task was shopping. The Riverwalk Mall has three different grocery stores: Spar, Shop Rite, and Woolworth’s. I visited all three, as well as a store called Mr. Home, sort of like Bed Bath and Beyond but much smaller, looking for specific cooking ingredients and kitchen tools. I’ll write a future blog about grocery shopping in Gaborone, but for now I’ll just say that I’ve been having fun looking through what each store has and trying to get a handle on what’s available where and what things cost. Plus, as most of you know about me, I’m food obsessed.

The rest of the week was more of the same. I’ve been driving around town, visiting the different shopping centers, especially the grocery stores. I’m also having fun cooking (who, me?) and experimenting with gluten-free recipes because Rishi is on a gluten-free diet. On Saturday I went to a Zumba class, which was great, and a tough workout.