GSA Meeting

I can not believe I didn’t write about this earlier and now that it has gone so long I am sure I will have forgotten some of the details about this experience so hopefully I will do a decent job of recounting the tale. This post should have happened in early august.

After all of the orientation activities and the first uneventful but stressful week of classes including registering and adding and dropping all of us international students were pretty on exhausted. I for one just wanted to fall into a routine to and settle in but with all the shifiting and changing and things that had to be done that process was not an easy one.

Amongst all this commotion an ominous notice was posted in the graduate village (where we live) reading ‘ATTENTION ALL INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS: An urgent meeting has been called (blah, blah..)’ Immediately rumors started swirling about what could possibly be the meaning of this. We had been warned repeatedly in the orientation that living in the graduate village was a privilege and that we should be careful (see pot from 7/30). Immediately I began to fear we would be kicked out of the graduate village and have to live somewhere else, having seen the other rooms and I did NOT want to live there. Also I had just gotten the internet working in my room and I did not want to give that up. Others were sure that there were other reasons.

Dylan and I showed up right on time and sat down. All the other international students trickled in and found seats. We were seated in a circle but when Charity and Dr. Malete came in they asked that we please move so that all of ‘them’ could sit at the head of the table. ‘Them’ was the two administrators, and two students from the Graduate Student Association (GSA). We began with pleasantries from Charity and Dr. Malete but soon enough the GSA representatives launched into a tirade. Apparently someone had been caught smoking in their room (seriously, that was dumb) and ‘everyone’ had been complaining about how much of a nuisance we are. One of the GSA reps, a Canadian girl, pretended to be on our side but it was clear he didn’t want us there. Throughout the meeting it became increasingly clear that GSA had fought hard to keep the international students out of the Graduate village and it became clear to me that the GSA never had had any intention of giving us the opportunity to prove ourselves worthy. After all, how was it possible that they had had “tons” of complaints in less than two weeks? At one point GSA and Dr. Malete got into a confrontation about how the GSA had fought us being there, it was clear that there has been a bitter issue of it prior to our arrival and all parties were not yet over it. At one point the GSA president said “you have to remember we are older than you and you have to respect us.” Needless to say that did not go over well as some of the international students were actually older than him and no one particularly liked the idea of bowing to people purely because of their age. At another point the GSA president used the phrase “you people” obviously he did not understand that in America that phrase is off limits and some of the American black students quipped back. The meaning was clearly lost in translation and it offered a little comedic relief but the emotion remained so intense that I dared not laugh.

Eventually as the meeting progressed the international students managed to gain the offensive and stated that the GSA was being unfair, judgmental, and had made no attempt to be welcoming. These comments clearly put the GSA reps on the defensive. Finally Dylan said loudly, “I have done nothing wrong” and stormed out. Every sat in stunned silence for a minute before the debate raged on. At the end of the meeting nothing was concluded and clearly bitter feelings were the only result. Needless to say it was not a good experience during our first weeks in Botswana.

In the end the whole ordeal was an empty threat, the GSA wasn't ever in a position to put us out and I think simply hoped to scare us straight, in the end I think the bitterness that resulted had the opposite effect and today some international do things to intentionally poke at the GSA. Such is life.

Thats all for now,
Love
Tommy