hi folks - just a quick update while I'm still in Lusaka and basking in my free internet.
First for those of you who get letters, if you could save them for me that would me awesome. I want to photocopy them as a rememberance of my service someday. If it makes you feel like a 1940s war wife, all the better.
Also, a CD player is next on my list of things waiting at home to be sent so I need music! Send me anything new, theme cd's, funny songs, or npr episodes (especially This American Life).
And if you scroll down there's a new book list of things I've read. Let me know if you want recommendations.
New photos are on Facebook.
Okay. Off to Malawi for the Lake of Stars music festival. Be jealous.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Friday, October 2, 2009
Trival Pursuits
I am sitting on my reed mat at a recent stitch 'n dish, or so my neighbor and I call our somewhat bi-weekly combos of lunch and chitenge quilting. Depending on how aggravating village life is the "dish" might change to the less tame "b" word but as this is a family-friendly blog and as both of us are pretty laid-back persons we'll stick with the "dish." (Besides then you get the benefits of the double meaning - food and conversation - and I do love a corny pun.)
And the conversation is the fodder for this post (though the food wasn't so bad either.) So getting back to my reed mat... On this day, we were discussing the role of the Peace Corps Volunteer and more specifically, our fear of not leaving any lasting work after our two-year stay. (Side note: most stitch 'n dish topics are not nearly so existential, this was a bit of an oddity.) I have mentioned previously that I did not come to Africa to effect a development revolution and have no illusionment about the ability of two years of work to surmount long standing systems of inequity. In fact, I still consider my decision to be a selfish one, shelfing a decent education and skill set that could have best served the greater good in some inner city school or cash-strapped NGO. Granted, that's just my opinion - I'm sure most PCVs would disagree. Even so, for all of my talk of being wise to the development crawl, I would still like to thinkof my work here as being somewhat beneficial. I think the "Is my time on Earth making it a slightly better place?" is a fairly universal dilemma whether in a mud hut in Africa or a skyscraper in NYC, unless of course you're amoralistic or certain former politicans.
So what do I do with that time here anyway? Basically everyone I talk to stateside has asked me what the heck my job is and I have so far pretty adeptly dodged the question. Reason being my job description is murky. Peace Corps PR solgan reads the Toughest Job You'll Ever Love. Internally we PCVs sub Toughest for Vaguest. On paper, I'm supposed to be improving the quality of education in my rural zone (equivalent of a US district) and increasing the number of children who can access said education. It all fits into the Ministry of Education's overall plan and more broadly the Millenium Development Goals, complete with statistical indicators and target dates. On the ground level, of course, things aren't so cut and dry. I have 6 government schools and 5 community ones, though I do most of my work at my zonal center school that is 7 km away. I observe classes and give feedback on how to provide child-centered learning. I run workshops or trainings on teaching methods. I work with school officials to write proposals and teach computer classes. I talk abou HIV prevention at the clinic during antenatal sessions. All this sounds lovely on paper. But when faced with the larger issues to rural education I often feel I am pedaling away on a stationary bike (no pun intended). Indeed my least trivial work is often that that doesn't fit neatly into numbers and reports.
In an environment where girls marry young and leave school younger, my status as a college-educated, single 23-year-old is slightly mind-blowing. I cherish my position as a strong feminine role model. Beyond that, I often serve as an ad-hoc cultural ambassador, answering questions ranging from American courtship rituals to the presence of poverty in the States. But one of my most trivial (and most valued) pursuits is just being me.
I once asked a Peace Corps trainer why she liked working with PCVs. She said, "All Americans are different. All Zambians are the same." While that is far from a general rule, culturally Zambia values community over individual efforts. This results in some beautiful traditions but it often boils down to conformity. I have never embraced my American individualism (and my own innate quirkness) more. Ayn Rand would be tickled pink with my acceptance of the ego. Don't worry my leftist comrades, in other areas of my life I remain decidedly non-Randian.
A consequence (and perhaps a contributing factor) to my promotion of the individual, is that I spend a lot time thinking about, well, myself. Apart from some recluses and hermits, I think I am pretty high up there on the time spent alone scale. The opportunity to delve within yourself is hard to find in the fast-paced stateside world but I would recommend you try. The findings might surprise you. Walt Whitman's famous line "I celebrate myself and sing myself" is written large across the wall of my bedroom. Perhaps it ties back to my being selfish but I know the work of believing those words in my heart will be a lasting legacy of my time here.
And somewhere in that heart I know that I am doing something in Zambia. I am encouraging teachers to try new things, I am showing girls a different path, I am befuddling everyone with my strange Kamizhi ways. Hardly a blip on the statistical radar - those percentages and pie charts that find their way into reports that find their way to Washington that find their way into the Congressional budget hearings that keep me fed every quarter. No one ever said that Peace Corp's impact was capturable. But whether I am sewing on a reed mat, or biking to town at dawn, or just rejoicing in this crazy bundle of atoms that is me, I am certain of one thing. It is hardly trivial.
And the conversation is the fodder for this post (though the food wasn't so bad either.) So getting back to my reed mat... On this day, we were discussing the role of the Peace Corps Volunteer and more specifically, our fear of not leaving any lasting work after our two-year stay. (Side note: most stitch 'n dish topics are not nearly so existential, this was a bit of an oddity.) I have mentioned previously that I did not come to Africa to effect a development revolution and have no illusionment about the ability of two years of work to surmount long standing systems of inequity. In fact, I still consider my decision to be a selfish one, shelfing a decent education and skill set that could have best served the greater good in some inner city school or cash-strapped NGO. Granted, that's just my opinion - I'm sure most PCVs would disagree. Even so, for all of my talk of being wise to the development crawl, I would still like to thinkof my work here as being somewhat beneficial. I think the "Is my time on Earth making it a slightly better place?" is a fairly universal dilemma whether in a mud hut in Africa or a skyscraper in NYC, unless of course you're amoralistic or certain former politicans.
So what do I do with that time here anyway? Basically everyone I talk to stateside has asked me what the heck my job is and I have so far pretty adeptly dodged the question. Reason being my job description is murky. Peace Corps PR solgan reads the Toughest Job You'll Ever Love. Internally we PCVs sub Toughest for Vaguest. On paper, I'm supposed to be improving the quality of education in my rural zone (equivalent of a US district) and increasing the number of children who can access said education. It all fits into the Ministry of Education's overall plan and more broadly the Millenium Development Goals, complete with statistical indicators and target dates. On the ground level, of course, things aren't so cut and dry. I have 6 government schools and 5 community ones, though I do most of my work at my zonal center school that is 7 km away. I observe classes and give feedback on how to provide child-centered learning. I run workshops or trainings on teaching methods. I work with school officials to write proposals and teach computer classes. I talk abou HIV prevention at the clinic during antenatal sessions. All this sounds lovely on paper. But when faced with the larger issues to rural education I often feel I am pedaling away on a stationary bike (no pun intended). Indeed my least trivial work is often that that doesn't fit neatly into numbers and reports.
In an environment where girls marry young and leave school younger, my status as a college-educated, single 23-year-old is slightly mind-blowing. I cherish my position as a strong feminine role model. Beyond that, I often serve as an ad-hoc cultural ambassador, answering questions ranging from American courtship rituals to the presence of poverty in the States. But one of my most trivial (and most valued) pursuits is just being me.
I once asked a Peace Corps trainer why she liked working with PCVs. She said, "All Americans are different. All Zambians are the same." While that is far from a general rule, culturally Zambia values community over individual efforts. This results in some beautiful traditions but it often boils down to conformity. I have never embraced my American individualism (and my own innate quirkness) more. Ayn Rand would be tickled pink with my acceptance of the ego. Don't worry my leftist comrades, in other areas of my life I remain decidedly non-Randian.
A consequence (and perhaps a contributing factor) to my promotion of the individual, is that I spend a lot time thinking about, well, myself. Apart from some recluses and hermits, I think I am pretty high up there on the time spent alone scale. The opportunity to delve within yourself is hard to find in the fast-paced stateside world but I would recommend you try. The findings might surprise you. Walt Whitman's famous line "I celebrate myself and sing myself" is written large across the wall of my bedroom. Perhaps it ties back to my being selfish but I know the work of believing those words in my heart will be a lasting legacy of my time here.
And somewhere in that heart I know that I am doing something in Zambia. I am encouraging teachers to try new things, I am showing girls a different path, I am befuddling everyone with my strange Kamizhi ways. Hardly a blip on the statistical radar - those percentages and pie charts that find their way into reports that find their way to Washington that find their way into the Congressional budget hearings that keep me fed every quarter. No one ever said that Peace Corp's impact was capturable. But whether I am sewing on a reed mat, or biking to town at dawn, or just rejoicing in this crazy bundle of atoms that is me, I am certain of one thing. It is hardly trivial.
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