RANDOM THOUGHTS and IMPRESSIONS of AFRICA so far
March 2008
After nearly two years of travel in Africa, it is time to reflect. I do not expect anyone to be interested, but for me these scribblings justify the journey….
During a short break in the UK, one of the most frequently asked questions was; "Did you see lots of animals?", and my reply had to be "No, apart from in the Game Parks. They eat them all". I visited my daughter in the Lake District: We sat in the sun outside her house and, apart from the sheep and cattle coming to drink in the nearby trough and the pheasants and partridges noisily running around getting ready to be shot at any day, we watched the various tits and woodpeckers munch from their nearby feeders, enjoyed the gamboling of four red squirrels a few feet away, watched the rabbits dash for cover to avoid the ever-watchful buzzards and kites and remembered to clear out the indoor mouse traps every day. Much of England remains!
It is reassuring to know that I have no fixed route and that I can therefore enjoy the journey as it happens. A book I once read said; “Travel with nowhere to go. That way you will be part of your journey and not a victim of it”. Try getting directions in Africa! You are confronted with the politest of people who certainly set out to be courteous and helpful. The fact that they do not know where you want to be directed to is not off-putting in the least. A vague hand wave my occur at best. I found generally that one asks three people and hopes that the two who agree may be right. But a little further on one is wise to repeat the action and then perhaps find oneself returning from whence one came…
The lack of a camera has not been a problem. A camera soon defines one as a tourist and I really have not needed one. If I want to remember something strongly enough to take a photo, I just look harder and try to leave an imprint on my mind. These days the internet is so full of magnificent photographs anyway, so that the most desired photos can only be of people one encounters. OK, I am a lousy snapper!
I know that many a friend and acquaintance thinks that ‘Hilda has gone Native’ because I ride on local transport and am not afraid to eat/live with the locals. It is really just a misunderstanding of what my trip is about. When in Rome …. In ‘Emma’s War’, the book about an English girl who marries a Southern Sudanese warlord, she tries to ‘go native’ when with him, but still maintains her Western dress and is frequently seen in Nairobi and London circles in the latest must-have fashion. One reads about many great cultural-difference-marriages which do not last, but where there is generally a similar educational background, the difference in skin-colour does not impede.
Within its vast space with endless tribes/languages and customs, the variety offered is so staggering that it is presumptuous to expect to understand and know any aspect very well. So whatever conclusions I come to are based on my incredibly small contacts. I am not an anthropologist and not an adventurer or intrepid traveler in the true sense. Of course I am not a tourist as I define it: Somebody with limited time and a budget to ease the adventure. Nor am I a backpacker as these tend to be young people either constantly on the move or caught in a community where they offer mutual support to each other. As an old lady, I am a bit of a shock to a ‘whiteskin’ (abroni in Ghana, farengi in Ethiopia, mzungu in East Africa) who is willing to eat their food on the side of the road and does not expect favors in overcrowded vehicles. Nor am I a revered member of the UN, an NGO, Peacekeeper, Medical or Religious Organization who gives their time so generously to relieve or uplift the plight of the locals.
Yes, I will always be an outsider, but I hope one who is willing to observe, absorb and leave a positive memory with those I encounter.
It is a great privilege to live with families whenever possible. I find it fascinating to just sit and take note of the way the women keep their households together. No matter what economic level a woman lives in, she is endlessly busy. In my society it is dusting, polishing or bed-making. Here, in the poorer communities, where there is no furniture to care for or cutlery to wash, time is taken up with pounding and planting; in a middle-class household, it is often doing ‘good works’ for the church or community; in affluent homes, it is working flat-out to pay for the nanny….. We need to fill that vacuum. Men seem far more capable of enjoying social contact without attendant children demanding attention. So what’s new?! Just my conviction that there is such a fundamental difference between the sexes that it cannot, indeed need not, be manipulated. Why can we not enjoy the fact that, in nature, the nurturing role is given to females? This does not exclude education, but acceptance provides stability. Women yield tremendous power in their homes, but just because it is not overt, it need not be regarded as ’oppressed’. Female circumcision amongst the Dogon women is revered as much as male circumcision. There too a first wife is chosen for social reasons by the parents and subsequent wives for pleasure/support. It is accepted and each has a status. In western society we are more and more unwilling to accept that one can work towards a stable family relationship (obviously not in every case where the mutual aims are not respected). Instead we exercise those compromising /problem-solving capabilities in the workplace. Would you dare to scream or slam a door at your boss?
I observed five female school and university students in a very traditional Muslim house in Mauritania. Three were wearing their milufas over jeans, one just a headscarf to show a bit of modesty as she was only 15 years old but happy to soon start covering up and the last, a glamorously dressed and made up student was happy to conform with traditional dress when she returned to her family in the Atlas Mountains. These girls were very educated and full of confidence. Similarly, in Mali it was totally accepted that the women had bare breasts. Erogenous zones move: In Mali it is the thighs, in the West we constantly change (lately to buttocks, but in the 19th century it was ankles). Shock horror when Janet Jackson reveals a nipple, yet virtually anybody can access bare nipples on the pornography internet sites. And in the UK we have the Page3 bare-breasted girls. What saddens me though is to watch western visitors to the African beaches, who are oblivious to the local customs, flaunting their bikini-clad bodies away from the accepted tourist beaches, in front of fishermen and boat-builders. So what am I trying to say? Just that we must not interfere with other cultures because we believe that our values are the best/only ones.
The equivalent of the ‘red tent’ exists in many African tribal traditions. Women who are regarded as ‘unclean’ during their menstruation are gathered in a separate hut where they stay until they are once again ‘clean’. How super! For a hardworking woman to have a few days’ break and to gather with other women to gossip away the day is a real joy.
Shopping in Africa too is a joy. Every market has a wide variety of goods on offer and one moves from one ‘specialist’ to another. Yes, it is time-consuming by western standards, but the joy of interaction and knowing that everyone is part of a vast, functioning economic system, leads to understanding. Just to see the acres of the ‘empty-container’ market on Saturdays in Lome (Togo) was a joy. In this poor country, nothing is wasted and one goes there to select one’s empty plastic bottles, cans or tins. Then they are in turn turned into a useful object…my favourite being the little Nescafe tins which become wick-lamps and look so effective in their hundreds at night when food stalls appear. By the way, if you ask for coffee in West Africa, you are given Nescafe. If you ask for Nescafe in Ethiopia, they look at you blankly: It cannot be had: real coffee is all they know!
Markets in some villages may only be once a month. One can be driving along a road and suddenly be aware of a vast tide of people laden with goods making their way to the local village. Later in the day they will be returning in droves once again, presumably satisfied with their day’s effort. One of the most striking aspects of markets today, though, is the vast array of Chinese-made goods. Plastic containers are the obvious items which have revolutionized the economy. To be able to collect water in a plastic can rather than balance a heavy clay pot on the head, must be wonderful! But anything you can think of has a made-in-China stamp. The downside of all this is that traditional skills are lost and traditional materials no longer produced.
Africans have are incredibly resourceful and it is a pleasure to see how they can solve problems with the minimum of materials available. I asked for a boiled egg in my hotel. Never mind that the cook did not understand what ‘soft-boiled' meant. He had never come across an egg-cup. When the egg arrived, it was comfortably balanced on a thick slice of cucumber which had been hollowed out….
In the past, waste was organic and goats were good cleaner-uppers. Today the amount of plastic detritus covering all of Africa is frightening. Rwanda being the exception of course! Plastic bottles, bags, and bowls litter everywhere. When a South African couple living in a village in Zanzibar organized a day of ‘clean-up’ with suitable entertainment and speeches and new litter bins, they hoped that the message got through. The next week there was not a bin in sight. ‘They got dirty’, was the reason for their removal, they were told.
Throughout my travels, the shop clothes’ models which are used to show off the latest fashion or just display what is on sale or the latest batch of second-hand clothes, are Caucasian. I once did a double-take in Nairobi when I saw an African doll (mannequin as we used to call it), but one gets used to the anomaly, and as someone said to me, there is still the wish to be 'Western' through ones clothes, so these old 1950s and 1960s sharp-nosed dolls from Europe, no doubt imported in bulk, are the way all clothes shops display their wares.
The second-hand stalls to be found in every town and city (often vast area of specialist markets), is a subtle indictment of our western values. When charity-shop clothes first appeared (Oxfam and the Salvation Army are the major suppliers), people were reluctant to buy them because they thought the clothes could only be those of dead people. Surely no one would throw away perfectly sound clothes? Slowly perceptions changed and buyers began to realize that these were indeed good clothes (better quality than the Chinese ones) and then it became a status symbol to buy clothes with creases from the shipping bales to prove that they were genuine charity-clothes. Now middlemen make vast fortunes out of this trade and sellers specialize in men’s’ or children’s’ etc clothes. Local cloth producing factories and clothes’ manufacturers employing thousands of tailors/seamstresses have been forced to close.
One day a local asked me about the way volunteers generally leave behind their worn out or still very serviceable clothes. I explained that they were probably going back to a cold climate and didn’t need them any more. ‘Also’, I said, ‘they probably have another six pairs of jeans in their cupboard at home’. This was met with disbelief!
Volunteers on the whole do much to leave the impression that we are all coming out to ‘do our bit’ and it is often difficult to persuade locals that these people are only a very small portion of our total population. And that some of us do not have unlimited money… and that we also have poor people and beggars on our streets…
Naturally the western media are always full of the problems of AIDS/HIV. Sadly I have been totally unaware of it and am obviously living in a bubble. Yes, I have been to Orphanages and been told that there are kids with AIDS, but as an outsider not speaking their language, it has passed me by. But there is a very vigorous awareness-making system through advertising and bill-boards in most countries. Except in Muslin ones. The minute I had left the Burkina Faso border and entered Togo, I saw a big poster in the Immigration office. Since then one is used to seeing the little red bow all over the place. But the stigma persists in a land where one’s male-ness is of paramount importance and where it is still necessary for men’s status to produce as many children as possible. In Ghana I saw a large anti-AIDS poster with a slightly skewed message: DON’T’S HAVE SEX it proclaimed. In some countries the hotels offer free condoms from under the counter or in the rooms. And in South Africa, they are in free dispensers outside health clinics and in toilets. I was once in Eldoret in Kenya when wanting to wash some clothes. Not having a plug in my wash basin, I used a condom from a box of 100 and it proved a most effective plug!
I often marvel at the way Africans can dress so superbly well and always look immaculate for church or school. They may have to iron clothes with a charcoal –burning iron on the bed, but they make the effort. The elaborate clothes worn in West Africa are always clean and the women there are constantly washing, much more than I can say for east Africa, although this is a terrible generalization. The one country where one instinctively knew that the person only had the one garment in which they lived and slept and maybe washed it once a year (according to our guide at the time), is Ethiopia where poverty is visible. There have been many social occasions when I really did feel ashamed of my casual dress and sandals.
I was caught short to reflect on our perception of unknown places when I looked at a set of six large murals around a hotel swimming-pool in Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso. The artist depicted scenes which showed people relaxing in various ways. One was of people on the beach, sunbathing. As the artist had obviously never seen the sea, he painted the waves as coming along the beach at right angles from one side to the other, rather than from the endless expanse of water.
Climatic and cultural differences determine the building style of a people. What has been very obvious to me though, is the generally incomplete or neglected state of so many homesteads. In some societies a hut or a house is burnt down or vacated after a death, but generally it is poverty or the lack of ostentation as I know it, that determines the poverty-stricken look so prevalent in Africa. Often houses started with cement blocks are left unfinished and then the goats seeking shade or weeds soon leave crumbling edifices. But it is only western sensibilities that are offended! I have been told that the same principle which one sees applied in Italy or Greece, applies here too: If a house is completed, taxes have to be paid. Another reason is also that the owner may be living abroad and sends money for building works when it is available.
Traditional ways of preparing food die hard. In cities with multi-story flats, special rules have to apply because the endless pounding of cassava or other foods disturb neighbours and threaten the fabric of the building. So special kitchen areas are provided on the ground floor.
African’s chronic inability to do maintenance and repairs to any kind of infrastructure is a real block to progress. Keeping a vehicle on the road is ingenious, but doing maintenance of the fabric or preventing a breakdown through servicing, is anathema. Putting plumbing in place is often part of new building; maintaining that operation is unheard of. And of course, there is not always constant piped water because of vandalism or other problems with infrastructure. Similarly one gets used to knowing that electricity supplies are never to be relied upon.
But one cannot escape the fact that Africans do not have western expectations of repair and maintenance. Once a thing is built or installed, it is never looked at again. I tried to teach my cleaning woman in the Addis Ababa hotel that walls and surfaces above the ground also need to be kept clean. But to no avail! People are generally brought up in unpainted houses/huts where the cooking fire keeps surfaces black, so no need to try and keep things ‘clean’. Floors and yards are kept immaculately swept, however. The argument that poverty prevents maintenance is often not valid. When men sit around because they do not have work, they could easily make an effort to repair things which do not need money. But they don’t. Aid agencies like to say they are listless because they are hungry, but I have yet to see that proven.
Education is as ever, a very problematic subject. Schools are difficult to control where the teachers themselves are badly educated and receive poor salaries. Often they need to do another job to keep alive and thus the children never know whether a teacher will be in or not. It is said that everyone wants to go to school, but it is not always possible and not only financial considerations, but social ones have to be considered. If the goats and cattle need tending, the ‘herd has to be there. And if the teaching is poor or just rote learning, this is not conductive to an enquiring mind being opened. Students will happily sing along a times-table to impress you, but ask a question, and they clamp up. I was told that if pupils challenge a teacher or ask questions, they can be failed for subordination.
Remnants of colonialist teaching remains in some countries where schools often assemble before lessons and the children then sing the national anthem whilst the flag is raised.
Paul Theroux, during his return to Africa after over 40 years, hopefully returns to the school in Malawi where he taught as a Peace Corp Volunteer. He remembered the immaculate lawns and sturdy, painted buildings. Before he arrived, he contacted the school and offered to deliver a lecture to the assembled students, but was ignored. When he finally drove up to the school, all he saw was groups of dispirited youths, crumbling buildings, overgrown lawns and simply no interest in him as a ‘world-famous’ author. No one had heard of him and no one wanted to know. Ouch!
Time is not important and many people do not know how to read it or cannot be concerned with dividing the day by the clock. In Ethiopia and along the Swahili coast, time is sensibly told with sunrise in mind. One o’clock is six o’clock our time. I spent 44 hours on a small fishing boat in the Zanzibarian Archipelago. The three fishermen worked together like a choreographed ballet. They just knew when to stop the engine, when to cook food, when to sleep, when the moon would rise for the actual fishing. Each man had his own task and carried it out with silent efficiency. For two nights I timed them and, despite there being no watch on the boat, they instinctively knew what to do when.
After months of travel by road, one does not query them. You just know you are in for a bumpy ride. The wonderful exception to this which reminded me of the endless tarred and vehicle-less roads in the remoter parts of South Africa, are the tourist roads in Tanzania which lead up to the major National Parks. Otherwise it is murram, a red clay-like soil which does not disintegrate into mud or sand and compacts very well into a hard surface but which eventually forms ‘designer-built’ potholes and fissures which demand very careful driving. Much worse are tarred roads which have deteriorated since Independence with no maintenance in sight. Those tyre-ripping potholes are really a test of any driver and I call them Slalom Roads. One has to drive to avoid the holes not the poles.
What is very reassuring is the fact that, in the more traditionally-built-up areas, the sense of community and loyalty to the extended family is reflected in the buildings and their proximity to each other. There would usually be some kind of compound around and within which various members live and share, whether they are traditional mud or reed huts or modern square concrete buildings. I receive much sympathy when I say that I only have a daughter and do not live with her. Within a compound a complex set of relationships may exist, but as they are all called ‘mother’, ‘brother’ or ‘daughter’ etc., they are without the cultural relationships of western society. In Kiswahili there is no distinction between ‘him’ and ‘her’ and I often tried to correct someone before I realized that I was as much a him as a her to them. The extended family and care for the community is constantly re-enforced; ‘What is mine is yours”. When I have paid someone for a service and enquire the next day about what the rest of the money will be used for, it has inevitably been spent or shared with the brother or friend who expects it. My exhortations of ‘If you do not keep and save some you will never be able to buy a bicycle/pay for school fees/start a business…’ fall on deaf ears. One can call it ‘the poverty trap’ or one can say that the idea of provision for tomorrow is not very strong or one can just admire their caring and sharing nature... One can admire the interdependence or reflect that that is why no-one gets to start a business (thinking of the early days in the USA when immigrants did so well or why the Indians are so resented here where they build up successful businesses amongst the Africans who have the same opportunities…).
Maybe I am too much in my dotage, but, when I recently told someone that my profession is 'old lady' he replied "old is gold". Respect for old age is still very strong, although one has to acknowledge that urban Africans are no longer so traditional. Their parents have provincial roots, but they do not.
On principle I do not give alms to beggars. It may seem mean, but this is often in an area where tourists are exploited or where the local religion demands that those more fortunate should give something. What I have been doing is to try and help individuals where I think it will make a difference to their lives. Things like opening a Bank account for a future vehicle, giving an unsolicited loan to start a business, depositing money for studies, taking on all-expenses paid journeys of discovery, membership of the British Council, contributing to a real and visual project (I still want to give an old car to a technical school for mechanical practice...) are the things that catch my imagination and where I am happy to join the thousands of well-wishers who have been aiding Africa for so many years. Conscience solved?
Often food like sugar, oil, salt is bought in very small quantities in plastic bags. Thus you buy enough salt for the evening meal only. It is not only because there is not enough money for larger quantities, but also because there is no storage space in over-crowded huts where everyone sleeps around the fire or on mats close to each other.
Traditionally cooking is done outside over a portable charcoal brazier and there is no definitive place for anything. I always like the idea of a shared container of food so that everyone can eat as much as they need and nothing is wasted though large portions. Scrupulously cleaned right hands are used and you dip into the platter/pot/bowl nearest to you. If someone wants to show respect or generosity, they may move a choice morsel into your area. All this is so practical in a water-short country where people are often nomadic and therefore do not carry too many utensils with them. When I am often given separate plates of food which I cannot finish, even if I insist on eating it for breakfast, I am told ‘it will spoil’ and it is then wasted. Being in a hot country with no refrigerator, means that everything gets eaten that day. The result is superbly fresh and healthy food. No chemicals or preservatives. And yes, there must be hungry people in Africa….but not as many as the media seems to make us think. I look at the soup kitchens in the streets of London and wonder…..
For those not able to prepare food, there are endless roadside establishments which offer a wide variety of freshly (on the spot) cooked foodstuffs and of course one is constantly bumping into food sellers who dispatch anything you can imagine, out of containers on their heads. Or you can order a take-away; the plate is covered in a plastic bag, food dished onto that and then the plate removed. Hey Presto! Often, whenever a vehicle stops, the passengers are besieged by such sellers and you can always be assured of having a drink, snack or meal passed through the window before your vehicle moves on. Where tables are supplied by the roadside, there is generally a bowl and jug of water for hand washing. Every eating establishment has a tap or container with tap where one can wash hands before and after eating. You might need to go to another stallholder to buy a drink to have with your meal, but this is accepted.
If one wants to have a ‘take away’ drink of the locally mixed fruit juices or cola extracts, the correct quantity is measured into a plastic bag and if you are lucky, you get a straw with it! …An instant drink-in-a-container!
In Dogon Country, where people lived isolated lives for many hundreds of years before being ‘discovered’, I was surprised at how quickly a recently-killed chicken was turned into a very tasty strew. When I asked to know how it was done, I became aware of the ‘secret ingredient’ which everyone uses: Maggi bouillon stock cubes…However, as it boasts meat extract, it is very difficult for vegetarians to sometimes eat a veg. stew. I have been told that most veg. sauces have a meat base.
Food is everywhere: Small plots of cultivated maize, cassava, beans, and pumpkins…fruit trees or wild spinach; In the Atlas Mountains the rare round Argon fruits are collected by goatherds for that superb cooking oil. Herbs and spices and bushes of the little very strong chilies abound. Nothing is ever wasted or not used for something. Goats inhabit all built-up places and were, with chickens, the traditional cleaner-uppers. Now they have had to learn to avoid plastic. In dry areas, vast herds of cattle are carefully husbanded and in more built-up areas, cows are kept in sheds adjacent to or near habitation. This is called zero grazing and is just a very traditional method of ‘battery farming’. Owners go out and cut tall Napier grass or similar for the cow who provides milk and never grazes. This way the animals do not need a cow-herd or spoil the small grazing spaces. I always have to laugh at the small squat goats of West Africa (not the ones which give milk which are used in appealing photos to your conscience for Xmas gifts) and, in Zanzibar, at the incredibly long-legged chickens which seem to float above the grass.
Rice-growing is surprisingly common in Africa. Or at least I am surprised because I always associate it with the paddies of the Far East/India. In West Africa they called them rice swamps and in East Africa I have heard them referred to as rice farms or fields. On Pemba Island, I had a good look at the hard work that goes into preparing the small water-flooded fields which are owned by families. The sprouted seeds were being planted in muddy ‘nurseries’ and will be panted in water in neat rows when they are long. But what is time-consuming to see is that the women who are harvesting the rice have a small knife in the hand and each ear of grain is cut individually. By the time the whole process outside the hut of drying and winnowing has been done, the cost in human work-hours is tremendous. However the amount of large 110kg sacks of rice being loaded on the Liemba cargo ship on its weekly journey up and down Lake Tanganyika, which had been cultivated around its shores, astounded me. Africa can be very productive.
Somehow, without planning it, I have been very fortunate with the weather and fruits of the season. How could I have planned it any better to see the wildebeest migration? Pure luck! Similarly with the fruits in season (Bananas are always available). In the hills in Togo I had been living in Mango Heaven where the sides of the road were yellow with dropped fruit and one just bent down, consumed a fruit and repeated the action endlessly. In Kabale it was Passion Fruit Heaven. Liz and I always made sure we had a supply of freshly-made juice in the refrigerator and because I was on a course of antibiotics for bronchitis, I needed to eat natural yogurt and this was a wonderful excuse to have one of my favourite foods: yogurt with passion fruit. After that came Tanzania and I fell into Avocado pear Heaven! During my 'cultural tour' near Arusha, we walked all over the place and every path had trees laden with lemons and the ground was strewn with avos. The locals simply did not gather these fruits and they were too far from the main road to make gathering and selling a profitable option. I returned laden with fruit and all the lemons I needed to go with them. During our safari, my little group enjoyed these fruits with me. The cook did not think it a worthy food to dish up. Although bananas are always available, Zanzibar with its very large variety of exotic fruits was tops for that particular Heaven. Of the 30 varieties to choose from, most are used in cooking, although I did manage to sample quite a few types from very long to tiny small-bite-size as well as ones with a small black pip. The giant wild bananas one finds in the indigenous forests and which are not edible to us, are popular with monkeys who litter the floor below with their marble-sized pips.
Just as food and its consummation adapts to the climate and culture in which it is consumed, Religion does the same.
Black Africa is still very dual in its beliefs. Although Christianity has an extremely strong influence on most people and their lives are often dominated by singing, hymns and studying the Bible, they are also very influenced by their traditional beliefs and customs.
On the beach in Nouakchott I saw a woman appease the spirits with incantations, throwing leaves into the sea and then opening two cartons of white milk to solemnly pour these into the oncoming waves. White is part of the libation used to pacify the spirits and once, in Lome, when a devote Christian Guide and I had been to a sacred waterfall and we saw white cloths, white candles and white bananas which had been used for some or other ritual by the fall, he was amazed. As a 37-year old Christian he could not accept this ‘backward’ religion. I explained that there are all kinds of religions and that Christianity is not the one and only. Later that night he came to me in quite a state of unrest because I had caused him to rethink his own beliefs.
I do not like to think that I take people’s belief away from them, but when one travels through the world, one simply has to accept that there are many versions of GOD and that they will all give succour of some kind or another. I loved the way the Friends (Quaker) Church in Kenya has adapted. That very calm and quiet 17th century discipline is, like other Evangelical Churches throughout Africa, incredibly noisy with rousing speeches, loud music, singing and dancing in the aisles. Charles Fox should be spinning in his grave, but he was a man of his time and no doubt would approve of their efforts to keep the congregation happy.
As much as I enjoy the comfort of my western upbringing, after so many months in Africa, it is interesting to see how my standards have evolved. I always think of Albert Schweitzer in this regard. When he was successfully establishing an African hospital in Gabon at Lambarene in the 1950s, he recognised that he needed to relax the very strict western standards of cleanliness that he was trained to uphold. Visitors were shocked to see people on the floors, families feeding their sick ones in the wards, general 'mayhem' around. Yet he was successful and became famous for his pioneering work. And he maintained his western standards through his violin-playing. The two can go together. In Addis Ababa, however, I saw another version of an African Hospital. This was the famous Fistula Hospital where women, who have been damaged through childbirth and, with subsequent bladder and bowel incontinence, have been ostracized by their families and communities. Here they arrive in a smelly, physical and mental state of despair and non-existent self-esteem. They are put in warm baths for the first time in their lives, then into a ward with beds with mattresses and clean sheets. Having always slept in crowded dark rooms in the dark in their day clothes with maybe a communal dirty blanket for warmth, this was an unimaginable experience for them! And then, not to smell any more and to feel whole and to have confidence through the other patients; to have learnt to read and write and skills to help earn a living and then finally to go back to their village in a new dress; this is so different from the usual hospital situation that one can but admire the work done there. By the way, it is deservedly recognised as the best hospital in Africa and is totally funded by voluntary donations. So here we have the two situations and I am accepting of them both. I can happily walk in dirty, uneven streets, accept the many stalls selling everything you can ever imagine for sale, be frustrated by the lack of 'service' in restaurants yet not think twice about it, and then be pleased if I ever find a clean toilet in a 'luxury' hotel. And I can now identify what is 'normal' and what is 'poverty-stricken'. I think this is often difficult for first-time visitors to Africa. And let me assure you the latter is not nearly as bad as I saw in India! Poor Africa really has an identity crisis which the 'charities' often milk for their own do-gooding reassurance. My usual cynicism comes through!
It was very illuminating to read a book which was written in 1962. ‘The People of the Sea’ by David Thompson. The author was in search of local legends about seals and visited remote fishing communities on the coast where he saw and stayed in thick mud huts with local plant-material roofs. There were no windows and animals slept on the one side while the cooking fire was in the centre. People wore essential clothes made from local skins or roughly made woolen cloth. They used knives, lamps and carried water for miles. Food was limited and monotonous. Mythical or real stories were told around the fire at night and these were the ones which the author was collecting. He traveled extensively for a number of years there before life was changed forever: in Ireland and Scotland. So, can Africa also change? Of course it can, but it has to come from within. Subsistence farming in remote areas does not encourage expensive houses and facilities. Strong communal family ties hold together communities which will fall apart if there are no children to follow in the daily lifestyle. Yet when the African mentality, which will not gladly sit at a factory belt for 8 hours or will give a job to a competent worker rather than an unskilled relative, is taken into consideration, the change will inevitably be very slow. Beware the foreigner who imposes other demands! When we put our hands up in horror at the low wages paid, I remember the rubber gatherers on Pemba Island who have the rest of the day at their disposal for working on their own farms (shambas) after a 3-hour paid working day.
When I think of my privileged upbringing in South Africa with Western values, what did I, as a 15-year old reading my text-books, know or understand about ‘The Horrors, The Horrors’ of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness? Similarly, how could a student living in a mud hut with no running water or electricity, doing the same exams, understand the niceties of Austen’s late-18th century marriage-making in English Society? In the 1970s, I was ‘sad’ to see how the SA Universities had had to ‘lower their standards’ to be able to help the large numbers of ‘black’ students being admitted to them. But it is necessary to accept that the old standards of Western Education as imposed on ‘black’ Universities like Fort Hare (SA) and Makerere (Uganda) Universities, were unrealistic. One has to accept that different standards/values apply in a different world. A backpacker I chatted to told me that when she was recently traveling through SA, because of security, the most difficult place to get entrance to was the University in Durban. By the way, for those not familiar with the SA history relating to Apartheid, even in the 1950s, I mixed and studied with Indian and African students. I doubt that that was the case in the south of the United States of America.
I cannot but think of The International Trial in The Hague of Charles Taylor (Liberia/Sierra Leone) as a bit of an elaborate farce. The Prosecution staff is large (I met one of the many lawyers in Sierra Leone who told me a bit about it) and Charles Taylor is happily milking the system whilst complaining that his Defense allowance of 500,000 US$ a month is not enough. Who are the suckers? I suspect we are....The Rwandan Genocide trials in Arusha also make me squirm at the waste of public funding where Western Civilized rules are being applied to an African problem. Sometimes we apply our rules and sometimes we say ‘do it your way’. How confusing is that? Probably the best ‘easy read’ book about Rwanda, is “We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families” by ….. He also comes to the conclusion that the Western way of dealing with the aftermath is totally wrong and contrary to African ways. Is it just the West now wanting to get in on the act to assuage its own guilt for not having prevented the bloodbath? Sam Kiley, in a TV film called Genocide’s Children (Channel 4 Nov. 9th 2007), warned that Rwandan exiles are being reared for a new genocide. (Sad to have my own feelings confirmed). Are we aware? Are we capable of positive action?
One luxury good which is still much sought-after is a car. West Africa is very well-placed to be supplied with our cast-offs. In Sierra Leone there is a traditional arrangement with Belgium for secondhand cars to be delivered in the docks. So the cars there are known as ‘Belgians’. Togo, a poor country, has a vastly sophisticated container port outside Lome where containers of second-hand cars are loaded onto trucks and then driven through the corridor of this elongated country to Burkina Faso, Mali, Chad, Niger, and Mauritania. Quite sensibly, there is no point in importing new vehicles to these countries with their bad roads.
Post Offices are no longer as important to travelers as they used to be. When I was back-packing nearly 50 years ago, one’s only affordable contact with family and friends was thorough letters and cards. In places like Tangiers, one constantly came upon hopeful people outside the PO waiting for the promised cheque which they would assure their hotel manager or landlord, ‘was in the post’. No excuses like that today. Western Union does the job and instant cell ‘phone and internet access keeps one in daily contact. So the African Post Office has minimal services. Postmen are unheard of and one collects post from a set of sealed boxes adjacent to the PO. There have been times when I managed to locate a PO in remote areas where the person in charge does not have the correct denomination stamp or change. In Ethiopia it is impossible to send a parcel from anywhere except Addis itself. This has no doubt also to do with their incredibly convoluted security system where all parcels have to be minutely inspected and described.
Africa has gone through a phenomenal communications change over the past few years. The mobile telephone network has made it possible for people to be in touch as never before. Not only does it mean that medical emergencies in remote places can be dealt with swiftly, but small-scale banking is making it possible for everyone to be in charge of their finances without having to go to a Bank. They can talk endlessly and thus keep up those essential family/community ties; they can organize demonstrations or pass news very quickly; they are totally unaware of mobile-manners and would loudly chat in the most public or intrusive places. All this and much more makes me wonder why things have not improved…. But Lateral Thinking is the answer to many African problems and one can but hope that the use of this kind of technology will speed up essential changes. There are innumerable street-side booths where one can make telephone calls. The competition is great amongst the Providers and one of their advertising gimmicks is to paint your booth for free in their colours. But that service is already getting less popular as more and more mobile (cell) ‘phones are sold. Technology and prices have already moved on to such an extent that just about everyone has a cell phone. Or the booths offer the services of both, depending on the network you wish to contact. It is actually cheaper to use a mobile connection than a land line. I am constantly asked for my telephone number and there is a sense of surprise that I do not walk around with a 'phone. The new trash in Africa is changing too. Included with the myriads of plastic bags and bottles, there are little strips of plasticated paper littering the roads: These are the used voucher strips with pin numbers for cell phones. It has been difficult to find out what people call them. They look at me in astonishment when they realize that I am asking for a name for the thing! I’ve heard them called ‘short cut’ but otherwise it is just the name of the manufacturer or simply ‘2000 voucher’ or whatever is the denomination one wants to buy. In a continent where the concept of saving for the future is anathema, there is no hefty telephone bill to look at the end of the month! Cynically, I am moved to repeat what I mentioned in Ethiopia. There, because of the very draconian hold on the people, txt-ing on cell phones is impossible/illegal. A few years ago they were used to great effect to start a demonstration against the dubious results of an election. The subsequent riots and brutality with deaths and imprisonment was blamed on this easy way of getting a crowd to gather.
TIA: You are returning to your Hotel after supper. It is dark and the sandy path is edged with bushes; ideal for an urgent pee. As you squat, a man walks down the road towards you and says “hallo”. You reply in embarrassment and jump up to rejoin the road. He follows up your greeting with sentences in his own language and you begin to explain that you do not understand. Then he passes you, still happily chatting on his mobile ‘phone…
Thank goodness there is a changing perception about giving Aid. Recently, CARE, a humanitarian group, turned down $46,000,000 worth of food aid from the USA, saying that it is sold by charities to finance anti-poverty programs but this results in low-priced crops being dumped on local markets and small-scale growers then cannot compete. Dumping cheap crops undermines local agriculture. This is different from emergency food aid for famine or drought. The other side of this trade too is that shipping companies get lucrative contracts to transport grain over 4 to 5 months and 2/3 of the money spent by the Govt. on food aid goes into packaging and shipping. The EU has replaced food aid with cash to make sure that help gets to poor countries more quickly.
Back in Zanzibar (direct flight now with Ethiopian Air) and I stayed in my little hotel which is much used by resting Volunteers. The same old story of corruption and mis-management and inefficiency by not only the locals, but the good people who come here to ‘leave a mark’ I suspect. In England I was reading again about how you can invest in Africa, but it is with the proviso; ‘African Funds are only for the most gung-ho of investors, who can afford to take a long term view and risk substantial losses’ (Sunday Telegraph Oct. 28 2007). It does not encourage me to even try to invest my own money while I am here when locals see one and immediately stick out a hand for money. I persist in loving the place nevertheless. And my opinionated remarks can rile and activate your conscience. Come and see!
To come to the end of my cynicism, let me just quote a recent Oxfam Report: War in Africa has cost the continent at least 280billiion US$ in 15 years- as much as the amount given in international aid over the same period... 38% of the world’s armed conflicts are being fought in Africa. And what I was very disheartened to learn is that about 95% of AK 47s in Africa came from the West. The joys and frustrations of living in Africa!
posted by Hilda Matthews @ 5:21 AM
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