"wend na lokke..." this is the phrase i have been told to say to the women and children who approach the americans in the streets or in the markets with their hands open, waiting for us to give them money. "god will provide..."
i know how hollow these words sound, even as i apologetically say them. their response is always the same - a nod, and then it is back to whatever they were doing before they spotted the white people.
my skin color alone here carries the connotation that i am somehow extraordinarily rich. we are the americans, the "nasarah", and no matter how much we try to explain that we are volunteers and do not make a lot of money, people still perceive us as wealthy.
requests for handouts were primarily confined to the streets in the bigger cities, where we are relatively anonymous, but in the last few days in our host villages, many volunteers have begun to feel the pressure for handouts from a much closer source. as people in our village realize that we will soon be leaving for our new sites, they are eager to find out what we will leave behind...and all-too-eager to make specific requests. some families have merely asked for clothes, others for electronics, but one family, fully buying into the rich american stereotype, asked a volunteer to help them purchase a moto-pump (used to irrigate a garden or field), which costs almost 2000 american dollars. this may not sound like that much money if you live in america, and it is actually a purchase that would get a lot of good use here...but we earn about $3 per day during training...it would take us the full two years here to buy one.
i do not begrudge any of our host families the right to ask for anything, and i most certainly do not resent them for trying. their requests do not come from an offensive place, just from a genuine belief that we have a lot to give away. it is still difficult, though, to hear them, because i know how difficult it is going to be to overcome the wealthy stereotype, even with burkinabé with whom i have a close working relationship, and that can definitely stunt my progress here.
aside from the work and progress aspect, it is even more difficult to hear these requests on a personal level, as someone who so badly wants to help. how do i make the feeble attempt to explain to my host family that i actually need all of the things in my suitcase for the next two years, knowing that it is more than most of them will own in their lifetime? and how do i look someone in the eye and tell them "god will provide", knowing that they will probably not eat dinner that night?
i cannot help but feel like a total hypocrite. i claim that i am here to help, but then i blatantly deny requests from people who actually need it. in the face of such poverty, i feel a certain obligation to give what i can, and i have a hard time reconciling with myself that i do not have a lot of material possessions to give here, and that i must leave them empty handed. this internal struggle will probably never be fully resolved, and it is one that i am sure i will return to many times in my two years here.
to maintain sanity, i must force myself to be realistic, as difficult as it may be.
i could leave my suitcase with my host family, and neither one of us would be any better off for it. the clothes would be used, until they were worn beyond recognition and became compost. the electronics would be used until the batteries wore out, then they would become just hunks of metal and plasic, used for something unrelated to their original purpose. my books, sadly, would become fuel for cooking fires, as very few people can read, and those who can do not do so in english. the signs of all my stuff would not last longer than a couple of months.
i could similarly start emptying my pockets to all those who ask on the streets. the contents, with my pockets not being as deep as burkinabé think they are, would send them to bed with full stomachs for a few nights, then it would be back to their hand to mouth existence. in the meantime, i would likely be shipped home, as i am pretty sure the peace corps frowns upon volunteers living penniless on the streets of burkina.
for me to think that this kind of a handout is the way to make a positive difference is completely antithetical to everything i have ever complained about with respect to the effectiveness of foreign aid. these contributions, though well-intentioned, would join the countless amounts squandered by organizations that chose to throw money at projects in lieu of actually doing something.
although this kind of rationalization makes sense in my head, it does not make it any easier to shake my head at someone asking for help. i cannot just walk around with blinders on.
this, i hope, is where my work will start to come in to balance out what i will actually leave in my community. i have quoted this tired old proverb before, and it seems fitting to do so again: "give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime."
in my host village, the other volunteers and i held a series of community meetings about malnutrition where we taught women recipes for enriched porridge for malnourished children, and the importance of varying one's diet beyond the traditional staples (sounds simple enough, but you would be surprised what was considered to be a well-balanced meal). slowly, but surely, some of these dietary changes have started to take off in village. in meeting with village teens to have an open discussion about AIDS, we were able to dispel a lot of harmful myths about how the virus is and is not transmitted, and the proper ways to protect oneself (two condoms are NOT better than one).
i can only hope that this type of information will long outlast anything that i could leave from my suitcase or pockets. i do not have the resources to give a fancy moto-pump, and i do not have a lot of money...but i have to hope and try to believe that information that can potentially prevent a child from being malnourished, or prevent yet another person from contracting AIDS, will be more valuable.
i cannot stop my heart from aching when i pass an outstretched hand in the street...but i can try to teach things, and implement changes that will keep those little hands healthy, and on a path to self-sufficiency where they will no longer need to rely on handouts.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Sunday, November 05, 2006
the land that globalization forgot
coming from the "land of plenty" i am used to being able to find anything i want at any time of day. if i want fruits or vegetables that are out of season, my local grocery store will order them from a country that produces year round. if i want clothing designed in europe, someone will manufacture it in taiwan and then make it available to me at a store down the street. when i wanted to buy an ipod, someone in california designed it, then someone in china assembled it before i bought it in wisconsin. anything that i perhaps had trouble finding in the store was available within 4-6 days from sellers all over the world on ebay.
i studied this globilization phenomenon in college, and seeing it through my american lens, i naively thought that the term "global-ization" implies that it is a concept that is applicable to all parts of the world. living in burkina faso, however, has caused me to rethink this.
in my own small village, anything that people need, they make. they do not order food from other countries, or buy clothing and electronics from china in a store; they produce what they need, and, for the most part, if they cannot produce it, they do not have it.
although i have studied subsistence economies, it is so strange to be living in one. breakfast, lunch, and dinner come from the fields, whether that means millet, or vegetables, or even goats, depends on the time of year and on the rain. the neighboring village of youba has a small marché every few days and people can go there to get fruit, seasonally, and things like oil and salt and some very limited amounts of spices (my host family loads piment, an extremely spicy red powder, onto my food because it is one of the only spices available here). clothing also comes from these types of markets, mostly in big, bright, colorful patterned cloths called pagnes that are made into skirts and head wraps for women, and long pants-suit type outfits for men.
one might think that my village is a sort of extreme example because of its small size, but the volunteers staying in other bigger villages report similar experiences...the concept of globalization is not something that has really caught on in burkina faso.
however, as i am sitting in front of an hp computer, while celine dion plays from a radio in the background (groan), with a nokia cell phone in my pocket, in the middle of ouahigouya, i must admit that globalization is not entirely lost on burkina. it is, though, a much less prevalent force, meaning that there are certain things that i took entirely for granted in the states that ceased to exist once i stepped off of the plane.
this idea was reinforced even more on a recent trip to the capitol. some of the volunteers who have been here for over a year told us about a big store called "marina market" in the middle of the city that carries the most products for westerners in the entire country. they are often referred to as "white people stores" by locals. after being in village for a week, walking into this store was like disneyland. there were even other western-looking people, meaning that i was not the focus of attention, or yells of "nasarah!"...i just blended. i wandered down the aisles happily looking at all the european products, breathing a sigh of relief that there was at least one location in the country where i could find things to get me through the next two years.
after a few minutes, however, the american part of my brain that is used to the convenience of a global society kicked back in. as i looked through the soaps and shampoos, it hit me that this is the biggest store in burkina faso...and it has less selection than the teeny walgreens that i used to complain about on campus.
burkina's failure to globalize, (or perhaps, the failure of the rest of the world to globalize burkina) unfortunately, does not just add up to little inconveniences, like not having my favorite shampoo, but can also contribute to already existing problems.
in the health sector, for example, medical equipment is just simply not found here. (mom and dad, i know you can appreciate this reference) in villages, if someone breaks a bone, they are not going to get an x-ray, pregnant women have never even heard of ultrasounds, and the only heart monitoring device for a sick person at the CSPS is a family member sitting on the floor next to their bed.
this also, sadly, translates to something as simple as food. in a subsistence economy, when there is not enough rain, or when something runs out...that's it. last week, the host families of all the volunteers in my village stopped serving bread for a couple of days, and when someone asked about it, the response was, "c'est fini." although bread returned from being "fini" a few days later, it was a rude awakening to me that the village cannot find simple foods for a large part of the year, and unlike most societies, they cannot simply import what they are unable to produce.
from my experience, this failure to globalize is not due to burkina's disinterest in sharing in what is going on in the rest of the world. each time i bring out something from home, my host family is fascinated by it, and eager to learn more about the united states. my host brother marveled at my ipod, and even at my nalgene simply because it bears the label "made in usa." people on the streets, even in big cities, are so happy to see us, and talk to us just because we are from a different country.
the sad and cynical conclusion that must be drawn, then, is that burkina is interested in globalizing, and interested in the rest of the world, but the rest of the world is just not interested in burkina.
burkina is an amazingly beautiful country; its people deserve better than disinterest, and it deserves a place in the global economy. i hope that my cynical conclusion will eventually prove to be wrong.
i studied this globilization phenomenon in college, and seeing it through my american lens, i naively thought that the term "global-ization" implies that it is a concept that is applicable to all parts of the world. living in burkina faso, however, has caused me to rethink this.
in my own small village, anything that people need, they make. they do not order food from other countries, or buy clothing and electronics from china in a store; they produce what they need, and, for the most part, if they cannot produce it, they do not have it.
although i have studied subsistence economies, it is so strange to be living in one. breakfast, lunch, and dinner come from the fields, whether that means millet, or vegetables, or even goats, depends on the time of year and on the rain. the neighboring village of youba has a small marché every few days and people can go there to get fruit, seasonally, and things like oil and salt and some very limited amounts of spices (my host family loads piment, an extremely spicy red powder, onto my food because it is one of the only spices available here). clothing also comes from these types of markets, mostly in big, bright, colorful patterned cloths called pagnes that are made into skirts and head wraps for women, and long pants-suit type outfits for men.
one might think that my village is a sort of extreme example because of its small size, but the volunteers staying in other bigger villages report similar experiences...the concept of globalization is not something that has really caught on in burkina faso.
however, as i am sitting in front of an hp computer, while celine dion plays from a radio in the background (groan), with a nokia cell phone in my pocket, in the middle of ouahigouya, i must admit that globalization is not entirely lost on burkina. it is, though, a much less prevalent force, meaning that there are certain things that i took entirely for granted in the states that ceased to exist once i stepped off of the plane.
this idea was reinforced even more on a recent trip to the capitol. some of the volunteers who have been here for over a year told us about a big store called "marina market" in the middle of the city that carries the most products for westerners in the entire country. they are often referred to as "white people stores" by locals. after being in village for a week, walking into this store was like disneyland. there were even other western-looking people, meaning that i was not the focus of attention, or yells of "nasarah!"...i just blended. i wandered down the aisles happily looking at all the european products, breathing a sigh of relief that there was at least one location in the country where i could find things to get me through the next two years.
after a few minutes, however, the american part of my brain that is used to the convenience of a global society kicked back in. as i looked through the soaps and shampoos, it hit me that this is the biggest store in burkina faso...and it has less selection than the teeny walgreens that i used to complain about on campus.
burkina's failure to globalize, (or perhaps, the failure of the rest of the world to globalize burkina) unfortunately, does not just add up to little inconveniences, like not having my favorite shampoo, but can also contribute to already existing problems.
in the health sector, for example, medical equipment is just simply not found here. (mom and dad, i know you can appreciate this reference) in villages, if someone breaks a bone, they are not going to get an x-ray, pregnant women have never even heard of ultrasounds, and the only heart monitoring device for a sick person at the CSPS is a family member sitting on the floor next to their bed.
this also, sadly, translates to something as simple as food. in a subsistence economy, when there is not enough rain, or when something runs out...that's it. last week, the host families of all the volunteers in my village stopped serving bread for a couple of days, and when someone asked about it, the response was, "c'est fini." although bread returned from being "fini" a few days later, it was a rude awakening to me that the village cannot find simple foods for a large part of the year, and unlike most societies, they cannot simply import what they are unable to produce.
from my experience, this failure to globalize is not due to burkina's disinterest in sharing in what is going on in the rest of the world. each time i bring out something from home, my host family is fascinated by it, and eager to learn more about the united states. my host brother marveled at my ipod, and even at my nalgene simply because it bears the label "made in usa." people on the streets, even in big cities, are so happy to see us, and talk to us just because we are from a different country.
the sad and cynical conclusion that must be drawn, then, is that burkina is interested in globalizing, and interested in the rest of the world, but the rest of the world is just not interested in burkina.
burkina is an amazingly beautiful country; its people deserve better than disinterest, and it deserves a place in the global economy. i hope that my cynical conclusion will eventually prove to be wrong.
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