Hey y'all.
We left off in Arusha
I'm just back from Zanzibar, which was beautiful and so cultural. But that'll have to wait...
Where to start?
Happy Ramadan!
I love asking muslims here if they're hungry - they get a kick out of it.
Anyways, I went to the village last Monday. I arrived and checked up on old projects and old friends. I stayed in a different house than I did last year. Outreach (the NGO I worked with last year) finished some teachers houses next to the Secondary School they're sponsoring with electricity and running water; so I lived there with a lady named Naomi.
Being in the village is different. You're afforded more of a rock-star status than in the cities here. In a village where everyone is some shade of brown being white makes you a spectacle no matter what. This means you get treated differently. Of course you still get the various people who ask you for things, but then you also get people who want to buy you a coke, or have you sit at the "seat of honor" or simply say hello. I know this is asking too much, but I feel like i've identified the root of much of my origianl frustration. It sounds cliche, but I just want to be treated like one of them. The greatest hope of every liberal, open-minded Anglo-Saxon is to "live like they do". To be able to experience an authentically different and simpler pace of life - while still being able to return to the excesses of modern living. This is one of the reasons I enjoy studying language. Although you're probably never going to achieve "being one of them" you're hopeless without being able to speak their native language.
Anyways, let me just describe a few experiences that stand out from my time spent in the village. First bad, then good.
On the 3rd day in the village. A lady who works for Outreach, Naomi, asked me if I wanted to go with her to Kinampuntu - one of the 5 villages in the county. I thought this would be a good way to save on gas, as she has to drive the "port - a -doc" (mobile pharmacy). Well I get in and then another man, Raymond, has to drive, so that makes 3 and then Naomi's 2 daughters get in as well. I'm asking myself, Why do we need 5 people to go out to give vaccinations in the Kinampuntu? Then we arrive in Singa (another village) and we pick up 2 more nurses. Now there's 7 of us sitting in the front and back of an ambulance truck made for 2. The radio is blaring Congo music and I'm asking myself, "what is Outreach paying for?" It's paying for gas and an expensive car, so 6 Tanzanians can joyride and listen to music!? Well, if you know me, you'll know that i'm not the best at saying what's on my mind; although I'm not good at hiding when I'm upset either...so people obviously see I'm upset, but they don't know why, and I don't bother to tell them.
When we arrive in Kinampuntu Raymond and I go to visit a boy we bought a wheel chair for last year while Naomi and her 4 helpers inject babies and distribute medecine. We get to the house and he's not there, but someone goes to find him. We see him coming, and as soon as he comes up to the house where we are sitting the chair tips tips on its right side and he falls out. When we first bought him the wheel chair he was a little unsteady while using it. I think he wanted to impress me with his improvement, but got a little carried away. So I'm feeling sorry for him, while Ray is helping him back into the chair. Then I ask him and his Dad if anything's wrong with the chair? They say there's been no major problems, which is a huge relief, because I didn't have high hopes for the longjevity of the chair in a village where the roads are made of rock and dirt and it rains everyday for 3 months. Then the Dad starts to ask me for shoes for the kid. I say, I'm only here to visit and our group doesn't have anymore money. Then he says the oil for the chain is running out. I say, can you get it in the village? To which he replies, yes. So, I say, you all shouldn't have a problem getting it then.
By this point I'm getting fed up. I'm saying to myself. We spent $230 to buy this kid a wheel chair, and if he can't find the $1.50 to buy some new chain grease; then what was the point in the first place? Sure I could give it to him, but is it just going to be futile? Was the whole thing futile? In one of my finer moments I say, Isn't that a piece of capital? Can't he use it to take some produce from the farm, take it into the village and sell it?
So Ray and I head back to where Naomi is pin-pricking babies, and then a man greets me. He says he's a bicycle repair-man. I tell him we just visited the boy who rides the bicycle wheel-chair. To which he replies, "Oh yes, that boy needs a spare tire, can you give it to him?" I say, you know, if I have to buy everything for him, then how is he ever going to rely on himself? By this point I'm angry, but I didn't know the word for angry in Swahili. So I say, you know, when I walk around in Tanzania, every day, every hour, every minute someone asks me for something. When they do that it makes me want to hit people (my translation for angry). Ray and the Repair man both laugh, which just makes me more angry, because it seems like they don't believe me. So, I say, FUCK ALL of THIS!
I'm sick of being a foreigner. I'm sick of talking to my "friends" who ask me for for things. I'm sick of wasting gas and joyriding in the car when I could have just taken a bus or a bicycle or walked. I'm getting out of here. So, I tell Ray, I'm going to walk to Iambi - about 4 miles away, "where nobody knows your na-ame". He says I shouldn't go, he says it's dangerous, why don't I just ride in the port-a-doc. I keep on walking. He gets Naomi and they plead together for me to get in the car, I keep on walking. I tell them, "Quit wasting your gas and your time on me. I'm going to walk." Finally they leave me alone and I'm out on my own - or so I think.
Then the bicycle repair man comes up to me and says, "I'm sorry if I disturbed you, I didn't mean to. The village leader was nagry with me, he said, what id you say to our foreign friend?" SO by now I'm thinking, great, I'm going to get this guy in trouble just for trying to "take the road less traveled". WEll, I write a note absolving him of any responsibility for my bad mood ( I am a moooody person). ANd tehn I keep on walking.
This guy, bless his well-intentioned bones, keeps following me on his bicycle. I sit down for a bit under the few shaded tress around and he takes out his bucket (he's about 100 m away) and shows me some water he just fetched because I was thirsty. I keep on walking, but this time I run to a mango tree and jump on its branches and wait. I wait until people give up and i can be ON my Own again. I wait after 30 minutes or an hour or so and pass the time by destroying a termite colony that was overtaking the mango tree. Hmm, i'lve lost steam again, and I'm sure - You - Dear REader, has already fallen asleep.
Where to end?
I'll maybe post some other time about the good
theres good i swear
i'm not a miser i swear
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