“I am in a world of shit, yes, but I am alive and I am not afraid.”
There is something frightening I fear in myself. A force equally as potent as the capacity for love: the capacity for hate. A dark face that lurks unnervingly below the surface: powerful, exciting, and alluring in its shroud. I’m thinking of all violence happening this very moment and that has happen in every moment before it, stretching back to the very beginning.
I remember growing up on violent video games, despite the stern protest of my parents. As a child, and more so as a young man, I craved and was addicted to the feeling of power, even false power: to have God-like control over the fate of animated armies or selecting the most pleasurable weapon with which to bludgeon an alien foe (a brut hammer).
I vividly recall the first time I played video games. It was in Perth, at a friend’s house. He was blasting through monsters in Duke Nukem’s pixilated palace of pain, scoffing at squares of blood that would spray everywhere. “The best is the rocket launcher,” he said eagerly as he keyed a weapon swap. He burst into a boisterous fit of laughter when the missile round expelled the monster into a fountain of red. Fortunately, he was too preoccupied with his own victory, and perhaps too young and insecure himself, to notice the horrified expression on my face.
We are trained for violence from a young age and it appears in a multitude of forms. As boys we battle aliens, protecting our planet, our families. As young men, we’re educated in the history of war and of the valiant soldiers. As men we are expected to fight for our country or cause as the highest order of honor. Men are to be quiet fortresses: strong, brave, and inclined to violence in the fight for good.
But what war is good? Give me a cause worth its weight in blood and I will gladly, and fearfully, march into battle. Since the existence of mankind we have stabbed, shot, chopped, raped, pillaged each other to what end? It is the same violence repeated in the name of religion, land, culture, vengeance or whatever reason in vogue during the century. We are wired with such potential for both good and evil: our minds powerful enough to skew reality, to forget and rewrite the same history.
It’s disconcerting because I have genetically inherited that ability. Here, frustrated by politics, corruption, and a tightening police force, thoughts are finding solace in the euphoria of violence. Violent revenge in the name of citizens that needlessly suffer under the rule of a growingly stubborn tyrant. The need to revolt, to spark a revolution is strong, but what will it achieve? More violence, killing and the fate of every other unstable African state.
Why do I feel strongly for innocent villagers? Are they so innocent? Aren’t they just like the Germans, the Croats, the Serbs, the Muslim Americans: innocent citizens? The people that simply let violence and corruption happen, buying into the national rhetoric? Why don’t they say stop? Why do the masses allow themselves to be fooled by higher powers and then brood vengeance against an enemy they manifested?
Perhaps people are no more than children witnessing a violent game: instinctively want to turn away and say this is wrong, yet cannot form the words. They fear being ridiculed, abandoned, and ultimately alone. Either you are with us or against us. You aren’t a real man if you oppose violence. I’ve seen enough commercials for the Marines. Enough movies like Rambo glorifying war. Enough talk of the allure of uniform. These are forces that ultimately form boys into the men that shape this planet.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Riding in Cars with Girls
A few months ago I couldn’t sleep. We were in Monkey Bay to celebrate Dirty’s birthday and we went big the previous night, pig roast and all. Shingles slept in until late into the morning, but I lay watching the sunrise over the lake through the straw covered windows. When she stirred awake she saw me lying, staring at the space in front of my eyes. She put a concerned hand on my chest and asked “what’re you thinking about?” I told her my mind was wandering, disconcertedly drifting through the past from one thought to the next memory. I always rein it in, but this morning I let it wander. “Do you like thinking about the past?” “No,” I lied. I do like the past, it is in a way comforting and soothing to see your life pieced together from today. The future is frightening in its unpredictability, which only provokes my need to plan and plan. The warmth of memories keeps me sane and I find solace in them during gray days. I only restrain them because I’m afraid. Some memories still have a singe of pain and a mere flash image, a millisecond of thought, can trigger the degradation of all thought and I fear my naïve memory may slip in to such an abyss. What I did not tell her was that that morning I wasn’t afraid, because she was there and the safety of arms were only a glance away.
Wind
The Killers came on, All These Things That I’ve Done, from the Hot Fuss album, if I remember correctly. KISS 108 promised all the latest hits commercial free and was the most popular station in New England. I can’t remember what month it was, but it was cold out. We sprinted out of the movie theatre and took shelter in her car, blasted the heating and huddled until the dry air warmed the interior. What movie was it? The memory has holes. It was sophomore year, must’ve been near winter. She was using her family’s car, a big Toyota SUV that took some time to warm up. She made me laugh and I enjoyed her company. We pulled out on to Rt. 9E to drop me off at Bentley first and then she would head back to Wellesley. I remember the roar of the engine as she accelerated down the highway. It was late and the lights from the dashboard illuminated our faces and she was dancing while driving. When the song came on she turned up the volume dial and began singing along. She looked at me smiling the words and I laughed. We never really spoke after that and had awkward interactions. We both needed something that night, the companionship of someone outside of our worlds, yet someone not entirely unfamiliar. She never called and I never bothered to write. I will always remember her singing in that car:
“Help me out. You know you gotta help me out. Don’t you put me on the backburner.”
Almost three years later she was working in San Francisco and I foolishly stayed in Boston. We began emailing each other from work; casually discussing life after school, building what I realize now was a kind of relationship that stems from loneliness. New graduates living and working in a city; on our own for the first time. But I’ll never understand why we took comfort in each other, why not someone else? We were both close to our families and had plenty of friends nearby. Why reach out across a continent? Perhaps we were trying to prove we could handle this growing up business and wanted to show our family and friends we were independent. Emails became letters. Letters often became phone calls, a little after midnight when I got out of work and she was still up. I used to look forward to those phone calls exhausted from work, having no personal interactions for weeks, walking out into a dark empty city, walking into an empty apartment. Her cheeriness and humor were lined with sadness, but it was enough, we didn’t feel alone and fell asleep happy with our phones by the pillow. Then it just stopped. I don’t remember how or when, but I guess we both got what we needed and didn’t need it anymore.
We haven’t talked since. I think she’s married now.
Water
I dubbed her the Little Navigator. She sat in the passenger seat fumbling with a giant map unfolding New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and fringes of the surrounding states. We were somewhere in Edison searching for parking so we could eat. We were on the hunt for a particularly large and delicious masala dosa, along with an order of chaat masala and two glasses of falooda. Having received a speeding ticket weeks earlier, I was quite content idling in the back lot of a strip mall. She was getting hungry. We did this a lot that summer, driving around together for food, picnics, IKEA, movies, malls, more food. By some chance of fate we ended up at the same firm and later that summer another turn of fate prematurely ended the lease on my sublet in Trumbull. I had no place to live and another month and a half remained on my internship. She happen to start her job that week and so I moved to Stamford. I remember how nervous I was asking.
“Hey, so my sublet for the summer ended, they finished rotations early so they’re leaving.”
“Did she ever give you back the money?”
“No, won’t return calls or emails, I think she’s gone. But I was wondering if…if it’s alright if I stay with you for a little while? I have no…”
“Dooks! Of course you can stay. I was hoping you would stay.”
“Thanks, it’ll just be till the end of the summer.”
“So...I was going to ask you anyway. Didn’t know how you’d feel.”
I immediately handed the keys back to my parents when I opened the box. However, they would not have it. This was a gift to their son, the first in the family to graduate from college in America, the result of more opportunities than they ever had. We drove around in it all summer, at least until her father made a snarky comment about how parents shouldn’t give expensive gifts to children. She defended my family arguing that they gave it out of love and a want to provide all the best things for their children. I was furious. My parents had nothing growing up and now, in America, they still have little, but provide the world to us. Even if we refuse. And we always refuse. Who was this shmuck to criticize my family? I eventually convinced my parents to take the car, claiming high fuel costs shuttling back and forth from Randolph to Stamford to Shrewsbury. I took the old Corolla and we still took road trips. Scenic drives down CT-15, connecting I-84 to I-90, and coming home to Stamford. Coming home. A home we made together for a brief moment of existence.
It’s was a strange realization the other night. To think that some of my fondest memories, some of my happiest moments, took place in cars, buses, vans, trains, planes with girls. Transient places where thoughts fall in order, where, according to Alain de Botton, thought is clearest and truly free. Though my friends ridicule me, these modes of transport are where I feel safe, comfortable and at home. That is why I sleep so deeply and so instantly in vehicles. Perhaps it’s the result of growing up always moving and now home is movement. And beyond the mere purr of the engine or the rhythm of the tracks, it’s also a false sense of stopping time. The world moves past you, yet you remain stationary in a capsule, safe and carefree. She makes it all the more precious, for not only have you stopped time, but you aren’t alone, vanquishing both time and solitude: our two greatest foes. Free of obligations of place or time, you are in movement not belonging to any singular place or falling victim to the effects and sense of time. A keen awareness of physical movement but unaware of direction or minutes expended. Like chasing the sun in a plane without a clock. Isn’t that what we all want? To find the love of our lives and once found to stop time for eternity? And if not eternity, at least for the length of a bus ride.
Wind
The Killers came on, All These Things That I’ve Done, from the Hot Fuss album, if I remember correctly. KISS 108 promised all the latest hits commercial free and was the most popular station in New England. I can’t remember what month it was, but it was cold out. We sprinted out of the movie theatre and took shelter in her car, blasted the heating and huddled until the dry air warmed the interior. What movie was it? The memory has holes. It was sophomore year, must’ve been near winter. She was using her family’s car, a big Toyota SUV that took some time to warm up. She made me laugh and I enjoyed her company. We pulled out on to Rt. 9E to drop me off at Bentley first and then she would head back to Wellesley. I remember the roar of the engine as she accelerated down the highway. It was late and the lights from the dashboard illuminated our faces and she was dancing while driving. When the song came on she turned up the volume dial and began singing along. She looked at me smiling the words and I laughed. We never really spoke after that and had awkward interactions. We both needed something that night, the companionship of someone outside of our worlds, yet someone not entirely unfamiliar. She never called and I never bothered to write. I will always remember her singing in that car:
“Help me out. You know you gotta help me out. Don’t you put me on the backburner.”
Almost three years later she was working in San Francisco and I foolishly stayed in Boston. We began emailing each other from work; casually discussing life after school, building what I realize now was a kind of relationship that stems from loneliness. New graduates living and working in a city; on our own for the first time. But I’ll never understand why we took comfort in each other, why not someone else? We were both close to our families and had plenty of friends nearby. Why reach out across a continent? Perhaps we were trying to prove we could handle this growing up business and wanted to show our family and friends we were independent. Emails became letters. Letters often became phone calls, a little after midnight when I got out of work and she was still up. I used to look forward to those phone calls exhausted from work, having no personal interactions for weeks, walking out into a dark empty city, walking into an empty apartment. Her cheeriness and humor were lined with sadness, but it was enough, we didn’t feel alone and fell asleep happy with our phones by the pillow. Then it just stopped. I don’t remember how or when, but I guess we both got what we needed and didn’t need it anymore.
We haven’t talked since. I think she’s married now.
Water
I dubbed her the Little Navigator. She sat in the passenger seat fumbling with a giant map unfolding New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and fringes of the surrounding states. We were somewhere in Edison searching for parking so we could eat. We were on the hunt for a particularly large and delicious masala dosa, along with an order of chaat masala and two glasses of falooda. Having received a speeding ticket weeks earlier, I was quite content idling in the back lot of a strip mall. She was getting hungry. We did this a lot that summer, driving around together for food, picnics, IKEA, movies, malls, more food. By some chance of fate we ended up at the same firm and later that summer another turn of fate prematurely ended the lease on my sublet in Trumbull. I had no place to live and another month and a half remained on my internship. She happen to start her job that week and so I moved to Stamford. I remember how nervous I was asking.
“Hey, so my sublet for the summer ended, they finished rotations early so they’re leaving.”
“Did she ever give you back the money?”
“No, won’t return calls or emails, I think she’s gone. But I was wondering if…if it’s alright if I stay with you for a little while? I have no…”
“Dooks! Of course you can stay. I was hoping you would stay.”
“Thanks, it’ll just be till the end of the summer.”
“So...I was going to ask you anyway. Didn’t know how you’d feel.”
I immediately handed the keys back to my parents when I opened the box. However, they would not have it. This was a gift to their son, the first in the family to graduate from college in America, the result of more opportunities than they ever had. We drove around in it all summer, at least until her father made a snarky comment about how parents shouldn’t give expensive gifts to children. She defended my family arguing that they gave it out of love and a want to provide all the best things for their children. I was furious. My parents had nothing growing up and now, in America, they still have little, but provide the world to us. Even if we refuse. And we always refuse. Who was this shmuck to criticize my family? I eventually convinced my parents to take the car, claiming high fuel costs shuttling back and forth from Randolph to Stamford to Shrewsbury. I took the old Corolla and we still took road trips. Scenic drives down CT-15, connecting I-84 to I-90, and coming home to Stamford. Coming home. A home we made together for a brief moment of existence.
It’s was a strange realization the other night. To think that some of my fondest memories, some of my happiest moments, took place in cars, buses, vans, trains, planes with girls. Transient places where thoughts fall in order, where, according to Alain de Botton, thought is clearest and truly free. Though my friends ridicule me, these modes of transport are where I feel safe, comfortable and at home. That is why I sleep so deeply and so instantly in vehicles. Perhaps it’s the result of growing up always moving and now home is movement. And beyond the mere purr of the engine or the rhythm of the tracks, it’s also a false sense of stopping time. The world moves past you, yet you remain stationary in a capsule, safe and carefree. She makes it all the more precious, for not only have you stopped time, but you aren’t alone, vanquishing both time and solitude: our two greatest foes. Free of obligations of place or time, you are in movement not belonging to any singular place or falling victim to the effects and sense of time. A keen awareness of physical movement but unaware of direction or minutes expended. Like chasing the sun in a plane without a clock. Isn’t that what we all want? To find the love of our lives and once found to stop time for eternity? And if not eternity, at least for the length of a bus ride.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Awakayi
There is no sensation that compares to opening a fresh batch of homemade awakayi (well, a close second is opening a fresh bottle of Sriracha after two years). Awakayi has so much more attached to it than mere deliciousness, nostril-pleasing aroma of spices and pickled mango, and saliva-inducing red chutney drowning in marinating oils.
Beyond the sensual symptoms are the memories of clay pots of pickle, my grandmother preparing large vats of spices for the family, and eating it with everyone on banana leaves. For most, awakayi is just another exotic chutney from Patek’s or a mild achaar. But to my family it’s in our blood, from infant to adult there is not a single meal without a jar of grandmother’s awakayi. When a pot of pickle is finished cooking all of us: cousins, nieces, brothers, sisters, crowd the stove to get first dibs. Once the pickle is transferred to jars, cooked rice is thrown into pot and mixed with the remnants along the walls and bottom. This is the best serving of pickle as it is fresh and mixed with hot rice and the flavor that only comes from eating out of a pot. Our grandmother would hand feed each of us, one by one, and we would fight over who got seconds.
These are the memories that came to mind as I opened my last and only bag of awakayi. Sealed in three air tight containers to ensure freshness and prevent leakage, I surgically removed each bag. I didn’t want even a drop of oil wasted. I patiently poured it into a Blue Band container and put hot rice in the bag. It was no clay pot, but this is Africa, close enough. My mouth watered as the smell filled the kitchen and the white basmati slowly turned a vibrant, deep red. Memories were overrun by a grumbling stomach, but I could not rush. No, this had to be savored. Such treats are few and far between. I scrapped every last bit of pickle and every grain of rice out of the bag and onto a plate and washed my hands at the basin. There it was, my favorite dish, served the only way I like it.
My grandmother always scolded my taste in food, claiming I liked poor people food too much. She accused my mother of the same tastes when she was growing up. What do the impoverished eat in a small Indian village? Rice mixed with raw chili powder, salt and oil. Rice with pickle. On a good day, rice with a curry gravy. Little vegetables and rarely any protein. My second favorite is rice with chili powder, oil and salt. In fact, just writing it is making my mouth water. So what if the poor enjoy these dishes? Doesn’t make them bad. It’s simple, delicious, and as I would realize later, perfect for the bachelor diet. Who needs nutrients? Better an addiction to absurdly spicy, yet simple, food than some other vice.
When my parents came to visit they brought, literally, three giant cardboard boxes of food. Every prized American treat was now in a cardboard cube in my house. Of course, these were non-perishable treats sealed air-tight and bursting with traditional American high-fructose corn syrup. Rows of Cheetohs galore, bags of Snickers, cans of Pringles, boxes of Indian food mixes, enough Maggie to put a desi college sophomore to shame and sachets of instant curries. And the best part: triple-sealed containers of pickles and spiced lentil powder mixes. It was like Christmas morning during the best market year in five decades. Every imaginable treat was at my finger tips.
So, I did what I’m best at: eat. Eat, get dizzy from the spice, rapidly suck air to cool my tongue, pass out, and do it again. My happiest memories in college were picking up a tub of Ben & Jerry’s at Harry’s, going back to her dorm and making the spiciest curry imaginable (usually chana), then eat, suffer in pain, cry, laugh, swear like a sailor, lose sanity, and wash it down with mint-Oreo goodness. You would think we would have learned our lesson, but addiction is an ardent ailment. While almost all other students were experimenting the limits of BALs and any smokable foliage, we sat on a couch and ate food that would induce pain and joy at the same time. It was a high unlike any other.
After eating and sharing it with other volunteers I have managed to level inventories to half of one box, plus a smaller box full of candy and snacks. An impressive feat.
Beyond the sensual symptoms are the memories of clay pots of pickle, my grandmother preparing large vats of spices for the family, and eating it with everyone on banana leaves. For most, awakayi is just another exotic chutney from Patek’s or a mild achaar. But to my family it’s in our blood, from infant to adult there is not a single meal without a jar of grandmother’s awakayi. When a pot of pickle is finished cooking all of us: cousins, nieces, brothers, sisters, crowd the stove to get first dibs. Once the pickle is transferred to jars, cooked rice is thrown into pot and mixed with the remnants along the walls and bottom. This is the best serving of pickle as it is fresh and mixed with hot rice and the flavor that only comes from eating out of a pot. Our grandmother would hand feed each of us, one by one, and we would fight over who got seconds.
These are the memories that came to mind as I opened my last and only bag of awakayi. Sealed in three air tight containers to ensure freshness and prevent leakage, I surgically removed each bag. I didn’t want even a drop of oil wasted. I patiently poured it into a Blue Band container and put hot rice in the bag. It was no clay pot, but this is Africa, close enough. My mouth watered as the smell filled the kitchen and the white basmati slowly turned a vibrant, deep red. Memories were overrun by a grumbling stomach, but I could not rush. No, this had to be savored. Such treats are few and far between. I scrapped every last bit of pickle and every grain of rice out of the bag and onto a plate and washed my hands at the basin. There it was, my favorite dish, served the only way I like it.
My grandmother always scolded my taste in food, claiming I liked poor people food too much. She accused my mother of the same tastes when she was growing up. What do the impoverished eat in a small Indian village? Rice mixed with raw chili powder, salt and oil. Rice with pickle. On a good day, rice with a curry gravy. Little vegetables and rarely any protein. My second favorite is rice with chili powder, oil and salt. In fact, just writing it is making my mouth water. So what if the poor enjoy these dishes? Doesn’t make them bad. It’s simple, delicious, and as I would realize later, perfect for the bachelor diet. Who needs nutrients? Better an addiction to absurdly spicy, yet simple, food than some other vice.
When my parents came to visit they brought, literally, three giant cardboard boxes of food. Every prized American treat was now in a cardboard cube in my house. Of course, these were non-perishable treats sealed air-tight and bursting with traditional American high-fructose corn syrup. Rows of Cheetohs galore, bags of Snickers, cans of Pringles, boxes of Indian food mixes, enough Maggie to put a desi college sophomore to shame and sachets of instant curries. And the best part: triple-sealed containers of pickles and spiced lentil powder mixes. It was like Christmas morning during the best market year in five decades. Every imaginable treat was at my finger tips.
So, I did what I’m best at: eat. Eat, get dizzy from the spice, rapidly suck air to cool my tongue, pass out, and do it again. My happiest memories in college were picking up a tub of Ben & Jerry’s at Harry’s, going back to her dorm and making the spiciest curry imaginable (usually chana), then eat, suffer in pain, cry, laugh, swear like a sailor, lose sanity, and wash it down with mint-Oreo goodness. You would think we would have learned our lesson, but addiction is an ardent ailment. While almost all other students were experimenting the limits of BALs and any smokable foliage, we sat on a couch and ate food that would induce pain and joy at the same time. It was a high unlike any other.
After eating and sharing it with other volunteers I have managed to level inventories to half of one box, plus a smaller box full of candy and snacks. An impressive feat.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Earth-movers
I woke up this morning to the sound of a large truck pacing forward then backwards with a loud beeping. Today was marked for civilian demonstrations throughout the major cities of Mzuzu, Blantyre and Lilongwe. Demonstrations supposedly organized by a Minister against the government regarding fuel shortages, tobacco and issues of governance. DFID recently pulled out of Malawi. The village was abuzz with excitement; people had been talking about it for days and radio voices echoed throughout the day. We were issued a no-travel notice from the office from the 19th-21st.
This was no ordinary truck. After I got ready, I walked out to the sandy path leading to the EPA for a beekeeping meeting. In the distance there was a crowd gathered in front of the EPA (strange because there is never anyone there). As I got closer the giant yellow Caterpillar earth-mover came into view. It was plowing a large square area in front of the EPA, shifting dirt to the outer rims, flattening a space. I spotted Mr. Singini – the secondary school night watchman – in the crowd and greeted him.
It seems the machine was sent by the government to clear land for temporary housing. The housing will be for the road builders, expected to begin work shortly. I guess all the gravel workers, other workers, and machines need a place to stay for the duration of the construction. Though it is a short road, Mwazisi is very remote and shuttling workers back and forth is not feasible. That somewhat solves that mystery. It’s strange how these developments kind of just show up. I don’t think anyone knew, perhaps I just didn’t know.
It seems you wake up one morning and there’s a giant earth-mover in your back yard. Just fell out of the sky. While a series of large construction machines may seem normal to most, it is certainly not normal here. To put it in perspective: seeing these machines in Mwazisi is like seeing a herd of elephants roaming about Post Office Square.
Despite the suddenness, I’m excited, as is the community. All these giant machines appearing, new people passing through. Though it is still isolated, the village is developing and changing in many ways: construction of the EPA, initiation of the Kulera Project, installation of electricity, commencement of the tarmac road, and soon the arrival of a second Peace Corps volunteer. The village is moving forward or at least poised to move forward, in many positive directions. Confirmation of my belief that development is best on a small-local scale, provided the presence of large infrastructure projects to support and encourage growth.
The kids are on holiday and crowds mounted the dunes piled up by the yellow giant. Everyone sat and stared, transfixed, as if in a trance, watching the giant move forward-backward- forward-backward. I sat in a trance too; it was calming in its repetition and in a way majestic. It was like a yellow elephant moving dirt about. It had a meditative rhythm that made it hypnotic. And like a child, you wondered what will it do next? Ah! Forward again.
These new developments are a pleasant distraction from the current tobacco problems, which continue to worsen. This is one of the few large-scale demonstrations I have ever heard of Malawi. We’ll have to wait and see how successful its actual execution is, but if it is then I think things will change even more in Malawi.
I remember the second-years when I arrived in country: “welcome to the most politically stable, safe, and boring country in Africa. Nothing ever happens here,” they said, “it’s nice but life can get very boring and monotonous.”
Well, life just got interesting.
This was no ordinary truck. After I got ready, I walked out to the sandy path leading to the EPA for a beekeeping meeting. In the distance there was a crowd gathered in front of the EPA (strange because there is never anyone there). As I got closer the giant yellow Caterpillar earth-mover came into view. It was plowing a large square area in front of the EPA, shifting dirt to the outer rims, flattening a space. I spotted Mr. Singini – the secondary school night watchman – in the crowd and greeted him.
It seems the machine was sent by the government to clear land for temporary housing. The housing will be for the road builders, expected to begin work shortly. I guess all the gravel workers, other workers, and machines need a place to stay for the duration of the construction. Though it is a short road, Mwazisi is very remote and shuttling workers back and forth is not feasible. That somewhat solves that mystery. It’s strange how these developments kind of just show up. I don’t think anyone knew, perhaps I just didn’t know.
It seems you wake up one morning and there’s a giant earth-mover in your back yard. Just fell out of the sky. While a series of large construction machines may seem normal to most, it is certainly not normal here. To put it in perspective: seeing these machines in Mwazisi is like seeing a herd of elephants roaming about Post Office Square.
Despite the suddenness, I’m excited, as is the community. All these giant machines appearing, new people passing through. Though it is still isolated, the village is developing and changing in many ways: construction of the EPA, initiation of the Kulera Project, installation of electricity, commencement of the tarmac road, and soon the arrival of a second Peace Corps volunteer. The village is moving forward or at least poised to move forward, in many positive directions. Confirmation of my belief that development is best on a small-local scale, provided the presence of large infrastructure projects to support and encourage growth.
The kids are on holiday and crowds mounted the dunes piled up by the yellow giant. Everyone sat and stared, transfixed, as if in a trance, watching the giant move forward-backward- forward-backward. I sat in a trance too; it was calming in its repetition and in a way majestic. It was like a yellow elephant moving dirt about. It had a meditative rhythm that made it hypnotic. And like a child, you wondered what will it do next? Ah! Forward again.
These new developments are a pleasant distraction from the current tobacco problems, which continue to worsen. This is one of the few large-scale demonstrations I have ever heard of Malawi. We’ll have to wait and see how successful its actual execution is, but if it is then I think things will change even more in Malawi.
I remember the second-years when I arrived in country: “welcome to the most politically stable, safe, and boring country in Africa. Nothing ever happens here,” they said, “it’s nice but life can get very boring and monotonous.”
Well, life just got interesting.
Friday, July 15, 2011
Mwana Wane
“You are too mobile,” scolded Mrs. Gondwe. For three weeks the primary school had no headmistress, and though she had returned only yesterday, she was already about the yard twisting laundry. Her left leg was still swollen and she limped when she walked. For three weeks she was bedridden at St. John’s, a new hospital built across from the airfield. It was a beautiful addition to the dirt strip off the M1, but not uncommon as Mzuzu was a growing city bustling with new constructions. Afumu was sitting under the vines when he proudly introduced me to their son, my brother, a student at the Malawi College of Accountancy, currently visiting on holiday. Strange we had not met till today. It was Sunday and the dry season heat was rising with the morning sun.
She reluctantly dropped the pair of trousers in the basin and walked slowly to a chair under the vine shade. The severe pneumonia left her but the high blood pressure had to be constantly monitored. She struggled to settle in the blue plastic chair. Afumu Gondwe put the leather chief chair out instructing me to sit on the chieftainship. I sat and inquired on her condition. She said that it had been a terrible three weeks and she was in a lot of pain. “I saw heaven, but God returned me back here,” she said with a sting of despair. Sadness was draped over her face, a sadness that rose from an inability to understand God, to come to terms with his judgment. She didn’t want to be here anymore, life had taken its tolls and she spoke of her return dripping with such disdain.
Mwana Wane. This is our child. That is how Mr. and Mrs. Gondwe always introduce me to others. What can a child do for such sadness? Our time on earth is short, though perhaps for many it’s too long. “No more salt and sugar, take lots of walks,” I prescribed hopelessly. Things have taken a turn for the worse in Malawi. People are desperate for money and hope is being sucked out though a national straw to the very top. The village has changed, despair blows violently in the dry winds leaving a thick air of tension in its wake. Tobacco sales have plummeted after a large buyer moved its operations to Zimbabwe citing lack of cooperation from the government. The UK, Germany and Norway have all pulled aid from the country citing human rights violations and governance issues.
The Global Fund has ceased funding to Malawi. ARVs will soon be cut as the country will not meet testing requirements. A ripple effect of the flight of NGOs and businesses has been triggered. Many Indian businessmen are closing shop, moving back home or to the US to start new businesses. NGOs are following suit or slashing their budgets. There are fuel lines stretching kilometers down roads in Lilongwe. Diesel and petrol are scarce and the national highways are empty. New roadblocks were built to collect more fines and bribes while the new budget, to accommodate for missing aid, has placed new taxes on basic necessities. A loaf of bread jumped from MK 100 to MK 140 overnight.
Mrs. Gondwe was right. I have been too mobile the past two months. Though my community is still somehow managing to get by, I have been away with a heavy dose of guilt. I miss home, but camp preparations and VAC duties have kept me in Lilongwe. To supplement it are a long list of little things that just need to be done. I’m afraid I will be away again until September for camp and my sister and Henry are visiting. My futile efforts will not change Malawi, nor will they alleviate the burdens of a tightening government in the grand theatre of global economic turmoil. But I keep telling myself: I’m doing what I can with what I have. It’s not enough, but it’s something. As long as I stay away from uninformed psycho Canadian women, I cannot give up.
It seems that throughout history the multitudes always suffer at the hands of few.
She reluctantly dropped the pair of trousers in the basin and walked slowly to a chair under the vine shade. The severe pneumonia left her but the high blood pressure had to be constantly monitored. She struggled to settle in the blue plastic chair. Afumu Gondwe put the leather chief chair out instructing me to sit on the chieftainship. I sat and inquired on her condition. She said that it had been a terrible three weeks and she was in a lot of pain. “I saw heaven, but God returned me back here,” she said with a sting of despair. Sadness was draped over her face, a sadness that rose from an inability to understand God, to come to terms with his judgment. She didn’t want to be here anymore, life had taken its tolls and she spoke of her return dripping with such disdain.
Mwana Wane. This is our child. That is how Mr. and Mrs. Gondwe always introduce me to others. What can a child do for such sadness? Our time on earth is short, though perhaps for many it’s too long. “No more salt and sugar, take lots of walks,” I prescribed hopelessly. Things have taken a turn for the worse in Malawi. People are desperate for money and hope is being sucked out though a national straw to the very top. The village has changed, despair blows violently in the dry winds leaving a thick air of tension in its wake. Tobacco sales have plummeted after a large buyer moved its operations to Zimbabwe citing lack of cooperation from the government. The UK, Germany and Norway have all pulled aid from the country citing human rights violations and governance issues.
The Global Fund has ceased funding to Malawi. ARVs will soon be cut as the country will not meet testing requirements. A ripple effect of the flight of NGOs and businesses has been triggered. Many Indian businessmen are closing shop, moving back home or to the US to start new businesses. NGOs are following suit or slashing their budgets. There are fuel lines stretching kilometers down roads in Lilongwe. Diesel and petrol are scarce and the national highways are empty. New roadblocks were built to collect more fines and bribes while the new budget, to accommodate for missing aid, has placed new taxes on basic necessities. A loaf of bread jumped from MK 100 to MK 140 overnight.
Mrs. Gondwe was right. I have been too mobile the past two months. Though my community is still somehow managing to get by, I have been away with a heavy dose of guilt. I miss home, but camp preparations and VAC duties have kept me in Lilongwe. To supplement it are a long list of little things that just need to be done. I’m afraid I will be away again until September for camp and my sister and Henry are visiting. My futile efforts will not change Malawi, nor will they alleviate the burdens of a tightening government in the grand theatre of global economic turmoil. But I keep telling myself: I’m doing what I can with what I have. It’s not enough, but it’s something. As long as I stay away from uninformed psycho Canadian women, I cannot give up.
It seems that throughout history the multitudes always suffer at the hands of few.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
The Centaur & The Specter
Centaurus has returned to the night sky, for some time now. He humbly guards over the Southern Cross, his sword ever ready to strike the glowing heart Antares should Scorpio lay siege. The scorpion waits patiently, his tail wound around the center of the galaxy, drifting across the celestial sphere, with his red heart exposed to the universe. To lose the Cross is to lose our bearing, our sense of time and place, and the heavens will fall to the Earth. Without a South, there is no North. Is he aware of the utter chaos that would ensue from his folly? His heart glows red, a star so far away that burns with such intensity, does it overpower his mind? Perhaps he has no mind. Perhaps he only attacks because the centaur defends.
On the Earth, among mortals, the Specter has returned. You cannot see her except for in times of darkness, when sadness engulfs the world. Until then she drifts under the opera of the heavens. She seems to be endeared by this season of death, though it only comes once a year, for she leaves her world far across the seas to merely pass through our world. She likes to watch the green life wither from grass and the fields burn to charred remains. One can never understand her fascination with Death, though it was Death that untimely took her without reason. Some say she is in love with Death and comes once a year to secretly witness his life. But I disagree; I think she comes to watch the world die.
The next two months will border the fringes of insanity. Getting things ready for Kamp Kwacha in July, then a VAC meeting, my sister and Henry are visiting in August, and camp begins as soon as they leave. September is the island in the distance and the seas are growing rough. I am ready to come home and reclaim the semblance of a life I have left. There are many things that have changed in me. I have learned to be realistic and not a daydreaming fool. I have learned that one cannot evade Death, he comes when he desires at no one’s convenience. And with Death around any corner, I think every day of what’s important.
My family. My friends back home. My memories.
I have also discovered that we never really fall from innocence; it simply secludes itself into protection. People never really grow up. In better words, there is no growing up; there is a layering of defenses to protect that child inside. The mischievous one that can love and hurt unconditionally. That needs attention, caring and love yet yearns to be free and explore a world of senses. I get satisfaction from thinking of myself as mature and grown up, but I too am only protecting a jealous child who is afraid of being alone and the dark. That sometimes wants to destroy life without thought but loves intensely because he knows of no other way. Impulsive and desires to explore the world without straying too far from home. This is the child I fear, love and protect.
I miss her more than ever, I don’t know why. It seems that in times of sadness my mind drifts to a happier time in a happier place. I don’t think of what happen anymore; no longer try to decipher a female mind. It does not matter and even if I do try I cannot remember anymore. But the happy memories are enough. They are a shining light in the darkest of days and without them I would be lost. So no matter the pain, the tears, the utter hopelessness that ensued, it was the gift of these memories I am grateful for. Wherever I am, whoever I am, I can love, I have loved and even a small memory of that can radiate a relentless hope. Thank you for these memories, especially in these months.
On the Earth, among mortals, the Specter has returned. You cannot see her except for in times of darkness, when sadness engulfs the world. Until then she drifts under the opera of the heavens. She seems to be endeared by this season of death, though it only comes once a year, for she leaves her world far across the seas to merely pass through our world. She likes to watch the green life wither from grass and the fields burn to charred remains. One can never understand her fascination with Death, though it was Death that untimely took her without reason. Some say she is in love with Death and comes once a year to secretly witness his life. But I disagree; I think she comes to watch the world die.
The next two months will border the fringes of insanity. Getting things ready for Kamp Kwacha in July, then a VAC meeting, my sister and Henry are visiting in August, and camp begins as soon as they leave. September is the island in the distance and the seas are growing rough. I am ready to come home and reclaim the semblance of a life I have left. There are many things that have changed in me. I have learned to be realistic and not a daydreaming fool. I have learned that one cannot evade Death, he comes when he desires at no one’s convenience. And with Death around any corner, I think every day of what’s important.
My family. My friends back home. My memories.
I have also discovered that we never really fall from innocence; it simply secludes itself into protection. People never really grow up. In better words, there is no growing up; there is a layering of defenses to protect that child inside. The mischievous one that can love and hurt unconditionally. That needs attention, caring and love yet yearns to be free and explore a world of senses. I get satisfaction from thinking of myself as mature and grown up, but I too am only protecting a jealous child who is afraid of being alone and the dark. That sometimes wants to destroy life without thought but loves intensely because he knows of no other way. Impulsive and desires to explore the world without straying too far from home. This is the child I fear, love and protect.
I miss her more than ever, I don’t know why. It seems that in times of sadness my mind drifts to a happier time in a happier place. I don’t think of what happen anymore; no longer try to decipher a female mind. It does not matter and even if I do try I cannot remember anymore. But the happy memories are enough. They are a shining light in the darkest of days and without them I would be lost. So no matter the pain, the tears, the utter hopelessness that ensued, it was the gift of these memories I am grateful for. Wherever I am, whoever I am, I can love, I have loved and even a small memory of that can radiate a relentless hope. Thank you for these memories, especially in these months.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Azungu Bo!
Airtel has been running a 100 Free Texts promotion for the past few weeks. You send a certain amount of texts and you get 100 free ones. I don’t have Airtel, but Flamboyant does. And so, three, four, more times a week I get random texts filtering through Mwazisi’s shoddy network containing critical messages such as “Azungu Bo!” or “Flash SoCo!” Though annoying it is nice to hear from friends; it gets quite lonely some days in the village. More importantly I didn’t stop him because I have TNM, the AirTel promotion does not apply to me, so he gets charged for each text he sends me. Perhaps I’m an awful person, but Flamboyant is a close friend and very frugal. Cheap is a better word. Cheap to a point of frustrating and this is my lesson to him.
I visited him last week, for the first time, to conduct business training in his village. We met in Kusungu BOMA and caught a matola to his village. He made sure to specifically open his backpack and show me a plastic bag from People’s. “See I bought you meat, and not just any meat: sausage,” he said proudly. The pack of economy sausage had ruptured on the corner and ground mush oozed into the bag. “Oh damn it. Whatever.” It was his way of thanking me for doing the training. I laughed thanking him for the gesture, though told him I was ok with anything, even bread and peanut butter. For Flamboyant, this was a great leap in expenditures, even SoCo doesn’t get meat, and I appreciated his sincerity.
The training went well, I hope. His community is wonderful and his Forestry department is probably the only extension office that does any work in all of Malawi. His favorite neighbor, Olive, spent the previous week learning and practicing my name, which she executed perfectly in our first encounter. She was an amazing woman with an adorable crew of children. Flamboyant is virtually fluent in Chichewa and I stood gaping in awe as he conversed gaily with Olive and everyone in his village. After spending the night in his well furnished house, we went to a nearby tea room for breakfast. I was fighting off a three week cold and coughing out a lung, but somehow managed to finish the all day business training. Flamboyant’s counterpart translated and while a majority probably won’t really use these skills, at least four or five of the attendees really got it. They grasped the material and asked thoughtful questions.
That was it actually. Not sure where I was going with this. Nothing very exciting or profound, like Flamboyant's texts.
I visited him last week, for the first time, to conduct business training in his village. We met in Kusungu BOMA and caught a matola to his village. He made sure to specifically open his backpack and show me a plastic bag from People’s. “See I bought you meat, and not just any meat: sausage,” he said proudly. The pack of economy sausage had ruptured on the corner and ground mush oozed into the bag. “Oh damn it. Whatever.” It was his way of thanking me for doing the training. I laughed thanking him for the gesture, though told him I was ok with anything, even bread and peanut butter. For Flamboyant, this was a great leap in expenditures, even SoCo doesn’t get meat, and I appreciated his sincerity.
The training went well, I hope. His community is wonderful and his Forestry department is probably the only extension office that does any work in all of Malawi. His favorite neighbor, Olive, spent the previous week learning and practicing my name, which she executed perfectly in our first encounter. She was an amazing woman with an adorable crew of children. Flamboyant is virtually fluent in Chichewa and I stood gaping in awe as he conversed gaily with Olive and everyone in his village. After spending the night in his well furnished house, we went to a nearby tea room for breakfast. I was fighting off a three week cold and coughing out a lung, but somehow managed to finish the all day business training. Flamboyant’s counterpart translated and while a majority probably won’t really use these skills, at least four or five of the attendees really got it. They grasped the material and asked thoughtful questions.
That was it actually. Not sure where I was going with this. Nothing very exciting or profound, like Flamboyant's texts.
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