Gripes and a Story

You’ll have to forgive my infrequent posting, this last month or so. I usually try to write something, even if it’s trivial, every week. I know my family, friends, and perhaps a few others enjoy knowing that I’m still here, safe and sound. These last few weeks I’ve been pretty focused on teaching, and the rare days that I make a trip into Bukoba, the internet tends to be down. Its another of the perils of East Africa- sporadic electricity. But here I am, alive and well. However, it has been a rough couple of weeks for several reasons.

First and foremost, Steph and I split up. I know, I only wrote about us being together a few months ago. Those of you who know me well know that my relationships tend to lack longevity, for whatever reason. Anyway, without going into details, let’s just say having a relationship while living on the opposite corners of Tanzania proved too much for me to handle. It has been a little hard, because we rely on each other’s communications at times when feelings of isolation set in. I still think Steph is a damn cool girl, and I’m hoping that we’ll remain friends. Cross your fingers for me…

Also, over the last week, I have attended two going-away parties for other ex-patriots living in the area. Back to the isolation idea, recall that Bukoba is on the western shore of Lake Victoria, effectively separated from the rest of Tanzania (the roads south around the lake don’t really…exist). We have become a pretty tight bunch here, despite our varying countries of origin, and it hurts to see two of our half-dozen go. Beth is (to use “was” would feel like I’m writing a eulogy) a twenty-something teacher from New York, who I once described as a “party animal”. We relied on her to provide fun ideas for get-togethers and such; she fueled our social machine. Beth flew out on Monday. Matt is a British fellow in his 30s with a doctorate in biology, and he was working in an advisory role for the Tanzanian government. His house is the one with the big fridge, a water heater, an oven, and a panoramic view of Bukoba and the lake. Matt made sure that none of us forgot exactly what sarcasm is (its easy to forget here, Tanzanians are completely baffled by it and so we tend to stop using it, all of us except Matt). With the two of them gone, the much-needed social aspect of our lives is going to be pretty different. Jodi (the other Peace Corps volunteer), Manuel (a rambunctious Peruvian), Gayle (Beth’s former housemate, a music buff) and I are the remnants of our little network. We’ll still figure out ways to have a good time, but Beth and Matt will be missed.

Lastly, I was teacher-on-duty at my school this last week. This is the third time I’ve had this responsibility, but also the most difficult. Let me explain… Tanzanian government schools don’t have the luxury of being able to hire staff to perform a good number of the routine duties the schools need to operate (as an example, two students are serving as librarians in our slowly budding library). Therefore, these duties largely fall upon the teaching staff. We are assigned this task by what ought to be a rotating basis, but fails to exhibit any true rhyme or reason. Teachers-on-duty are given manifold tasks, from making sure students are up and in class on time, to supervising afternoon work hours (remember the grass slashing?), to making sure the staff room has hot tea at break time, to a number of other minute but time-consuming duties. Other teachers-on-duty have the responsibility of punishing (read: beating) students, but that is one task that most, if not all, volunteers shun. Here at Ihungo, the shifts are usually assigned so that there are three teachers-on-duty for a week, and then another three take over. Unfortunately, one of my fellow teachers just happened to be out of town for exactly the week we were on duty, creating more work for we who remained (this is a common occurrence, Jodi and Steph have both given me horror stories about being the only teacher-on-duty because the others have just up and left their duties, leaving behind weak excuses and nightmare weeks for the volunteers). Additionally, my previous two experiences as teacher-on-duty were during my vacations, so I could concentrate on that and not worry about actual teacher; not so this time. Trying to both plan and attend all my lessons while facing the unceasing teacher-on-duty responsibilities was a bit much. I finished up my duties on Monday, frazzled and in need of a break. I’m lucky there were no serious incidents (such as our riot, imagine being the one in charge of trying to stop that…), but it was taxing nonetheless. Especially considering what was going on outside of the school setting, with Steph, Beth, and Matt.

I would write more complaints and difficulties, but I feel like I have been bordering on ranting (or whining, as my brother would say). To be honest, I’m floating along pretty much steady by now, after the turbulence of those weeks passed me by. As I said, I’ve been losing myself in the class room lately. It has been a relief to forget myself in that routine, and also in the mental challenge of preparing lessons on digital electronics to students who live without electricity fifty-percent of the time. There is some irony to be enjoyed there, but the seriousness of my students sometimes turns it ashen. Considering the resources available to most American students, if they were as earnestly devoted to their studies as are a large number of my kids here, America would be producing an awe-striking force of intelligentsia. But at the same time, I think some of these students are sacrificing their enjoyment of life with their furious pursuit of academia…

One last story to leave you with-
Monday night was the date of Matt’s goodbye party. He lives very near to Jodi, so I stopped in to say hello. She looked flustered, and I heard the sounds of dishes being washed in her kitchen. I was immediately confused, as the woman who helps her with laundry and dishes is never around in the evenings. She sat me down in her living room and told me about Joseph. Joseph is a young lad, maybe twelve years old or so. Apparently, for the last three years, he’d been living with a Swedish couple who were doing work in some religious capacity here. Well, they left. He said they tried adopting him, but his grandfather wouldn’t allow it (even though his grandfather is unemployed and has no way to care for Joseph; Joseph’s parents have both passed away). So basically, he was kicked to the curb when they left. I guess this was a few weeks ago, and since then he has been looking around town for work to do, relying on acquaintances and strangers to house him for a night before moving along to look for more work and another place to stay. He came to Jodi’s school looking to do work for the teachers living on campus, of which Jodi is one. She agreed that he could cut her grass, and went to teach or some such. When she returned, he was finished, but was sitting on her steps crying. That’s when he told her his story, which she then related to me as we listened to him wash her dishes. What do you do when you find a kid like that who has no place else to go? Could you be just another person who tells him no? She couldn’t, and she’s got a big heart because of that. So she agreed to help him out. With our connections to the ex-pat and NGO community, we could find him opportunities that he would miss on his own. He told us he had already been turned away by the orphanages and churches, so she asked around at Matt’s party for other ideas. The next morning, we set out bright and early to follow up on the leads we were given. The first was a Belgian or French (I’m not sure which) organization called Partage, which deals exclusively with orphans and is well funded. We were given the name of the director, and so we sought him out. As we left Jodi’s, we agreed that Joseph should come with us, to tell his story first-hand if it was needed. Now here is what floored me… I should have realized it sooner, but not until we set out the door and began our way to Partage did the epiphany strike me. All this kid has are the clothes on his back. When he went to get ready to go, all he did was put on his coat. This triggered me to think about what we were doing, and how overwhelming it must be for him. This kid was a leaf on the wind, I can’t think of a better analogy. When we walked out that door, he had no idea where he might end up. Wherever we took him, whoever accepted him and helped him, they would become his future. Just that simple. The weight of that idea staggered me. Here was this boy, bravely headed with two complete strangers to an unsure and certainly capricious fate. That someone’s life, their destiny could be so…transitory, I still can’t really comprehend it. I think myself and a large number of citizens of Western nations have become used to the idea that we make our destinies, that our efforts will reward us by allowing us to achieve our goals. Goals which tend to be stable, rooted in desires from seeds we planted in childhood and which blossomed in our early adulthood. At least for myself, in one way or another I imagine that I’m always working for some bright future. And here was Joseph’s unreliable future, waiting for him as he walked toward it with only the clothes on his back. The feeling that these ideas gave me as we were en route to Partage was pretty overwhelming. Maybe I’m making something out of nothing, but I still can’t fully comprehend how it would feel to have your fate lay so much in the hands of others that you calmly follow them to meet it. (I imagine some of you might be thinking that this is all our lives, and God is controlling all our fates in that way; perhaps…). In any case, we met the director of Partage, an old French fellow named Phillipe, who told us we’d done a great job bringing Joseph to their organization, and that they would take care of everything and find him a home. The last word from Jodi was that he will be moving into his new home tomorrow. Before you think “What a noble thing they did!” you should know that all I did was to go with Jodi as moral support. She showed herself to be a benevolent soul in taking the responsibility and well-being of Joseph onto her shoulders, and I have been duly impressed by someone I thought I knew well.