“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

~Mark Twain

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

As I promised, more Fote at the well kind of stories...

I now know what fear looks like. I was hanging out at the pump, waiting my turn to fill my container up with drinking water when a woman came in with her son. He was probably 1 year old. The moment he saw me, his eyes widened with fear. You would have thought that he happened upon a bloody, axe wielding murder with only half a face and an exposed brain. Honestly, I have never seen such pure fear. After he overcame the original shock and was able to move/breathe again he started crying and screaming at the top of his lungs and pulling his mom to get away from me. She took him out to calm him, but then came back in…and repeat scene. I think it is a pretty normal reaction to seeing your first white person. Apparently, they plan to torture him by telling him the Fote is coming to visit. Good. I am the Guinean Boogeyman.

Sunday morning I woke up at the crack of dawn thanks to roosters, some sheep, and the ever-present call to prayer. Waking up that early meant that I had many hours to pass before it was late enough that people in the US would be online and so my going to the internet cafĂ© to skype would be worth anything. I decided to pass the morning by doing laundry. I did not have too much to do, but really wanted to wash my sheets. They are white so you can see the dirt outline of a body where I sleep. Our well was dry but my family had already filled their basin so they gave me buckets of water from that to do my wash. Just as I had finished the last bit, feeling really good about myself because I was not exhausted and was only bleeding from 2 fingers, I heard the sharp intake of a breath. My sister, in trying to make the line a little longer, had dropped all of my freshly washed laundry into the dirt. Damp laundry and dirt that has not been rained upon in months is the antithesis of oil and vinegar, whatever that is. All my clothes were now brown. My sheets were an absolute disaster. I would have to start all over. And our well was dry. We collected all of the buckets in the house and went down the road some ways to the next well. My mom decided that I would get water for my laundry and refill the basin at the same time. So we pulled up buckets and buckets of water. I was photographed on a cell phone and I carried the biggest buckets of water that I have thus far attempted, back to my hut on my head. After three trips and exhausted back muscles, I bent back over the board and went to work. Pockets of dirt had collected in the corners of my fitted sheet. Nothing would get it clean. Eventually we settled on hanging everything to dry and then beating the dirt out when it was dry. It worked. Not fabulously, but it worked. I am happy to say that not only did I not cry when I saw all my fresh clothes sitting in the dirt, I did not even want to cry. I had no tears welling in my eyes. Crying did not seem rational. I reacted the way any African woman would. Set backs are just a part of life. In the immortal words of Shakira, “You’re a good soldier, choosing you battles, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, get back in the saddle…When you fall get up oh oh, and if you fall get up eh eh, samina mina Zangalewa. Cuz this is Africa”. I just watched the last episode of Modern Family Season 2 and they say that all speeches should just be song lyrics put together so I am hoping the same applies to blogs.

P.S. I added pictures to the photos page but they are below the old photos

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

The World Has Become a Village


Today, I was discussing access to credit with members of my organization. Having read “Banker to the Poor” by the father of Micro-Finance, Mohamed Yunis, I had glowing admiration for the industry. Unfortunately, over the years, microfinance has become like any other profitable industry. It is, and has to be, focused on the bottom line. Although, most institutions do not require tangible collateral, they make up for this risk by having prohibitively high interest rates. I was told that the cost of a loan makes the poor, poorer. So, this led to a conversation on credit in the United States. Is it easy to get a loan? Can you get good rates? Does having a college degree help you get a better rate? Ect. Of course this led to a discussion on how credit was too freely available and how that has led to the current economic crisis. My colleagues knew a surprising amount of information about the situation in the US. When I asked if they have been following it in the news, one said, “Of course, the world has become a village”. He explained that there was a Chinese mining company that was heavily invested in the US. When our economy down turned at the same time as the global demand for their minerals, they decided to pull out of Guinea because investment dollars were short. So because of the US economic crisis, this man’s Guinean friend lost his job. I don’t think a single business class I have ever taken has explained globalization so succinctly. In the U.S., we say “The world is flat” mostly because of the popular book by that title, but also because it fits into our collective cultural knowledge. We all know that one of the reasons Christopher Columbus set out on his fateful voyage was to prove the world was round by going to India the other way. This cultural tidbit means almost nothing to the people in Guinea so they have based their saying on something culturally appropriate for them. The world is a village. Everyone knows each other’s business, if there is a bad harvest then everyone suffers, and Ousman can sell his product to any person in the village. I know that this shouldn’t surprise me, but it did. It is the basis of the Peace Corps method of development. I have been frustrated because I am supposed to be doing a community study until May when I am anxious to get down to work, but without this period of time to absorb, you miss the crucial ability to culturally (not only linguistically) translate what you want to share.

I know my last few posts have been serious “I do work in economic development, blah, blah, blah” kind of posts. I promise that it will not remain overly serious and get back to “Fote at the Well” kind of stories. The third goal of the Peace Corps is to encourage cultural understanding on behalf of the host country on the part of Americans so I am trying to get in a spoonful of actual sharing / learning every couple of posts. 

Monday, February 20, 2012

Speeding Towards the Future


The other day I was talking to a volunteer who is finishing up her service in May. We were joking about how far behind she will be in terms of technology. Her Blackberry, which here is seen as a very snazzy phone, will probably be most useful as a paperweight when she gets back. Looking at my ipad, she remarked that tablets were just coming out when she left. Now it is a full-blown market with new models coming out regularly from multiple sources. This got me thinking about what will be out on the market in two years when I return. I read an article that the biggest advances of the last 50 years were not nearly as huge as from the previous 50 years. My grandparents’ generation saw cars, televisions, vaccines, commercial airlines, and the atom bomb*. Life was drastically different at the end of their life from what it was at the beginning. Recent groundbreaking inventions include the Internet and the Internet. Everything else is more evolution than revolution. This article said the main advancement of the modern era was instead the rate of technological advancement. Every day, current technology is evolving at a faster rate than the day before so in two years this volunteer missed tablets. Where will the world be after my two years?

And then I look around. There are times when one could easily forget that Guinea is also living in 2012. When you see a woman wearing a pagne (a traditional wrap around skirt) pounding manioc root into powder with a wooden mortar and pestle while the pot is heating water over a wood fire; or when you see a girl walking back from the well, down a dirt path, with a bucket of water on her head and a baby on her back we really could be at any point in the last 200 years. Of course there are also places where you can get on the internet, where the roads are paved. In Dubreka, I saw a brand new Porsche. Cell phones are everywhere. Since I am in a city, there are cars and mopeds all around. So Guinea has not taken the linear approach to development that we are used to in the US. There are many parts of it (usually and unfortunately the parts concerning women) that remain dangerously (ex: vaccinations, waste management, wells, traditional latrines, wells way to close to latrines) in the past. Then there are parts that are almost right up there with Europe in the United States. Well they are really about ten years behind but if you can picture these services as they were in 2002 you will be able to see Guinean usage of cell phones and websites.

With the exponential rate of technological advancement and the ever decreasing size of the world, it does not take a big leap of the imagination to believe that the discrepancy between the standard of living in the US and Africa will not continue to exist. Africa will probably continue their “take this, leave that” approach to development, but eventually has to touch all the aspects of living. There eventually has to be paved roads, reliable electricity, running water, safe vaccinations, mandatory schooling ect. How it gets there and what form these advancements take will be fascinating to see. So I guess the point of all of this is that I am curious to see how the US will change by 2014, but what really fascinates me is Guinea 2064. 

*Sorry if I am off by 10-20 years with these. There is no electricity while I am writing this and so no chance of internet. 

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

5 Things I Have Learned in Kindia



I have been at site for a week now. Sorry for not posting in a while. Some far, this is what I have learned.

The path of most resistance is that safest route.
On unpaved roads, motos take the smoothest route. Therefore, if you do not want to get hit by a moto taxi, you should go out of your way to walk over the steepest, bumpiest, least desirable path.

For babies, all clothes are unisex.
My little brother constantly wears shirts with pink frilly collars that definitely once belonged to some American girl. 

Without rice, it’s not a meal.
For dinner the other night, I made a hearty bean soup. It had beans, carrots, eggplants, onions and a tomato base. I gave some to my family to try. They took a few bites, saved it until the rice was ready, and then poured it over the rice.

If you try to take a short cut, your trip will take longer. Also, you may get videotaped.
Walking home from a different part of town and with a deadline to get home by, I set off on a short cut. It typically takes 30 minutes to get from town to my house. I arrived home and hour later. I’m pretty sure a girl of about 20 followed me for 15 minutes filming me on her cell phone.

Kindia is a multi-lingual town.
Now in addition to Fote (Susu), I get Porto (Peuhl) et la blanc! (French). Also, knowing greetings in one language means that it is assumed you are fluent in it. In Susu, I can say I am going to four places; Home, Work, Town, and Market. Since “Where are you going / Where are you coming from” are two of the most commonly asked questions, I give these responses atleast 20 times a day. Surprisingly, knowing these four locations gets me pretty far and I almost never have to lie. 

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Where there are no Supermarkets

As a group of volunteers, we have pretty much been all over the world. One of the indicators of development we have noticed is the quantity and quality of supermarkets. The existence of a supermarket shows that there is a working import system, transportation system, and a large enough group of people who can afford to add the cost of rent, electricity, and salary onto what they pay for food. Conakry (which has about the same population as Philadelphia) has about three supermarkets. I have not been to any of them yet, but I have heard rumors that you can get real cheddar cheese at one. The only downside is that a brick of it costs 500,000 GF or about $70 US. So for us lowly volunteers, it’s straight to the market. The market can be overwhelming. Some are vast and have seemingly no organization. You walk down narrow paths, which usually have a stream of filth running down the middle, trying to not bump into the woman with goods piled high on their heads. Surprisingly, I have grown to like shopping in the market. It is a social event. Yesterday, I decided that I was going to make a salad for lunch, come hell of high water. In Dubreka the only vegetable you can count on being in the market in quantity and quality is the onion. Tomatoes are also always there but of varying quality. Cucumbers come every few days but are sometimes too moldy to eat. Lettuce is a once a week thing. Luckily, I am in Conakry for swearing in and so finding vegetables to make a salad was possible. So the quest for salad started with the walk to the market. It’s only about 10 minutes long, but you would be surprised how many conversations you can get yourself into in a ten-minute walk. “Bonjour Fote! Tu es Americaine?”, “Oui, je viens des Etates Unis” “Oh I speaken the English small-small!” It’s always “small-small” since most English teachers here are apparently from Sierra Leone and speak a pidgin English. It’s good in a way because it’s a chance to practice your French and explain the Peace Corps, but it’s bad because it turns 10 minutes into many more. When you get to the market you have to scope out the stands and see where the produce you want is hiding. When you sidle up to the stand, you don’t just take what you want. First you have to greet the market lady- if you do it in the local language that is best. The friendlier you are, the more luck you will have with step two. Step two is to ‘discutez la prix’. I typically pick up a cucumber and ask how much does this cost. When the woman responds, I make a face and say “Really, for one this small?” As I begin to walk away, she will usually come back with a lower price. If not, it’s on to the next person. In Dubreka, I had a relationship with the market woman I frequented. I would ask about their family, they would ask about mine. One even offered me her baby! I am looking forward to getting to know people in the market in Kindia. It is a great way to culturally integrate and save money. I ended up getting a salad with lettuce, cucumber, tomato, hard boiled egg, onion and…AVOCADO! We are right on the cusp of the best season of the year in Guinea. That is avocado and mango season. They both are just beginning to appear on the market and when the season is in full bloom they become practically free. I doused some Frank’s buffalo sauce (carried lovingly across the ocean in my suitcase) on as dressing and voila! dinner time.

Swearing In: Volontaire na n na!

The big day has arrived. After more than a year of waiting, followed by months of training, I am finally a volunteer. The Peace Corps has specific terminology for a person at each stage in the process. Applicant, nominee, invitee, stagiaire and finally volunteer. We all had outfits made in locally bought fabrics- everyone in my group, Community Economic Development, wore a purplish green floral print. Why green flowers? Because we plant money trees. Sorry, it’s a terrible joke we use when we are competitive with the other sectors here in Guinea- Public Health and Agroforestery. We had speakers from the Guinean government, US Embassy, and Peace Corps. We all raised our right hand and swore to defend the US Constitution against all enemies. I'm not joking. Leaving Dubreka was a bit sad. I had to say goodbye to my host family and my husband. Don’t freak out. I’m not actually married. On my walk to school there is a three-year-old boy who would always run out to me no matter what he was doing and high five or fist-bump me. Or raise his arms over his head, which means pick me up and spin me around. He always babbled at me in Susu. About 10 days ago, I met his dad who speaks French and he told me that his son was telling everyone that we were married. It was pretty cute. His name is Ousman Camara, which is the Guinean equivalent of John Smith. After the ceremony, we went over to the country director’s house and swam in her pool. It was so nice that you could forget that you are in Guinea. It was a tropical paradise and a reminder of the potential that Guinea has for eco-tourism. So now I am just hanging out in Conakry. On Tuesday I will go out to my site and the real work will begin.