Unripe Bananas

My yard in the dry season is decrepit, exactly as it was this time last year. The grass fence I had built during the rains has fallen apart, except for the sections near the front of the house. Pigs, goats, chickens, guinea foul, dogs, cats, pigeons, winds and children each played their part in the inevitable demise of the little semblance of privacy. Gaps turned to passageways, turned to missing sections, turned to fire kindling. It doesn’t matter anymore really. Things from the earth here have a tendency to ultimately return to the earth. There are about five pigs and piglets scurrying about my back door at the moment, oinking, snorting, whining in search of food. The Zyambo’s livestock seem to grow in number exponentially with each passing month, most endearingly evidenced by the increasing number of guinea foul banging and squawking on my tin roof at five in the morning and the farm animal a cappella in the yard. It’s humoring to waste hours watching the animals scuttle about the yard, interacting with each other without a care in the world. Especially the mother hen and her line of chicks in close pursuit. Equally humoring are the spastic, alien geckos watching vigilantly from the rafters, as if in a constant state of panic and anxiety.

There is a banana tree in my yard, between the kitchen and a decrepit piece of fence adjacent to the Zyambo’s bafa. Its leaves hang over the trash pit and it’s managed to grow abundantly during my service. A testament of resilience, having survived dry seasons, flocks of farm animals, my general lack of knowledge and interest in gardening, and a burning trash pit. It’s still the only green growing in an otherwise dry, barren environment. A channel of water leads from the drain of the Zyambo’s bafa to the base of the banana tree, keeping it constantly watered. About two months ago two large flowers of bananas appeared and the burgundy purple flowers at their ends fell shortly after. Benedicto informed me that they should start ripening within a week or so, as all the water was now feeding just the fruit. Weeks passed into months and the unripe green bananas clung stubbornly to their stems. They did not even slightly shade yellow, instead remaining a lush green. We can’t figure out why. It’s as if after expending months of effort in fruiting they just gave up, so near the end. It’s as if they thought: what’s the point in ripening, in completing a cycle, when we can just cling verdantly to this tree, ever fed by water and still face a similar fate? Perhaps they are tired, or perhaps they need to have their faith restored; that by ripening they will feed a mouth, improve a life even if only for a moment. So near the end they simply have to turn and while they may be eaten by an unscrupulous goat or never appreciated, they will have finished what they started. More than what most can say for a lifetime.

Bear (Wellesley) recommended putting them in a sealed plastic bag, so I picked four of them and tied them up in a People’s jumbo. Last Saturday, we threw a month-belated birthday party for Bear. Belated because we were both at Kamp Kwacha and Zebra’s mom and sister were visiting. It was a celebration of surprisingly good success; she seemed happy and liked the food. We made burgers, luckily procuring ground beef at Rumphi Metro, and fries, with plenty of Greens – one of several of Bear’s favorite meals. And Zebra and I baked successfully on our own, on a mud fire stove, for the first time. We made yellow cake, from scratch, filled it with custard and topped with a chocolate icing improvised from a Hershey’s chocolate bar from a parcel and milk, icing sugar, and Blue Band. Zebra carved a birthday candle out of a large Moonlight and I topped the whole thing of with crushed macadamia nuts. We were trying to replicate a Boston crème cake with what we had and quite proud of it. A slice of home for Bear, one of the best people I know, probably my closest friend who knows everything about me, who cares unconditionally, loves almost limitlessly, and melts even the most hardened of moods with her mischievous big blue eyes and a laugh as infectious and delightful as her smile.

With one camp successfully over, planning begins for the next camp. The inaugural Kamp Kwacha was a success. Hobbit handled all the logistics and I handled all the curriculum and classes. Together, the camp was near perfect; not a single hitch that wasn’t easily solved. Zebra, Bear and I are hosting an all new, revamped, restructured, and renamed environmental camp, now called Camp RENEW (Revitalize, Enlighten, and Nurture Environmental Wellness). It will be hosted at Chilenda Camp, as before, but the camp will be molded on the Kamp Kwacha model: few students, more interactive sessions, more difficult material, and better food. We want to provide a greater variety of knowledge, at a faster pace, to a more selective group of top students. With about eight staff members for twenty students, we provide greater attention for each student. We will teach topics ranging from environmental protection to business to building local windmills. And as essential to any good camp and happy students, the quality and variety of food will be better (especially if we can secure a particular local chef who previously served as chef to the French embassy). All of these qualities are the opposite of the current Peace Corps camp models, which prefer many students (upwards of 80), leading to less learning, attention, course offerings and general enjoyment.