After a few weeks of doing a whole lot of nothing, it seems my work is finally beginning. Now that the holidays have passed, organizations are finally starting to get going again and school has also begun here in Macuse. It felt good to actually have a schedule of activities and meetings to attend last week.
On Tuesday I met with some people at the health post, my counterpart, and the FGH doctor. We discussed a few project ideas, including a bike ambulance project. Wednesday I was able to stop up at the primary school at just the right moment to awkwardly walk in on the entire staff having their meeting. Lucky for me, I was invited to pull up a chair and sit at the head of the circle and be starred at by 20-or-so sets of eyes. I introduced myself and explained to them that I would like to work together on whatever projects or areas they need assistance in…after a few minutes of confused, blank stares, I arranged a one-on-one meeting with the director for a later date and let them get back to their staff meeting. The events of Thursday deserve their own paragraph, so let me just skip to Friday, I sat in on a TCE (Total Control of the Epidemic) meeting with about 40 field officers and again introduced myself to the sea of blank, confused stares. I’m not sure if I just need to talk slower, give a more detailed explanation, or if the blank, confused stares will always be pointed in my direction simply because I am this white foreigner female living in a rural African village, and this, to many people I feel, is incomprehensible.
The events of Thursday were much like that of a grand circus performance, or perhaps a magic show would be a better analogy…it certainly was unlike anything I’ve seen or been a part of thus far during my stay in Macuse. Perhaps I shouldn’t even be writing this, or maybe I’ll be asked to take this post down by Peace Corps or FGH eventually, but for now I’d like to share my thoughts and point of view and in no way am writing these things in a vicious or cruel manner because I imagine I was myself much like these women I am about to describe just a year ago on my trip to Uganda. So, some “high-ups” from the US that fund my organization (and shall remain nameless, although I realize it would not be hard to research the information if one feels so compelled) came to visit this far-away African land to see how their money is being spent and where improvements can be made. In an effort to impress these women, FGH sprang into action, recruiting the theatre group from a town away, having the Mobile Clinic pay a visit, and obtaining a guest speaker to do a presentation on breast cancer, all squeezed in to one afternoon presentation at the health post in my village while these ladies stopped in to observe the work being done. I imagine this was largely the reason why I was invited to be involved for the first time in the month I’ve been here, normally, I just randomly see an FGH vehicle pass through my town and no one has informed me that they will be here doing work or bother to invite me to tag along to try and learn about what they do. So on this occasion, I was there to witness it all, the play centered around condom use, the speech was on how to do a self-breast exam, and many people were waiting to be tested for HIV in the Mobile Clinic. As the women pulled up in their nice air-conditioned car, they filed out, all wearing similar khaki pants and white t-shirts to fight the heat, and were welcomed by 40 or so activists singing Mozambican songs of appreciation and gratitude. It reminded me of my trip to Uganda, such a tainted view, everyone puts on a performance everywhere you go and jumps to work in an effort to impress the donors. It’s not a true sense of daily life and activity. I think a surprise visit would be far more telling, but planning a surprise trip to Africa has its complications-it’s not really a place you can just show up to, unannounced and unnoticed. The women, with the help of a translator, introduced themselves and asked a few questions, the answers I heard given didn’t exactly coordinate with reality I didn’t think, but I kept my mouth shut-I’m just a Volunteer after all… “Oh, there were far more people here this morning, but a lot of them left already because of the rain.” “We have events like this a few times a month.” “There are field officers that go out and cover 50 different villages doing home visits.” These tidbits of information seemed to impress the ladies and evoke an “Obrigada” and “Muito prazer” out of them-the few words of Portuguese they perhaps learned for their big adventure. And with that, they were gone, headed back to their air-conditioned hotel with running water and satellite television, I imagine.
I just don’t think there’s any way a person can understand it unless they’ve lived here for an extended period of time-and I am in no way claiming to be an expert having been here a mere 4 months, but there’s definitely realizations that I’ve made from my time here-one being how ridiculous and incorrect my vision of Africa was after a short 2 week trip to Uganda one year ago. I stayed in a comfy hotel with running water, did a home-stay with a well-off family that lived in a 2 story home with running water and owned a car, and topped it off with a safari and boat ride down the Nile, how pleasant. The Africa I’m seeing and living in now is much, much different-for better or for worse. Donors I think are typically all about numbers, they want statistical data to prove their money is making a difference-but Africa doesn’t work that way. There’s too many beliefs and traditions, lack of education, and poverty to just throw our Western ideals on them and expect them to immediately adopt our theories and proven medicine, etc. It’s complicated…and like I’ve said, perhaps this will only make sense to those who have been in Africa, working, living, not just visiting.
I hope I haven’t sounded too dark and depressing in this post. I definitely think FGH needs to be here in Mozambique and they are improving many lives, there is just a different pace to life here and it can’t be understood or accepted by most do-gooders in America that are results-driven, so perhaps the magic show is necessary to keep foreign aid from vanishing from Mozambique all together…
It’s my birthday this weekend! I’ll be in Quelimane visiting some other Volunteers and co-workers! It will be nice to leave site and see some of the Moz 13 Volunteers that are back from Christmas break now too! I stayed at site last weekend and actually hung out with some Brazilian volunteers that are working at the school here and on Sunday I biked to the ocean! It was about an hour each way, a little draining in the heat, but well worth it! Very beautiful and peaceful, and the children that ran after me, yelling “olá!” as I biked away reminded me why I’m here. See their picture below! :) Tchau.
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