Growing Perspectives

Endings and Beginnings

2009-09-20T09:40:00.002-06:00

{I penned this reflection/rant/anything while waiting for a flight in an airport somewhere after being grounded due to an on flight illness midway from Lilongwe to Nairobi. So I was sitting in the departures area waiting for the flight and decided to write this. Sort of. Most of it anyways. The writing was kind of... really... okay entirely messy so I had to fill in the blanks a little here and there.... Well most of it.}

Pale soul. Pale with regards to a loss of colour caused by remorse and regret dripping with nostalgia. Pale soul. To opt for an oft used metaphor that "life is a road" it feels as though we're all wanderers, drifters really, and each fleeting moment is really just a step forward to our mutual destination. Perhaps time in Zambia was just spent wandering in about in the fog of the unknown and what lays beyond. A unique blur; maybe I was a blank canvas upon arrival that was painted with the faces encountered and the stories they shared. A unique blur of mere glimpses into the lives of so many - the family who called me their own in Twapia (their love, joys and adversity), the women and men who were interviewed for NGO work (their challenges and desires), and the fellow JFs within Zambia and Malawi (their stories, friendship and support). As return to Canada looms ever closer and closer - counting down in hours now instead of days - I cannot help but feel as though all these faces are drifting away, becoming permanently blurred and lost, especially those from Zambia.

So perhaps the canvas brought to Zambia is finished - no more will the child's call of "musungu! musungu!" colour memories of walking down the street, no more will I dine with Joseph and his family and hear his insights into Zambian culture and NGO work, no more will I receive those late night (which in Zambia was 19:00) text messages from fellow JFs. All the time allotted for Zambia has been spent. On top of the connections created with fellow musungus and Zambians alike I feel that spending the short amount of time overseas presented me with an opportunity to drive bits of change within NGOs and in the field.

Traveling to Zambia gave a different perspective of what the word "life" might mean compared to Canada... It does not feel so different. People still have their share of laughter and joys coupled with tears and sorrows. Hope still drives dreams of different tomorrows and change, but what is different is the opportunity for those hopes to blossom into reality. The women, men, and children of Twapia still dream of a new future for themselves - maybe it's an electrified house - they too dream for their children - maybe it's the chance to go to school - yet even after working twelve hours a day seven days a week for months and years such dreams aren't tangible. Where's the opportunity? What can be done to create it?

The return to Canada? Maybe it's an ending, but the ending of most aspects of life is the beginning of something new. I feel that there is an immense and overwhelming potential for Canadians to knock down barriers to opportunity without ever setting foot on an airplane. Global citizenship..., responsibility on our part for our actions and the understanding of how we are citizens of the world (whether we like it or not) and that within this complex sphere of the world our actions can have strange and unanticipated ripples. There's opportunity to create opportunity, to catalyze opportunity..., to create change in our homes and in our class rooms, in the coffee shops and in the newspapers, in our governments (of all levels, not just federal) and in our conversations. In the actions we take every day after we arise the potential to make change happen is ubiquitous. Change happens in Canada, not just overseas. Change happens when we as Canadians realize that we can create change by holding our government accountable for its policies or when we encourage one another to take actions as responsible global citizens. Change happens in Canada.

The sun sets every day in Zambia, it sets every day in Canada. Each night the sun sets on a world where opportunity isn't found in every nook and cranny, it isn't flowing through life in places such as Twapia. Wouldn't it be something amazing if the sun didn't rise on the same world every morning, that as light falls to the ground it passes into a world of incremental change? So if each day is an ending and a beginning it's time to make each beginning a different one, a new one - for each sunrise to be greeted from all our actions the day before. Driving small changes on a day to day basis. With each new sunrise, each completion of the endings and beginnings, let our actions contribute to building a world of opportunity.

the sun too shines in Calgary

2009-09-05T03:34:00.005-06:00

It's a strange place..., this city of Calgary. But the same sun that shines on the fields of Canola bordering the city and the concrete city core within also shines on the lush green trees of Mapalo and the metal roofs of the families of Twapia. The same wind that shakes the Baobabs and mango trees of Zambia also rustles the maple leafs of Canada. Life lives in Zambia and Canada. Humanity - we're all connected world over by the most honest, simple, and beautiful things - the sun, the wind, the ever blue sky and the clouds that dot it. So why isn't something as simple as opportunity just as universal? Why will the child born in Calgary have far greater opportunity than the one born in Ndola?

The sun too shines in Calgary, just as it does in Twapia. The sun shines worldwide - why too doesn’t opportunity?

Internal roadblocks to change

2009-09-05T03:22:00.000-06:00

As difficult as it is for an organization to achieve project success based on conditions in the field there are also difficulties inherent within organizations that are roadblocks to change.

When considering a hypothetical organization - at home or overseas - various factors influence its ability to achieve what it sets out to do. Management styles, internal structure, organizational values / perspective, and ability to plan can all hinder the progress or "success" of a project before workers even hit the ground.

For a moment consider the idea of different “management styles” (which is a very broad term). It is important to look at who holds decision making authority. Is this person a complete autocrat with a glorious vision of the way things "are" or "should be", or are they an open minded individual more concerned with both the project and those working on it reaching their potential? Does the manager actively try to understand the strengths and weaknesses in the team and work to make sure that the right people are doing the right job? Does the manager try to motivate people to achieve the goals of the project by understanding why or how they are motivated? Does the manager take into account the needs of the team? Ect. . . Does the manager connect the dots or dictate?

Organizational values can sway the definition of "success" of a project away from one that actually conflates with "change" for the intended beneficiaries to one that is merely justification to continue whatever the project is for the organization. Essentially, if the organization's values are not in line with the heart of the matter / the reality of the situation then there is the potential for the organization to justify its work as "good" without considering what "good" is actually being achieved. When the desired change is quantified in terms of organization's perspective, as opposed to that of the beneficiary, there is a great potential for projects to roll forward - full steam ahead - in a way that pleases the organization or maybe the donors, but not necessarily the intended beneficiaries. Does the organization put value on planning ahead of time? Does the organization put value on personal or professional development of its staff? Does it value the input of all stake holders? Is it concerned with the impacts its work will have on the communities? Does the organization value new idea generation and innovation? Does it value the thoughts and lessons learned from its staff who are in the front line, or only the desires of the upper echelons of the organization’s structure? Is the organization committed to driving change through deep impacts? Does the organization’s culture put value on critical thinking? The motivations and abilities of those within an organization can be directly impacted by its values, perspective, and motivation.

What about hierarchy? Does the internal structure of an organization make decision making a slow and cumbersome process? Who is responsible for decision making on important matters? For example, should the big bwana / person at the top of the pyramid be able to make unchecked decisions about all programmes without consultation from those who are actually informed about the issues? Are team leaders able to make programme critical decisions without having to ask higher authorities and wait for a “timely decision”? The hierarchy of an organization can drastically cripple the ability for meaningful decision making. Will the hierarchy be an intuitive map of shared authority and decision making power or a synthetic “power grab” division of responsibility that hinders change from occurring? Streamlined decision making vs. confusion? Can an organization structure themselves in such a way that those involved feel ownership over their role, empowered in their decision making, and able to drive the change they want to see, while at the same time having an organization that is accountable and effective?

Plan, plan, plan. Part of planning is to establish a realistic metric for success (a working definition for the change the project is trying to create). As obvious as it sounds - before moving forward the team should know exactly what it is they want to accomplish or change. What's a reasonable way to determine a definition of "success"? It all depends on the context. Ideally all the stakeholders will play a role in determining what success might mean. (example - in Canada if the city is going to commission a major road they'd speak with the communities that will be affected. If a NGO is going to work in a community hopefully they'd involve that community in planning, problem identification, ect . . . as opposed to: HERE'S OUR SOLUTION.) Gathering information about whatever it is the project desires to change or achieve would be a logical starting point. What is the cause of the ‘problem’ – what indicates there is a problem? (the problem being a situation or condition within a community that could or should be changed?) What are the indicators related to this issue? Indicators of the base problem or issue that is trying to be resolved are essential. It’s not enough to say “there’s bad water” or “the traffic piles up” – actually indicators, qualitative and quantitative, for the problem need to established. A realistic definition of success seems to be contingent on gathering accurate information about the present situation as well including all stakeholders in definition generation.

In a project management course I once took, a prof talked about risk and how risk can never be completely removed from any project, but through proper planning it could be mitigated. Inside and outside of the classroom this statement seems to draw water - there is risk in everything we do, whether it is designing a water provision development project in Zambia or a roadway system in Canada. Smaller scale activities in day to day life - such as buying a cup of tea - too have their associated risks. Risk in this sense is the potential for an internal or external event or change to hinder the project from reaching its defined success.

When risks are simplified there is potential for disaster - the risk of failure is an accumulation of various other risks which need to be planned for carefully. Contingency plans need to be developed. Failure to succeed - is it a risk of supply line failure? Oops we're no longer able to have access to an all necessary part. Is there a risk of low adoption rate of whatever the project is? That's probably not the end of the story. Why is there a risk of low adoption rate? Do the intended beneficiaries not desire the project? Not understand the benefits? What about changes within the community - what risk do they present for project success? ect . . . On top of managing risks that may be apparent or possible it is also essential to not make a project plan too rigid so that it cannot adapt to unimaginable risks. What seems impossible today may be a cruel reality four months down the line when the project is in full swing. This "unlikely possibility" or "unimaginable situation" might derail the whole project if the original planning is too rigid to adapt to changing circumstances. Essentially a project is an attempt to work within an ever changing system (ie a community. A community may be composed of households. Think about all the changes that occur in your household on a day to basis. Multiply that by four months. Multiply that by hundreds or thousands of households. Now think about environmental changes. Political changes. (both likely and unlikely) - communities are very dynamic) .

Planning also needs to take into account how to determine if the desired change is actually occurring. Meaningful indicators relating to the change should be established and a way to gather the pertinent information related to said indicators needs to be developed. If a project is designed to have some success or drive some change what reflects this change or success? What about the indicators mentioned earlier (the ones for “how do we know this issue / problem exists?”) – can they be used as correlation? If the same indicators for identifying the problem are used to identify successes or change will that create a more accurate picture?

So those are a few thoughts on "planning" - the key idea is that any project, complex or simple, needs to be well thought out. Understanding what change is desired and how to measure it along with what might hinder that success is important. Of course this post is an over simplification of “planning” but I just wanted to highlight a few drops in the bucked that contribute to an organization’s ability to create their desired change.

Not a comprehensive look at roadblocks to change that can occur within an organization, but rather a few thoughts I wanted to jot down at 3:22 AM . I figured in the very least it’d make a new blog post. I’ll try to come back and update this one as more comes to mind.

an apology for my terrible tendency..,

2009-08-26T11:16:00.006-06:00

..., to wrinkle up the most valuable [things] in life and shove them into a pocket with all the useless spare change, wrinkled napkins and bloody Kleenexes found while walking down life's road. What should have been framed was tarnished.

From Drop Box

Full House

2009-08-19T00:29:00.003-06:00

It feels as though it is four and half minutes to midnight on New Year’s Eve. Last minute conflicts, regrets over the year's happenings, bouts of laughter, reflections on circumstances, and hurried last minute preparations to welcome the New Year accompany the last breaths and struggled mutterings of the old one.

However it is not 23:55:30 on some December 31st in some year Anno Domine, it is August nineteenth 2009. The stage has emptied, no encore no continuation. The house lights are on and the room is emptying in a surreal manner. Acquaintances become memories as they furtively rush out of their seats, into the aisle, and out of the theatre. A placement has ended and conscious thoughts drift from the present reality in Southern Africa to another world far removed from present circumstances. A world of maple leafs and electric powered public transit trains. A world of five dollar cups of coffee and drive by apathy.

Febrile Chills - Sleepless Nights - Morning brings a lucid, cruel, cruel, reality

2009-08-14T08:41:00.007-06:00

"A child dies of malaria every 30 seconds" - WHO

A statistic I have heard before several times - Spread the Net Campaign Advertisements, commercials for one NGO or another, and friends have all shared this chilling fact with me. However, I feel that this fact is a cold statistic. It doesn't carry the weight of the whole story - it's an accountant's attempt at poetry. Honest yet simplistic; this is an important message. But in a culture so far removed from Malaria we hear many stories - how can we understand what it is like to have Malaria, how ubiquitous it is, how many times or how many ways it alters one's life? So here is yet another stab at Malaria, take it for what it's worth.

This figure doesn't just indicate that every thirty second the laughter of one child is suddenly extinguished forever, replaced by the weeping of loved ones and friends. Malaria isn't a quick and tidy death - for children it's a drawn out process lasting days. It indicates that every thirty seconds a young one has succumbed to an illness that has sapped the life from them in a painful, discomforting, and usually completely treatable process. Malaria seems as common in the Ndola region as the flu seems in Canada. People get it, it slows them down for a few days and life goes on. Many people I met keep a supply of treatment on hand and know the early symptoms. If treated early perhaps the brunt of the illness can be mitigated.

Most cases of Malaria are treatable; while there is no vaccine;however, treatment drugs are cheap and readily available. For around ten dollars one can walk into a Chemist / Pharmacy and buy Coartem. But for households where the monthly salary is only three hundred thousand kwacha it is a sacrifice born of necessity to roll out fifty thousand Kwacha for yellow pills. This little yellow package contains enough artemesinin derived medication to treat Malaria in three days. After the first day of medication some symptoms subside, by the end of day two the patient is walking rapidly down the road to recovery, and once the third day's dosage is complete lingering symptoms should vanish in a day's time.

Symptoms of Malaria which may overwhelm the child after infection are varied - nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, body pain, head ache, chills, and fever are some of the symptoms one may encounter one to two weeks after being bitten. These symptoms, as I described in a previous post, are intense. The chills are enough to deny much needed sleep. The fever induces all manners of discomfort. The pains immobilize and cause suffering. The vomit and diarrhea hinder nourishment and cause dehydration.

The infection begins with a simple mosquito bite at night time. Such an event is hardly considered cause for alarm in Canada. As the parasites enter the human body they move to the liver and multiply. Upon re entering the blood stream they destroy red blood cells. Eventually the previously described symptoms are followed by coma, kidney problems, and death. I've heard from many a typically nasty condition known as "black water fever" for the colour of the victim's urine arrives once Malaria has begun to take it's toll on the body.

For me when I felt ill it was a simple trip to the doctor to receive medicine to address the discomfort caused by symptoms and medicine to treat the infection. I'm white, wealthy, and have medical insurance. I've had Malaria three times this summer while trying to avoid infection. I've taken prophylactics. I've used a bug net. I've sprayed my arms countless times with mosquito repellent. I've have Malaria three times. I can't imagine what the symptoms may be like without medicine to lessen their toll, without being healthy and well nourished, with out having a doctor to quickly diagnose and treat.

I cannot imagine what the symptoms would feel like without drugs. At the worst of times the room never stopped spinning due to nausea, my bones felt shattered, and the chills reminded me of Calgary winters with no jacket. These feelings occurred with medication given to me to lessen these symptoms. What would Malaria be like without medication?

Every thirty seconds a child dies after suffering through fevers and intense pain, diarrhea and vomiting, nausea and head pain. All of which is preventable with bug nets and bug spray. All of which is treatable with cheap medicine. If only life were so simple. That's the cruel reality - you'd think something as simple as medication for those who need it could be easily facilitated. Yet these problems still exist.

Like many things I have encountered in Zambia, there is a white get out of jail free card for Malaria. The treatment exists within the walls of so many Chemists and Doctor's Offices. It exists, it's cheap, and it's readily available. So why do such staggering problems still exist? Why can't every human be entitled to such simplistic medicine? Why do children succumb to Malaria after days of suffering from such dire symptoms?

It's not as simple as giving nets to people or producing more drugs. Nets and Drugs are out there. People have to perceive a need for nets. I've heard stories of people using mosquito nets to catch fish. Is it an issue of developing the capability of public health provision? Arguably that's still an issue in most "developed" nations. I’m not an expert in medicine, health care, or anything for that matter. I do feel that having had Malaria three times now and having been easily treated each time that this problem is complex and confusing.

Every thirty seconds a child's struggle with a brutal disease ends with the loss of life.

Stuck inside of Lusaka with the Malaria blues again

2009-08-11T04:51:00.004-06:00

The plan was perfect - leave Ndola early on Sunday morning to arrive in Lusaka by Noon. Spend the day in Lusaka doing last minute preparations and final work related emails and then head to Kasama for a village stay. Head to the market on Sunday and grab a gift or two for my intended host family, eat a good meal and most importantly GET SOME SLEEP!

But plans never work out as intended, which is why I am not a fan of rigid plans. Saturday night I felt ill - not desperately, but even my last meal with the Bala family was strained due to aches and fatigue. Sunday morning greeted me with similar symptoms and accompanying vomit. "Maybe it's a flu..." I boarded the motor coach in Ndola around 6:30. After a quick call and a text again thanking Joseph for his hospitality over the last six weeks it's already 6:52. The bus is full now and hitting the road. Symptoms persist. I try to dose on the bus in between conversations with my new friend headed to Mazabuka. I wonder if in Canada complete strangers can become fast friends just by sitting beside one another on a bus?

Upon arriving in Lusaka I felt improved - I met up with some other EWB volunteers (OVS). In the evening the symptoms came back in full force - they even brought their ugly cousins "chills and body pain". By nineteen hours (or so) I was slumped on a chair. The next day I went to the doctor with the help of an EWB volunteer. "You have Malaria." He handed me a bunch of pills for addressing the various symptoms (vomiting, pain, ect..) some coartem to kill the parasites... and Doxy to treat some other infection he thought I had. I left the doctors office with a pocket pharmacy and crashed.

Malaria round three. Despite wearing bug spray and sleeping under mosquito nets one (or more) little vampire(s) was able to bite me "seven to fifteen days" ago. Tricky mosquito, it must have known my plans and set out to destroy them with one little bite. What foresight on the part of a tiny insect.

So I'm stuck in Lusaka till at least Thursday. The doctor (who oddly was from Kasama. And all around the best doctor I have visited while overseas) told me "Kasama is very nice, but you can't travel for three days. Maybe more." So now I am waiting so patiently in Lusaka till I'm done my medicine and feeling well enough to step out into the world. Hopefully I can make it to Kasama on Thursday, but I'm not counting on anything!

Moral of the story: don't make time dependent plans at the last minute that can be easily derailed by something as tiny as forty thousand ish parasites swimming through your blood stream munching on red blood cells while throwing a party in your liver.

Changing Change?

2009-08-07T06:46:00.003-06:00

If a solution is rendered, there is no guarantee it will be adopted or even work within a community. Each person is a unique individual set against the backdrop of their communities cultural, political, economic, social, and ecological circumstances. Some individuals may jump at the thought of new ideas, others may not. Take the BSF for example. No two households had an identical perception or usage behaviours. The BSF is something new to the community - never before has such an object existed. For households to use it effectively a new set of behaviours (complementary or opposed) needs to be shared with each individual in the house hold. The old behaviour of not filtering water needs to be replaced with a new behaviour and all its little pieces. Some of the little pieces of the old behaviour and the new behaviour (such as water storage behaviours or sanitation behaviours) may already work well with the new intervention (ie safe storage behaviours) or work against it (ie not washing hands).

Projects may take a patriarchal point of view, one of 'helping' a community. If the community is not actively involved at all levels there is great potential for the project to fall apart. If a community doesn't actively desire change in one way or another are solutions being forced in a way of "we know more, it's our obligation to free the masses from their ignorance?". Or is it more "We have something new to share that might help, let's share?" - is there a distinction at the end of the day?

Can there be change without an expressed desire from an individual or community to change? In that case shouldn't technology be left behind while we embark on a journey of looking towards why current behaviours exist and why we want to change them? Should we look at changing the way we drive change? But even if we are working towards behaviour change is it really any different from a technological approach? There is still manipulation - we want people to act in a way similar to us. Perhaps the new behaviour will lead to a safer and more productive life (on our terms), but is it right to force change on individuals when we as a culture still have so much to learn? Is it the role of development to bring water to the thirsty, teach the thirsty how to get water, show the thirsty why they should demand clean water, or demand that the thirsty do water our way? Is it something else entirely?

Many development workers seem to have a vested interest in the project and not the cause - whatever their motivation is they seem to benefit from their work. NGO competition? Why do multiple NGOs grab funds from donors in a competitive way for the sake of putting their way forward? Other NGOs start up a project and even though all signs point to "DANGER" they trod forward without a worry - not even looking for the signs in some cases, ignoring them in others. Funds are still requested for the sake of driving "change" put into a broken system with little accountability and the donors smile. Perhaps a sly smile emerges on the implementer’s face as well. "We have expertise in this area, so therefore the community must need our help" aka "our solution fits any problem because we know how to run it!" aka "to a hammer maker everyone problem looks like a nail" Many projects require behaviour change to be succesfull. Not just behaviour change projects. Again, the often looked at BSF - without some change in behaviour the BSF becomes very dysfunctional. Yet if a community's project is focused on an intervention, where success is contingent on behaviour change, why is it implemented before looking at behaviour? Why are communities not driving their own projects ALL THE TIME? (should communities be playing a minor or non existant role, in this two thousand and ninth year AD?)

One thing I know for sure: the first thing that needs to change is the way many people look at creating change. I have heard a lot about "behaviour change" - to me it is apparent that before we can even look at changing the behaviours of others we need to look at our own behaviour and think long and hard about who really needs to change first.

Awakening to change

2009-08-07T04:13:00.005-06:00

Upon awakening I was at once overwhelmed with feelings of confusion, and weariness. A wayward soul exposed to a new reality, a waking one. For this morning my work placement is finished. The last three months were spent locked in a deep trance of obsession and unflinching focus on my project - the BSF programme.

Were the eleven to twelve hour, sometimes longer, work days worth it? As I awoke this morning it was as though a grand dream had ended, the dream of working in development. The active scenes of Mapalo peel away as if they existed only as essential elements for work; shades of some dream world. Now they become stagnant, static. The memories are no longer dynamic and changing; after Wednesday's training meeting there will be no further memories built. I will not visit this community again sometime - no provision to travel there one last time for work.

Work consumed most of my time with an insatiable lust. Now that it is complete I feel both liberated and thirsty - even upon delivering deliverables the project will go on. Life will continue in Mapalo..., Change will need to be pushed forward. Learning will need to continue. Personally, in organizations, and in communities. The dream of working there in Mapalo is through. I woke up. I wont directly bear witness to how the stories of Joyce at the RDC or the SHIP workers will continue. Change will have to be shared over emails and phone calls. What fruit will grow from the SEEDS I have sewn over the last three months? Or are the seeds failed and futile?

The surreal notion of leaving Ndola..., leaving Twapia is a cruel and biting reality. On Sunday I will travel to Lusaka, and then to Northern Province for a long overdue village stay - a critical component of the JF experience. I am at once excited to see life in Zambia through the rural lens, but I am also wondering what critical learning’s about Peri Urban life and the struggles within still are waiting to be plucked?

"You are counting down" - as with many of the words shared with me by Tauzen, a coworker of mine, they are very true. Since the fifth of June I have been counting down. Three months is not a great amount of time to achieve impact - especially when impact is contingent on the abilities of the individual and how that individual interacts in their environment..., less so contingent on time. One countdown ends today, the other on Sunday. I wish there was a way to shatter the hour glass and extend this dream indefinitely, to go back once more to work within Mapalo, to live in Twapia with the Bala family. Such circumstances reoccurring are unknown- will I ever walk through the paths of Twapia again?

The Bala family reminds me daily of my departure as well. “Trust is crying” says Carol, my mother in Twapia. Trust is her youngest child; he is a school student who today seems quite discouraged by the looming departure of the musungu. He sheds tears over my departure – they grow my guilt even more. I must endeavor to keep these bonds strong – even from Canada, whatever it takes to do so.

However, a further rude awakening awaits in Canada – the return to a world that has become such a surreal notion amidst the red huts of Twapia and the mini busses and the Nshima meals and the Zambian friends and the howling hounds of Twapia/Ndola/Mapalo and the zealous evangelism of Zambians and the gospel music of motor coach rides and the pit latrines and family struggles of not having ten dollars to pay for school where as in Canada people will carelessly pay ten dollars for a cup of coffee.

The village – my destination in Northern Province lies near Kasama, the heart of Bemba Land. Cherie, our Junior Fellow from last year, lived in this village for some of her time in Zambia. Journeying amidst the wheat yellow coloured scenery of Zambia for many more hours will too be a new experience. Throughout the placement I have darted between Lusaka and Ndola many times - I’ve drifted through the Copperbelt to Kitwe, and dined in Central province in Kabwe. Solwezi in Norther Province was never reached, but Tony and I did set foot on Northern Province soil. Lusaka Province and Eastern Province were seen through trips to and from Malawi. Southern Province was briefly watched through the window of a dangerous motor coach ride on one trip to Livingstone. Northern Province is up next- what waits in the villages up north?

Experiencing peri urban life has presented me with many ideas, situations, and experiences so far outside of the scope of anything Canadian. Yet there is a whole other aspect of Zambia to explore – rural life. What challenges are similar between peri urban and rural? What of the opportunities for those who live in the village – how do they compare? What are the dreams of villagers? What are their stories, their hopes, their struggles? What is their poverty – how does it exist and manifest its self? What does development mean in a rural context?

Each question will be a mini awakening – new ideas and thoughts as perspectives grow in a new environment. Ignorance is all I have when it comes to my perspective on rural life – case studies have been read as have stories – the chance to see what it means to be a villager is a meaningful one. Perhaps I am greedy and opportunistic to jump on it? I feel that in order to share this Junior Fellow Placement, development, and life in Zambia the lens rendered by this village stay experience, even if it is a short one, will be essential.

Yet even so I wish I could stay in Twapia for much longer; to see life through the seasons and all the joys and struggles within. The last few months have just been a snap shot of life, a small instance amongst a grand tapestry of happenings and the human experience. Yet even so it has awoken me to the changes that can occur in the household, in the community, and in individuals as a result of outsider involvement - in development terms and in the sense of being a new family member. For all the lessons I have taken from Twapia I can only hope I have left something behind.

Time is precious. Life drifts in and drifts away just as waves on the shore of lake Malawi. Time is the current of life - drawing us all towards or away from wherever it is we are or will be - waves causing us to drift through months and seasons and days and other synthetic divisions of the human experience. Time.

Upon arriving in Northern province yet another awakening will occur – at once able to be aware to the rural experience and all the stories contained within. Fare well Ndola! Farewell Twapia! Musali Bwino.

Shade under a wilted Banana Tree

2009-08-07T03:29:00.000-06:00

Joseph's shadow crosses over dusty trails -
dimly lit trails, draped with shade born of the dieing day's last limping light.
Voices of children and adults alike too drop shadows -
cast audibly under the presence of clouds mourning the sun.
Bundles of rape here, cabbage and tomatoes over there.
Neighbors eking a living from the labours of the land.
Man and shadow take no head, wandering down the road to home.

George lurches towards the market mini bus station -
one eyed stare gazing at the dimly lit path below.
The moon serenades the scenery with pale light;
veiled by dim light and masked by shadows,
pot holes and imperfections are gashes on the face of the road.
An eye disease devoured in a distant childhood,
another eye eyes the path lest the body tumbles.
Fixation halts falling amidst tell tale flaws on the red road.

Virginia sweeps furiously under an early morning sun -
paths once swept yesterday and the day before are touched up
and will be in need of touch up tomorrow.
Bundles of dry grass bound by string,
improvised brooms for a dusty world.
Later she'll sprint school bound - for lessons on 'civics' and 'maths',
Tomorrow she will sweep the path once more.

Ben's laughter echoes 'neath the ever blue sky
Dashing down the path from school, friends in tow behind
dressed in the crisp blues of school uniforms
running with accomplices in bare feet.
The sun's zenith has signaled the lesson's end
Afternoons contain endless football and running
Evenings Nshima and an early bedtime.

Agnes sits alone no more, yet her work has not ceased;
Methodical stirring, every day Nshima, every day stirring.
Her family, hypnotized with inferno, sits nearby.
Fire's flames are watched intently and so very closely
by those who care to stay warm amidst the lost sun light.
Charcoal is a lost luxury, the brazier lays vacant amongst dirt by the door way
scraps of wood is immolated for warmth, sacrificed to cook
Faces - young and old - congregated about the tiny pyre

Musungu sits observing; witnessing every crack on every face and every word under the sky
Eyes watching waiting, mind seeking elucidation of change
Thoughts drifting to opportunity and opportunity
Dried banana hanging from a wilting tree
the day passes slowly, forcefully, dragging Twapia behind
all those who walk her streets know her name
"We have suffered"

Deprived of sunlight

2009-08-07T03:24:00.001-06:00

Momentary or monetary Eclipse?

"No school today" the sorrowful words of my young friend strike my heart with their puerile and brutal honesty. They reflect realities of the young and beckon the memories of the old to remembrance. Promptly continuing the tale - "the teacher wanted fifty thousand. we have none." - the words delivered without a sign of hesitance and are embroidered with a subtle and sincere sadness .

Chirps of a bird carried on the cool July Breeze form a sorrowful melody - perhaps on any other day, amongst any other moment in time, the simple beauty of the bird's voice would embody happiness. Yet amongst the turmoil the notes take on a melancholy meaning. Memories of a Canadian childhood where school was not only available, but also enforced, clash with reality in Twapia. Five grades of school were already a sacrifice for the family; a sacrifice made of love and hope, of opting to spend kwacha on education rather than whatever it is adults desire to spend money on.

"Education is key for a good life. I only have grade 3, no not my children. For white collar jobs they need education. You see, food is good, but education is better." explained the father.

Somewhere in this train of sacrifice and dreaming there was a breakdown - the tracks ended. Reality can no longer sate the dreams of the father, no matter how simple it may be to want to send a child to school. How is it that hard work has lead to this? What of the families with no jobs - can they send their children to school?

Preternatural predator?

Poverty is vicious - veiled arms reach into every aspect of life - for me it is beyond comprehension, anytime I can think of "need or want" in my life it is superficial and trite compared to this family, or any other family's abyss of no opportunity. This lack of opportunity is an embodiment of poverty that is a low hanging fruit - it's easy to identify and easy to write about.

Asking various people within Twapia about poverty does not render any single answer. No universal household to household description has been discovered yet. Is there a symbolic representation of poverty?

Death has long been portrayed as the grim reaper; skeletal form draped in a dark cloak carrying a cruel scythe to harvest the souls of those whose time amidst the living has expired. Can poverty be portrayed so symbolically? Are these stories, these remarks of starving families and unschooled children the grim reaper portrayal of poverty?

the village bicycle

2009-08-04T08:02:00.003-06:00

... and other random snaps from towns, villages, and townships. This post is dedicated to Haley T., who at an EWB meeting in April suggested the rather unfortunate name for my blog of "the village bicycle". This post is dedicated to you el presidente.

the village hygiene session

the village movie bar

the village mini bus

the village... pipe?

the village field with two hens and a farmer

The ties that bind? Some ideas on functionality, assets, behaviour, and perceptions

2009-07-29T03:52:00.011-06:00

As I near the end of my placement I have finished my BSF programme study. To elucidate, my work has focused on the impact of Biosand Filters on households and how their functionality is influenced by assets, behaviours, and perceptions within households and communities. Looking at how intervention projects, such as the BSF programme, influence assets, behaviours, and perceptions was a secondary focus.

When I began this study I was naive and ignorant, and in many ways I still am. I had never read much development literature nor had I thoroughly explored appropriate technology in any great depth. To this day the bulk of my 'development' knowledge is pulled from case studies, papers, and the odd chapter of a book. While there is something to be said for hands on learning I think I should also begin to read more of the lit. As I conducted this study I constantly referred to similar work done in other countries, frameworks for semi structured interviews, and of course my own learning being done explicitly and implicitly in the environment around me. I feel as though much of development is hard to express on paper form and is in fact tacit - that is, to truly understand certain aspects of development perhaps it must be experienced. With that being said I want to toss out some ideas (so much for being tacit) I've come up with while finishing my final report. They aren't based on any essays or books; just a few thoughts derived from the placement thus far.

Assets, Behaviours, and Perceptions - a muddy cycle
ABP - Assets, behaviours, and perceptions. I'll call them collectively household aspects (for lack of a better word).
Perceptions shape behaviours... Behaviours shape perceptions..., they both shape which assets are used, or more importantly are not. Assets in turn impact the evolution of behaviour and perceptions. It's a muddy cycle - it's hard to tell which area sparked the other. Intervention functionality is directly impacted by these three aspects of a individual and its environment. I like to express them in the following way:

(note each area should say Why/why not, how/ how it isn't, what/what isn't... Out of room. Remember the contra is important too!)

This triple Venn shows each aspect and how they overlap. Two ideas I draw from it:
1) Each aspect can be affected by one another and they all have overlapping areas (ie behaviours based on perceptions, perceptions based on behaviours, and so on).
2) The functionality of a intervention will also be impacted by how these three aspects interact.
To clarify: in the case of the BSF (an asset) in is important to know what other assets (ie: a well) will be used with it, why all assets are used, and how they are used. In order for an intervention to change or impact any one aspect it is important to consider the repercussions such a change will have on the others. Or on the flip side: what changes in perceptions will lead to changes in behaviour? If suddenly an NGO decided to fill in unsafe wells what would the resulting behaviour and perception changes be? (no, I am not advocating this.)

An example based on several households I have interviewed:

assets: BSF, buckets, shallow well, jerry can

perceptions:
-a household states that good water is clear, clean and cold. The filter renders water that is clean, clear, and cold so it may be perceived as a provider of good water.
-However the household doesn't perceive the need to clean the filter and does not.
-the household strongly believes that the Jerrycan is the only container which can be used with the filter

behaviour:
-the household uses the filter for all drinking water by pouring the water through the top and drinking it
-the household never cleans the filter
- the household stores water in the Jerrycan.

The following are some scenarios are based on the household above. I hope will articulate the three aspect framework:
(I have experienced them all multiple times)

Scenario: Jerrycan is lost
Since the household perceives the Jerrycan is the only container to be used with the filter the household may discontinue use. This is an example of how related assets and perceptions can impact behaviour.

Scenario: the filter is never cleaned and flow rate becomes very slow
Since the flow rate is very slow the household begins to perceive the filter as more of a chore and gradually stops using it. Perceptions have influenced behaviour which has changed perceptions, which have in turn influenced assets.

Scenario: The household doesn't have hygiene behaviour
There is a lack of behaviour, such as hand washing and as a result continues to suffer from diarrhea disease. Gradually their perception of the filter changes as they lose faith based on their behaviour. This is an example of behaviour influencing perceptions.

There is capacity for any one of the aspects to influence the others, or for any two to influence the remaining one.

Functionality? What's the function...
Another concept I have been thinking about is "what is functionality?" - in the case of the BSF I have begun to see a functional BSF as a BSF which is completely integrated into a household approach for water, hygiene, and sanitation. As I pointed out in an earlier post, even a technically functional filter can be dysfunctional if it does not have positive perceptions and behaviours... such as safe water storage!

I see the BSF "system" as a three step process. Of course each of the steps is made of of many other steps. All steps, big or small, noted or otherwise, are influenced by assets, perceptions, and behaviours. The BSF system revolved around using the BSF to accomplish what it should: provide households with clean water to reduce waterborne illness. When trying to define functionality I looked back to the the function that the intervention was trying to serve, what a system for this function be successful may look like, and what might hinder it.

Basic functionality seems to be influenced by these three steps or areas:
1) Obviously "bad" water must be present or there is no need to filter, no?
- Certain sources can kill the bio layer rendering it useless (ie Kafubo water and sewerage or prechlorinated water may have chlorine concentrations which hinder filtration)

2) Operation and Maintenance practices are key. If the filter isn't used right (and despite having a design North Americans consider "simple" I have seen all kinds of divergent behaviours. Everything from food storage to removing the diffuser plate) then it wont be able to functionally give water.
-If the filter isn't maintained (ie cleaned) then eventually the flow rate will reach a point of frustration where it takes hours upon hours to filter even a little water. Eventually it may become too clogged or the household may give up
-Alternatively, consistent use is required or the filter will dry up rendering it dysfunctional.

3) I found lack of safe water storage is the leading cause of filter dysfunction (with the second leading cause being lack of cleaning knowledge/practices). Even if filters can clean the water, if the water is not stored safely (ie in a container with a spout and lid. No dipping allowed.) the household can still get sick.

Each of these "steps" can be derailed by assets, behaviour, or perceptions! When training for the functional use of an intervention it is essential to take into account the assets, behaviours, and perceptions within the community. Which ones are compatible with functionality? Which are needed to be shared? Do some need to changed? Por exemplo: if a new behaviour is introduced what will the impact be on assets (maybe the environment.)? It is also important to look at how the filter relates to the rest of the water and sanitation behaviours, perceptions, and assets in the house. If people are not washing their hands what is the impact on their health? Can the filter truly generate a marked decrease in disease?

Of course these ideas are really "rough" - they are just based on a few months of field experience. Take them with a grain of salt, or perhaps probably a few pinches. I am sorry about the vague nature of some of the descriptions - I can elaborate upon request! (or I may go back through and edit this post... as I do with many others)

mid afternoon cries in the dark

2009-07-28T04:24:00.008-06:00

July 27 2009 AD

The sun lay casually in the sky; mid day had come and departed as quickly as it had arrived. It could have been around three o'clock - the daily decent of the sun was well underway and energy levels, after a day of activity, struggled to sustain themselves as they awaited for evening's inevitable arrival.

White and blue minibuses congregated around the Twapia market "station"; townsfolk wandered to and thro doing whatever it is they needed to, or in some cases did not need to. Women carrying bundles on their heads, charcoal salesman walking their charcoal mounted bicycle as if it was a prize horse unworthy of human ridership, and men consuming what was left of the day at the local bar could be noticed by all those who disembarked from the buses. But are such instances noticed? Most of those who depart the mini bus for the community have lived within the community for sometime and such sights could be as unnoticeable as old cracks on a bedroom wall. Even so, after a month of mini bus rides into Twapia these features still jump out at me - awakening questions and thoughts, feelings and frustration about the disparity between Calgary and Twapia.

Just passed the market station lies the one field in Twapia - yet it is empty aside from some girls, a boy, and a woman sitting on the hill, as to what she is doing up there it is unknown. A few young girls, dressed in the dark blues sweaters and light blue skirts which compose their school uniforms, play a game of net ball on the outskirts of the field. A young boy draped in rags occupies one of the football nets, dribbling a ball of rags around. None of these people seem to pay attention to me as I pass by. Walking into the community I pass a little girl, who is usually wearing a pink dress, of about seven years old. Every day, without one exception, she sits outside of the bar with her little wooden crate - a dusty box (about 30 cm tall, 40 cm in width and 60 cm in length), covered by a white table cloth. I assume the table cloth is white, yet it is covered in the characteristic red dirt; soil which is tossed to and fro amongst the July winds. Little clear plastic bags of popcorn lay on top of the cart. Today I am not buying though. She speaks no English, and I speak little Bemba.

Something out of the ordinary - the most furtive cries I have ever heard shatter the otherwise calm atmosphere. Even the bass heavy music from the bar, some remixed pop song recycled from North America, seemingly disappears. Again I hear the cry - my soul is shattered by the sorrow... the despair laced into every moment of screaming. Puerile cries overwhelm my senses; where is this auditory embodiment of pain coming from? Surely not from within the bar, not from behind me - where?

A small boy wearing overalls, blue but also red with soil, and no shirt emerges from behind the bush wall of one of the little red mud brick homes. He looks me in the eye with tears streaming down his cheeks, his young and innocent face bearing witness to some form of pain and anguish. As we lock eyes his mouth closes and the crying settles, yet only for a moment. He begins shrieking again, and he turns only to be greeted by a woman who delivers a slap to his already wet face. The young boy, not even five, crumples to the ground. In defiance he stands again and tries to waddle away yet is caught again by two hits. The woman is slender and aged - her blue shirt is barely blue after years of washing and her chitenge is tattered - she looks at the boy with judgment... blow after blow the beating continues.

I lay frozen in time - what can I do? This isn't right... What can I do?

Indignation flows from my soul and to my eyes - I shout "why!?" and she looks at me, momentarily halting the attack on the boy. She uttered something... something in Bemba, words which I cannot discern, and swatted once more at the boy before picking him up, as if he were a rag doll, and wandering back through the bush fence, under the cloth draped over the doorway, and into the house. The cries continued.

I stand still - still standing by the popcorn girl and the bar. Despite my fixation on the incident no one else seemed to even turn an eye. Life continued on as usual until I spoke up - eyes were locked on me, the Musungu who shouted. The typical questions of "Musungu! How are you?" were absent..., if they were present I wasn't listening. My mind mingled with uncertainty in a dance for two- have I violated some unwritten law of the community? Were others too caught up in their lives to witness what just happened? Is this a common occurrence? Did I even do anything to help the young lad clad in overalls, so assailed by this woman?

I stumble forward walking slowly, a few eyes still locked on me, as I near the house I stand still. The crying has stopped... No life is visible. What happened? Why was this boy beat in such a way? Was that his mother? Should I have done more to stop this? What have my actions done? Why did no one else intervene?

Cries of the young echoed in the dark crevices of my mind well after they ceased to echo through the darkness of the broad daylight scene only moments ago.

Dreams of the falls

2009-07-28T00:08:00.006-06:00

Water recklessly rushing forward, with no allowance for cautious behaviour yet complete with reckless abandon, drifts amongst rocks and inlets downwards into the river below. How many litres for how many thousands of years have followed this path to the river? Mist rises above the craggy outlets and weathered cliff face spraying all the onlookers and aged trees. Plants are lush shades of green, a complete contrast to the wheat dry foliage of the highways. Water flows perpetually over the horizon as far as the eye can see - running as if it were chased by death its self. Falls carry soothing sounds; the fall's fanfare is composed of an unimposing, yet consistent, flow and splash - sounds which have flowed through the air for eons. With no end in sight, ever perpetuated, the water flows. A river falls over a rough precipice, a cliff clothed in falling water, just as it did ten thousand years ago and just like it will for many tomorrows yet to be conceived or dreamed about by human minds. Amidst the falls dance rainbows - colours streaking between the falls and the cliffs. Profound water color paintings amidst a backdrop of life and flying water.

Plumes of mist overtake the pathways; the yellow and green rain ponchos, which are available at the tourist stop, are draped over many of the passersby - some equipped with backpacks and cameras, others wearing nothing but a t shirt jeans and sandals. Drops of water land on the lenses of cameras obscuring attempts to capture the majestic falls and all their glory. Photographs and faces are both speckled with water. How much water erupts and cascades through the air during the rainy season? Do these experiences within the heart of the Cold Season compare?

The cluttered pathway down the side of the cliffs into a lush almost tropical canopy of growth and green is considerably more dry than the paths above. Hiking through mini falls and rapids, boulders, tree covered paths, and baboon nests is an experience that wont soon be forgotten. Signs of 'civilization' lay claim to the horizon above - steel arches and railroad paths. Screams in the air of jumpers who fall only to rise up again, and fall, and rise, and fall. Yo-yo perpetuity broken by the elastic limits of the chord - jumpers return to the top. Rocks carved since before man walked the earth line the ground bearing signs of the rise and fall of water. Slick and slippery - all dust has been washed away by mist, rain, or encroaching water levels. The exposed cliff face towers above; if the falls are nature's aqueducts then surely these are its walls.

Leaving something behind - a friend to watch the flow of water as time flows by. Will it be the rains or rising waves which consume her?

The Smoke That Thunders.

... also called Victoria Falls. Just why falls in this land should be named after some monarch is nonsensical to me (reminds me of Denali in Alaska). Amongst the inspiration and awe of visiting the falls there are also feelings of guilt. Why do I get to go see the falls while so many of my Zambian friends are unable to appreciate them? Even nice tracts of land near the falls are owned by foreign hotel chains - resorts styled after the west for westerners to come and experience "Zambia". I didn't know that Zambia was characterized by Western Cuisine. Regardless, my thoughts on tourism from 2005 are similar to the ones inhabiting my mind today. Resorts have no place in the world. To think the lush beaches of Mexico (I worked in Tijuana for a week in 2005 and heard some truly disturbing stories about resorts. Then again I never cared for the notion of resort), or to a lesser extent the Smoke that Thunders are unavailable to the locals of countries because of money, while foreigners can drink in all the beauty is unsettling. In the case of resorts in Mexico beautiful land is occupied by companies for foreigners to come and... be North American at (including all the binge drinking and none of the unemployment). While the Smoke that Thunders is open to Zambians for a cheaper rate than foreigners it is the travel that makes them unobservable. To think that I participated (although having only ate a meal at a hotel) in all this tourism makes me feel as though I have abandoned a large part of the values that make me who I am. Was it right to go and see the falls, or on principle should I have avoided the JF reunion entirely out of respect for my Zambian friends who have never seen the falls and likely will not? Was this not just a parachute out of the adversity of development and poverty? As written before - how can anyone integrate if there is always the ability to eject and decompress for a few days?

I have yet to meet someone in Ndola who has seen the falls - that isn't to say that no one in Copperbelt has, but the numbers seem to be few. Many families in Zambia cannot afford to hop a bus and ride across the country on a whim to see the falls. Or even jump on a bus to see friends or family, to attend funerals, or to visit new areas. In Twapia I met a diesel salesman, he told me his wish would be to travel "Zambia" - "I want to see Southern Province, my brother is there in Livingstone". It cost me a grand total of twenty four Canadian dollars to travel to Livingstone from Ndola. This price is unaffordable to many. Twenty four dollars, a trip to see a brother... And nothing.

"I am so glad you have seen our falls" says my host father. I only wish I could have taken him with me. Many Zambians wish to see other horizons, many who I have met have their own story of the places they wish to visit some day. In their souls is an insatiable learning to see the world, not even the world but their country, their homeland, and all its beauty and all its horror; in their hearts live dreams of the falls.

Did Icarus cry?

2009-07-23T07:46:00.025-06:00

“... Poverty:
the embittered poetry of humanity’s soul.
struggle between an ancient intrinsic insatiable appetite for growth
and itself, its environments, and its dreams?
A toxin for life and all it aspires to?
Opportunity’s shadow?
within a dream's cage, thoughts are found
locked behind the eyes?

bellows inflating disease and famine with febrile tenacity?
prisons for minds in cages of ignorance
jailed souls amongst bars of apathy, hopelessness?

Absent artist a masked sculptors
eying souls as clay?...

...

called to 'freedom'
fatherly hands and their 'wisdom'
leading the way 'forward'
cruel fate, pride or a 'father' 's mistake?
See the sea below, at once elucidated,
eternal blue.
drawn towards waves beckoning below
response of futile furtive flapping?
Acceptance amongst jeering clouds, welcoming squalls?

Daedelus' dream -
once planted did it bear the most poisonous fruit?

as the sun faded
did icarus cry?
...”

Poverty

some thoughts and theories

Poverty, might it be closely linked to the individual’s opportunity to live a meaningful life in their environment? There is a link between poverty and opportunity. Perhaps poverty is both an environmental and individual state? Basic needs, such as food and water, need to be met for individuals to be healthy – if someone is unhealthy or unable to meet basic needs perhaps they cannot find opportunities, even if they exist? Perhaps other individual aspects of life, such a self expression and education, are also important in living a meaningful life? What does opportunity really represent? To one person it might be the ability to, with the right amount of work, be able to pursue any path in life. To another it might mean every door opens on its own. I feel that opportunity, like poverty, is incredibly hard to define rigorously, but perhaps both concepts can be explored. IS opportunity the antithesis of poverty? Both opportunity and poverty seem to be based on the individual and their relationship with the community and their environment.

I think that poverty can be looked at as one state of being composed of two ideas: internal and external poverty

Poverty – externally enforced, and internally recognized.

External Poverty may also be composed of two parts:

Environmental: a set of environmental factors – economic situations, availability of schools, water quality – which have the capacity to impact an individual.

Environmental poverty- this is a difficult subject to address and is based entirely on how an individual perceives an environment. These are factors which exist that can be changed – but the weight they carry is based on how they are perceived. How a community is perceived by insiders or outsiders may vary considerably. What makes an environment “dire” – is it the disease? The land’s inability to provide for its people? Lack of industry? Lack of industrialization?

Applied: How an outsider perceives or brands a community’s or individual’s environment in terms of being able to meet needs or render opportunity.

For a moment look at externally applied poverty:

Consider two communities - community A is the similitude of what we in the western world would consider ‘developed’ – notions of rights, politics, laws, electricity, healthcare, automobiles, ect . . .

The other, community 1, is a community with different dynamics in population density, access to basic goods and healthcare, governance structure ect… For all intents and purposes this community will be also considered to have no automated industry, be very agriculture oriented, and have a pronounced absence of certain scientific theories that are common in community A (such as germ theory).

If an observer were to arrive, fresh off of one of those aeroplanes which are common in community A, on the outskirts of community 1 what would the observer think? Would her/his thoughts be relevant in the context of the community? Imagine community 1 has many traditional embodiments of “poverty” - if observer were to declare the community was in a state of poverty would it be meaningful? If a member of community 1, the traveler, were to be whisked to the shores of community A would this member be able to actively describe the new surroundings in a way that is meaningful to the observer? What would traveler and observer discuss? If Observer was to wish for the people of community A to have things like electricity and motor cars would traveller want such things? Would the traveler think that community A is better or worse off than community 1?

Theory – the further apart the two communities are in terms of ecological, cultural, technological, and economic circumstances the more difficult it will be for individuals from one community to appraise the other.

Consider a westerner traveling to Lusaka – the city is very similar to many all around the world – the notions the westerner brings may be more relevant in this context. Now imagine the same westerner traveling to a small village, very traditional lifestyles abounding within, and the thoughts the westerner might have.

In a broader sense it would appear that poverty cannot be entirely approximated by outsiders in a meaningful community specific way. Is it accurate to state poverty is a state of living on only a few dollars a day? Can poverty be communicated holistically with adult literacy rates, life expectancy, infant mortality, rate of diarrheal disease, or lack of democracy? Such statistics become dashboard warning lights and perhaps enact a grave injustice to those who live in breath in communities to which we apply them – homogeneous problems applied to a community made up of unique individuals. Are not such indicators ideas and notions dreamed into existence far away from the places to which they are applied? These grim indicators do wonderful job acting as the rallying call for those who exist in situations elevated from them to render ‘assistance’; however, what is their value in measuring a country? Communities are measured and weighed by scales which are tempered far away from the realities and the contexts of the community itself. If these words on paper, these statistics, have no relative meaning to those whom they are applied to can development based on these indicators be driven from within a community?

This is not to say that high infant mortality and high illiteracy are not terrible circumstances – it is to say that if these are used as justification for external intervention will the community’s level of understanding of said justification lead to participation?

My dilemma with External poverty – is it meaningful for outsiders to declare a community is in a state of poverty? If a community is labelled as impoverished – under developed, developing, or undeveloped – what is the rationale? If an individual, as part of the community, feels sated by its surroundings and current understanding, is it possible for them to be impoverished? Is external poverty not just an expressed representation of a difference between place of origin and the place in question?

When I say Zambia is impoverished I am considering it impoverished based on my experiences. Would we know what developed was if poverty was nonexistent? Not to say I know what it means to be developed, but the whole concept of developing world vs. Developed world appears to be a dire dichotomy.

Sometimes I wonder about this conversation:

“The developing world is Poor”

“But why are they poor?”

“Because they are not like us”

“How do you know that the way you are is the right way for the poor to grow?”

“Because we are developed”

“But what makes you developed and them not?”

“Because they are poor”....

Internal poverty

Theory: Internal Poverty is a state of being comprised of recognition of one’s current reality as negative – needs are unfulfilled and self described opportunity is absent – this state must be self realized.

Real poverty is internal – unless individuals realize they exist in a reality where their needs are not met, their desires are unfulfilled and opportunity is limited then any notion of poverty applied to them will be external, and perhaps not meaningful. Perception shapes needs and desires – if needs are not perceived to be lacking or if certain things are not perceived as needs are they meaningful to the individual?

Could it be that once an individual realizes that they desire to exist as an individual in a different reality than the one they presently exist in will they take cognizant actions to change their situation? (as actions, cognizant or otherwise, will always have the potential to change one’s situation)

Once an individual becomes aware of situations or opportunities foreign to their present reality, no matter how intangible they may appear to be, if they are perceived beneficial perhaps the individual will desire to pursue them?

Is it possible that if people are told they are poor they will behave poor?

Is internal poverty an essential part of the human experience? A drive to pursue “something more”? What differentiates the child who wants a lollipop from the man in Twapia who digs a well to increase his opportunity? The child may not have comparable environmental poverty– however environmental poverty is a difficult notion to explore. Without using the value set of one’s culture is it possible to define an environment? Physical abuse, disease, famine ect . .. Such things appear to be wrong or bad, but is that a sense of right and wrong speaking or is it my culture?

Theory: no matter how vehemently an outsider claims someone is in poverty it will not become real poverty until the individual undergoes a realization of such things.

I wonder about the happiness observed in communities that are said to be in "poverty" - have these people realized they are in poverty? If not, is that the source of their happiness? What will trigger a realization?

Perhaps poverty requires a self realization of one’s situation, but it also requires an environment... a dire one?

How does this relate to change?

Do communities need to self realize their circumstances to change them?

Theory:

Real sustained change depends on the actions, thoughts, and desires of a community. Communities must make decisions and be responsible for them.

The actions of outsiders can greatly impact the evolution of a community

Change driven solely by the will of outsiders can limit the potential of a community to grow as a creative decision making body. Change is unsustainable.

Dilemma– rendering the assistance which we “think” we have the capacity to render, or let a society evolve and flourish on its own pace on its own terms? External vs. internal? When is it right to intervene, when is it right to let a community take its own course? If a community experiences all manner of disease a outsider should intervene, right? But how can intervention be appropriate? If people do not understand the problem how will they understand the solution? If they are given help before asking, or told they are in poverty based on indicators foreign to them how will they react? But with such dire circumstances is the western world not obliged to help? I tend to yes... Is there an answer?

Is poverty an essential part of the human experience – defaulting to relativity: if we didn’t have a pre conceived notion of ‘right’ how could we say something was wrong? In that case – would developed countries be developed if poverty didn’t exist? In my own naive way I cannot help but feel everything is broken – overseas and in North America. Especially in North America – are the values we espouse right or meaningful?

Asleep

2009-07-23T05:29:00.003-06:00

Darkness has devoured my bedroom. Only the slightly lighter outside world breaks the black wallpaper of the night - the outside witnessed through a small turned over "P" shaped window in the wall. Little light drifts in; however, much heat escapes. Even with bits of plaster the red brick walls cannot contain heat, the night is dark and cold. In the distance is the murmur of some dogs arguing over a scrap of food - or so I imagine. Perhaps they are laughing or discussing, or perhaps just barking. Awwwoooouuuooo.

Movement that is not my own. Within the ward of my mosquito net, the veil that is to protect from malaria, I feel four feet wandering over my body. My legs become road bumps and hills for the scavengers of the night - rodents of some species or another. Tiny foot steps are nearly silent on the soft shapes of my legs, which are padded with a sleeping bag and a blanket. The only source of warmth comes from within - thick clothes, blankets, and sleeping bags all aid in stopping it from abandoning me to lie in the cold of the evening or early morning. My night time companion, the mouse, runs circles around the room. Its toes click over the the dirt floor and scrape over the floor covered with some sort of plastic.

Occasional voices murmur in Bemba; words barely obscured by brick thick yet paper thin walls. Yelling in the distance - someone screams. In the room beside the sound of coughing and shifting is audible - someone rises to use the urinal. The urinal is a carton with the top sawed off.

Sleep is broken up into little segments - a few hours here and there if the night is a lucky one, otherwise forty five to fifty minute portions will make do. The in between is a struggle to find my cell phone - not to call but to see what time it is. The colorless digital clock... When it strikes 5:00 it is time to wake up, but I am usually up and dressed and then back in bed waiting for 5:00 well before 5:00 arrives. Sometimes I wonder if the clock is used to Zambian time - if a meeting is called at ten then usually it wont start till twelve - if I want the clock to read five, it usually reads three.

The mouse runs around within my bed - what does it desire? Food? Warmth? Shelter? An escape from the outside world of predatory animals? I feel something brush past my hair - is it my imagination or is it a rodent?

progress is dilapidation...?

2009-07-22T07:00:00.004-06:00

The cold glimmer of roadside lamps glances off the dust covered mini bus window. Every scratch on the pane’s surface has a story and during the fleeting moments as light flashes by the chronicles of pebbles flung skyward towards unsuspecting windows, or the tales of a fierce dust storm are illuminated. Dusk slowly settles amidst the pot hole ridden paved roads, fenced houses, and arching trees of Kwacha road – a road in Ndola. Standing in defiance are the street lights; a symbol of remonstrance to the impending nightfall. The half spent moon emerges as the evening traveler’s lantern; a beacon amidst the darkening skies.

While riding within the crowded solitude of the mini bus the hacking sounds of coughing and the odd conversation in Bemba whisper to my ear unique thoughts and ponderings. Grey dark dust dances in clouds as it is raised thru the air by July winter wind storms. The flu is coming to prevalence in the compounds and places where gregarious humans congregate. The story of a cough –who is the principle protagonist: particles? Pathogens? The moist sounds of phlegm and mucus stirred up, within lungs, by sudden anguish accompany the hacking coughs of those in the bus.

As dusk’s daily dance unfolds I reflect upon my placement thus far; amidst bumps on the road, the anguished coughing of passengers, and the avaricious shouts of the conductor. The calm and gentle voice of a Zambian passenger causes time to slow, but only momentarily. “Why are you here?”

Pardon?

“why are you here?”

In this bus?

“why are you here in Zambia”

The guillotine had fallen; it had dangled for some time and was waiting for the slightest July breeze to cause it to fall. With it fell the weight of internal dilemmas, indecisions, uncertainties, and all the questions as junior fellow might have after a couple months abroad. From the gaping injury spilled all the uncertainty I had attempted to internalize.

Why am I here?

Since May 23rd such a question has greeted me in the morning and been my lullaby as I struggle to sleep.

“Why are you here?”

Hesitation. Why is any Musungu here? I thought – “Patrick, such a migratory bird, flocking abroad carrying aspirations and flawed assumptions. Silly bird”. Why am I here? Hearing the question from an external body – a party not named Patrick, not myself, made the answer all too apparent. I do not know. To learn? Yes I have learned a lot, and I think that if I was to rest with one answer that would be it.

I’m here to know Zambia. I am here because I want to hear the stories… But not just hear I want to listen, I want to experience and I want to feel. I want to see the struggles families go through, I want to see their happiness, their troubles and their successes. But why that – my drive is to serve others and I think, perhaps, if I delve a little deeper… Perhaps this migratory bird is here to start exploring some questions first hand. Questions lead to discord within.

What is development? What does it mean to suffer? What is poverty?

The emerging moon bears witness to these internal arguments, these thoughts which have become a burden upon the decision making faculties within my heart and mind – questions which challenge me to evolve my thinking. Yet at the same time do such thoughts cripple? Are there answers, or discussions?

My existence within dusk ridden mini bus rides and twilight meals of Nshima and relish within four mud brick walls is out of place – the looks draped upon the faces of grownups in Twapia suggest a weary anxiety of this new visitor, while the cries of “musungu, musungu” delivered to me by children further indicates how much of an oddity I am. “...many children never leave the township till they are aged, they have never seen musungu. They think you are a ghost...”Says one of my coworkers. The romanticized notion of the musungu – a ghost, or a source of money – perhaps there is some truth in these thoughts. At times the role of a musungu within a community is fairly phantasmal - while I am able to observe everything happening within the community, it is difficult to meaningfully interact with those who dwell within. Eyes lock – mutual observation - but both parties are unable to verbally communicate meaningfully; every conversation feels like a scripted play – the playwright being my working knowledge of Bemba, if only there was time to develop a fluency in Bemba. My presence in the community is not understood; musungus come and go working feverishly at whatever their development, evangelism, or development evangelism aims are. The collective perception of the musungu is a tangled web, knots of experiences, conversations, and expectations – many of which do not apply to me. Isn’t that what life is – a web of adversity, love, experiences, and dreams? If I were to photograph the family I live with and return to the youngest thirteen years from now (so he would be twice the age he is now) would he relate to the figure in the picture? Would they relate to me as the same musungu who walked so heavily through the paths of Twapia in the cold month of July?

" is life in Zambia some sort of dream
a game I play?
airplane pinch, scenery fades
"

It may seem as so to the Zambians - the white boy who plays development worker / villager of Twapia.

“Patrick you are a real Zambian” laughs a coworker, moments before I walk through the prison to arrive at the minibus which will take me to the traffic circle colloquially called “Kitwe Kitwe” – where I board a second bus to Twapia. I disagree with every word of it.

Integration is not something I believe in – if I ever state that I have integrated it is very likely I am either a liar or a man of superficial intentions. These mini bus rides, these nshima meals, these pit latrines, and every other “Zambian” experience makes me no more Zambian than the night time makes the moon the sun. I can reflect these experiences, but I’m no substitute for a Zambian. After all why is a migratory bird, branded a jf, in Zambia? To share the stories back home – right then and there I have a reason to hit the ‘eject’ button. Unlike my young Zambian friends I can leave Twapia when all is said and done – and for those who read this blog I know that I have restated this over and over, sorry for the repetition – and it is this idea that I find crippling. Within Twapia exists thousands of souls worthy of a chance – yet because of their birth lot they receive different circumstances. But I wonder – if Twapia was Calgary and Calgary was Twapia, would the Twapia folk not live out life the same as the rest of us? Driving cars? But perhaps this statement reaches a measure of truth because the way these cultures have been encouraged to change – explicitly and implicitly – has been through western memes. There’s no way for a westerner to ever truly understand what goes on deep within the mind and heart of someone else in their own country.., Much less in somewhere like Zambia.

Some people I have met have argued the simpler life leads to a purer form of happiness than what we experience in the ‘developed world’ – perhaps ignorance is bliss, but what of those who yearn to experience more? I’d argue that cultures should evolve to find what is meaningful.

Perhaps progress is the expressed dilapidation of the human soul – trading a life or death dependence on the natural world for a life or death dependence on a time clock. Losing meaning in life through the pursuit of higher meaning? I once heard that a philosopher is never truly happy. Maybe not. Despite the romanticism of the simple life ‘living off the land’ I wonder of modern medicine, deep thought, and exploration of new ideas. What is it going to be my friend – the menu has two choices: Happiness or cognizance? To me it is not so simple. Yet who are we, the privileged west, to decide what is poor and what is rich?

Do we need notions of progress to have fulfillment in life? Is living in the success or is living in the struggle – is it a human’s accomplishments that define them, or is it the burns we receive climbing for the sun with wings of wax and feather? In the case of the latter – how is development allowing cultures to evolve meaningfully if it doles out solution after solution? There are books and real world examples of how ‘development should be’, but I wonder if these are still rules from a book, some sort of play book, penned in the west and reinterpreted. The book wasn’t written in Bemba... Maybe it’s time to throw out the book? Maybe I’m audacious and ignorant. Despite the critical circumstances communities face – disease, death, illiteracy – I am often left wondering if these development solutions just might be crippling a community to adapt to problems on their own, in their own way. Perhaps hindering genius from taking flight.

In that case is progress dilapidation?

"

We are led to believe a lie
When we see not through the eye
Which was born in a night to perish in a night,
When the soul slept in beams of light.
God appears, and God is light
To those poor souls who dwell in night,
But does a human form display
To those who dwell in realms of day.

William Blake

Icarus' Dawn

2009-07-21T23:58:00.002-06:00

{this was posted in a bright ideas newsletter in June. }

…Slowly sunlight begins to invade the solitude of the bedchamber
through cracks in the red clay brick walls and gaps in the corrugated
tin roofing, As the sun begins to rise specks of light slowly drift in
through the mesh of the mosquito net. Consciousness suddenly returns;

in the distance the cry of a rooster beckons the world to life,

shattering the stillness of the early morning. Progressively, under
the more and more blue sky, the laughter of children echoes louder and
louder - it is dawn in the Township of Mapalo and a whirlwind of

activity, which has waited all evening to be released, slowly clamors

to life and overtakes the tranquility of daybreak.

Mapalo stands as a boundary between the city of Ndola and the plains

and forests that paint the Zambian countryside. It is a peri-urban

community, which for the entirety of its existence has dwelled in a
state of uncertainty. During the early morning I find myself walking
down one of the red-soil pathways which are bordered by red-clay-brick
huts and an abundance of lush green foliage. Only a short distance
from the side of the path, sheltered under the shade of a corrugated
tin roof, I notice a man leaning on the wall of his home. His face is
weathered and wise with age, his body is draped in a tattered t-shirt,

and his feet are naked. He beckons to me and we exchange greetings.

Amongst the backdrop of uncertainty and poverty, both so prevalent
throughout the township, is something else: human tenacity and the

desire to better one’s circumstances. In the west, “Water is life” is
a common but ambiguous expression. The absolute truth and meaning of
such a phrase becomes very apparent by listening to the stories of

Mapalo. “I dug the well myself many years ago”, he remarks, speaking

to me with a measure of pride in his voice, his eyes moving towards a
metal “lid” in front of his house. “We needed the water.” We gradually

walk towards the well not seven meters from his perch in the shade – a
hole pierced through the soil surface and covered over by a rusted

metal plate, which in turn is covered by a crumbling concrete block.
The history of this simple shallow well spans back to a time before
interventions were present in the community; before the hygiene

training, hand pumps, and biosand filters arrived.

To me this man demonstrates that the fundamental notions of life in

Mapalo aren’t so different from those in Canada. World over life

dreams to flourish – just as the same wind that shakes the Baobab,
gently drifting it to and fro, will also rustle Canadian Maples leafs
the same dreams for opportunity and brighter tomorrows are shared by

Mapalo and Canada. Upon shedding away the layers of poverty and
uncertainty it can be seen that life is still a precious accumulation
of experiences, memories, aspirations and dreams to be catalyzed by
opportunity.

The volition of one man to bring water, to bring life, to his family

was a passionate plea to reduce uncertainty. However, it is a

possibility that his well may very well be contaminated breeding

ground for disease, in which uncertainty may flourish. Yet in his
voice resounds a very certain pride and sense of fulfillment for the
actions he took so many years ago. After parting ways I wander down
the path for a few moments and then stop to think. As hens and
roosters strut around the path clucking silent questions ring in my
mind. Can this well, this embodiment of persistence, ever truly add
certainty to lives of this man and his family? What is it that can be
done to work with this man and understand his perspective?
Contamination is quantitative - perceptions are not; simple answers
are an enigma. In the stillness of the moment I wonder to myself why,
after years of intervention in Mapalo, this man, full of initiative
and pride, has yet to find certainty in water. I walk towards the road
emotionally scattered and expressively confused by the words and
stories of an upbeat gentleman. The sun continues its ascent; it is
now mid morning and in Mapalo life goes on…

Is there something there?

2009-07-20T03:35:00.002-06:00

After spending a few days in the field working with some colleagues on the first implementation of our new monitoring tool I find myself sitting in the office. If one listens to the murmurs of the background they will discover the bland wallpaper of vacant worship music has lay claim to the sonic atmosphere - drifting drifting with its lack of enthusiasm, not too forcefully, but almost antagonistically throughout the corridors of the office. The field abounds in energy - conversations, laughter, and interactions with coworkers and households / informants alike. However today's work takes shape in the form of meetings, meetings away from the townships and within the office walls. Down time - waiting to speak to a colleague about an upcoming meeting. Perhaps hopping on the mini bus to Mapalo would have been the better alternative for today's programmes. Regardless the office is my environment and I am today working on the plan for tomorrow's RDC meeting - what might a network for monitoring and maintenance look like? How might the community be best leveraged to work with NGOs instead of under.

Communities are dynamic and full of individuals, households, interactions..., life- but what is a community? In the physical sense it is a collection of households. Thinking a little broader it could be considered an organization of humans, who are not only interconnected to varying degrees, but also live together in similar social, political, economic, ecological/environmental, and cultural contexts... circumstances.

Communities - for all the engineers out there - are perhaps very complex and very dynamic systems. Ones which are always in a state of flux - a situation where changes are not always apparent or measurable.

The composition of informal and formal leaders, informal and formal markets, churches, clinics, households of all shapes and sizes, physical roads, social roads, and environment all impact the behavior of individuals as part of the community. Internal and external factors alter the livelihoods of those who dwell within.

For example - one community I visited has not enough trees or land for internal charcoal production. Charcoal is an essential fuel for many households - it provides warmth for cooking, warming water, and warming bodies. Charcoal is made by chopping down trees, entombing them in soil, and lighting a fire... since tress are the number one asset in production they should play a role, right? Partially. It would seem that prices are a lot more complex than that - very dynamic as one charcoal salesperson put it. So when these charcoal sales people ride to town with their charcoal in tow they sell at an inflated price to cover the distance. However, some enterprising youngsters realized that the price the sales people were selling for was well above markup - these young men went to town to buy their own charcoal and sell it at a profit and at a cheaper price than the original vendors. The result? These youngsters had a fledgling business but could not handle the demand, had fights with the original vendors, and in general made a mess. This community, despite being geographically further away from the origin has the cheapest charcoal around. The original vendors have cut their prices, which means they now make less money to take back to their own communities to spend... which interferes with someone else's livelihood and so on and so on. Since charcoal is the primary fuel for most people in this community, due to the lack of trees, the price and availability of it can drastically alter many house's livelihoods.

{I say interfere as a means to convey unexpected change - for positive or negative.}

Development projects which are enacted at the community level have great potential to cause more than ripples in the fabric of a community. Even if programmes are focused on one aspect, such as household water treatment, the repercussions throughout the community may become large waves. Small projects can rock a big boat, even capsize it.

For consideration - a hypothetical BSF scenario (it may be a bit ridiculous, but it's an illustration):
1) BSF are introduced into a community which has a functional chlorine business and water kiosk. Many people in the community presently use shallow wells, however some also will use a water kiosk or a hand pump well.
2) Some people who use the kiosks or handpump are given BSFs. People who use the handpump and do not have a filter begin to question the safety of a kiosk or handpump after seeing their neighbours filter handpump water.
3) People who presently buy Kiosk water also receive the BSF. Upon hearing how useful it is they begin to use surface water and filter it - using the kiosk money elsewhere. Let's say they start buying more veggies from the market.
4) As BSF reach a large number in the community the sale of water kiosk water and chlorine begins to drop. Eventually these businesses do not become profitable and the store stops stocking chlorine - this leaves those who depend on Chlorine in a shortage scenario. Eventually the sale of kiosk water drops to the point where maintenance and labour costs are not covered - kiosk slows down and kiosk people lose their jobs.
5) What happens next?

In the Masala markets a man once stated that his village was encouraged to grow a certain crop, this however flooded the market with this crop and limited the profitability of it for those who traditionally grow it.

Communities are a collection of households which share various contexts and circumstances. Households are a collection of individuals. Actions taken by both insiders and outsiders can drastically impact a community and those who dwell within. Communities also impact other communities... economically, environmentally, socially, ect . . . The actions of a community are difficult to map and even more so to change.

Behaviour Change appears to be a key part of development - but what behaviours do we want to "instill" in others? What community or household behaviour can we truly say needs to be changed? What are the repercussions of changing behavior? (I once heard from a prof that if everyone in Alberta recycled everything that there would be a net negative effect in terms of pollution.) Is the change sustainable? What material "factors" are part of this change? Is it right to change behaviour? What will the negative impact of this behaviour change be? What damage or growth will the programme cause?

Every time an outsider sets foot in a community there is an echo -will the echo to result in singing or an avalanche?

growing pains

2009-07-20T03:00:00.002-06:00

Despite earnest efforts to brush aside expectations before stepping onto the airbus from Calgary to Toronto, eager in anticipation for predep,I believe there were a few key assumptions about the JF placement I had spent months preparing for that could not be so easily dissipated.

Spending the last two months overseas has revealed to me many new ideas - lessons, experiences, frustrations, and reflection have all elucidated to me so many new ways of thinking, living, and being. Many notions and thoughts I brought with me from Canada have been discarded, recycled, or changed with every drop of sand in the hourglass. But amongst the immense abundance of learning there exists one thought - a reinforced reminder that stands above all others - I know nothing. I know nothing - a belief I've clung to for years, however, I think I fell into a trap midway into my placement that with the experiences I have had so far that perhaps I had begun to know something... Something about development, or poverty, or perhaps even about people. Upon further reflection it has become self-perceptible that this is not the case.

To articulate on this point - when I was doing some field work in Mapalo one day early in my placement I saw a young girl, wrapped in a chitenge cloth and wearing some sort of second hand north american sweater, fetching water at a well. Individuals such as this are the ones my partner is to 'help' -yet what do I know to help her? How can I know the challenges she faces ever day? How do I know if she even needs 'help'? I've been told by 'science' that it is risky to use well water. It is risky to use the same container that goes well-diving as a storage container. That it is risky to live at all, really. I see the yellow "SHIP" container given to her by my partner used as a water collector, a big 'no no' - yet I am not compelled to say anything. We can make the conclusion, as westerners, that those who we are trying to 'help' are irrational - clearly this woman is insane for using a nice 'gift' to collect water. OR we could assume that these individuals make conscious decisions based on their understanding of their own lives, the lives of their families, cultural memes, and their dreams to act in such a way, then we'd find that there is a very good reason for using this 'gift' in an unintended way. But we'll never know for sure. There's no one person, one informant, whose behaviour speaks for a community. There's no "one" story that will inform us, as westerners, on how we are to do development..., I think that is the problem we have made for the last forty... two thousand... however many years - we assume we know more about someone else than they know about themselves. I know nothing.

Even after living in these communities - living with and loving peri-urban families - I have found that the more I learn the more I realize the less I know. The constant reminder that understanding and loving people does not conflate to knowing. I am not Mapalo.

Perhaps my perceptions and perspectives are undergoing growing pains? Immediately my mind was nourished by the sensory barrage of sights, scents, stories, somewheres, and sunsets in the townships.., perhaps to this point it has been a sensory overload.

Heart of Suffering

2009-07-16T09:00:00.003-06:00

Zeal for the cold city, shade under a feinting tree

Twapia, which has the equivalent meaning of" We have suffered" in Bemba, is the community that I presently call home - it is a township/peri urban area on the outskirts of the town of Ndola. What makes Twapia "Twapia"?

Walking through Twapia is a heart wrenching and mind tearing experience – I see what I feel is “poverty” but I don’t know what poverty is. Poverty presents its self to me every day yet I am able to shut it off – even in this simulation of a white boy in poverty I have day to day escapes. When August arrives in Zambia it will pick me up a nd take me to Canada... Even so, my mind is constantly stretched to capacity; a balloon over inflated. Every night I feel that when I succumb to sleep it is due to mental exhaustion from all the sights, sounds, scents, and stories. The mental exhaustion of ignorance – what is the cure?

The paths run red-orange with thick soil – around the paths are homes made of soil or plaster. Small wooden stands carrying a varity of goods are accompanied by people. There are always people on the paths – people of all ages and all descriptions.

Who are these people? Travelers from all walks of life – displaced from the cities due to unemployment, poor pay, social issues, and everything else I dare to imagine coupled with all the dark eventualities that are beyond my comprehension? What is Twapia? What is my new Home? What is suffering?

Rape and cabbage – does it take a farmer to know the difference?

Similar to most townships I have visited, Twapia is a collection of terra-cotta mud brick houses in the poorest areas and more 'upscale' homes in the wealthier areas. In the area I am living in it appears that most families use shallow hand dug wells as their source of water - this is fairly consistent in most Townships. A few households use Kafubo Kiosks to buy pumped water, while others will opt to use a hand pumped borehole. Wells are not well. Due to the lay of the land, latrines are too close in proximity from the wells. These latrines become a source of pollution for all the waterin' holes within a "thirty meter radius"; however depending on the ground water levels, changes in elevation, and other physical properties this radius becomes less meaningful. Regardless, water borne diseases are very common in many households. During my work on a perception study a common response about Kafubo was "I can afford it, but why would I buy something I can get for free?" - money not put towards water can be put towards other things, so why switch sources? While faecal matter permeates freely into wells, unfortunately the notions of hygiene and sanitation are slow to reach full permeation in the collective consciousness of the community.

The lush vegetation of Mapalo is not as ubiquitous in Twapia; there are fewer trees and more fields. Houses within Twapia are also more spread out; it would appear population density is lower than other townships.

Markets are not in short abundance in Twapia - I have visited two so far. Both have been equipped with the basics - chichenge, food items, charcoal, odds and ends (tropicals/flip flops, power adapters, bike parts,) ect. . . Along with the markets, most pathways have their own abundance of roadside vendors of other various items - popcorn, rape, sweet potatoes.

Similar symptoms of poverty manifest as problems in the townships, yet they are unique communities and should not be treated the same. Twapia isn’t Twapia due to the geography or the housing style as much as it is Twapia because of those who call suffering home.

Occupied without pay

One of the men I met on the mini bus ride to work spoke to me about Twapia - "there are no jobs for me, so there is no school for my son" - the community suffers the same symptomatic embodiments of poverty that have plagued the other townships. He had just spent his savings on fliers for his business – he styles himself as an electronics technician, a trade he even went to school for. Even with his training he cannot find a job and is thus self employed, yet he has told me there have been little customers for a long time. His name was George, he told me to speak his story to all “my friends”.

There is a seemingly perpetual gyre of poverty - the unemployment of parents limits the educational opportunities of children, who in turn cannot rise into the few "good jobs" available in the region due to their limited education and as a result become unemployed as well. The cycle continues. Spirals.

Johnny Appleseed

I know of a young man, a seventeen year old in grade eight - not due to a lack of ability, but rather a lack of funds. His father has to balance education amongst all the children - eventually he decided that the elder ones were a lost cause and decided to give the youngest a consistent education - grade 1-12 with no gaps - can the family truly say that this is a possibility? Every text book.., every piece of paper is a sacrifice. Even if the child finishes his schooling, what will happen next? What happens when there is no job waiting for him? How can a family living off of four hundred thousand kwacha a month pay for a nine hundred thousand kwacha three month term of post secondary? Every one or two weeks requires a new bag of ground maize meal, a bag of charcoal and all sorts of other food and cooking items. Schooling takes fifty thousand a month. Little is left over for saving for post secondary. Even if the family can pay for the child to graduate high school... what happens? Surely my Canadian money could buy one child school books till university? What would that solve... I believe the word begins with an ‘n’ and ends with a ‘g’.

precipitous hills; jill came tumbling after

Another family I met is composed of a young man, twenty six, and his wife, who appears to be a bit older. The only source of income they have is selling small bits of vegetables at a improvised wooden stand. Diligent work consumed the wife’s time during the rainy season as she worked tirelessly to make a bit of cash. Upon return to Twapia her meagre pay cheque has been used to purchase goods at the market in Ndola. The goods are then sold for a slight profit from the top of a stall made of scrap wood. Is this a form of entrepreneurship or economic suicide? Every day I see this family as I walk home from work; their table is stocked with the same goods from the day before – maybe a few bunches of rape are missing, but the general quantity remains almost the same. Tired looks are perpetually painted upon her face, their situation appears bleak, however her voice rings with a longing optimism for tomorrows that have yet to dawn. Sometimes her hopefulness would make her seem unaware of the crushing circumstances around her; however, these notions are dispelled with her lack of hesitancy as she exclaims “we are poor in Twapia”. The husband spends most of his days waiting - waiting for a chance, waiting for change. He looks for some piece work here and there – odd jobs that will render a little cash. Perhaps one day he can cut some grass with a machete, or even work for a farmer during the maize harvest. Maybe a brick crew needs an extra set of hands ...? Usually he returns home empty handed and ready to pour what little kwacha he has down his throat in the form of cheap liquor. I have seldom seen this man completely sober.

“And then I’ll change the world...”

Twapia is a world away from the rock stars, politicians, and rock star politicians - who vehemently claim change is tangible while riding in their luxury aeroplanes far above the ground amongst clouds and fantasy. Calgary, my home for twenty one years, minus a few months, is vivid in my memory but has become a surreal notion of what the world can be. Each passing second draws me closer and closer back to Calgary – to a world that fills me with indignant curiosity – time is an angler, drawing me as a catch towards the old reality. My conscious lies in a perpetual state of derailment – catastrophic train wrecks lie along the pathways of my heart and mind – it is such a rational spiral, this game of poverty, no opportunity breads no more opportunity, yet the cruel actuality of it is something that is a rough face to greet every morning. The perpetuation is irrational. To smile when my family offers me the lion’s share of the Nshima while their children eat very little is a feigned and superficial appeal to their gentle hospitality. I am frozen in time unable to convince them to feed me less, every meal is an argument. To laugh with the girl, whose mind is a vacant bookshelf which has yet to know school, unsettles the heart –shouldn’t this young one be given the same chances I was so effortlessly granted? Dreams lay in wait in Twapia, lingering amongst the early morning mists hovering above the highway, parted by mini buses and freight. Yet even this analysis is based on my framework of what is ‘right’ and what is not – a framework instilled upon me from the date of my birth till the day I stepped on the KLM flight to Malawi- instilled in me by the land which has turned from an object of frustration to a catalyst of indignation. Perhaps my notions of opportunity are a flawed sentiment applied to an incompatible setting, a botched blood transfusion leading to illness. Still I wonder ‘Why do the majority of youth in Canada get to experience all these opportunities?’ – a song called “WMA – white male american’ opens with the line “he won the lottery when he was born’ – a line I always enshrined as one bit of thoughtfulness amongst the landscape of modern music full of trite lyrics and superficial messages. My experience only reinforce that notion – in North America most children won the birth lottery- yes we have poverty and problems in North America, yet applying irrational relativism it would seem that the opportunity granted to me by my birth is unfair. I won the lottery – a nice middle class family, a great public school, and a government scholarship. Why are such things not awarded to my Zambian friends?

“we have suffered” is the name of my new home – a home which has taught me what it personally means to suffer. Suffering is hard to imagine in Canada – when I think back to all the expressed feelings of frustration in Canada and look back to the Zambian backdrop the two are incomparable. Suffering isn’t a universal state, it varies from person to person. There’s no homogenous state of being, no complete rigorous definition of emotion. Everything is relative. Yet I feel that for the first time in my life I’ve truly learned what it might be to suffer. For me to suffer is to see the suffering of others and to feel it through them; in Twapia it is abounding in such an unbearable intensity. The heart of suffering is in knowing that suffering exists in the lives of others and that I am incapable to cause it to cease. My actions will do little to end the suffering in Twapia or even in the household I call home. Regardless of their dream– as one Musungu all I can do is ponder the injustices running rampant through this global village called Earth, no panacea to deliver. My actions can help here and there, but also lead to more suffering. Stories of the Musungu who never delivered – a handful of people I have met have them. “He stopped sponsoring me and I never could pay for grade 8” – said one woman. Broken dreams that hinged on the will of a white man. After a pampered existence in Calgary I feel that I now have had a glimpse into what it might be to suffer; suffering is watching the suffering. Perhaps that is why Twapia is called ‘we have suffered’ - neighboured by other compounds, neighboured by suffering communities, households neighboured by other suffering households.

Yet if each person in the "have" category of humanity faced these issues head on with thoughtfulness and caring – what then?

Snap! Crackle! Photo

2009-07-14T00:17:00.004-06:00

From web

procession of mini buses

the home of Joseph and his family - Zambian family that has welcomed me as one of their own.

A little different from the latrine my last host family had. (that one was made of sticks and maize meal sacks)

"we have suffered"

Mapalo market - from the back of a truck

Thirsty?

new family, new friends

morning time - walk to work

children of wardens

Charcoal glow

Catch 22 - silent cages

2009-07-13T09:14:00.002-06:00

1. (Premise: If a person is excused from flying (E), that must be because they are both insane (I), and request an evaluation (R));

2. (Premise: If a person is insane (I), they should not realize that they are, and would have no reason to request an evaluation)

3. (2, Definition of implication: since an insane person would not request an evaluation, it follows that all persons must either not be insane, or not request an evaluation)

4. (3, De Morgan: since all persons must either not be insane, or not request an evaluation, it follows that no person can be both insane and request an evaluation)

5. (4, 1, Modus Tollens: since a person may be excused from flying only if they are both insane and request an evaluation, but no person can be both insane and request an evaluation, it follows that no person can be excused from flying)

"Catch 22 (logic)." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 21 June 2009, 13:31 UTC. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 10 Aug. 2004.< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catch-22_(logic) >.

In short: you don't have to fly if you are insane, but to be proven insane you must request an evaluation. The very act of requesting an evaluation demonstrates your sanity so therefore you must fly!

My spoon is too big

2009-07-12T05:03:00.001-06:00

From web

title snagged from: Don Hertzfeldt's Rejected

First Nshima meal in Malawi... Many days ago.

spooooooooooooooooooooooooooon!

a life in the day of

2009-07-09T23:20:00.015-06:00

4:47 - Cold. Shivers as skin crawls and hair stands on end. Awareness. Pale light is absent. Darkness dominates. Once the thick coverings have been displaced even a hooded sweater cannot keep warmth for long. Off from dreams and into the waking. Un-tuck the silver veil that hangs over head. The momentary struggle for the phone - a torch in these early hours. Work clothes are left folded on a nearby ledge. Slowly the sounds of the radio permeate the room. Who turned it on? It’s on now anyways. A sermon on Job. The words are lost; unseen in the darkness. Thoughts linger on four martyrs and three lambs.

5:09 - Sitting in a new room on chairs upholstered with faded green fabric - a host of stories represented by stains and tears can be found in the light of day, but not now - warmth at the brazier. The slight scent of charcoal wafting throughout the room accompanied by the sombre orange glow of half spent charcoal. Gentle glow of one half candle radiates, quivering in a breeze that is only felt by the meagre plume on the wick. Cracks in the wall, or windows open a crack? Glass of water - Do the well dwelling bacteria ask before infecting? Can they be felt? Rinse. Warmth on the face. Soap. Towel. Be clean? The only mirror is the distant moon and the sun is fixated on it. How would one know what cleanliness is? Foreign ideals in the dark.

5:34 - The moon bathes Twapya, the township of “we have suffered”, with vague light. Moon rains with the intensity to pierce the clouds that obscure its path. The odd passerby on a bicycle or two running feet briefly enters eye sight and then is consumed by the dark. Work. One of the minority for sure. Angry voices are muffled by distance and terra cotta walls; disembodied cries in the darkness. The sounds of violence; a tumble or crash of glass dinner ware. Shattering sounds shatter the silence. Metal cans fall too, rattling somewhere in the dark. Woman screams in pain. A man yells. The sound of hitting. Where? Why won’t it stop? Foreign world, familiar sounds - heard in Canada too. Who denies? Useless apologetics.

5:48 - The distinct glow of one headlight can be seen at the end of the clearing amongst the closed grocers, bars, and market stalls. A brilliant fire burns just off the road, two men mumble in Bemba at its feet. tick-ta-tick-ta-tick-ta... the orange hazard lights and the clicking of the cab. Flashes of amber. The minibus is empty except for a lone passenger sitting beside the vacant driver seat. The sky is slightly bluer. The sun, off in the west is traveling over the hills. The clouds become illuminated. Grey black blights on the sky slowly fade to white. Departure is a distant notion, only three out of sixteen inside. Need at least eighteen out of sixteen, usually.

6:04 - Honking. Honking. Honking. The bus driver reaches in the window of the driver side door and is pumping the horn. Breath visible in the cool morning cold. Slowly shadows down the road become the shapes of people amongst the solitary headlight and flashing ambers. Unique faces everyone of them - Joseph and Agnes and Gift and Georges... - faces that become defined as they file into the minibus, lured by the pied piper driver and his honky honk horn.

6:13- the groaning mechanical noises of the engine, the gyre of automotive motion, extend throughout the bus. Perhaps, usually the engine's whinging are all that is heard. No voices murmur within the bus, no calls or responses. Only the laboured dry cough of one woman or man and the sudden shock of being jerked forward by potholes along with their characteristic THUNK. THUNK. The finer details of the Ndola region countryside are slowly elucidated by the sun's continual advent. Remorse - cold windows fogged over obscure witnesses to the activity flashing by as the motor bus accelerates.

6:24 - Hurry, off the bus at Kitwe Kitwe. Run. Cross the street. Kansenji, Kasenji prison! Wait, we need to board. Three pin for two? Okay. Deal. Hop on. Yes all right we're here. My name is George. Good to meet you George. Muli Shani? Bweeno. Ah, the day has found you well? Yes. This ride is one five each? Okay here's three for two. Prisons please. Okay we'll stop there. Natotella.

6:43 - the songs of criminal choirs escalate. Songs of the condemned –simple choral anthems praising something unseen but felt? Early morning praise. Small fields with mixed crops, maybe onions or cabbages or tomatoes or rape. Rapists in a prison now growing rape? The tattered and oft faded uniforms of prisoners. Green. Drapes that allow even the most undiscerning eye to discern to whom they shouldn't speak lest they invoke the ire of the wardens. Wardens, wives of wardens and warden wives can be seen here and there. Just there. Children too - wardens maybe make good wages - wearing their blue school uniforms wait for minibuses to ferry them to learning. Stumble down the path which is not terracotta red soil but brown, oddity? Cross a bridge made of three and one half branches over a small 60cm deep trench. Exit prison. Exit music, sounds now distant - dilapidated by distance - and the words are lost. The off key harmonies are, however, still resonant in ears and mind.

6:47 - Office. Arrived. Moon is vanishing from the horizon. Winds blow slowly sending wave after wave of consistent cold air. Simple couch, leather upholstery? Fake. Feels like dead cow, but is anything but. Green as well. Laughter is shared as new security relieves nocturnal security. Happy faces as a shift begins and one ends. The perpetual cycle. Day and night. Work and rest. Love and pain. Brazier and lawn chairs congregate aside metal storage bins. Shipped from America. Arrived in Dar. Congregational partings, where once was three security now there is one.

7:04 – words on paper. Moleskin notebook. Black, bound. Elastic cloth band. Pocket in the back for memories and notes, tea pouches and business cards. Promises and fortune cookie fortunes saved for months. Commitments to those with no name. Pages – pages of words. Thoughts? Entrapped in a cage of paper. But even caged birds will dream of flight, across another time where sails were wings and seas were blue skies echoing the laughter of children in distant lands reflecting between clouds. Wind breeze ruffles pages, causes shivers. Feverish pencils shaking across paper; HB graphite propagating, shedding off into every imprinted crevice on the tainted yellow used-to-be white pages of a moleskin notebook. Febrile thoughts of a present or maybe of a yesterday or another future shoreline.

7:29 – the sound of metal pieces (cylinders and gears?) aligning resounds in a click. Click. Rusted hinges shrug as metal grates are tugged apart. Skeleton key causes the wooden door to yield, the office is open. Work begins. Daily programmes instigated by the simple opening. Life returns and tries to flourish in the office. Scent of dust thick in the air. Sound of sweeping. Voices arriving in the distance behind walls still outside. Phony green couch now has patrons. Worship? Songs in Bemba. Praise? A martyr’s absence. Buttons pressed, power chord plugged in. Laptop resurrected from its sleep.

7:59 – within office walls. hidden amongst shaded thought. waiting for the end.

8:19 - //a small tuck shop has been carved out of the wall of one of the kansenji mansions. It is dimly lit on the inside. The walls are a sort of pale grey color mixed with subtle yellows. The rusted bars on the carved out window are red originally making the rust deceptive. On the outside of the window hands clear plastic bags containing different snacks or “crisps” – different flavours; Mexican, ground beef, cheese . . . – also can be seen bags of jon cenas, dough nuts, and popcorn. On the counter are bottles of coke and fanta. Deep in the stall is an assortment of items: milk, biscuits, tofu in a bag hung in the back, and other nicknacks including soap (both laundry and personal), maize meal, and talktime. There is an older man, maybe 34 in the store.//

*enter patron*

Patron: good morni... Mwashibukani!

Vendor: eye mukawai. And good morning to you.

Patron: Thankyou. This morning can I have a milk and Jon Cena...?

Vendor: Of course. Three three, okay?

*patron hands over 3300 kwacha*

Patron: Natotella.

*patron departs – exit stage right*

8: 48 – Meetings in progress. Printer is working overtime. Paper pressed with lines and dots forming words and tables. Communication? Communication to be communicated to others to receive communication and record communication. Survey questionnaires. Four pages to go, the printer continues to shuffle papers through as it leaves its mark – tables and questions – on the face of each virgin page. Proper combinations are gathered and bound with a click-chick-click. Metal suture through the faces of four pages. Piles formed.

9:07 – farmers work effortlessly to improve their tomorrows. Dedication marries dirt. Fields may be ploughed carefully, the strongest fertilizers selected (or not), and the soil may be sewed with the right seeds (maize..? Sorghum?) yet there is no guarantee of growth. Environment is not under control of the farmer and may smite his feeble attempts at growing something for tomorrow. Months later will it have grown? Desolate wastelands abundant in silence. Effort wasted on unfertile fields? Fertile fields ravaged vehemently by careless crows and craven pests? Is there an absolute in either regard? A heterogeneous mixture of failed farming practices and environmental disasters? Cowardly crows cackle carefree.

9:24 – Training teams have departed. Anxiousness – a wish for wisdom maybe. Ineptitude at the most fundamental of tasks leads to the creation of other plans, other avenues, for progress? Vacant offices lead to sanctuary, but what of vested work, what will it turn to? The sun’s ascent is tracked by the height of the roof’s shadow on the cargo container parallel the office window. Green leaves and yellow leaves- the living and the dying – rest on branches which in turn rest on the container. Soaking in the sun, exhaling cleanliness.

9:45 – eyes fixed on laptop. Read pdfs on project related information. Transfer key ideas to moleskin #2. Share ideas later? How to share. Collective learning. Team advancement. Self perpetuation. Participatory squared.

10:29 – anguish on colleague's face. Anguish breads sorrow. Morose tendencies arisen once more? Reporting, reporting, mind off of matters, maybe. Principles trampled with a smirk. Anguish on anyone’s face. Reporting is made for facts, not frustrations. Wood splinters in changed environments, does the human soul? The filthy walls don’t change, pale green draped on messy white with the grey dust prints in the shapes of thumb whorls and finger prints. The black dye of chairs and plastic scraping – unintentional graffiti. The laptop still glows, the coworkers fixated on theirs. Bemba, bemba, bemba.

11:11 – To the tuckshop. Milk for heart burn. Fixes physical problem, what of others? Overcharged. Is that a problem? No. Should they correct the change? We all need to ride the mini bus. It’s only a small mistake. Walk away instead. We all need to ride the mini bus. Okay. Toiling on the trip back. A two minute walk becomes fifteen. Thoughts drift to change. What is it? Is it driven by one, can it be driven? No mirror – but noses must be red. It’s cold outside. The scent of dirt raised from the ground and all kinds of other scents – human sweat included – linger. Is this the scent of a mausoleum? Circles are easier to walk than straight lines. Aggravated circles. Leading nowhere further away from where it started. Faraway there’s snow on mountaintops and nearby, not thirty minutes from where thoughts stand, a family struggles to prepare their home for the rainy season, so many months away, but stumbles. No funds, no opportunity. Their wish? Half finished homes become full finished so they do not become no finish when the clouds gather and cry terror over the townships. Distant snowy mountains, unfulfilled wishes. No more can one fulfill this family’s dreams than can one move mountains in distant horizons and places- yet what do they think can be done? What drives change?

12:00 – not lunch. One cycle remains. Still many programmes to consider. To execute on. Reporting. Interim? Okay, back to work. Who monitors the monitoring? Write the report. But plan ahead, but write the report. To write the report would be right. What can we do about the one who monitors? Not now, back to work. Martyrs may return, can words be shared with the one? Would that be a scandal, perhaps. Would that matter? No. Personally. But to the others? Perhaps. If prison choirs of the condemned can sing songs of praises, while awaiting their freedom, can the oppressed too be uplifted similarly? Cuts are bearable. Sprain ankles are too. Principle injuries punish more severely. Daily the thought of such things is cutting. Anxiety, what can be done?

13:04 – a break from the day’s “WORK” – outside under the sunshine which drifts in and out of clouds. “Every cloud has a silver lining, what does it mean?” is murmured by another. Even common clouds have silver lining? Don’t trust superficialities? Maybe storm clouds have a glimmer of light? “the cloud is blanketed” utters another. True, the clouds blanket the sun. Warmth becomes vacant intermittently as the clouds overtake the sun.

13:55 – pack the chairs up. Time to return to work, inside of the office. In front of laptops and discussions. Later the field? Not today, resources have not aligned. Maybe next time. Computer screens and note books. PDFs on various development buzz word topics sputtered off and off ad nauseum.

14:33 – interim report. Evaluating progress. But who will read it?

16:02 – nothing new? No. Session. Workshop, share what I know. Try to learn. NO IT ISN’T PERFECT. Say why it is broken. Flawless things are nonexistent. There must therefore be flaws. QED. Anxiety lingers down the hall waiting to pounce. Gawking. Flip chart paper purposefully lays on the table top. Words are scrawled onto its face in red and black felt pent ink. Discussions share ideas. It’s not flawless. Three of five share, four of six learn together. Progress, finally. At the end it is still perceived flawless. Don’t thank, we worked together.

17:07 –Zambian English (work is done) = knocking off. A phrase of unknown origin. Is it a borrowed Bemba phrase? Work ends, regardless of how the Zambians express it. Feet stumble out into the dusk. The sun is already hiding behind the hills and clouds. A brilliant sunset, guilty of making the sky bleed crimson. Perhaps that’s why the sun is off to the other side of the world. Fear of sky’s blood. radiant beauty in the distance heralds the moon’s return. Feet stumble through the prison – no songs echo. Wardens lead those draped in green to their fenced areas. A sign on the prison exterior denotes there is a clinic nearby. The scents of chickens and old produce linger by the place of waiting for the mini bus. It’ll return soon. Off to kitwe kitwe stop. Then Twapya. Old Twapya station.

17:30 – Second minibus at kitwe kitwe to Twapya. It’s getting darker. The sun redder, breathing its last breath. The road is always traveled during the transition hours – day to night, night to morning . . . The minibus at night bears conversations. Sounds of vocalizations all around. All around.

17:49 – Twapya. The mini bus turns off the main road to stop in New Twapya first. Lets people off. Picks new ones up once it returns to the main road. Arrival at Twapya as the sky continues to transition. Walk back home. Will sounds of the morning’s violence still echo in the side streets? Broken glass, has it been swept up? Beckoned further into Twapya, short cuts to take, further home. Where warm water to wash lies waiting in metal pots. Where the brazier will restore warmth sapped by the biting wind and cooling now night time air. Like the cold, the smells of different meals being prepared outdoors permeate the air. Some non charcoal cooking fires that use wood – the scent of burning timber and the thick smoke that accompanies it.

18:46 – washed. Cleaner than before. Gather by the brazier inside the sitting room. No new stories etched into the green fabric since this morning. Non visible anyways. Two candles glow on the table beside the chair. The sounds of Nshima preparation – stirring, pouring, and changing pots can be heard in the “kitchen”. Delicious scents sparking appetite which usually lays fallow. Conversation about mausoleums and martyrs as dinner is prepared. The two candles and charcoal add illumination to the world, the conversation similarly illuminates the mind. It’s very dark. Shapes and shadows are seen along with the odd face as it enters the candle’s radius. But it’s dark.

19:29 – Nshima. Tastes delicious with rape and ground nuts. Break some off and roll it in your hand. Scoop some rape. Enjoy. Eat. There is plenty. Plenty of Nshima. Plenty of rape. Never ending supplies of Nshima and rape. Always the case? Or is it the case of a guest that provides such a feast?

20:34 – Exhaustion. All the world is black. Not a single light in the room. Even the silver veil, a net to stop vampiric insects, is invisible. Conversations in Bemba in the room beside? Paranoia – what do they say. Alienation. The hole in the wall, half filled with rolled cloth half open, carries in the sounds of humanity in “we have suffered” – singing, laughing, yelling, crying. They all, every voice in the distance, weave some part of what it means to live in the township of “we have suffered”. Voices cluttered together into the stream of consciousness of “we have suffered”; wishes to learn and understand, not to eavesdrop. Then flurried dreams return.

¿Qué Es Eso?

2009-07-09T08:13:00.005-06:00

From web

This is from Lilongwe.
Slogan "your lovin' it"

What exactly is a "lovin' it"? I would think that before spending all the money to print banners they would at least consider "you're vs. your"

while walking through the old west I heard thomas the tank engine toot "In theory communism works"

2009-07-03T08:07:00.009-06:00

Biosand filters are hailed as a solution to the problem of contaminated water. Filters are basically a container - usually a concrete filter body - that has the right amount of gravel and sand along with water at the right height to allow oxygen to diffuse through the bio layer. The essential idea behind biosand filtration is that water will flow through the bio layer, the sand, and finally the gravel and emerge from the filter free of pathogens to 97%.

Lab tests have proven this, as have field tests. If a filter is fully functional and contaminated water is poured through then the water will emerge "clean". Concrete is a durable material, sand and gravel are available everywhere so some would say BSF represents a catch all solution to household water issues. The technology is sound and "simple" - in theory it works! So let's give everyone a filter.

However, the problem is not so simple that such a simple solution can solve it. Let's not give everyone a filter just yet.

In the field I have observed constantly that people use different buckets and containers for different uses. Some are used for multiple jobs - fetch well water, fetch borehole water, store water, fetch kafubo water . . . It's commont to see people at wells with three or so containers. Normal behaviour - afterall it's easier to fill up several containers at once than it is to walk back and forth. However, some containers are used to store mixed types of water -pre filtration and post filtration. These containers can be heavily contaminated. Once the filtered water is placed in such a container bacteria will propagate causing the water to reach a level of contamination comparable to the source. A colleague of mine has done coliform tests on filtered water and stored water and has seen the evidence quantitatively. The filtered water is clear of bacteria while the stored water is a proverbial playground for e.coli. BSF are rendered effectively dysfunctional by one simple action and a plastic bucket.

I believe that any development project can be undermined by one simple action. It doesn't matter if the theory or technology involved is "flawless" or even if it works and the people know how to use it - one auxilary practice derails the train.

So for a laboured metaphor: I heard once that putting a penny/rock/brick a train track can derail the train. Or that a fissure in the tracks can do the same. Do development organizations look for pennies/fissures/bricks, or are they too busy running trains down the track?

So I love westerns. I absolutely love "the good the bad and the ugly" - revisionist westerns. None of that cowboys and indians trite- the real stories that explore the human condition set amongst a back drop of the west. So imagine it's the wild west - that steel steam stallion is coming down the tracks. A marvel of nineteenth century engineering. Massive. Powerful.... and it derails because of one little fissure. One fissure! Something inconsequential to the mind of a train track engineer inside his comfy office. Even the conductor of the train's eyes are too far elevated on the seat of his locomotive to see such a thing. He is also moving so fast, so very rapidly in fact.

A simple solution: teach households to store water in one container! Not so simple. Human behaviour is complex. We can all relate to that, can we not? Just assuming that giving someone a big yellow container for storage and telling them once that the container, if dirty, will make them sick isn't enough. How is the message communicated? How will it be interpreted? Is it one of rote or understanding? Which is appropriate? Are links between sanitation and containers established? Not so simple. More thinking and planning is required.

What about the training to operate and maintain the filter...? That's a whole other beast. What about networks to make sure filter users have the support they need? A whole other issue. Do people continue to use the filter and trust it?

At the end of the day there is much more to functionality than just having a filter that is technically sound. Is it functional because it is in the house, or functional because it is being used as part of greater water/sanitation efforts in a household, properly maintained, and used with containers that are clean (among other ideas... just throwing a few out)? Just a few thoughts.

Not to push my metaphor any further - but any project "train" that comes into town needs to make sure it has the right cars - m and e, training, community involvement.... ect.

On community involvement: Remember that story, I think it might have been an episode 'little house on the prairie' or maybe it was another western movie (or several) where the greedy railroad company wanted to put a train right through the town or through some man's land?

I think in the movies that someone got shot and maybe the ending wasn't happy. Bloody in fact. In "little house on the prairie" I am sure Mr. Ingles exercised his prairie Confucianism and saved the day with no more than a sweat drop. He might have also called Doc Baker. I think I am making this episode up. BUT IT WAS A MOVIE!

Given the penchant for trains going through "lands that have no business being train lands" being quite messy...Maybe implementers should stop doing that. Run trains where they are wanted and understood, or at least try a town hall meeting before laying the rails... Okay enough laboured metaphors.

Random question - what's everyone's favourite Western?

(apparently pennies cannot derail trains, but fissures, rocks and bricks can.)

Bio sand - what?

2009-07-02T07:27:00.002-06:00

Interview after interview after interview the same ideas continuously emerge. Repeating sets of perceptions form a disturbing gyre. Simple steps in the wrong direction have lead to "catastrophic" troubles in the land of BSF - what can be done at the household level to make these programmes stronger?

a transient reflection on change and smiles

2009-07-01T05:17:00.012-06:00

As the motor coach \slows to a standstill I slowly become conscious- we have arrived. Moving the drape that serves as a veil cutting off any intrusion from outside sites reveals a new world. “We’re in Ndola” my coworker informs me; the veil is replaced and I reorient myself to my surroundings. After five hours of travel, five hours spent trying to sleep with no success– no oneiric journeys for this Mzungu – I have arrived. Groggy. My bag, where did I leave it? As if players to some sort of script the bus riders slowly shuffle off to the outside world; not a thought of anything exciting or extra ordinary can be seen on the faces of the distant strangers as I watch them depart from the last row of the bus - the bus left in the morning, perhaps everyone is tired. This is not the same energy I saw last time I rode the coach. I feel my face is a similitude to those of my now distant travel companions; vague and blasé. Despite the excitement of arriving to a new horizon, where the timeless dance between the sun and moon will unfold before me for the next few months, my face doesn’t edify to a single feeling of uncertainty or exhilaration, I doubt my actions were much of a testament to such feelings either. Stoic? My coworker remarks “are you still dozing?” – I don’t think I ever dozed on the road, I never arrived in the place where vivid dreams linger; my consciousness stayed slurred in that awkward state of being on the fence between reality and dreams, an uncomfortable state oh so common when I take to the road. Baggage located – time to depart the bus. It’s the nineteenth of May, 2009 Anno Domini.

I gaze at the monoliths of Ndola underneath a cerulean ceiling sky painted with blotted clouds... Sweet bite - a modern fast food restaurant. Shoprite – something akin to safeway. The sprawling bus depot – a world of activity. The district government office – a colonial era building standing out with a glimmer of a new paint job.

What is development? Is it these paved roads, these deep fried food eateries, these motor cars racing down the streets, these swarms of rabid taxi drivers who pounce on those who depart from coaches? Is it the web cafes, photo copy shops, monolith shoprite stores, beggars on every street corner, vendors selling goods on cloths outside of said monoliths while children lay in the dirt? Is it giant motor coaches and street lights? Power lines and vendors selling cigarettes, power adapters, and boom detergent? Is it a kidney transplant from the USA, Canada, UK – the western world – to an “ailing” new world? What is this place Ndola? Why does so much of it feel like some sort of bizarre skin graft gone wrong from North America? Do the voices of the compounds around, the beggars within, and the unemployed cry “we have opportunity?” - is this progress?

Is development Canada? The UK? The US? Is development the tangible material goods we cling to and lust for daily? Two car garages and seventeen bedroom luxury homes? New ipod models every three days, high speed internet, coke flavoured chocolate and chocolate flavoured coke? Washing machines and bubblegum, feint lights of vending machines, sterile sickening glow of the dairy aisle in safeway?

Is development the thought processes we espouse – notions of sanitation, rights, laws, freedom, and happiness that are fresh born in our minds when compared to all the collective knowledge ever to exist? Are the hallmarks of development things we have only recently stumbled upon? Was it Dr. Snow’s fluke, that chance discovery of epidemiology, which makes us developed? What enduring trait of our culture makes us entitled to pass on Prometheus’ flame – as if we are the keepers of some divine knowledge? Is development sharing these notions? Instilling what we think... no what we believe works?

Is development an act of mercy? An act of guilt? An act of selfishness? Of selflessness? Act of desperation? A marriage of passion and critical thought? A dive into the world of majority trying to bring thoughts we have had from living in the minority?

It’s now July 1st – the solitude of the office becomes palpable as many colleagues stand amongst mourners as friends and loved ones; last respects are paid in some township, some foreign locale unknown to me. The office contains a relative level of energy only slightly greater than some graveyard in the rain; the disembodied voice of worship music, a fresh import from America – full of synthetic pop sensibilities – can be heard in the distance, whoever the audience was for the tunes has long since left for the funeral. The day’s field work has finished, meetings now become transcripts, memories are simplified to clumsy words on paper or typed kachick kachick kachick. Somewhere thousands of kilometres away, an incomprehensible distance for the limited mind of this volunteer, Canada-kind is celebrating Canada day, somewhere beyond the scope of my comprehension. Maybe in the distance as sleep overtakes my senses in Zambia so the night sky will overtake Canada and be continually bombarded and ruptured by fireworks and Roman Candles celebrating whatever it is to be Canada.

I feel the field reveals many secrets to on lookers, and perhaps even more to those who stop to listen. Enigmatic parables detailing in fine script the tragedy that is poverty- the shear brutality to bring children into the world knowing that what they will achieve is limited by circumstances that are irreconcilably uncontrollable – are woven into the tapestry of life in places such as Mapalo. Children grow with great smiles on their face into an adulthood that embodies a dire dichotomy - both uncertainty and certainty – uncertainty in how they’ll be able to care for their family and certainty in the fact that if there are not sweeping positive changes the realities of unemployment, piece work, and struggle may embody the remainder of their days. Families with so many children who have found some pot of gold – which child gets the full brunt of this limited opportunity? Who gets to go to the good schools, who gets the slight shot at post secondary? Some of the folks encountered herein have shared with me their struggle which mirrors this dilemma.

So, what is development? Is it the boreholes sunk to a predefined depth? The filters that “clean water”? Is it the hygiene training “bestowed” onto communities? Is it something tangible and nice – children smiling at a borehole – (as at least five people seem to think) some pleasant imagery, evidence that someone has fixed, over night, the most grievous injustices present for the minds of donors and North Americans, safe in their homes with the TV blaring, drowning with concerns over who will win the Stanley Cup/super bowl/Olympic gold/what?

I don’t know what anyone really thinks development is. Humans are complex. Their motivations are complex. There’s no easy answer to what development is – I don’t think “development” can even be contained in a little box. Maybe only one box is found when we try to do that – Pandora’s.

In the expressed ignorant feelings of a white boy lost in Zambia working in “development” - I think that there is something that perhaps Development can aim to be. I think perhaps development is realizing we don’t have the answers to this “problem” of poverty, or at least that these answers do not come in pre packaged projects with easy to follow instruction manuals.
For maybe it could be something intangible, idealistic, naive, and every other adjective in that scheme of “unobtainable, unreasonable, wrong” family of words – but to me I think development is an accumulation of actions, thoughts, and love that creates an enabling environment. What is this enabling environment?

Not a cosset environment of indulgence where every need is met and doled out adding nausea to life. No, not that. Perhaps one where the acquisition of basic needs isn’t a giant game of Russian roulette –not one where food and water fight out sub consciously for what need can be rendered on a daily basis, or where water can become a Trojan toxin destroying lives. Maybe it is an environment where knowledge is offered and teaching is two way? An environment where people have the opportunity to offer a different future to their children – a future those children can embrace or shun. An environment where people answer to their own decisions and actions instead of answering to cruel circumstances beyond their control. An environment where the environment does not take away choice. One that allows people to make choices on how they want to live their lives – to find their own meanings for success and failure. Maybe that is what it means to be developed. It’s an accumulative process with stumbling and spurts of growth. Or maybe I speak nonsense.

So yes, I write these words in my ignorance and inexperience – trite and superficial conclusions drawn from experiences that are but a drop in the bucket. I write them to remind myself of my thoughts on today, July 1st 2009, tomorrow and the next day and the next day and for all the tomorrows that stretch out to where I dare not count.

"

pity this busy monster,manunkind,

not. Progress is a comfortable disease:
your victim(death and life safely beyond)

plays with the bigness of his littleness
--electrons deify one razorblade
into a mountainrange;lenses extend

unwish through curving wherewhen till unwish
returns on its unself.
                        A world of made
is not a world of born--pity poor flesh

and trees,poor stars and stones,but never this
fine specimen of hypermagical
ultraomnipotence. We doctors know

a hopeless case if--listen:there's a hell
of a good universe next door;let's go


ee cummings

oasis

2009-06-30T06:53:00.005-06:00

I took this one in Mapalo. I think it is a neat picture. Not an expert photograph like something Ian or Tony can create, but I like the way the shadow dances with the wall. Two to tango.

Oasis

A little music for a change; Pat Metheny's oasis.

sheep in wolf's clothing

2009-06-29T22:46:00.008-06:00

brief intro
So, I feel that many of my blogs have not centered much on this abstract and complex little monster called "international development", but have instead drifted to thoughts on the JF experience outside of the office, and for the most part segregated from field work. So rather than another diatribe on bus rides or mental states I'm writing something else today. I hope this post will elucidate some of the work I've been doing and then throw out a few ideas I've been toying with alongside a friend or two from my partner org.

Writing about the actual 'work' part of this placement is tricky for me; among other reasons I never quite feel the calling to write about it! So I really had to force myself to write this post, apologies in advance if it feels laboured.

woes of the "field worker"
I genuinely enjoy field work - I find it to be much more fulfilling than a day in the office. It gives me a chance to genuinely connect the projects my partner runs to real people - faces of determination or faces of sorrow, any emotional state rather - and with these connections it makes connecting the dots in the office that much easier. My partner's work covers three different intervention areas : training, water points, and household water treatment. The field work I have been doing thus far is based around "semi-structured" interviews with household members; topics range from biosand filters, 'what is good water?' and other practices, aspirations, and ideas about hygiene.

Interview "structure" varies depending on who it is I'm conversing with (because the idea is not so much to interview, but to speak and converse. Share and learn); if the household speaks English it is much easier to have a conversation. Depending on who my translator is, regretfully so, the conversation can become more and more of a stream of questions. (Some translators simply will not translate the side remarks or even add extra words to my questions ie: "to you what is good water?" ---->"a bunch of bemba with the words "name of my partner" "BSF" ect...") Sometimes it is very hard to make it clear to the translator what the intents of going to the field are. So what are the intents? To figure out what exactly is going on in households. Finding out common and deviant mind skill sets, perceptions, and habits that if my partner takes into account will help them.

My original goal was to have an partner in this work so that we'd build the study questions together in a way that makes sense in Bemba. Unfortunately this has yet to come to pass. So the communication issue becomes even more difficult, especially when your translator selectively listens to both parties and adds her/his own thoughts into the translation. It really muddles who said what!

systematic seeds for systematic needs?

Upon returning from the JF retreat I was not confident the work I was doing was going to positively benefit my partner - any field data I process still will contain the mental biases I have and be presented in a 'report' form. Since it is difficult to get a partner in crime for this study the values within are highly personal to me and may not be as grounded in the realities of my partner - so the recommendations I can make will not be optimized for the environment, and could likely be dropped. Regardless of this line of thought, my coworkers want me to continue this line of action and give them a report and recommendations. So that's what I will do, but it's going to be in a smaller scope due to the difficulties of doing this work. (that and the fact that it is a large time investment with no guarantee it will build any capacity or even be useful)

So I met with the team and shared with them what my field observations were pointing too: filter distribution wasn't always targeting the right people, there exists gaps in understanding of training and there is also an absence of monitoring and evaluation. (I wont go into the details here)

On the bus from Chipata to Lusaka I began to wonder why the same indicators used as a justification for intervention were not being used as the indicators to measure success? To me this seems like something that makes sense. I've never read anything about this in a book or paper - it's just a thought I had. And for my limited experience with my partner it seemed to be true. So I put some thinking into the matter and thought it all boils back to no m and e and no funding for anything like that.

On my first day back I asked for a meeting with the team. At the meeting we hashed out a plan based on some of these thoughts; the ideas are nothing ground breaking or innovative, but we feel they'll be a seed that can grow into something functional. So taking what I've learned so far and proactively acting on one of my recommendations we are now in the process of laying the ground work for a distributed system for collecting meaningful info. It's a chain or a pyramid where each stakeholder has some level of responsibility in tracking progress towards impact and ensuring functionality.

The major mistake I made in my last line of work - not actively involving my coworkers as much as possible - was one I tried to rectify on day one. I made it clear that I did not have the skills or knowledge to work on anything like this on my own. So now it's a team effort - but not so much a team effort within the organization. The key here is that the community will be involved every step of the way. We'll see how it goes. I'm feeling a lot more positive about this project - sure it wont have a finished product when I leave, nor will it solve any problems overnight (which in my opinion NEVER HAPPENS) but it leaves something to grow with. Also - the way we're structuring it leaves room to include the other major field level problems: "who gets filters and how are they trained?" as part of the system. Ambitious? yes. But not according to my coworkers.

"We're working you hard now, we want all the work you can do before you go. No time to rest".
I wish they brought that attitude on day one of my placement! But living too much in the past leaves little of the soul left to explore the future and act in the present. So... full speed ahead! I don't know what I can add to this but I'm trying and checking my assumptions every step along the way.

My overarching goal for the time being is to develop a household assessment tool based on the ground work I have done (... and will continue one or two days a week) as well as help facilitate meetings with community leaders, design forms, plan and so on and so on. Lots of flip chart paper and lots of meetings. Baby steps, baby steps. But I think that in a year or so, that if my coworkers continue to think along the lines they are going down that perhaps something stellar will begin to grow! Right now it's all on the drawing board - I feel a sort of uneasiness about the whole thing. So ambitious in scope and there is such a firm ambiguity in the details. Way outside of the scope of my skills and knowledge, but it's a learning process for both myself and my coworkers so I know we'll stumble a lot, but if it's an earnest endeavor I can hope that in time something genuine and positive will come out of it...!

away through the lens of another telescope

2009-06-27T12:36:00.006-06:00

Catharsis:
There's only a few short weeks remaining here in Zambia - a little over a month and a half. In my short time here I've been unable to truly understand why I'm here or what sorts of impacts are possible - organizational, personal, or otherwise. Original objectives rapidly burned to ash upon facing the friction of my entry into Ndola - and now, despite multiple multi hour honest efforts at reflection and planning, I am still, for the most part, really unsure what is happening. It's hard to get clear expectations in the open - hour long conversations may coax some ambiguous phrases out, statements which are rich in uncertainty and can't be cleared up with any manner of ease. However, certain parties are more than happy to, without being in want for their idiosyncratic disdain, remind me what is not in line with enigmatic expectations in a split second statement. Lethal and cunning. Trial and error? Guess and check? Pull my hair out in frustration and start over? Read the writing on the walls and provide a much needed spell check along with a realignment of false, and entirely rote based, grammatical concepts? Or perhaps put the chalk and brush away and instead opt to sit silent? Hit the eject button and cut my losses? Maybe there isn't a parachute.

Reflection:
Much to my anguish and regret the clock tauntingly ticks perpetually - the hour glass was tipped upon the final decent into Lilongwe. Complexity is inherent in everyday interactions. The winds of change blow slowly in concrete "prisons" and slums alike. Deception flourishes in hearts and minds resulting in growing disdain and confusion.

Rational:
- Many weeks have elapsed
- Can impact be achieved in the remaining time?
- no clear programme is in place despite earnest efforts
- where to go next?

Bob Dylan:
Now the bricks lay on Grand Street
Where the neon madmen climb.
They all fall there so perfectly,
It all seems so well timed.
An' here I sit so patiently
Waiting to find out what price
You have to pay to get out of
Going through all these things twice.
Oh, Mama, can this really be the end,
To be stuck inside of Mobile
With the Memphis blues again.

A sailor's Epitaph for the wind

2009-06-26T10:56:00.004-06:00

A few words I hope will honour the enduring memory of a healer, wise man, and grandfather:

I once witnessed a funeral in the township of Mapalo in Zambia; the small red dirt pathway was covered by mourners, all of whom were dressed in their brightest colors. On the fringes of the group stood a man and as I passed by I heard the words “when an elder passes it is as if a library has burned to the ground”. The words stuck to me, some sort of Zambian proverb perhaps.

The news of Grandpa’s passing arrived to me somewhere amongst the rolling hills and sprawling forests of baobab and acacia between the town of Chipata and the Capital of Lusaka. The words were devastating and for a moment even the bus, plunging ever forward at over 100 km/h seemed to stand still. To me it felt as if a great library had burned down in Calgary; one which I had cherished and learned uncountable life lessons from had disappeared in a foreign horizon, beyond my sight and beyond my control.

To say my grandfather was an honest man would be an understatement. He would speak his mind willfully but never in spite. His love and wisdom were shared equally with all those who were lucky enough to make his acquaintance. His honesty, love, and dedication to humanity knew no boundaries; at least there were no boundaries I ever beheld. He had another rare gift: tenacity and stubbornness to soldier on through whatever adversities and hardships he encountered. Fall down? Yes, don’t we all…? But he was never one to stay down. Dr. Miller, as I would hear him referred to by others, is a name that is only a further testament to his ability to impact the lives of others through his love, wisdom and persistence. He once remarked to me about his passion and intrinsic drive to serve and how surgery was a fulfillment of such traits…. “fixin’ people up” is what he would call it.

My passion in life took shape in a way different from medicine – international / human development. But these words were a constant source of inspiration for me throughout my young life and continue to be so to this day. Before leaving for Zambia in May I visited him at home – he told me that what I was about to embark upon was as good as surgery in his mind. That’s the last time I ever spoke to him… but a more meaningful conversation I could not have asked for. I share this anecdote as, to me, it embodies his love and support for his family.

When I think about all the lives my grandpa touched – his medical practice which saved and improved lives, as well as the wisdom he openly shared with his family, friends, and community I feel proud to have ever known such a man. When I think about the love he shared and planted in others like seeds, inspiring others to serve, I am proud to have been able to call George E. Miller ‘grandpa’. For me it would seem that the wise man in Zambia, or any other African country that started the saying “when an elder passes it is as if a great library has burned” did not know Dr. Miller, didn’t know my grandpa. He was a man who shared wisdom and love with all and that is an enduring legacy that will not be lost with his passing. While the library may be gone the wisdom and love remains. Thank you grandpa, rest easy.

-patrick

Life as a road

2009-06-18T09:34:00.002-06:00

As a curtain rises in a theater life’s overture was a thunderclap

My head is jostled up and down in between laboured attempts at sleeping as our motor coach barrels down the Zambian highway. To declare that the road between Lusaka and Chipata is a problematic trail bred after the union of poor craftsmanship and short-sightedness is only an approximation of the road’s quality, or lack thereof - a sarcastic jab at the reality of the matter – the cracks propagate in between pot holes and as the bus accelerates the existence of such dysfunctional aspects of the road become more and more apparent. Nauseous feelings overwhelm me - is this motion sickness or the malaria that manifested its self as vomit last night over the bowl of bone-white toilet in the wee hours of the morning? The shivers overwhelm and the aches incapacitate- "ah salvation! I'll take coartem..." if only I had water and food to take it with. In my stubbornness, or perhaps delirium, I refuse water from a friend and drift in and out of sleep. Regardless I am on the road to Chipata, on the road to Malawi, on the road to the JF retreat.

A shot screams out; an immense thunder that overwhelms even the grinding noises of our high velocity motor coach. Alertness returns to me, my heart is racing and I can feel it. Intense thumping within my body as consciousness quickly returns. My body shrieks at me to find out what is going on - self preservation systems at work? I look out the window and see our bus swerving out of control into the opposite lane - directly in front of an incoming motor coach; a motor coach which is running as if it was chased by the end of the world. What will happen when two ferries of the Zambian plain collide at critical velocity? What life survives? What limbs are severed? I am in the back of the bus, I must brace myself, must be careful to keep my tongue in my mouth lest I bite it off on impact. What of my thumbs? They must be safe too, for being flung forward might snap them off on head rest, draped of course in white plastic, which is in front of me. Mortality is but a simple gift that can be taken away; this mortal reclamation seems to be more and more easily given the advancement of technology and the human capacity to put ourselves in situations that are not safe. Such unsafe technologies include: shotguns, flame throwers, and anything with an internal combustion engine traveling on a Zambian highway.

For a mere instant in time I feel scared for my life, yet I do not panic – there is no time to panic. Perhaps these are the last thoughts of some small animal or maybe a majestic elk as it looks upon ever approaching headlights with lethal fascination. Time felt as if it was dawdling for a few seconds - heart still pounding - each second was cumbersome and lingered with me. I return to reality and hear screeching sounds as the bus driver regains control and we return to our lane. I have survived! Our driver is either lucky or gifted with reflexes beyond my clumsy comprehension: for if the buses collided his existence would be void, and the lease on life of every bus rider would be up for review.

After the ten second eternity had passed the bus began to slow down and came to a halt half on the road and half of the shoulder. All the bus riders slowly file off the bus; phrases in different languages… Bemba, Nyanja, Tonga?... were uttered by the odd passerby.

What time is it? Is there such a thing as time when lying ‘neath the scorching Zambian sun on the swerving tarmac that slices through the plains, hills, and forests of Zambia? In a world of cautious stillness the relevance of seconds and minutes becomes distant; arbitrary and synthetic divisions of the human experience. Left of the bus (perhaps North...?) lies, in anguish, a path – anguished by the shrubs and tall grass making claim to it, subtly making the lines therein less defined. Just past the path can be seen some straw huts – their outlines visible through gaps in the defoliated trees and their colors blending into the dry wheaty color that has overtaken Eastern Province in the dry season.

The bus lies in fallow on the highway– no progress – the wrench lies amongst a few lugnuts on the shaded roadway. Words slowly propagate throughout the growing crowd of wanderers and travelers – strangers to this landscape – of how the jack and spare tire are both absent. Work removing the devastated tire grinds to a state of being similar to the bus its self.

We aimed for Chipata but instead found Purgatory amidst the highways and bush

The Mzungu contingent of the bus is gathered together sitting on the side of the road opposite the steel behemoth. Despite the sun reaching its peak the heat is tolerable, even as we sit on the cooking black-grey highway away from the shade. Motionless. Stillness. Uncertainty. Tranquility? Agony? Somewhere in between?

Our coach sat with two demolished tires – driver side front and passenger side interior on the back ( the bus has six wheels). No jack. No spare. No movement, no progress. We lie in wait. Perhaps a bus would drive by and render us assistance – a tire and a jack and water to quench our growing thirst – vehicles come and go. First they are heard, then they are seen, then they are gone leaving us the sound of drifting wheels, firing engines, and displaced air in their wake.

We lie in wait.

The huts in the distance are an alluring spectacle – my eyes are coaxed by their siren song - and an accomplice and I slowly tread down the trail, pushing aside the tall grass as we go. The scene we beheld is reminiscent of some kind of horror movie – stillness. There is evidence of humanity nearby – foot prints. I feel a certain tension in the air. Small birds and chickens slowly strut around the clearing. There is one large hut and a few smaller ones. In the distance I see a man sitting, silent, inside a straw enclosure. As we wander further into the clearing I am surprised by the presence of another silent man in another straw enclosure.

Ignorant interlopers. We know not what it is we tread upon or where we are.

Encroaching into the lives and land of strangers was not our intention on this trek so we return to the bus – our landmark... our point of reference.

Off in the distance down the road I can see something... Some sort of settlement?

What lies over past yonder?

On the right side of the bus (south?) is another path cut through an even denser Zambian brush – trees, shrubs, and grass almost a meter high (or so it seems) lies amidst the path and amidst the road devouring any notion of emptiness. No huts in sight. Explore again? Progress on our situation is uncertain – another adventure can’t be of any harm, can it?

With the same accomplice I set out on a second voyage into the unknown of the Zambian country side. Mysterious trails cut their way through the bush – “there must be a village over past yonder” I continually think to myself – we continue on. We scramble down a small hill and into even taller grass and a forking path, “This trail looks like it was cleared by an elephant” remarks Tony.

The sounds of crickets can be heard lightly singing amidst the rustle of grass during a mid day breeze. What kind of anachronism are these sounds? It’s day time... They shouldn’t be out; it’s not concert time.

Over ahead I see what I believe is the source – an abyss of light under the canopy of a short yet majestic tree. No light exists under the branches and leaves which resemble the mouth of some cave. The path forks – one leads to the absolute darkness under the unknown tree while the other leads to more tall grass and a thicket up ahead. We embark upon the latter. A similar dark tree path awaits us – the first we saw is dwarfed in size by the immensity of this canopy. The sound of some unknown creature can be heard amidst rustling bushes. It is dark underneath – dark as if the sun has set early – and a small creek runs through the middle. Just as I cross the creak on a small branch bridge I am told that we are out of cell phone coverage... We decide to return lest the bus leave us to this clearing and whatever village lies beyond. In the distance we can see a town – perhaps this is what I saw from the roadside?

The road comes into sight and with it the faces of friends and strangers as well as new comers to our road side prison: bicycle merchants. AH-hah perhaps these merchants put nail belts on the road so that now they can come and peddle fritters, coke, fanta, popcorn, and biscuits to the disabled wanderers?

Likely not. But they are here and they are selling. They come and go with bike loads of food items. We gorge. Eventually the post bus arrives – salvation! A tire and jack are shared with us and work starts up again. The critical tire, the driver front, is swapped and we slowly file back onto the bus. The sounds the bus makes driving with one flat are frightening – it sounds as if the bus will be caught up in some dark conflagration at any given moment. Crawling as some lame creature anguishing in the pain of dismemberment our bus howls. Eventually the distant town is reached and our bus repaired; fitted with a new tire. Wandering around this town reminds me of many of the other road stop towns – towns that remind me of the old west. Or rather the old west as portrayed in films...

The horse we rode on

One main road. Watering holes / bars, small shops and vendors dotting the road through town. Homes lost in the distance. Water and icecream for sale with rice samosas? Refreshing. Time for coartem. Saddle up! Our horse aint lame no more. Wrangle up a posse; we be heading over past yonder to chipata. Yee haw. Giddy up.

Sleep is found as we are Chipata bound

As we continue to Chipata I begin to once again pass in and out of sleep amidst the typical gospel music and the words of James Joyce, which slowly seep into the sponge behind my eyes. Soon the sounds of countless Taxi drivers singing in disharmony to pick up the Azunga –“taxi, machinji!?” as they exit the bus in Chipata will abound around me. Soon the dilapidated road to the Machinji border station will throw me around the cab of a taxi. Then it’s Lilongwe!... And Senga Bay. And the retreat – a reunion of EWBers on the shores of Lake Malawi. Consciousness fades ... “Rhythm begins, you see. I hear. Actalectic tetrameter of iambs marching. No, agallop: decline the mare.” (Ulysses, page 31) and then I sleep.

On the road even the most irrelevant stories aren’t without meaning.

Music in Mapalo

2009-06-13T09:44:00.009-06:00

Chirping resounded all around our red-mud-brick household. An indiscernible barrage of tiny voices rattling in the distance; busy indecipherable messages broadcast from all the pale tall grass and stout vibrant green bushes abounding in the community. The grand nocturnal symphony of Mapalo performs every night for free, and thanks to the seemingly paper thin walls the audience has no choice to partake in or abstain from this production. Everyone is a witness.

The sun has completed it's journey through the Zambian horizon and now the Township lies dormant under the light of the moon. As sunset begins the sounds of pots being clanged and filled with water and maize meal can be heard in front of most homes. Scraping the side of the pot, as Nshima is carefully stirred and prepared, are the Woman of Mapalo - who work tirelessly under the failing last embers of the day's light. For many households this one meal of Nshima will be the solitary meal of the day; no provision for breakfast or lunch. Nshima is made in haste as the night becomes darker - all members of the family move inside lest their blood and bodies be poisoned by the nocturnal vampiric pests that have emerged from their slumber. Meals are eaten inside the home under the vacant light of a brazier, the gentle light of a wax candle, or perhaps the small flame of a kerosene filled pickle jar.

Sitting in the main room of the house are Teacher's two sons and myself. As per tradition I was forced into isolation for meal time - simply eating in the same room was a struggle. "You may eat your dinner in the bedroom" commands Teacher in a shy yet authoritative tone. "I would love to share this meal with the family" I reply dryly, exhausted from the day's activities and battered from the daily struggle of integration into the new household. He concedes but the wife and kids sit on the opposite end of the room leaving me in the sanctuary of a brazier and a candle; alone quietly rolling Nshima and relish.

The crickets begin their overture just after Teacher and his wife step out to go visit a neighbor on some personal business. Teacher is the only English speaking member of his household and as I am left with his two children I feel imprisoned by my own ignorance of Bemba - trapped in the corner of this room with only the sound of crickets and the odd passerby mumbling in the dark.

It may have been solitude and the pressure it brings, or perhaps it was pure boredom but I began to whistle - a short little melody. Laughter erupts from the children - joyous looks on their faces that can be vaguely seen amongst the flickering candle light. The house is eclipsed in darkness and I can barely see my cell-mates not even two meters away. "In the very least I can make them laugh - that's communication, right?" I think to myself. Or perhaps I said it out loud? It wouldn't have mattered if I broadcast all my thoughts - no one would understand.

Whistling slowly cuts through the darkness. I expect more laughter to erupt, but my ears are only greeted by a chuckle. Chuckling followed by a reply to my melody. The youngest son whistles back a melody of his own! I'm not sure if it is the love of music in me or memories of playing in a Jazz band- with Paul on piano, Mike on the bass, and Fraser on the drums - but I felt obligated to reply to his response. We traded whistling back and forth for a long while. Music has a unique power in that it can make seconds seem like an eternity, or an eternity seem like seconds. This was a case of the former.

Not one to slow down I started clapping and clicking my metal water bottle when I wasn't whistling - the kid did the same, only he used his plate instead of my bottle. The crickets have competition! The elder brother watching us with a sheepish look that combined, in equal parts, bewilderment and amusement.

Our little concert continued until Teacher and his wife returned - moving the cloth drape that covers the door and opening it they walk in to see their guest and one of their suns whistling and clapping and making a ruckus! The look on teacher's face - half draped in darkness the other visible due to the flickering pickle kerosene - was simply perplexed! "show's over" I thought to myself - this time it was a statement confined to a prison behind my eyes.

Music - the universal language. Anyone can hear a melody and it can be meaningful to them - exuberant or melancholy, comedic or beautiful, soothing or devastating, nostalgic or inspiring - and it doesn't matter what language they speak or how old they are.

Perceptive challenges, part I

2009-06-12T01:56:00.005-06:00

{Disclaimer for my chapter, the amazing UCalgary EWB team: I thought I would take a second to share some of the work I have been doing. This is especially for my chapter - some of you asked more about work so here's what your JF is doing!
Disclaimer for everyone else: Dorothy is an idea EWB uses to symbolize who it is we work for. Some might call her the mother who works tirelessly for her children, others might see her as the marginalized or poorest of the poor. It's a personal concept.

Disclaimer for everyone: hope this makes things more clear as to what this crazy Mzungu in Ndola is doing! Please ask questions and comment! I’d love to hear your thoughts.}

The scoop

For the last few weeks I have been working on a project I proposed to my partner, AFMAC/SHIP, to conduct a study into understanding household knowledge, assets, and skills and how they can impact the success of a SHIP intervention, specifically biosand filtration. The focus of this study is to share a new perspective based on the perceptions in the community with SHIP for structuring their training, distribution, and monitoring programmes.

SHIP is an NGO that has local Zambian staff from different backgrounds; there are former city council members - the administrators who managed the city of Ndola, and former chemists from large corporations - the scientists behind mining operations and laundry detergent paste. The staff are for all intents and purposes professional and fairly high capacity. Directly adding to their in office operations is something that an expert in HR could accomplish, perhaps, but for a three and a half month placement this is not an area I can add capacity or value.

The early field trips I took with my partner were full of questions and excitement - I was entering into a brand new situation with the intent in my heart and mind to help my organization help Dorothy - help the poorest of the poor. In the Townshisp around Ndola the poorest of the poor are very existent. A combination of incredibly high unemployment and high population density has made some of the Townships the poorest areas in the Copperbelt.

As a field worker I was helping my partner collect, process, and manage data. This was a long process with a specific focus on quantitative analysis of water quality. For all the biologists/ecologists, civil/environmental engineers, environmental scientists, and chemists out there you may know exactly what this means. For everyone else: water quality analysis involves taking samples of water and running different tests to determine the presence of certain ions as well as bacterial colonies that can cause diarrheal disease. Other data we collected was in an area much more dear and interesting to me: how humans relate to these BSF interventions.

Stepping away from quantitative and into qualitative

I began to think to myself about household perceptions. Sure the BSF can be proven to be working with the necessary quantitative analysis, but does that tell us why it is working? How do we define the success of an intervention? Is it enough to know that quantitative data points to the filter being operational? For improving SHIP's ability to serve Dorothy I began to wonder if an understanding of Dorothy's perspective on these interventions would better equip them to do so.

As I spent a few more days in the field I began to notice some reoccurring observations - both through what my eyes beheld but also in what I heard through conversation and discussion with households. Slowly these observations changed from personal to ideas that I think SHIP could benefit from knowing. SHIP runs a three tiered approach to community water and sanitation: 1) water access points and bore holes, 2) hygiene promotion and 3) bio sand filter distribution. The focus of my placement was on BSF so I began to think of a way to capture the perceptions of households on water using BSF as a focal point. AFMAC is already conducting a baseline survey which is oriented on quantitative data as well as some qualitative - what I thought I could do is conduct some research to compliment what is already being carried out (with a good degree of efficiency) with a field reality point of view on SHIP's work. I wanted to listen to Dorothy, understand Dorothy, and amplify Dorothy to all those who can listen. I believed that as a JF here for a few months that this project could add some capacity and learning to my partner.

In late May, perhaps around the 25th or so, I began to pen a proposal for a look into household perceptions with the goal of providing SHIP with a report that would complement AFMAC's (the team I am on) baseline survey as well as make recommendations for how SHIP can structure its programs taking into account household perceptions. On June 1st I submitted the proposal and upon approval I began working hard to collect data.

An approach I am taking is one that focuses in on communicating with households. Since this study is all about household perceptions I feel a lot of the relevant data will be found by directly talking with households. "Semi-structured interviews" will make up the bulk of my research - I have a mental checklist of information I think will be beneficial to understanding perceptions but I also want to get answers to the questions I will not think to ask. I leave these interviews open ended and after each day I return to my mental checklist (now digitized, oh the wonders of laptops. Thank you so very much Cherie!) and revise it. The lists from pre and post Township stay in Mapalo are similar at the core but drastically different in how they look at water and households. Dr. Jekyll, meet Mr. Hyde.

Conducting interviews is something I must endeavor to become more proficient at. Communication becomes more difficult when cultures collide - one way of saying a phrase from my perspective may mean something entirely different from someone else's. Using a facilitator or translator for Bemba speaking households can prove to be equally challenging. My words must be clear and understandable to the translator – he/she must understand what it is I mean by the question, try to put that into Bemba and then reinterpret the answer. Early on, even before pursuing formal research, this was a challenge. As I look for a permanent translator I am taking care to explain the purpose of the project and the meaning behind questions that are asked.

Finding people to interview can be difficult or not so difficult– my focus may be on BSF but that doesn’t mean those without BSFs don’t have anything valuable to add. To find households with BSF I consult SHIP or the local community leaders – between both sources of info it is not too difficult to find someone to speak with. I’ve had some warm and friendly receptions as well as some people who seemed disinterested. (oddly enough the one interview I thought I did the best in terms of communicating and speaking got a very sour response from the man I was speaking to. So much to learn!)

Truly "understanding" perceptions might have been an oversight on my part - but it is something I will continue to work on till I am back on Canadian soil, and then I will probably still fret over it. After interviewing a handful of people it became apparent that there are trends in the way people view water and the BSF - each had their own unique motivation and history thought. Human behaviour is a tricky thing to analyze - there's a long road to walk in terms of this project and I'm already sprinting.

So, you may be asking – “Patrick, you crazy Mzungu, how is this development!?”

Development isn’t just about digging wells and implementing programs or infrastructure. The physical manifestation of development – the indicators so often cited by donors – often take the shape of x number of wells sunk or something similar. But development as I see it isn’t solely about wells. Looking at the ground level, the field, the township – Mapalo, Mackenzie, George - the act of boreholes and filters being installed in and of its self is not development. Seeing these interventions used in an effective and functional way that reduces poverty is an idea I have as real development. Remember, these are my thoughts - tell me what you think.

Allow me to elaborate with a hypothetical situation – say an NGO installs some perfectly technically sound hand pump design in a community that one hundred households have access to. From my perspective this doesn’t indicate development – how many houses actually use the well? If it breaks can it be repaired (hopefully without the Township running back to the NGO)? Is there an actual decrease in disease? Was this well sunk in the best geographic location for the town? - and so on. If the project and intervention are not planned in a way that takes into account the unique needs and perceptions within the community will success be impacted? Is it possible for an NGO to balance donor requirements, project restrictions, and field level realities (ie household needs + perceptions)?

So while the fruits of all my labor here in Ndola wont physically manifest its self in the form of a well or a knock out sanitation training session I feel that it will give SHIP something new to consider as they continue to upscale and restructure their programs. It’s a long term process – but it is my most sincere hope that my endeavors will help SHIP do development in Townships for Dorothy by listening to Dorothhy.

thoughts on the value of Words, the power of a Dream and creating Hope

2009-06-11T03:38:00.011-06:00

Dreams
"Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow."- Langston Hughes

Words have an immense power to shape the perceptions of those who bear witness to them. Thinking back to the critical moments in the history of the twentieth century so many of them are coupled with the inspiring words of a great orator which have echoed through the annals of history for years, and will continue to do so for many more. Others have taken shape in the form of great writers; be it the protest singers - the troubadours of change who channel the energy of their time in the form of song or the more reserved poets, journalists and novelists who opt to share the truths of the world as they perceive them on paper for all to read. For me, at least, the power of language cannot be underestimated. Who hasn't heard the iconic statement "I have a dream" a rallying call for change in its own era and a continued source of inspiration to this day? Are all the sentiments, actions, and events of the civil rights movement still so largely remembered in the same way?

Returning to Mapalo for the first time after finishing my Township Stay truly felt the same as visiting an old friend for the first time after an eternity of segregation. Sleeping, eating, washing, laughing, talking, reflecting, cooking, writing, observing, and fetching water for many days in the community created some kind of bond to life there for me. Spending time in Lusaka and a house in town while I recovered, under doctors orders, was quite a change of pace. The lifestyle of Mapalo that had been entrenched in me began to crumble and dissolve - washed away amongst the hitch hiking and bus rides to and from Lusaka. When I returned to Mapalo, this time to do field work, the experience was something I can never hope to describe accurately in writing; however, I can say that it was a marriage of happiness and frustration - relief and anxiety.

When a curse becomes a blessing

Names and memories walk hand in hand in Mapalo - and for a Township that has changed names in the lifetime of some of its younger members there are quite a few memories to share. The history of the Township as I have heard it from different sources is a sad and bloody one - something of a modern incarnation of some demented old west tale with bandits and desperadoes taking hold of a wood shack saloon on main street town. In these tales the protagonist, be it the benevolent sheriff or a Sergio Leone anti-hero, rides into town and dispatches the violent and usually sadistic villains in some epic and grandiose manner. The tale ends happily - the west is safe again! The innocent townsfolk are still struggling to survive, but our benevolent protagonist has rid the town of scum so all is well... right?

Mapalo once was named Chipulukusu - which is the word for cursed in iciBemba. Why was it called cursed? Some stories tell of gun violence while others talk of "poverty".

For a town with an unwritten history perhaps the truth can only be obtained through the oral tradition of story telling. I'm not sure how much of these stories are embellished or perhaps censored... The one thing I can say with certainty is that the Township is now cured of the plague of armed violence and has changed names to Mapalo - blessing.

Words laced with cyanide and sugar

The wind blows in its gentle way - no urgency or ferocity, but it still kicks up dust and red dirt as it causes the leaves of the trees over head to dance. The shade begins to shift back in forth in the breeze; gaps in the shade where leaves have fallen are tossed to and fro. I am only in Mapalo for a few hours today so I embark into the side streets looking for an English speaking fellow who has time to spare.

In Mapalo there is always time to spare; people want to help, however they all have their own set of mixed motivations. The household mother you are interviewing for as a member of an NGO will give you a warm farewell. She is happy to provide you with information; happy to contribute to the cause of whichever NGO it is that has come knocking on her door. However, another individual, perhaps, will try to help thinking he will receive something in return. One girl offered to teach me Bemba and before I had even learned a useful phrase she already began asking me for my bracelets, my phone or my backpack. "I would really like it if maybe you give me your phone so I might remember you!”

The shady side streets of Mapalo are a refuge from the sun beaming down on the community. The sun and I are locked in the heated dance of an intense love-hate relationship. The gentle light it may provide during the day is a great alternative to the pale and uncommitted light of the moon that graces the sky at night. For in Mapalo there are no street lights and few homes have electricity. The gifts of the sun are plentiful for daytime is the only time lots of meaningful activities can be commenced. In the community, for example, the one consistent thing I have seen done at night in the household is cook Nshima on a brazier under candle light and the dim offerings of the moon. The sun falls fast, usually by nineteen hours all is dark. However, the light of the sun is a taxing gift - the intensity when standing in the open fields is quick to give sun stroke and demands rehydration.

So when I am traveling to do field work - primarily semi-structured interviews - I prefer the shady side streets. I find the person I am looking for - a young man, maybe a bit older or younger than myself. The conversation we have immediately shifts off focus from water issues and into the community at large. The man wants to be an engineer he says, "There’s no money for school, I thought maybe my parents could help. That's why I visit them... But no, it is not looking possible, but maybe if..." I hesitate to tell him I am an engineering student with EWB. . .

He tells me a little bit about Mapalo - for him the place is not his permanent home. As I speak with him I ask him about the compound and he stops. His eyes glare directly at mine... "Did I say something offensive?" I think to myself, mentally back peddling. He says to me "please call Mapalo, and all the other compounds, Townships". "We do not need to be reminded of our situation."

The idea of a compound may be crushing too many people who live in places like Mapalo. Compounds are rattled with negative connotations in Mapalo. "People want to work for progress" he said, "and it starts with taking pride in one's home and trying to better it." The crushing mind set of compound life when coupled with the tangible poverty is too much - calling their home a Township, which has become more popular in recent years, is one way people want to escape this mindset.

The name change to Mapalo was one that has not had one hundred percent adoption - even the clinics and residential development committee buildings still bear the name of CURSED. However, whenever the subject of the name of the community comes up in conversation people are overjoyed by it. It would seem to me that just as happy people are to have boreholes and tangible acts of change in their community they are just as excited with the idea of the name change. "Things have Changed, our homes are a blessing" one woman remarked to me.

I take all my experiences with Mapalo and try to assemble a composite idea of what day in day out life in Mapalo might be. What will this life look like going on and on perpetually until I, as a typical Mapalo citizen, meet my end? In this hypothetical reality a lot of what I have heard about names makes sense. How many people in Canada would want to live in a town named Cursed? Would you want to take pride telling your families and friends you live in a town named Cursed? Add in extreme uncertainty. Add in the unemployment, rampant disease, and the struggle of day to day life.

When each breath of the living is the sour miasma of the cursed do their dreams not perish?

Now consider that your Township has improved in many regards. There are now opportunities to get clean water and many criminals are gone. Extreme poverty may still be present due to a complex web of issues but there has been an improvement - safety has been restored. Taking pride of this change through words? It seems that the new name has become a beacon of hope for many people. An indicator of change - a cry for continued progress and a reminder to everyone that is the poorest and most cursed place in the Copperbelt can change then perhaps there is hope after all.

When living and speaking with the people of Mapalo it is very apparent how words can impact others. The name of "Chipulukusu" or the idea of a "compound" is laced with the most sinister poison of the heart for many people, yet the idea of a "Township" and the name "Mapalo" are uplifting. To the people the name Mapalo is a reminder that, yes, change can happen. While a borehole may provide a man water, perhaps words and names - thoughts - can provide something for a different kind of thirst?

Will changing a name somehow give everyone jobs, food, clean water, and anything else they may want or need? No. Nothing will do that. Poverty isn't erased over night, over years. There's an intangible value that comes along with the rebranding of a compound to a Township, of changing curses to blessings that provides hope - something that might be in short supply but something that is essential for change. This is an aspect of the human spirit that enables endurance and ingenuity. Hope. Don't underestimate it; the people of Mapalo don't.

Moments from Mapalo

2009-06-11T01:33:00.008-06:00

This child sat with me while I was speaking to a man who keeps livestock. He sat for a long time and finally asked for a picture with me. I hate the photo. It's cliched and silly, but the kid was sure insistent....

From web

This child is making his own soccer ball out of wires, string, yarn, and plastic bags.

From web

The most popular snack with the kids is popcorn. Here one of the kids I stayed with is preparing some.

From web

And the finished result!

From web

Night time trips to the bore hole

From web

Homes

From web

Mzungu! Want to play?

From web

A bar.

From web

The depths of Mapalo

From web

off to market, where roads cross and vendors congregate

From web

Farewell to sunshine, off to distant horizons, taking the daylight. Welcome the pale light of the moon and twilight. Farewell Mapalo.

From web

I am torn over photos - is it right to take pictures of people and their homes and put them on a blog? Do pictures accurately tell a story about the community? From the perspective of a parent - would I want my child's picture on some "stranger from a different country"'s blog?

Mapalo Musungu Messiah Complex

2009-06-09T22:45:00.013-06:00

{more journal thoughts on Mapalo. This post isn't about the majority, just some of the people I have bumped into}

He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven
"Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams. " - William Butler Yeats

"Hey Mzungu! How are you? You see when the rains come my house floods, wont you help me?"
"Mzungu, I want my kid in school! I want my kid in school! Help me, my kid in school!"
"Mzungu! I just need a little bit, I haven't eaten in days."

The voices of Mapalo were a varied sort and are impossible to structure into a homogeneous grouping of beliefs, values, and attitudes. However, one occasional trend in some of the voices I hear day in and day out resounds with the idea of the Mzungu Messiah.

High noon; the sun has reached its zenith and for the pale fleshed Mzungu this is the hottest time of day. Even in the Zambian cold season the sun is a cruel master and when I walk in the open fields I am in its domain. The intensity of the sun beaming down can, especially on a hot day, be exhausting. Walking through Mapalo towards the outskirts placed me at such a time and in such a place; it was high noon and I was in an open field. I decided to regroup after the morning long walk in the shade of a school house wall, and it was here that I met a small scale agricultural worker. He is a shorter man whose face and hands both bear the scars of years of the intense physical labour it takes to be a farmer; cheeks weathered by countless days spent under the sun working in the soil, and hands calloused and rough from hours using hand held shovels and ploughs. Working the soil on the outskirts of Mapalo for small yield crops was his trade. He had been a farmer for years and could tell me many things about cropping, irrigation, and raising livestock. And he did. But he told me "I am so glad that you, a Mzungu, would come and speak with me today for now I will learn many things and gain your wisdom, you will help my work so much". These words were troubling to me - why does this man think that me, an ignorant pale skinned Mzungu, would have any wisdom about agriculture to share? Any wisdom about life in Zambia in general?

It's late in the afternoon - the sun has began its final decent towards distant horizons. I'm walking home from a day of exploration through the winding pathways, rich in red dirt, of Mapalo. Walking through a woman approaches me, climbing over a few shrubs and past a toppled bicycle in disrepair, with a very determined look on her face. She has no sublety or grace in the way she bluntly accosts me: "Mzungu, I want my kid in school! I want my kid in school! Help me, my kid in school!". Her face bears no smile in her plea, her few remaining crooked teeth becoming visible between words, the scent of liqour heavy on her breath.

Wandering through Mapalo in the early morning is my favourite time to become a fly on the wall. The day has just begun and more and more Mapalo is becoming a hive of activity and energy - it is emerging from its slumber and greats the day with unbridled vigor. My companion on the walk continually tells me "Patrick, it would be so very good for you to share a picture of the lives of Mapalo when you return home" - I tell him that this is part of the JF program as well as matter of great personal importance. "Good, good" he says, "now many more Mzungu will journey here and our problems will be solved."

Speaking with people in Mapalo is a highlight for me - I get a glimpse into their world and can share a glimpse of mine too. I've made a few friends this way but also had some rather awkward situations. Walking through one of the larger roads in Mapalo I come to a clearing - a man is begging on the ground asking me for money. My companion grabs my arm and says "we should keep walking, do not listen to this man". I am in Mapalo to learn so I decide to hear what exactly it is this man is begging for - he says "Malaria medicine, it is too much to buy". I ask my companion what kind of networks are in place to get the poor medicines in Mapalo - before I get an answer another man walks up and with a loud and commanding voice - "Mzungu! Do not listen to this man, he is begging here everday. Malaria! HAH he doesn't have Malaria." We chat for a bit and quite the crowd is growing around - children fascinated by the Mzungu and many adults saying things to me in Bemba. I am later told that the people were thinking I am about to give the beggar something, just because I spoke with him, and are hoping to get help too. The man who informed me the beggar didn't have Malaria then begins to ask me for assistance with his house - it floods he says.

These are just a few examples of the 'Mzungu Mesiah Complex' I have observed in my travels in and around Mapalo. The image of the Mzungu is varied person to person, but it would seem that quite a few people, view the Mzungu as a person of wealth or wisdom. Immediately it is assumed that the Mzungu will have money to buy foods and medicines and have wisdom to solve any problem. This in many ways, in my opinion at least, is a crippling mind set. Is it previous interactions with whites, cultural myths, or just simple begging? This is a multi dimensional situation that really makes it hard for a Mzungu to integrate - but also puts an emotional toll of guilt on me as an individual. I want to help people, to empathize with people, and understand them - this is where my heart is. But, when people put such hope on you as a source of solutions to all their problems it is a heavy situation.

If I am to give that one woman money to send her kid to school what would I say to all the kids in Mapalo who didn't get money? How do I know this money would be used for her child? Instead of giving her money I refer her to the Teacher I was staying with, who charges a meager five thousand a term for schooling, or even gives it for free it it is unaffordable. She spoke with him, I do not know the result - I hope her child will go to school.

While sharing the Mapalo perspective with Canada was received with joy sharing with my guide the perspective I have on Mzungus in Zambia was something he was not so eager to hear. As best as I could I responded to his remark about more Canadians by asking him how he sees Mzungus helping the community? He just said "they'll help us". Taking a different approach I explained how I was staying in Mapalo to learn from the people since Mzungus come to Zambia completely ignorant about the realities of his community. I continued by remarking that since Mzungus are so blind to these realities how can he expect us to save his community? "Would you want a blind man to drive your mini bus?", "then why would you want a Mzungu, blinded by ignorance to steer the future of your community?" - We continued to discuss and decided that the role of the Mzungu isn't to solve problems but to share what they have so that together we can learn from one another and help the community solve its problems where we can - but that development of the community must be driven by the community.

Farming. This is something I should really learn a lot more about. Through my new friend in Mapalo I was able to - and he wanted wisdom so I shared with him the only wisdom I had. If he expects a Mzungu who has never lived on a farm to give his new wisdom and solutions than he is waiting for rains in the dry season. Some Azunga might know how to farm well in Canada, or even in Zambia, but to assume that we are all wise is not helping him. I spent all afternoon, under the scorching sun, helping him with his work. Speaking with him, asking questions, and fetching lots of water to irrigate. I was able to share the Canadian perspective and was able to learn from his Zambian one - but at the end of the day he still asked me for answers, "Now that you have seen and worked on the farm maybe you know how to make it better?". I told him I would have to think long and hard. Sure I had some half baked ideas about how to make his irrigation work easier, or ideas about pursuing different markets for his cash crops and so on - but this is a man's livelihood. I can't just start sharing ideas with him, especially after he has expressed that he sees Mzungu wisdom as infallible, so I am thinking long and hard. Every time I see him we speak, laugh, and share but at the end he still sees me as a wiseman when my actions have not reflected such.

Instead of trust being based on merit it is based on skin colour. In this community, which is composed of so many vulnerable households, I am beginning to understand why some things or people are perceived as symbols of hope and why this is so profound for a household. Be it the beggars in the streets to the mothers who want their children in school a certain amount of people in the community see a Mzungu and immediately think "Here is a solution to all our problems." One man followed me around for an hour the whole time telling me about his life, he kept motioning to his stomach the whole time. Eventually he left - was I just seen as a free meal?

Morally is it right to feed one man? To perpetuate this Mzungu Messiah Complex? To feed one when many need food? To send one child to school? How do I pick who? I am torn between helping with the immediate problems and showing people that the white man isn't the solution to their problems - they are.

A very good friend of mine who is a tailor assures me the path I have taken is the right one - "You see, my friend, in Zambia we have this idea that since there are no jobs we cannot work. Since we cannot work we cannot feed ourselves or send our childs to school. When the whiteman pities us with his petty cash he only perpetuates these problems - these social problems. What you do is just okay - share with them your perspective not your prosperity". He takes a breath and looks me in the eyes with an intense stare - "as I have said before, my friend, I have not succumbed to poverty. When my job was lost I made myself a business making clothes. I do not give up and I have never taken a hand out from anyone. If more Zambians did this our problems would disappear. If you cannot make money, make clothes make something! But sinking into despair, my friend, is a problem so many have. If you give them your petty cash they sink further." This conversation gave me some level of vindication for my actions - but I still feel immense guilt about betraying the faith and hope people have placed in me. Even if it is shallow begging or this romanticized idea of the Mzungu being a fountain of wisdom - when someone begs you for help with an intense fire in their eyes, even if you have rationalized it out that for the long term "Awe - no" is the better response the guilt is still over whelming.

Another man I met, under the shade of a bar roof around a table with cups of shake-shake, was seemingly drunk but also had an interesting perspective. He told me of his agriculture and how he really needs help. I asked him what kind of help he wanted and he said he needs more man power to market his crops to middle scale hotels and restaurants. Someone who has business knowledge and a nice shirt to make a good impression. I told him that I thought it was a brilliant idea - he asked me to help. I told him about my work with AFMAC and he told me to stick to that and be sure to share his story with my friends. I told him that HE can be the one to make such connections.

I feel the action I took with the woman and her child was one of the few things I have done right in this short time in Zambia - I didn't make any promises, I explained to her how unfair it is to other children if I pay for her, and I recommended her to pursue a solution in the community. I wanted to make it clear that I cannot solve her problems anymore than I can make it rain or cause earthquakes and I wanted her to take action on her own beyond the begging. I hope she took personal action to meet with a school teacher and get her child to school through that. Maybe she didn't have a kid to send to school, maybe she just wanted some cash off me? Maybe she was so drunk that she had no idea what was going on (her breath was scented with an intense mixture of listerine and whiskey)? Next time I see the school teacher I shall see. Is this the kind of wisdom as a Mzungu I can offer? To not wait for the rain but to seek it out for yourself?

So this social problem, as my friend calls it, may not be afflicting everyone - but in my short time here I have seen it often enough to think that, like my friend tells me, it is a social problem that I CANNOT contribute too. But still, the guilt of having so much hope placed on you is immense. As I said in my last blog entry about Mapalo - the simple act of staying in Mapalo home was seen by Teacher as the swan song of poverty - things will start to change. In Zambia you can really realize how powerless you are to send kids to school, give people jobs, assist people's health, and all in all positively impact the community - yet people still ask you to do as much. It's crushing.

The weight is crushing in two ways - one is that true friendships and profound relationships are that much harder to foster when people see you as a wallet or miracle worker. Another, as I have said before and am probably pumping a dry well here (or going on like a broken record) is that being the one who is making faith/hope unrequited is painful, even if you do not have the means and have rationalized your actions. To me it is heart wrenching to be unable to help people in a tangible way. Is this me being selfish?

Next blog post: my thoughts on how NGOs, volunteers, and aid organizations contribute to the continuation of the Mzungu Mesiah Complex through their actions, their words, and how they view themselves in Zambia.

WASH Forum!

2009-06-09T13:31:00.007-06:00

More remarks about Mapalo forthcoming; but I wanted to put a quick note on something else up today.

This morning I participated in the WASH Forum. The WASH Forum is a monthly meeting of WatSan sector players where work plans, promising practices, and sector developments are shared! NGOs are able to collaborate on projects that will develop strong sector wide learning while at the same time not spreading resources too thin.

How effective is this forum? Do the projects its members plan come to fruition and help set a course for WatSan development? Does it facilitate an open environment of sharing and learning? Does it allow members to share their work and avoid people doubling up on one another?

I'm very interested in continuing to attend and participate in these forums while I am here in Zambia. One discussion I got involved in was about rural and peri-urban water supply. I threw in the Mapalo perspective as best as I could. Later SHIP encouraged me to share my project with the forum - I am hoping to receive some feedback and maybe some ideas! (in the case of similar work being done elsewhere, or if similar projects have been completed I would love to learn from the current progress or outcomes.

Maybe, in Mapalo...,

2009-06-07T12:25:00.009-06:00

{rather than do a day by day recount of some time I spent in Mapalo I want to share the pages from my journal as I wrote them. I don’t write entries in a dated linear kind of way, I write them blurry and based less on chronological happenings and more on progression of thought.}

"So everything is necessary. Every least thing. This is the hard lesson. Nothing can be dispensed with. Nothing despised. Because the seams are hid from us, you see. The joinery. The way in which the world is made. We have no way to know what could be taken away. What omitted. We have no way to tell what might stand and what might fall."
— Cormac McCarthy (The Crossing)

Anxious wanderings and haggard steps. Legs were treacherous - betraying every emotion that I tried so hard to conceal with every step I took. Underneath the canopy of a scorched sky - rich in shades of crimson, violet, and fuchsia - and amongst clouds of smoke, dust and all else an uneasy tension lay suspended in the air. A deep miasma that drowned my heart and submerged my consciousness with combative waves of revelation; sorrow - the revelation of the poverty griping the entirety of all I could see. When the sun begins its exodus to foreign horizons and all the tomorrows that they are waiting for the entangling and poisonous thorns and vines will slowly become more and more visible. Their vices more apparent; rising as the sun falls. Anxiety - the sun makes its final retreat west (crimsons and violets fade) leaving the red-dirt roads and red-clay huts bathed in the cold sterile silver lunar light. The celestial mirror reflecting the shining light of the sun with cautious hostility is the only source of illumination amongst the dark new big top tent canopy. Anguish – what is this bizarre circus I have walked into? Anger – how has the community come to this point?

Uncertainty – what can be done? The brilliant colours of the sunset have dissipated. Twilight has taken hold of Mapalo and I am in the market.

Sounds lost amongst the clamor of the day take center stage at this time. During the day one room watering holes that blend in amongst a world of activity play second fiddle; at night they are the vanguard of Mapalo. As the day drags on the bars, which are always open and always full, cease to blend in with their surroundings. As the vendors pack up their fish, vegetables, and charcoal to head back to their homes the sounds and characters of these do not increase… they become more apparent.

I stand in the center of the Mapalo market just as the last rays of sunlight are disappearing. The sun by now is greeting a new morning somewhere to the west, perhaps its gentle light is now shining in Canada. My companion is a local head teacher {who I will refer to as teacher from now on, I do not feel comfortable using the names of others in my writings without their permission!} who I stayed with for all the nights I spent in Mapalo. Eager to see the realities of Mapalo – of the poverty that has taken hold of the community – I ask Teacher on our walk to show me what he sees as the grim problems of the community. I ask to see what he sees as an embodiment of poverty - what he sees as the clearest image of poverty.

We arrive in the markets. Amidst the backdrop of nighttime the market takes on a script of a different play from the afternoon's production– gone are boisterous merchants so eager to sell me sun glasses and power adapters. Gone are the talk time merchants, small shop sellers, and vegetable vendors - vanished from their wooden stalls to homes unknown to me. Gone is the veil that sheltered my perceptions from one of the harshest symptoms of poverty: Mapalo unemployment which has lead to rampant alcoholism.

Teacher explains to me how with an unemployment rate that ranges from 65-75% and those who are employed making about one hundred and fifty thousand kwacha a month (less than a dollar a day) that poverty is rampant. On the opposite sides of the stalls, which I would normally visit during the day, in the market lie the bars that I now stand on the outside of. Sober proprietresses sell alcohol to not so sober patrons – Teacher informs me that due to the lack of opportunity these young men and women drink all day and all night. He says “this alcohol problem is only making the spread of AIDS worse.”

I had spent some time in Mapalo doing field work before beginning my “village” stay there and always will remember the puerile cries of the children; rich in ignorance, innocence, bliss, curiosity and everything it means to be a child. As I walk down claustrophobic dirt paths between red mud huts little faces peak out from around corners and through the shrubs and bushes: “MZUNGU! HOW ARE YOU!?” “HELLO!” the joyous yelps of children are fresh – echoing in my mind and onto this paper. But amongst these children where were the young adults – my contemporaries? I had only met a few in Mapalo thus far – most were volunteers on committees and the rest I always saw tucked away in yards behind houses always waving and greeting me… But what are they doing?

Teacher provided me a possible answer – they are drunk – he says it without a measure of doubt in his voice. Many of the young adults of Mapalo suffer from a problem of alcoholism. I am not sure if this is the majority or just some, but the number I saw each day in the bars and tucked behind their houses with the strong odor of alcohol hovering in the air would reflect that Teacher’s problem is a real issue in the community. Throughout the week he is adamant in the way he indignantly reiterated his point that liquor is the most serious issue gripping the community – a problem that must be solved.( In a later conversation I asked him if it was more of a symptom of the lack of opportunity – and that the bars might not be the heart of the problems in Mapalo - which lead to a good discussion as we walked the streets of Mapalo – and of course a train of children calling for the Mzungu was my shadow – the youngest with the shortest legs serving as the caboose. )

But it seems Teacher speaks the truth in many respects. Just as poverty has drunken the aspirations of so many young people in Mapalo, Mapalo now drinks - inadvertently crushing hope to escape from the realities of poverty but only end up in a cycle.

Peri-urban communities… unplanned settlements… slums are very different from anyplace else I have lived. There is no land to till in Mapalo; nowhere to sow seeds. Impossible for fields to flourish with maize and groundnuts; even subsistence is seemingly out of the question for so many households. The population density is so high that in some areas even if households know to not put latrines near wells they have no choice.

Random customers, each with their own story, wave as we pass bars with outdoor “patios” – an imaginary lasso strangles me as I am drawn to the door ways, tempted to cross the river Styx. The patrons are ecstatic in their drunken haze and demand that I have a drink (as a personal rule I never drink, but that’s another story). “Mzungu, here drink!” when I politely refuse they then ask me to buy a drink for them to return the favor. A woman, who is breast feeding her child in the back of an outdoor bar, begins to follow us as we walk away. She stumbles up to me, child in tow, speaking in such a slurred manner that neither Teacher nor I can discern what she is saying – or even tell if she speaks English or Bemba. She staggers away, half her shirt still open, carrying her baby like a sack of potatoes – returning to her perch in the bar.

As we return to Teacher’s home I can hear the noises of the market – they don’t fade into the distance as they should. Is this evidence of the sheer volume of patrons who drink from morning to morning? Or perhaps the evenings walk has permanently etched such noises in the deepest reaches of my mind – now echoing just like the laughter and shouting of the children.

Teacher has a small family by Mapalo standards –a wife and two children. One is eighteen – he has a learning challenge. The other is a young child. His house has a main room used for storage and two bedrooms. He tells me “I hope you learned many things tonight, I want you to take a picture of Mapalo back to Canada so you can share what is real there”. He moves the cloth covering the door to his home and opens the door.

The nighttime walk through Bulgakov’s Walpurgis ball of Mapalo left me shaken. I had heard of the alcoholism prominent in Zambian communities and I had seen some telltale signs of poverty in my field work – but this was total immersion. I witnessed the horror in my new friend’s eyes, the horror the horror and the sorrow as he looked on and explained to me the situation. I heard the voices of the drunk and the voice of their judge – both voices were shouting out for a better reality, while the voice of the teacher demanded a different future for the children of Zambia. The idea of alcoholism and the hopelessness it represented had an impact on me, but what was more profound was Teacher’s reaction and desire to see a brighter tomorrow.

Exhaustion – red embers danced as the brazier glowed warmly; the charcoal slowly consumed amongst the ash. I sat on the red-dirt floor of the house gazing intently into the brazier, overcome with its gentle warmth radiating through the room. A candle glowed dimly in the corner of the room providing a little light to the room; the eyes of my hosts were on the opposite side of the room along with the candle... Munching some Nshima and speaking quietly in Bemba, Eating around another brazier – I had originally sat down with them on one side of the room by the brazier but they moved to the other. Lonely host imposed solitude or much needed sanctuary to reflect? I don’t know which. My thoughts wandered towards the children of Mapalo and I followed.

– I remember speaking with a community leader: he said some organizations come and build the community primary schools so that Children will have the right start. I ask but what happens to the children once they pass the last grade the school offers? The man replied they would add new grades – eventually though the children will need to go to a middle school. I ask what becomes of them once they finish their middle school – he happily says they will go to highschool. I ask what will happen next. He hesitates and looks towards the skies and proudly says “college and university!” – I ask about the cost of Zambian colleges and university and scholarships – he says that most people in Mapalo can’t afford these things, even with the best scholarships. He says “maybe some could work . . .” and then trails off. He soon remarks how the joblessness in Ndola and its compounds is just so high that there is little social mobility – parents have no work and can’t pay for college and university. Students can’t pay for their own school for there is no work; no work so very few can attend a Zambian university.

The conversation is clear in my mind, illuminated by the charcoal burning so quietly below. These schools are built to pass on knowledge to children – to share the legacy of their parents and new ideas with young vessels full of hope and bewilderment, full of the passion to see and grow. But where is there for these children to grow to? I realize the frustration of Teacher as he looks at the bars with such spite – the Bars are an indicator, evidence, an embodiment even of the flowering tips of the poverty, the weeds that have choked opportunity in Mapalo. The innovation and energy of these children is unquestionable – they build their own action figures, ninjas, out of red clay. One of Teacher’s sons made his own checker board for a game called ‘broadway’ – fanta caps serve as game pieces. Upside down and right side up – no color coding like in our version. Every neighborhood scamp has his own home made soccer ball – layers of bags tied with string. Excited by cameras they all assume the shapes of wrestlers and ninjas and pose for a picture; the grim faces and karate-style poses dissipate to giddy laughter when they see the picture on the lcd. I think to myself that these Children are phantoms – precious spirits lost in a cruel world only to grow into wayward souls unless things begin to change. But I do not dwell on such thoughts for long – I begin to drift into thoughts of how things can be changed. How does a world of limited opportunity grow into one where every child in Mapalo has a chance to live their dreams? Where alcoholism doesn’t grip so many lives? I once heard ‘it is better to light a candle than to curse the dark’ in this moment I couldn’t have agreed more.

{ This next paragraph is one that I did not want to share in my blog – but it has found its way here.}

I head to the room set aside for me to sleep. The voice of Teacher is barely audible in the next room, but he says to his children he has hope for Mapalo – because for the first time ever a Mzungu is sleeping under the roof of a Mapalo home. He then moves the cloth covering the doorway to my room and reiterates the statement to me – “I’ve asked around… and it would seem you are the first Mzungu ever to sleep in a Mapalo home with a Mapalo family. Maybe, maybe in Mapalo there is hope.., maybe there is change.”

Why the event of having a Mzungu in his home is something so profound I don’t think I’ll ever understand. I can leave the poverty of Mapalo, he cannot. I have opportunities in Canada that are unimaginable, his children do not. I can sleep comfortably knowing my family will have food, water, and shelter. He cannot. Even the mud huts of Mapalo collapse in the rainy season. Do you or I have to worry about the rains dissolving the cohesion of the homemade bricks that make our homes? Do we worry one day our walls will collapse potentially killing us? (this is how one of his neighbors died last rainy season).

I have not grown up in the community of Mapalo – my life is so drastically different from those around me. I can try to integrate and understand – I want to be emphatic to my new friends but I don’t think I can ever truly understand any one individual in this community. But Teacher speaks with such conviction about the hope of having a Mzungu – he speaks of how this community was one called “Chipulukusu”- cursed and that it is now called Mapalo – blessed. Like Teacher said, perhaps seeing the white man live there with a family has shown the changes he wants to see for how the outside world views his community – perhaps I will never know. At the end of the day I am but an ignorant white kid sitting still - no ground breaking powers to reshape the community at will (as some members might believe) and his words trouble me, confuse me, and leave me that way for all my nights and days and mornings and breakfasts and borehole adventures in Mapalo.

As I try to sleep on an improvised bed underneath a now invisible mosquito net in near absolute darkness I can see a glimmer of light drifting in under a gap in corrugated tin roof. The sounds of Mapalo at night are a deafening blur. I can still make out the sounds of the bars and drinking yards through the thin walls of the house now joined by the characteristic angry yelping of dogs, but amidst them I hear something else. I listen long and hard – and I hear one of the most beautiful sounds I can remember – laughter. I hear the laughter of children amongst the clamor of their older counterparts. But even more powerful than the laughter I begin to hear singing – songs of happiness and worship. Songs of hope.

Perpetually my perceptions were reshaped as the events in Mapalo passed. I arrived at Teacher’s house with an open mind ready to see through the eyes of his family what life in Mapalo is. What does it mean to live in Mapalo? The truth of poverty as Teacher believed it was shown to me with clarity and precision by a visit to the markets at twilight; future trips through town made the backyard gatherings in the morning and the bars stand out for what they really are. Why are so many youth drunk? No jobs, no school – how does Mapalo get to a point where this doesn’t have to happen? But as I felt so angry in the darkness, laying on a combination of wooden crates, boxes, and mattresses my perspective changed again as the sounds of joy permeated through the mud hut. There is great hope in Mapalo – the laughter and the singing reflects this. The people collectively have not given up as some community members may believe. But to me it would seem that it will take more than building schools for the youth - serious change in this community seems to be contingent on economic development.

As I learned more about the livelihoods of the people of Mapalo the dichotomy between those resigned to poverty and those with hope that are fighting a way out became stronger and more apparent. So perhaps teachers problem is turth - there are men drunk in their yards at ten in the morning and remaining in this state all day. These aspects represents some of the darker moments of Mapalo. But there is hope, not just in singing but in the tangible actions of people in the community.

Hope for a better tomorrow is embodied by proud women who work tirelessly in the fields of farms far from home to make small wages that they use to start small scale businesses upon return. These businesses are small and take a lot of effort to make ends meet but due diligence in the side streets and markets of Mapalo is allowing some members to eck out a living. These women have begun to form groups to collect their own money and develop a locally operated micro-credit group so more woman can pursue business effectively. Women are pushing serious change in Mapalo. Hope is embodied by the committees and RDC who work tirelessly to see the community bettered and improved by planning with NGOs and trying their best to be a voice for the scattered peoples of Mapalo. Hope in the men who work seven days a week, or if they do not have a job look for piece work diligently. Some people my age I had a chance to speak with were members of volunteer committees and shared with me deeply how they want to see changes in the community.

Mapalo, once called CURSED – a village inhabited by both the honest folk and all the bandits, gunmen, and criminals has been cleaned up and is moving towards positive change. Even the re branding of the town has, according to some members, uplifted the spirit of the community in many ways that were unexpected. More and more people have gained access to resources – both in terms of knowledge but also in the tangible resources of hand pumps and capital – which many say is moving the community forward into uncharted territory. But there are still prevalent problems that will not be fixed overnight. 20% HIV/AIDS, 70% unemployment, high levels of illiteracy and many still without access to clean water are just a few of the more severe symptoms of the poverty that has strangled the community, along with much of the country for years and will continue to do so unless change is continued to be driven from within and outside of the community.

"The rain falls upon the just
And also on the unjust fellas
But mostly it falls upon the just
Cause the unjust have the just's umbrellas"
— Cormac McCarthy

Caring, anguish, love, depression, and hope were just a few of the manifestations of Mapalo I noticed in my time there. I was taken into a house that is already stretched beyond its means with open arms and ushered in as a member of a family. A stranger welcomed like a long lost brother. I have had many experiences in Zambia thus far but this really reminded me of some age old wisdom – those with next to nothing will share openly all they have while those with some will only want more. My first host family, a family with significantly more means who I spent some time with earlier, had members who saw me as little more than a client and demanded steep financial compensation when I departed. Teacher's family welcomed me into their home and shared their brazier with me, warmed me when I was cold and made sure I got to a doctor when I was sick. They showed me to the market and shared their view of the world with me and wanted to hear mine. They fed me and were even prepared to butcher a chicken for me. (I assured them that I am a vegetarian and they understood and made me the best beans ever!) Eventually they let me contribute to household activities and the cost of food and used some of my contribution to buy charcoal -eventually I started functioning as a member of their family. A high point was helping with the dishes and finally making it clear that I could sit on the wooden stool and then the floor. (the hosts kept giving me the only chair in the house). I did not want to destroy my family's right to be good hosts but I also wanted to be treated as an equal. I eat in the house, so I help cook. I eat food so I help pay. I make a mess, I clean it up. If the family sits on the floor, I sit on the floor. At the borehole when people want me to move to the front I decline and help them pump their water, just as they do for their neighbors.

I hope that, even if slowly, my actions were a tide that eroded myths of the Mzungu and deposited sentimental sediments amongst my household to see Mzungus as not the keepers of answers and solutions and money but friends and equals.

Despite the problems facing Mapalo – even as poverty has coiled its self around the lives of many, even if there is desperation and alcoholism in the lives of some – the people are just like you and I – a complex web of hopes and dreams and all the darker aspects of the world too - and for a few days of my lifetime I got to be closer to what it is like to be in Mapalo.I heard the voice of Dorothy in the winding back streets and the school houses and around the boreholes. For a moment in time I experienced life in poverty; the tastes, the smells, the sights, the sounds and most importantly the emotional feeling of poverty. For a moment in time - a few short days out of all the days I have lived on this blue planet - I lived in uncertainty. I lived in Mapalo.

and maybe, in Mapalo, there can be change.

Frozen Blood and Shattered Bones

2009-06-03T01:33:00.001-06:00

"Malaria is caused by a parasite called Plasmodium, which is transmitted via the bites of infected mosquitoes. In the human body, the parasites multiply in the liver, and then infect red blood cells.

Symptoms of malaria include fever, headache, and vomiting, and usually appear between 10 and 15 days after the mosquito bite. If not treated, malaria can quickly become life-threatening by disrupting the blood supply to vital organs. In many parts of the world, the parasites have developed resistance to a number of malaria medicines.

Key interventions to control malaria include: prompt and effective treatment with artemisinin-based combination therapies; use of insecticidal nets by people at risk; and indoor residual spraying with insecticide to control the vector mosquitoes."

-WHO

Mosquito death. African Flu. Malaria, malaria.

A mere eleven days spent in Africa and I had contracted this illness.

Even bundled underneath blankets and sheets, underneath a mosquito net glimmering in the feint moonlight, and inside a MEC sleeping bag I still felt cold. Not cold in the conventional sense, but cold in that my veins felt as if they ran with ice water. Harsh dry coughing echoed through the bedroom, my head ached - pulsing, wave after wave of intense pain. There was no escape because nausea prevented me from finding a way out of the net. My savior became a trap - a noose. Despite feeling the need to vomit and no matter how much I thrashed I couldn't find a way out of my net. I lay for hours hoping to recover, eventually fatigue overwhelmed me.

By morning some sense of balance returned and I struggled to get to work - I wasn't aware I had malaria, I just felt terrible. Even sitting under the Zambian sun at noon - after it had soared to its highest point illuminating the clear blue sky and cooking all that lay below - even as I sat under the sun in a jacket I felt cold. Frozen from the inside out. A new symptom arose as I rode in a toyota cab - my skin felt electrified and it was as if a sledge hammer had violently struck my arms shattering my bones. Every bump on the road was agony. In the Cuban doctor's office I could barely hold my head up.

I say these things not for sympathy, but to describe Malaria as I experienced it. In North America we hear about Malaria and the toll it is taking on many developing countries but how often do we try to understand how agonizing the symptoms truly are? In Zambia Malaria is no joke, my coworkers encouraged me to go the doctor as soon as they saw the way I was walking, sitting, and coughing. For a disease that is so common in Zambia they know and they take it very seriously. Most coworkers I have spoken with have had Malaria as many times as you or I have had the flu. Many people I know keep treatment medicines on stock and know the first signs and self medicate. The trick to Malaria is catching it when the cough and fever arise - if you start treatment early the disease is easily manageable and doesn't reach the terrible stages.

The aftermath? Well I had taken malarone for preventative measures so I was spared from the brunt of the symptoms, I can only imagine what the disease is like without. Apparently I can no longer donate blood in Canada. I was left feeling exhausted and ill for days and days but I am now on the road to recovery!

Photographic evidence

2009-06-03T01:15:00.004-06:00

Blog post one of three:

Cheesy title! A few more photos -

Interviews.

From web

mini bus stop and go

From web

how do you get your water?

From web

latrine

From web

will it grow?

From web

welcome to masala

From web

"HEY MZUNGU! What are you taking a picture of?" Says the charcoal salesman standing behind me. We spoke for about fifteen minutes, exchanged names, and he wanted to join EWB!

A thousand words - perhaps more, perhaps less

2009-06-02T07:38:00.004-06:00

I have neglected to post photos so far as I misplaced my camera cable. Today I borrowed a card reader from the office so I was able to upload a few snap shots from the last two weeks.

The first few pictures explore water:

Boreholes (alluded to in an earlier post)

From web

a quasi-protected hand dug well:

From web

"piped" water

From web

Some other pictures...
A life in the day of a junior fellow: Friday May 22nd

watch a home made kite as it sails the blue horizon:

From web

play some football

From web

top up your mobile with some units

From web

meet with the residential development committee. cheesy smiles included.

From web

visit the local clinic to meet with an environmental health nurse

From web

stand in awe of Ndola landscapes, Zambian horizons

From web

Putting the "what?" in WatSan

2009-05-26T09:39:00.008-06:00

What are the benefits of household pathogen removal, how are these benefits perceived, and how do they enable households to lift themselves out of poverty?

I've spent a few days in the field and I've tried to make my mind a sponge - there is so much to see and learn every time I step out of the taxi. A world of activity awaits me every time my feet leave the Toyota taxi and connect to the red soil of the Ndola compounds. Now I am trying to process all my observations - from the notes in my moleskin notebook, from the photographs, and from the thoughts and feelings within.

I remember my first visit to the Mackenzie compound vividly - my mind was racing with question after question; I didn't get to see the look on my face but I imagine it was one of perplexed thought. Peri-urban dwellings are places I had only read about in a case study or a book, or perhaps I have heard about different dwellings from one professor or another. I had received some brief and fleeting details about the community and the 'interventions' that had happened in it before arriving.

As I mentioned in another post the first thing I noticed was a borehole and a young boy filling up a container. The taxi cab came to a halt just in front of the clearing where the primary school stands - incomplete gray brick extensions standing beside it - a tree for shade and of course the borehole. As more children gathered around the borehole I couldn't help but steal the moment on my camera - the cliched scene you will see in TV commercials and pamphlets that pronounce the successes of whatever NGO's watsan strategy by showing a group of happy kids using a bore hole - right before they ask for sponsors. {I misplaced my camera cable back in Toronto, I'll try to upload this and all my field photos in short order . . . } The borehole became a focal point for me as I entered Mackenzie. Many questions race through my mind as I see this borehole, this object of great happiness for children, and watch as they laugh and cheer as they work the hand pump.

Is this success? What structures/systems are in place to ensure that this borehole will stay an object of happiness for these school children for years to come? Why was this borehole placed here of all places? What happens when this borehole breaks? Can this borehole serve all the children - and what of the community encircling the school... do these house holds also get unfettered access to the borehole? More importantly - how is this borehole serving to lift these children out of poverty? What will be done to ensure it continues to do so?

It seems that a lot of the work I have seen and read about looks at WatSan projects as means for giving access to something - be it training or a new tool (borehole, filter) - with the hope of lowering rate of water borne disease. But what about the bigger picture? Do these projects look at how reducing pathogens/disease will actually improve a household's livelihood and enable it to escape poverty?

I suppose the key question I am pondering is: are those who are intervening in communities looking at the link between water and a household's livelihood? Are they adapting their strategies to suit the unique links in households and communities? It seems the indicators used for "success" are number of boreholes, filters, wells ect... installed - the quantity of people served. But what of the quality of life of this quantity? Are we looking too much at water as a problem to be solved from a trick bag of solutions and as a result missing the big picture? Is water viewed as something to be provided or as a mechanism for improving livelihoods?

We spend a lot of time looking at how well something works - how many people use the borehole? 3000? okay. How is the filter doing? It reduces pathogens? Okay. And so on. But do we spend enough time looking at WHY things work?

So if these WatSan strategies are benefiting households perhaps the more important question is "how do individuals, households... families and Dorothy perceive these benefits?"
And for the the why: what characteristics do households and individuals have that enable these benefits?

Each time I walk through the communities - be it Mapalo, Mackenzie or any community really - I am left with many questions.

I am not sure if I am just being skeptical but I feel that there are so many unknowns to me about the work that is being done in the WatSan sector. Each field trip raises many questions -some may prove to be a challenge to answer. But it is my commitment to bring the "What?" to WatSan - questioning my actions, learning from the perceptions of communities, and asking what my partner is doing every step of the way.

Sunday at the Depot

2009-05-24T09:51:00.003-06:00

“Bubble gum for five hundred kwacha! Biscuit, sugar biscuit one pin, one pin!” “Passport covers, passport covers!”

The sounds of innumerable horns honking, and hundreds of people shouting, laughing, and arguing resound through the open air.

Our mini-bus slowly comes to a halt upon entry into the bus depot – a red soil clearing cooking under the hot Zambian sun. Even on Sunday the depot is a whirl wind of activity. Immediately the bus depot seems chaotic; dozens of mini buses of different sizes are spread out in haphazard columns and groupings. Walk-around vendors encircle our bus peddling us nick-nacks through our open windows. Suckers, lollipops, passport covers, bubble gum, watches and sunglasses are just a few items shown at the open windows; glistening under the hot Zambian sun. Despite seeming chaotic there is some overwhelming system driving the depot –there are always buses ready to leave and I have yet to see an accident. It is time to switch buses and I descend into this ant-hill world of activity.

Immediately after stepping off the bus I am bombarded by offers for other buses and taxis “Hey boss where are you going? Want a taxi?” – “Awe Mukwai”* I reply. The conductor of the last mini bus gets into a scuffle with others over who gets to take the passengers to their next destination as well as who gets the lion’s share of the kwacha. I am with my friend Chris who promptly leads me from the scuffle and into our new bus – I can still see two men outside brawling in the depot; one of the men grabs the others jacket and throws him to the ground. Upon entering the new mini bus the vendors are already becoming vultures – circling, making their rounds.

Mini buses do not leave on a set time. They are far more efficient when it comes to people per quantity of gasoline consumed than our Calgary city buses that run on fixed circuits. Mini buses only leave when they are full – what full means is questionable. I have been on ‘full’ mini buses with sixteen or seventeen people; however, I have also been on mini buses with twenty five people plus conductor and driver. Just like the jumbo buses that ferry us across the Zambian highway, the mini bus does not leave till it is full. Even if a bus is deemed full upon departure from the depot it will almost invariably pick up new riders along the road as it heads to its destination.

As I wait for the bus to disembark over and over I see a man carrying a plastic tub of baked goods – fritters perhaps – walk around the depot. No one ever buys anything from him and he has become lackadaisical in his sales pitch. Perhaps the sun has got to him? Or perhaps it is his lack of sales.

The mini bus begins to fill up quicker and quicker as the conductor boisterously promotes his vessel. In the back a baby is wailing; its cries shatter the scene entirely. Even amongst the horns and shouting outside this baby’s shrill cry is indomitable. Its mother whispers gently in Bemba; however, I am still learning the language and cannot discern what the words are. The baby continues to cry until we are fifteen minutes away from the compound; mother softly comforting the entire time.

*awe mukwai essentially means ‘no thank you’ in Bemba.

Stories from the field: Learning to listen to the voice of Dorothy

2009-05-23T05:05:00.013-06:00

{The first week with my partner has gone by incredibly quickly - I have spent some time in the field each day this week and would like to try and share some of these experiences as best as I can.these are some glimpses into what I have perceived when I visit communities for field work, take them with scrutiny and critical thought for they are just the perceptions of a volunteer}

{Dorothy is a term EWB uses to describe those who we work for. Who/what she embodies will vary from person to person. Who is my Dorothy? That is a tough question. I could say in my short time in Zambia I have met many men, woman, and children who are Dorothy to me. One is mentioned in this post}

The taxi is jostled on the red dirt roads to Mackenzie I am riding in the taxi with two others from my partner and one determined driver. The bumpy roads do not unnerve me anymore; I feel I have become accustomed to being thrown around in these toyota taxis the moment the car disembarks from a major road. Scraping sounds are common as the taxi bottoms out over the large pot holes, slopes, and cracks that dominate the hard red soil. In the rainy season are these roads washed away? Eventually we arrive in the community of Mackenzie - a peri-urban dwelling on the outskirts of Ndola.

Mackenzie is a far cry from many of the places I have seen thus far in Zambia. It is unlike the highway towns, unlike the small mud hut villages beside the highway, and unlike the massive cities of Ndola and Lusaka. My first sight is a borehole well and a small child using the hand pump to fill a small red container. This borehole sits outside a primary school for community children. One by one more children come to the borehole and begin to fill up all manners of plastic containers - yellow, blue, red - but mainly yellow.

I spent the morning in Mackenzie collecting field data ranging from answers for a questionnaire to water samples. I met a girl in one of the households we visited, whose name I wont include, and heard her story. I ask her if she speaks English, quietly she replies "I can try". She tells me her story - how her older brother does 'nothing' and how her younger brother and her try to go to school. She tells me her parents are 'gone' and that she takes care of her brothers. She can't be older than fourteen or fifteen. Her house is dimly lit - I nearly trip upon entering. There are no windows and no electricity. The only source of light is the sun, which barges in through the open front door and creeps in through cracks in the wall and the roof. She speaks softly with hope in her eyes but it is now time for our group to move to the next house. What will happen to her? She says she still goes to school - will she be able to finish? Where will life take her? How can I better listen to her and understand her stories? How can I learn from listening?

As I walk through the streets of Mapalo young children sneak up behind me yelling "Muzungu! Muzungu!" others yell "Yesu, yesu!" while others still call me "Rambo! Rambo". I turn around a wave, struggling to utter some Bemba, trying to communicate. In Mapalo as we meet with some community leaders sitting on small wooden stools on the porch of the RDC office little children gather around staring at me - as the RDC and I discuss the state of water and BSF in the community the attention I receive from the little ones gathered by the porch and across the street leaves me very uncomfortable. Little faces peering at me from across the street on a giant pile of dirt when they see me turn my head towards them they wave. I grin. They grin back. I am told that these children never see white people since their world is this small community - I am told that unlike North America where mothers and fathers take their children to market with them these children are left at home. Many do not go to school. It's a hard situation to understand and even harder to react to - how should a JF respond to hundreds of little eyes constantly staring with such perplexed looks on their faces?

My meetings with the people of Mackenzie and the leaders of Mapalo have helped me learn a lot about the state of water in these communities and how water and different water methodologies are perceived but I am still trying to learn how it all relates back to Dorothy. I need to spend more time in the community so I can learn how to listen to Dorothy's voice - from Dorothy and from those who represent Dorothy. I need to listen to the people like the girl I spoke of earlier so I can better understand the true realities of these communities.

Departures and Arrivals - chapter ii: Farewells and Beginnings

2009-05-17T13:09:00.010-06:00

The day finally arrived where our Southern African team would fragment - just as team Burkina and team SA split at the end of predep our SA team would split at the end of in country training.

On May 13th our good friends on the Burkina team parted ways with us at the airport; it was odd not having our francophone buddies hanging around anymore. (To everyone on team Burkina: bon voyage and safe travels! Be sure to stay in touch throughout the summer)

On May 17th the cycle of farewells continued as we, the Z-team, the Zambian JFs, the IDE +2.... - Well let's stick to the "Zambian JFs" for now - departed for our long journey to Lusaka and fragmented from the Malawi Muzungus. Splitting the team up was both exciting but also a little sad - I think we developed quite the team over the last two(ish) weeks and it'll be strange not having the group around.{ I'll be missing that distinct SA JF vibe that you all brought to the table (figuratively and literally). But it is also very exciting! So very exciting to see where everyone on the team will go as they walk the road that is their placement. - see you all at retreat!}

Traveling to Lusaka

We left bright and early - thanks for the send off Malawi! - and rode a mini bus to the Border. A mini bus is essentially an expanded mini-van. It was an EWB only mini bus since we had so many packs and quite a few bodies. The road was smoother than expected and I slept most of the way to the border. Colorful little villages dotted the roadside; villagers walked by the roadside, what they were doing I do not know, passing quickly into the distance along with their villages. Travel in Malawi feels fast. The wind gusts through every orifice on the mini bus creating a sensation of speed.

Suddenly the mini bus pulls to a halt - a Malawi police roadblock. It seems these police officers (army?) are camped by the road side. Our mini bus slowly crawls off the road and into the red soil - an officer approaches the vehicle and we all file out. I eye him cautiously and curiously - yet another road block...What might he be looking for? The open Malawi air refreshes my lungs and my legs are more than thankful to be off the mini bus. But before I can figure out what exactly just happened we are whisked back onto the bus. The bus grinds to life and heads to the open road at full speed.

We finally arrived at the border and bid farewell to our mini bus and its driver. It is nice to be outside of the bus but I feel very groggy. Immediately we are swarmed by money changers - they come to us in small groups or pairs offering us different rates for USD to Kwacha or Malawian Kwacha to Kwacha. They are enthusiastic and persistent - who are these men and how did they end up here? Every new experience leaves me with even more questions that I will be hard pressed to find answers to.

Crossing out of Malawian territory is very easy; a simple walk through a station and the team is no longer in Malawi. Crossing into Zambia is entirely harder in terms of paper work and financial transactions. It costs a good eighty dollars (USD) to enter Zambia - a small price to pay for the experiences we will all have - but it is still a large amount to spend all at once.

Walking out of the outpost we are greeted by more money changers. We fend them off and head towards taxis waiting to ferry us to town where we can find a bank and catch a bus to Lusaka. The road to town is full of detours due to construction efforts. Work crews and their red stone repair material dot the roadway. I am told that this is because the road was poorly constructed the first time and now the Zambian government must fix it. When we are on the main road the travel is fairly smooth - the pace is almost hypnotic and I have trouble staying awake; however, when the driver takes a detour the taxi bottoms out and we are all tossed a little. I'm jolted back to my senses every time a major road repair stands between the taxi and town. The scenery is very similar to Malawi but is gradually turning into hills and there are many more trees. Eventually we reach the Barclay’s Bank. Zambian style Kwacha, is something I will struggle to get used to. There is about 5000 Kwacha to a dollar - easy right? Except machines only give 50000 Kwacha notes and many people do not wish to change a 50. To put things into perspective the ride to Lusaka cost 115 000 K.

The bus was crowded and full of life - various people from all walks of life continued to pile onto the bus. In one row you might see a man in a sharp business suit and in another a woman in traditional style clothes - there is great diversity on the bus. Patience is an asset on the Zambian bus line as the bus doesn't have a set time of departure - it leaves when it is full. With our huge travel bags stowed and our tickets in hand we all headed onto the bus - tired, excited, and ready for the road ahead. The only remaining section that had enough seats for all of us was the back row so we all sat there. As the bus slowly reached maximum capacity we would hear the occasional engine jitter as the driver revved the bus up. Eventually the bus lurched to life and once again we hit the Zambian roadside. The first leg of the trip begins to blur in my mind amidst games of twenty questions, questions, and book talk. Eventually I succumb to my exhaustion and I am asleep.

When I wasn't dancing with the sandman the scenery I saw was far different than anything I have ever seen in Canada, but a little reminiscent of the rolling hills that I saw on the bus ride somewhere between Calgary and Tijuana so many years ago. {perhaps this nostalgia is actually nostalgia of being crammed into a bus?} Rich forests surround the road side – a sight different from what Malawi granted us. Villages are also further spread out. As I nod in and out of sleep the bus becomes more and more crowded. When I fell asleep I was sitting beside Mike Klassen, when I awoke a Zambian man was beside me. Buses continue to pick up passengers as they trudge towards their goal – in this case Lusaka. Different styles of music can be heard in the background: reggae, African pop, some western music too. Occasionally the same tune would loop two or three times – I even heard a rasta rewrite of the old song “where have all the flowers gone”. One time I awoke and heard a heated argument – apparently the bus had been stopped and it was necessary for some passengers to get off. Was it the police? I couldn’t tell. After a good twenty minutes the bus finally resumed and left a few passengers behind. Oddly there is little audible conversation on the buses when they are moving…

As we got closer and closer to Lusaka the sun began to set and a movie began to play… Arnold Swarzteneger’s Commando? Odd movie. It was pitch black when we arrived in Lusaka – we were once more swarmed by taxi drivers upon disembarking. We eventually regrouped at Kuomboka Backpackers, which is a hostel EWB volunteers frequent. The hostel is enclosed by walls and a large metal gate that slowly slides open - agonizing sounds of rusted metal scraping and lurching resound in accompaniment.Upon arriving we we were met by a group of OVS and some other Canadians and had a warm Indian meal waiting for us.

Kuomboka Backpackers is exactly what I picture in my mind when I think of a place expats would gather - only there are many more Zambians than expats. An outdoors bar is covered by a strawstyle roof - behind the bar is a Zambian barkeep who is busy getting beers and fantas from the fridge. A few men sit at the bar watching the tv anxiously; I think a soccer/football game was playing. In the corner is an expat writing in her notebook.

We all filed to the outdoors bar and began to unwind. Mark - a EWB OVS was there - and we were later joined by Hans and John (who brought the food... mmm!) I also met another Canadian named Marissa who is working on a highschool north of Ndola - perhaps I will get a chance to see this project.

Yet another day of travel had completed and it was time for sleep . . .

Intermission: A day in Lusaka

I was informed by Melissa that Esther, my counterpart with SHIP, would be leaving Lusaka on the 19th at 5:35 am. This meant that the 18th could be a day for me to catch up on sleeping, eating, and healing... and also explore Lusaka! A rooster kept cock-a-doodle-doing all night and kept a few of us awake. Every now and then the silence would be shattered by a boisterous and shrill shriek from the beak of a rooster... He reminds me of the rooster in Tijuana, who did the same thing... non stop. The next morning the IDE gang headed to IDE so Mike K and I hit the town and I was able to buy a cell phone, use an internet café, and even eat pizza. (about the pizza: we both thought it would be worthwhile to explore Zambian fast food… you know…. Enjoy something greasy one last time!) We got a whole meal deal for maybe 6 dollars, which wasn’t too bad.

My phone number is: 260 975192692

Lusaka seems a lot larger than Lilongwe but also a lot more developed – larger roads, more traffic, larger concrete buildings, more robots and so on. But ZAIN is still ever present… Even shoe stores are selling units. * in Southern Africa you buy a phone and a sim card – no contracts! You ‘top up’ at different stores by buying a little slip of paper with a number that when dialed adds minutes to your phone. What an enlightened way of doing business. North American cell phone companies should learn from this!*

After another night in Kuomboka I headed off to Ndola. (and yes the rooster was just as loud this night as he was the night before. Mike and I saw the rooster on our walk back into Kuomboka... Cocky little fellow)

Lusaka to Ndola

So this is it – the final fracture. I am now separated from the Southern JFs entirely. Mike K, Melissa, and I headed to the bus depot bright and early (5:20) – I was meeting Esther, and Mike was taking a bus to have his village stay which was arranged serendipitously at the last minute the night before. The bus ride to Ndola was much like the bus ride to Lusaka. We stopped in Kabwe on the way there – more people loaded onto the bus and the aisles are now crowded with luggage. There are Western Hip Hop, country, and pop tunes blaring in the background.

I am now in Ndola writing this from the SHIP house which has wireless internet. Tomorrow I will head to the field to conduct some data gathering. The room is silent aside from the occasional cell phone jingle that plays softly in the distance with a melancholy yearning. Silence is shattered by a pack of dogs howling and yelping – how close are they to the house? I can hear them closer and closer, perhaps it is my imagination. This current situation is so far removed from the EWB house, the airplanes and the hostels. The silence is unnerving after living in so many high energy environments. I once heard that Southern Africa lives and dies by the sun – it would seem this is true. When the sun is in full bloom the markets blossom with life and energy; however, once the sun is out of sight darkness prevails. The energy withers and dissipates and all that remains is the odd passerby and the dark scathing howling hounds.

Laughter in Lilongwe

2009-05-15T21:22:00.002-06:00

On our first evening in Lilongwe our team broke up into two - each half went to dinner at the EWB OVS' host family's home. I ended up going to the Adams' house for a traditional Malawi meal: Nshima!

The hospitality of the Adams family was phenomenal. They welcomed us into their home to share a meal and asked nothing in return. We were welcomed with great smiles and open arms. Their home was not too unlike that of a North American home - a family room, a kitchen, and a backyard with a garden (only this garden was growing some kind of crop). Their family room was equipped with a TV and adorned with some form of porcelain dogs (aha! Dogs that EWB volunteers can be near - no fear of rabies).

Before the Jfs headed into the kitchen to learn the art of Nshima we were given a GIGANTIC bowl of ground nuts. Ground nuts look like peanuts but taste fairly different; regardless I really liked trying them.

Nshima is the staple food in Malawi and Zambia - the best way I can describe it is that it is some sort of Maize porridge. It's cooked by adding maize meal to warm water and then stirring and then bowling and then adding more maize and stirring more and so on. Eventually a very thick porridge is in the pot that is scooped into portions. One portion of Nshima was huge! I could barely finish it. Mrs. Adams taught us how to test the water (dip the spoon and drop it on your hand, it needs to be a certain temperature) how to add maize and how to stir. She showed us all her different cook ware - my favourite was a GIANT Nshima stirring spoon. Sierra has a picture of it - I hope to post it soon. Nshima is eaten by rolling a ball in your right hand and then using it to scoop relishes. It's tasty, and despite the severe case of Nshima coma that follows I love it.

As I mentioned above the meal was humongous. I could barely finish the relishes and Nshima. Fish and chicken were also served - I did not partake in them though (vegetarian). I was told that in traditional Malawian culture the fish head granted wisdom and that woman are not allowed to eat the fish head. The punishment for eating the head was divorce.

The dinner was full of laughter and discussion - warm hospitality. The open sharing between the two groups was never too serious; it was happy and genuine. It was a great experience to be introduced to Malawian food and culture with such an amazing and friendly family. They cooked far more food than our group could devour and offered us to come and dine with them whenever any of us are in Lilongwe. I left the house feeling genuinely great and ready to learn more about Malawian culture – this meal was just the tip of the iceberg and I want to experience a lot more!

Awakening

2009-05-15T15:00:00.004-06:00

The markets of Lilongwe were a dry brush whipping away the chalk board lines of perceptions in my mind. No matter how much preparation I underwent, no matter how many articles I read in the early hours of the morning in the EWB house, no matter how many other volunteers I spoke with nothing could have prepared me for the sensory overload that was day one of in country training.

Day one: the market. The task? Scavenger hunt/on the ground on your feet learning.

The streets of Lilongwe are animated and lively; the city has a very organic feeling to it. Activity abounds on every street corner and every side street contains a rich narrative to learn from. The lesson that I learned? I am extremely out of place. I do not understand Lilongwe but I feel that Lilongwe understand me. She has seen my kind before - the wide eyed North American White Boy who walks her streets as a deer gazed by the headlights of its executioner. I stick out like a sore thumb in the way that I conduct myself and each interaction is full of mistakes – mistakes I hope to learn from! My knowledge of the local language is a mere trick bag, a few phrases and words that cannot sustain a conversation. But Lilongwe is happy to speak with me; those who walk her streets speak English and are willing to overlook my lapses in their language (Chichewa) and are in fact quite helpful. I hope that in my interactions I am as happy to listen as she is to speak. When exploring a clinic Vicki (U of R, IDE in Zambia), Colleen (U of S, District Assembly in Malawi) and I were approached by an extremely outgoing Malawian who insisted he teach us not only about Chichewa but also about Canada! He told us a story of how Christopher Columbus discovered Canada and the natives called the land "Kanada" and that it meant "our land". It may not be the most adept understanding of the history of Canada's discovery or its name but it was interesting to hear about home from a new friend.

Navigating the market became fairly easy but understanding it remained difficult. An immense network of human activity - deals, sales, shouting, laughing.... living! - abounded. Who are all these people? What are their stories? Where are they from? Stalls outside of more formalized shops make up the main street - fabric stores, tailors, food stores, wholesalers, currency changers, cell phone stores, and a massive mosque are just a few of the buildings you may see on the street. The "ZAIN" cell phone network signs are everywhere... mainly shops and buildings are painted bright paint. The ZAIN insignia boldly highlighting the building's pink paint job. But it was time to enter the real market; an interlocking framework of wooden shacks with vendors selling everything from chips (fried potatoes) to pirated DVDs. This market sprawls around the river - complete with its own set of twenty kwacha "private bridges". There was a plethora of produce too - bananas, tomatoes, avocado.... Crafts like necklaces were found around too. On the other side of the river was more of a flea market. Vendors carried items such as cell phone covers, cigarettes, towels, shirts (some of which had value village tags on them! - second hand clothes from North America are a common commodity brought over in bails), and practically anything else you could imagine were laid out on cardboard mats or on cloth sheets or under wooden roofs. Another experience was when my friend Colleen tripped - the near by woman laughed and told me to "look after" my wife.

Understanding the city of Lilongwe isn’t something I can accomplish in two days, or even three months. Learning the language isn’t something that can be done in a day. Integrating and living the local life is something I will be hard pressed to do in my three and a half month placement. I am now awake to the idea that there is no room for comfort zones and that for me to truly understand, learn, and grow I need to constantly challenge myself and push my boundaries. This awakening was a warm up – the pump has been primed. I hope to continue my cultural learning and to learn from my mistakes each day. I have arrived in Malawi and will soon be heading to Zambia with a heart full of a genuine desire to learn and to understand.

Until next time,

patrick

Departures and Arrivals - chapter i: walkin' down the line

2009-05-15T06:46:00.002-06:00

We left Toronto on the 13th after an amazing bon voyage party.

Toronto to Amsterdam

… and we’re off. The captain’s preflight speech is but a distant murmur – a mere whisper unable to phase through the internal anticipation. It is lost amongst the outwards excitement. The words linger but are not heard; we’re finally leaving on the first leg of our journey. A sudden acceleration and the airplane begins its ascent driving upward and defying gravity. Toronto becomes tinier and tinier as it fades into the distant grounds below.

So we’re finally off to Zambia/Malawi – we’re finally off. Since November when I found out I was selected to be the U of C’s JF this moment has felt to be unreachable. All the questions and excitement revolving around me leaving Canada created such an insurmountable divide between where I was throughout the year and departure. Even on the last day of predep departure felt like it was an eternity away. Until actually leaving the ground the idea of saying “fare-thee-well” to Canada was intangible, incomprehensible… an enigma. But as flight happened (and I say happened because aside from getting onto the plane flying is beyond my control) the idea of going to Africa entered the realm of the real and tangible. As the plane takes off a mind full of questions and a heart full of passion wait patiently for arrival. Farewell Canada.

Amsterdam to Nairobi

The expansive desert is unlike anything I have ever seen. For hours of flight it felt as though the plane lay suspended amidst the clouds; stationary above the eternal scene that lay below – endless deserts carved by winds and scorched by the sun. The desert was awe inspiring from the safety of the airplane as we soared at a pleasant altitude of 11900 m above sea level - frost on the airplane windows and not a drop of water to be seen on the ground. Down below there is a world of uncertainty; endless oceans of sand, a parched world so foreign to me…, a world so far outside of the realm of my understanding. An under booked plane was the luck that granted me a window seat, and a window seat is what granted me a looking glass into the world below. Amidst the dunes shaped by wind forever and forever what life blossoms? The static calm of the scene was abruptly disrupted by the occasional streaks – great snakes coiling through the desert – cutting their way between sand swept dunes. Who made these roads and where is it that they go? Further shapes would appear: great circles seen from above. What are these shapes in the sand? What are these concrete-grey compounds that occasionally appear below?

When imagination is granted a bird’s eye view into the unknown excitement and passion ignite. But as I watched from the safety of the airplane cabin I had a nose bleed. Nose bleeds normally aren’t a big deal; this wasn’t quite your ‘garden variety’ bloody nose, it was in fact a little worse. No problem. But add in some heavy turbulence coupled with the fact that I had only one napkin (it came with some apple juice) and an airplane nose bleed can be quite the experience. No Kleenex and no way to stand. It took about twenty minutes of nose pinching and turbulence before I was able to stand up – after this twenty minute span I was able to get some Kleenex and clean up. (to my friends at the Ucalgary chapter: aside from this experience and a slight cold no injuries or sickness yet! No malaria. No broken bones. No worries, right?)

As the flight from Amsterdam to Nairobi trudged on and on the desert was suddenly lost amidst clouds and more clouds. As surreal an experience as it was to look out of the plane and see the same landscape stretch as far as the eye can see it was almost more so to see the landscape vanish in an instant. Eventually once more the clouds would break, only this time a different landscape lay below. Lush green. Green everywhere. Forests? Jungles? I can’t tell for sure but green jumped off the ground and into the plane. Mountains and rolling hills could be seen as well. The foreign red sand of the desert had been replaced by a sprawling world of green. Soon we arrived in the Nairobi airport; where as Amsterdam's was synthetic Nairobi's had a quiet and subtle liveliness to it... And lots of book stores...

Nairobi to Lilongwe and Beyond!

Walking around the Nairobi airport felt electric to me. Despite my travel fatigue and a slight cold I had bounds of energy and a million thoughts racing through my head. Even after two long flights the energy of the group and within my heart was undeniable. Only moments after landing it finally hit me: "we're in Africa!". But not the part where we were all headed for. We still had time to kill in the airport - hackey sack was the culprit, time was the victim - the crime? murder one.

Walking in the open Kenyan air to our flight was another point of illumination - WE ARE IN AFRICA. The excitement diffused through the air. You could taste it - every face carried its own story of excitement.

The flight was an odd one - we flew from Nairobi to Lusaka before Lilongwe. The plane was practically an EWB flight both ways; a few other customers but around half of the fliers were EWB jfs. Upon touchdown in Lusaka I felt a desire to jump out of the plane and run to Ndola! The excitement of being so close after so long was unbearable. But in country training in Lilongwe was also an exciting prospect and so the plane once again began to sail the starlit sky to the warm heart of Africa: Malawi.

After thirty one hours of travel thirteen JFs landed in Lilongwe... Next stop the welcoming faces of the OVs and then the Golden Peacock. We landed at one in the morning and didn't arrive at the golden peacock till a bit later. On the way to the peacock - jammed into taxi cabs I was overwhelmed by the fact that I was finally in Malawi. My first sight of Lilongwe was a police blockade on the road - officers in tow with automatic rifles. Definitely something I have never seen.

The golden peacock is a please\ant rest house in Lilongwe; beautiful trees surround the house along with a green grass lawn which is apparently an oddity. There are showers! Hot showers... Tomorrow begins in country training - after a good sleep and a shower of course - but what awaits us on May 15th?

The Hurricane

2009-05-13T06:22:00.004-06:00

For me Predeparture was a challenge; it was reflection, learning, and growth embodied. As the week progressed it became a flurry of thought in my mind that reshaped perceptions and challenged assumptions… Predep was a hurricane.

There is no one way to describe predep and there is nothing to compare it to; it was unlike anything else I have ever experienced or probably ever will. For me it was a major turning point in how I perceived the JF program, EWB, development, and myself.

Imagine this: twenty three people living in the EWB house for one week. Twenty three people living under one roof. Twenty three people made up of two awesome office interns and two amazing JF teams. Sessions ran nonstop all day, and when I say all I day I mean it. Beginning normally at nine and ending around seven the days were jam packed. Sessions took different shapes including discussions, role plays and extended case studies. The topics covered were fairly diverse and ranged from workshops on health to discussion on what exactly poverty and development are. But that was just the tip of the iceberg; with each passing the day the concepts covered became more inherently challenging, more interactive, and more focused – they left me thirsty for more exploration and critical thought. I learned a lesson the first day: you get out of predep what you put into predep.

An activity that I really connected with was a role play where our team (Zambawi! / Zambia & Malawi) were each given a character from a rural village. The Burkina team were each given characters from an NGO that wanted to ‘help’ the village. The character I was given pushed my heart and mind in many ways. She was a thirty-something widow with three kids. She owned no land and was forced to be a hired hand on the farms of the wealthier. Given her status in the village I was not allowed to speak unless spoken to and was forced to lower my head in shame when speaking to men or others in authority roles. Once the roleplay began I immediately found I had little opportunity to share with the rest of the village my hopes and dreams. The first step of the role play was a village discussion – all the members gathered to discuss what to do with this NGO and what kind of ‘help’ we wanted. Being unable to speak up was frustrating; while other more prominent village members reiterated their thoughts over and over the voice of the poorest, my voice, was lost. I was only given two chances to speak and it was incredibly hard to hammer home the points my character wanted. When the NGO arrived this character could not speak – never was she spoken to, if we did would they listen? This made me think about Dorothy differently; yes we often consider her to be the marginalized and the poorest of the poor – a person who we should always keep in heart and mind. But it seems that we often assume that this voice is easy to hear and easy to listen to and that this voice will be triumphant and defiant and echo through the village. I think there is a perception that this voice seeks us out and that it will be easy to listen… But how can we help empower her if we do not listen? How can we listen if we can’t hear her voice when it is caught up in a cacophony of others? How can we amplify that voice for all the ears of the world to hear and understand?
Other activities/sessions included another role play – a behavior change one which again highlighted the complexities of NGO – Village interactions. Although these are of course just role plays and I will be interested to see the realities very shortly.

Integration. It’s an easy word to throw out and say it’s a goal that I want to have but how to go about it? What exactly is true integration? A session on integration sparked some debate and some ideas based on different situations. An idea on how to have deep integration vs. shallow integration is to constantly focus on human contact and not the superficial amenities. For example I am a vegetarian; if I was offered to eat local cuisine that contained meat I do not see eating the meat as being integrated or being open – I think true integration involves human contact, deep experiences, and discussion of culture, beliefs, and values. More on this in a later post.

An extended case study on Sorghum tied up the week; it involved analyzing an actual project proposal, presenting ideas on said proposal, and learning about participatory approaches. The capstone of the whole exercise was yet another role play where we broke into groups and interviewed EWB NO staff who were playing the role of farmers. Andrew, Annette, and I were a team and we tried to focus on asking questions that were more about the farmer and less about the key facts we wanted to obtain. It was a tricky exercise but I feel it was a good test of the skills we had developed thus far in a safe environment where good feeback and coaching is available. Key thoughts for me: focus in on the farmer and let the conversation reveal what is needed, and if that information doesn’t arise begin to ask more specific questions. Always remember it’s about the farmer/Dorothy and not about the sorghum.

If I was to talk about all the sessions and all the learning I gained from them through participation and reflection this post would be A LOT longer – these are just a few of the key points that are on my mind. But the learning and team building did not stop when the sessions stopped; walks back to the EWB house and to the Metro grocery store were full of conversations and fun. We prepared meals as a group, ate as a group, and traveled as a group. Between the sessions themselves and the fact that we were all living together and facing similar challenges a tightly knit group formed. Indeed for me predep was a hurricane – new and great friends, deep reflection, lessons learned, and critical thought. I think I’ll miss the EWB house and I know I’ll miss having the whole group together but it’s time to hit the road. The next step of the journey begins!

"SHIP"-ping off to Zambia

2009-05-01T16:38:00.000-06:00

In short order I'll step out of the familiar and into the unknown; I'll embark on a journey to a continent I've never set foot on. The landlocked Southern African nation of Zambia is my destination. In short order I'll step away from familiar and often snow covered Canadian soil and live under the Zambian sun. Preconceptions clouded by expectations and ignorance will give way to growing perspectives fostered by experiences in Zambia- perspectives that will grow under the Zambian sun.

My name is Patrick Miller - I'm twenty one years old and I study Civil Engineering at the University of Calgary. This summer I'll be shipping off to Zambia as part of the Engineers Without Borders Junior Fellowship program. EWB Canada is a charitable organization dedicated to creating a world of change by fostering growth of global leaders in Canada and participating in development overseas by learning and building capacity. The Junior Fellowship program presents a unique chance for Canadian university students to work and learn with partner organizations in one of the four nations EWB is involved in (Burkina Faso, Ghana, Malawi, and Zambia). Each EWB Chapter has the chance to send a JF and this year I will be representing the amazing University of Calgary Chapter!

The program involves four months of foundation learning before departure, four months of work and learning overseas, and eight months of sharing upon return. JFs strive to have impact in their country and sector by taking part in capacity building oriented development, to learn about development and poverty through first hand experience, and to drive change in Canada by sharing their experiences and the lessons they have learned- driving change by growing new perspectives amongst not only the EWB chapters they represent but also the Canadian public at large.

This summer a team of thirteen Junior Fellows from across Canada will be headed to Southern Africa. Seven of us will be in Zambia and six will be in Malawi.

The SA JF team: (from left to right) Front row: Sierra (Z), Vicki (Z), Tamara (M), Annette (M)
Back row: Ian (M), Me (Z), Mike H (Z), Colleen (M), Tony (Z), Mike K (Z), Rob (M), Deg(Z), and our awesome coach / support staff Melissa.

(Andrew (M) is not pictured)

Our team will be working in both of EWB's Southern African focus areas: Water and Sanitation (WatSan) and Agricultural Value Chains.

My placement is in the city of Ndola which is in the Copperbelt province of Zambia.

According to the United Nation's Human Development Index Zambia ranks 163rd/179; Zambia is a country facing numerous challenges in the twenty first century. In Ndola I will be working in the WatSan sector with an organization called "Seeds of Hope International Partnerships" (SHIP). The specific area I will be working on with SHIP is with regards to BioSand Filters.

EWB's WatSan work is divided into three focus areas:

1) Sanitation Behaviour Change

2) Operation and Maintenance of water access points

3)New Approaches and technology

My placement fits in with the third area in that it is dealing with the approach of integrating Biosand filters as a means to allow households to access clean water. Clean water is essential for a individual, household, or community to stay healthy and grow. BSF offers a way for clean water to be obtained at the household level. Not all communities have access to a bore hole or other improved water source so unsafe water sources may be the only way a community to get water. Biosand filters have the potential to treat contaminated water for human consumption. My understanding of my placement is that it will involve looking at the user perceptions of the BSF as well as how effective these filters are and how to best manage this information.

(a lighthearted BSF video demonstration! )

Throughout the summer I will be living and working around Ndola, a city located in the Copperbelt province. It is the home of approximately 374,757 people and has a rich history that is too much to explore in this introductory post. Where in/around Ndola I will stay I don't know; JFs typically stay with a host family or families during their placement. This is an experience I can't wait to have. I am very excited to see how my living arrangements take shape in Ndola.

In these four months in and around Ndola I hope to learn as much as possible about the local people; I want to experience their culture, learn from their life stories, and delve deep into everything that is Ndola..., witness everything that it means to be Zambian. Gaining these new perspectives will help me better understand the problems facing Ndola/Zambia, and hopefully help me be a more effective JF.

This blog will chronicle and reflect my experiences and changing perspectives in Zambia with SHIP. I plan to continually update this blog throughout my placement and I would love to have you all, the readers, accompany me on this journey. Is there anything you'd like to see in my blog? Have any questions? Any comments? Please let me know! I would love to hear from everyone and anyone either through comments on this blog or via email (patrickmiller@ewb.ca).

In mere days the familiar Calgarian scenery will fade away and be replaced by the Toronto skyline for pre-departure training which begins on May 6th. After an intense week(ish) of learning and training I will fly to Lilongwe in Malawi via Amsterdam and Nairobi (Kenya) and then it's off to Ndola!

Until next time,

-patrick