Okay, so here is my perception of this meal – not that of my coordinators', my teammates', nor the recipients of the meal; subjective value can be a beautiful thing.
Not here, but it can be.
It was wonderful for Big Chicken, Snow White, and Cinderella (our Burundian teammate) to give to one of their communities in a way that they appreciated. It was wonderful for us to be able to be with them, to watch them sing and talk together – it was wonderful, in short, to see the relationship which I see as the point of our program. As usual, resources were where the line got fuzzy, and fast. Small children gave way to big children, big men, and some coming back for seconds until we had basically a pushing mob on our hands. We had implicitly encouraged them to find creative ways to get food for themselves or save it for later, which is one way that manipulating others becomes normal...
...I watched the wandering toddler among a forest of knees. He had an empty little metal bowl – he must have been fed earlier, and a lot more than his little belly could handle, too. But he was clearly seeking more food. A young man asked me to give more. I refused, meeting his eyes and smiling, but instinctively shielding the rice behind me because I take orders better than any Nazi. I told him to share some of his with the toddler. He did. The little one patiently waited while his plate was filled, then tottered carefully into the outstretched arms of a teenager outside the makeshift enclosure – who took the food and hoisted him up on her back, where he rested, content...
What she did is not sin.
The fact that I watched, guarding more food, is.
I believe we collected the leftovers and took it back to Big Chicken's house, where he would probably share it with his neighbours so none would be wasted. But my reality is that I refused to give an old woman leftover rice from the giant pot at my feet because I had served my target group and she was not an intended recipient. The power was mine, mwa-ha-ha...
...There's a lesson in this somewhere, for all of us following rules and not really knowing what we're doing or why.
I've recently heard that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing poorly. And in a technical sense, yes – obviously some-thing is better than no-thing. But this relaxation of the old adage also goes against everything we've been learning about peacebuilding and humanitarian aid in developing countries – for example, that helping one group (hit harder by any natural or man-made disaster) may increase tensions in a given region. Within that framework, accepting a poor job just because it's a job is... difficult. I accept that any plan would have its flaws – if we'd somehow tried to feed the whole camp, others would have tried to sneak in, still creating a scuffle for food. And I am still grateful that Big Chicken wanted to do this and that I could be part of it. But to be able to see the flaws so clearly – to see how any shiny thing becomes a double-edged weapon in my hands – made me want to run from the glare of the sun, the shiny brown hands outstretched, and find a place to process my culpability.
Thankfully, the women and children had an all-out dance with us by our land cruiser and showered us with leaves and branches on the way out, so it was clear they bore us no ill will for not serving everyone. They know the rules too – they were just trying their luck. I blinked fiercely again – no tears, just pain.
“There are so many!! And probably increasing all the time,” I sniffed indignantly.
“Nope – around 650 families in 2008, and now just over 200. The rest have homes.”
“Well.” The flames of righteousness burning within my breast were still releasing hot air. “Well, it's horribly sad, so there! What do they do all day? The children should be learning!!”
“They are. There's a project for that.”
So maybe people had this under control. Maybe I didn't need to step in with my brilliant ideas for education and food. Maybe I needed to spit out the guilt I was holding under my acid tongue for the sake of others with an unerring capacity to see joy that I obviously lacked.
Luckily, I have a memory shorter than the fall of a guillotine, and usually with the same stifled snick of nasty laughter – dark humour and a single potato, respectively, preserved my psychological and physical health that afternoon. We were demanded a tourism tax on the way back out of the province, which would also have been laughable if I hadn't been entertaining visions of a tapeworm in my eye.
Right, I'll pay tax as a tourist the day you equip IDP camps with a roller coaster and cotton candy. And plates and adequate clothing. You malignant bashi-bazouks.
That night, I got on my first moto in months (other than two brief trips with BFG) and enjoyed a long, terrifically bumpy ride to a restaurant that served rabbit, Captain's main reason for coming to Goma. “You must be tired,” my moto driver laughed after one squawk too many, but he was wrong. It was the best part of the night, I thought as I squinted at the neon lights around us, listened to pounding music in the bar next door, and tried to avoid the insufferably knowing smirk of a gorilla statue behind our table.
That night was even more sleepless than I expected, what with mild agony every time I blinked. Though Cinderella had a giant bed and lovely heavy covers against the cold, I eventually gave up and camped on the couch in the living room, feeling sorry for myself and my blister. Dawn saw an unexpectedly early trip to the guest house where Grandpa, Captain, and Carrottop had stayed, instead of the moto directly to the port that I'd been looking forward to. A fellow passenger - far too excited and kind for that early in the morning, Butters thought - encouraged our team to find life partners in the Eastern Congo to keep as souvenirs.
We eventually made it to the boat, where I was faced with an erratically pulsing lightbulb that did even more damage to my eye than was already being enthusiastically done by a few bacteria – I adopted a couch far away and hoped to spend most of the trip in a spirited attempt to dig through cushions with my nose (hygiene aside) to give my eye the blessed relief of darkness. This was marred somewhat by my desire to watch sexy Tanzanian music videos of girls who wouldn't understand anorexia if it made them a Powerpoint presentation, and guys who really, really wanted to apologise for cheating but were sharing the same thesaurus. This was further marred by a small child who had decided to adopt me. Children are usually suspicious of my naturally menacing aura, but this one was hugging me, explaining a kung-fu movie to me, attempting to look up and down my shirt (that was an interesting 'Name That Body Part' game), and generally making a flaming nuisance of himself while his mom checked out her phone and likely reminisced about the single life. Eventually, in order to keep my eyeball from falling out, I had to ignore him, even though I think this is a faux pas in most Eastern cultures (though most Indians would be too incredibly paranoid to leave their children with such minimal supervision in the first place).
When we docked, I think I acted normal, though it's hard to tell because the sun seemed to be building a tire swing on my optic nerve. Even hearing my jam on the radio (Kamatia Chini - which I recently discovered means 'Touch Me Down There' and could account for at least half the Romeos I meet daily) didn't help. Thankfully, Butters was the only one who recognised that I seemed close to death (though perhaps not how close). If the worst happened, at least I could count on him to inform the others; I'd hate to have to tell them myself - it's so needy.
So I unpacked, waded to the nearby clinic in the middle of a storm mostly barefoot due to malfunctioning flipflops, waited two hours for an ophthalmologist, and now I'm ready to start my Christmas break.
Part I
Part II
Not here, but it can be.
It was wonderful for Big Chicken, Snow White, and Cinderella (our Burundian teammate) to give to one of their communities in a way that they appreciated. It was wonderful for us to be able to be with them, to watch them sing and talk together – it was wonderful, in short, to see the relationship which I see as the point of our program. As usual, resources were where the line got fuzzy, and fast. Small children gave way to big children, big men, and some coming back for seconds until we had basically a pushing mob on our hands. We had implicitly encouraged them to find creative ways to get food for themselves or save it for later, which is one way that manipulating others becomes normal...
...I watched the wandering toddler among a forest of knees. He had an empty little metal bowl – he must have been fed earlier, and a lot more than his little belly could handle, too. But he was clearly seeking more food. A young man asked me to give more. I refused, meeting his eyes and smiling, but instinctively shielding the rice behind me because I take orders better than any Nazi. I told him to share some of his with the toddler. He did. The little one patiently waited while his plate was filled, then tottered carefully into the outstretched arms of a teenager outside the makeshift enclosure – who took the food and hoisted him up on her back, where he rested, content...
What she did is not sin.
The fact that I watched, guarding more food, is.
I believe we collected the leftovers and took it back to Big Chicken's house, where he would probably share it with his neighbours so none would be wasted. But my reality is that I refused to give an old woman leftover rice from the giant pot at my feet because I had served my target group and she was not an intended recipient. The power was mine, mwa-ha-ha...
...There's a lesson in this somewhere, for all of us following rules and not really knowing what we're doing or why.
I've recently heard that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing poorly. And in a technical sense, yes – obviously some-thing is better than no-thing. But this relaxation of the old adage also goes against everything we've been learning about peacebuilding and humanitarian aid in developing countries – for example, that helping one group (hit harder by any natural or man-made disaster) may increase tensions in a given region. Within that framework, accepting a poor job just because it's a job is... difficult. I accept that any plan would have its flaws – if we'd somehow tried to feed the whole camp, others would have tried to sneak in, still creating a scuffle for food. And I am still grateful that Big Chicken wanted to do this and that I could be part of it. But to be able to see the flaws so clearly – to see how any shiny thing becomes a double-edged weapon in my hands – made me want to run from the glare of the sun, the shiny brown hands outstretched, and find a place to process my culpability.
Thankfully, the women and children had an all-out dance with us by our land cruiser and showered us with leaves and branches on the way out, so it was clear they bore us no ill will for not serving everyone. They know the rules too – they were just trying their luck. I blinked fiercely again – no tears, just pain.
“There are so many!! And probably increasing all the time,” I sniffed indignantly.
“Nope – around 650 families in 2008, and now just over 200. The rest have homes.”
“Well.” The flames of righteousness burning within my breast were still releasing hot air. “Well, it's horribly sad, so there! What do they do all day? The children should be learning!!”
“They are. There's a project for that.”
So maybe people had this under control. Maybe I didn't need to step in with my brilliant ideas for education and food. Maybe I needed to spit out the guilt I was holding under my acid tongue for the sake of others with an unerring capacity to see joy that I obviously lacked.
Luckily, I have a memory shorter than the fall of a guillotine, and usually with the same stifled snick of nasty laughter – dark humour and a single potato, respectively, preserved my psychological and physical health that afternoon. We were demanded a tourism tax on the way back out of the province, which would also have been laughable if I hadn't been entertaining visions of a tapeworm in my eye.
Right, I'll pay tax as a tourist the day you equip IDP camps with a roller coaster and cotton candy. And plates and adequate clothing. You malignant bashi-bazouks.
That night, I got on my first moto in months (other than two brief trips with BFG) and enjoyed a long, terrifically bumpy ride to a restaurant that served rabbit, Captain's main reason for coming to Goma. “You must be tired,” my moto driver laughed after one squawk too many, but he was wrong. It was the best part of the night, I thought as I squinted at the neon lights around us, listened to pounding music in the bar next door, and tried to avoid the insufferably knowing smirk of a gorilla statue behind our table.
That night was even more sleepless than I expected, what with mild agony every time I blinked. Though Cinderella had a giant bed and lovely heavy covers against the cold, I eventually gave up and camped on the couch in the living room, feeling sorry for myself and my blister. Dawn saw an unexpectedly early trip to the guest house where Grandpa, Captain, and Carrottop had stayed, instead of the moto directly to the port that I'd been looking forward to. A fellow passenger - far too excited and kind for that early in the morning, Butters thought - encouraged our team to find life partners in the Eastern Congo to keep as souvenirs.
We eventually made it to the boat, where I was faced with an erratically pulsing lightbulb that did even more damage to my eye than was already being enthusiastically done by a few bacteria – I adopted a couch far away and hoped to spend most of the trip in a spirited attempt to dig through cushions with my nose (hygiene aside) to give my eye the blessed relief of darkness. This was marred somewhat by my desire to watch sexy Tanzanian music videos of girls who wouldn't understand anorexia if it made them a Powerpoint presentation, and guys who really, really wanted to apologise for cheating but were sharing the same thesaurus. This was further marred by a small child who had decided to adopt me. Children are usually suspicious of my naturally menacing aura, but this one was hugging me, explaining a kung-fu movie to me, attempting to look up and down my shirt (that was an interesting 'Name That Body Part' game), and generally making a flaming nuisance of himself while his mom checked out her phone and likely reminisced about the single life. Eventually, in order to keep my eyeball from falling out, I had to ignore him, even though I think this is a faux pas in most Eastern cultures (though most Indians would be too incredibly paranoid to leave their children with such minimal supervision in the first place).
 |
| I wasn't able to take pictures, but this is a fair representation of what I saw on the way back |
So I unpacked, waded to the nearby clinic in the middle of a storm mostly barefoot due to malfunctioning flipflops, waited two hours for an ophthalmologist, and now I'm ready to start my Christmas break.
Part I
Part II
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