Remember me??

So it's kind of been awhile. I've been in my village for 3 months now, and I am very happy to be here. I get a lot of emails asking what I am doing exactly...because the name of the program "Girls Education and Empowerment" doesn't really explain what I'm doing. First, I should say that I just finished assessing the needs of my community, so I haven't started very many projects yet. The "etude de milieu" is the time to assess needs and get to know the community. So I have lots of ideas, but what's more important are the things that the village wants (because they know what they need better than I do). For example, there is a village close to mine with a school that doesn't function very well because there is no water pump. That means that girls are sent away from class to walk to the nearest pump and they miss some of the lesson. It also means a school garden is impossible and that there is no way food can be prepared for students, and many go without lunch. So...basically the things that I wanted to do here, planting trees at this school for example, was not the most pressing need, and I changed my plans. Now I am in the process of looking for ways to bring a pump to this school, before it can be improved in lots of other ways.
The school in my village does have a pump, and it does have a garden. So with one of my classes I am going to plant Moringa trees (http://www.treesforlife.org/our-work/our-initiatives/moringa) that can help fight against the malnutrition in the village.
At this school I am also going to start a reading/studying club with girls so that they have a better chance of passing the test to move on to high school (this is a GEE activity). Right now, there are a lot more boys than girls who get to go to high school. There are a lot of reasons for this: girls are needed more at home to work, sometimes they get forced to marry early or get impregnated, but really their education just isn't seen as important as the boy's.
I have lots of other activities...weighing babies at the health clinic, trying to start a preschool, adding books to the library (which is a trunk of 70 books, some of which are torn), teaching about AIDS and other STDs, and probably other things I'm forgetting.
I hope that clears up some of the mystery behind what I do here. It's kind of a lot of random work, but I really like it, and I love the people here.

Some of the reasons why:

They are accepting. There is an old deaf man in my village who walks around, greeting people every day in the market. Everyone greets him happily and seems to have his own sign language messages with him. I feel like this man might’ve been ignored on the streets of a market in most places, or thought of as crazy, but here, the people make him feel special.

They are giving/unselfish: My neighbor Collette is probably the best example I know. Her husband is a teacher at that neighboring village I mentioned without a pump. Each morning she gets up early to cook. She gives food to the neighbor kids who aren’t as well-off. Then she goes to school with her husband and when the kids have breaks for recreation and from noon to 3 for lunch, she sits outside the school and sells rice for a really cheap price (I’m pretty sure she doesn’t make a profit). The schools here are supposed to have “cantines” or lunch provided for the students, but most in this region don’t have them. Usually though, women sit outside the school and sell food, but since the women in this village don’t and many of the children have no other way to eat, she has taken the responsibility.

The more well-off people in village are called functionnaires--in my village they are just the teachers and health care workers. It is normal for them to have a young/teenage girl who does house chores for them. Most of them are treated very poorly, yelled at, as they do all the work (kind of like Cinderella)…Anyway, sometimes there is a girl that helps Collette and her husband, especially now that she’s pregnant. But Collette treats the girl as a friend, and after they finish the work together, they sit around and talk and laugh. She is such a great example of how someone who has privilege can love and serve others. She is a great example for me.

Some reasons why I get frustrated:

One of my biggest frustrations is being called Nassara, Bonpieno, or la blanche—different ways of calling me a white stranger. And I can understand why the people would call me those names if I really was a stranger, or if they didn’t know my name. But now I’ve lived in my village nearly 3 months. Most people do call me by my local name, “Yentema,” and I even have a few good friends who call me by my real name ("steven" is very difficult to pronounce here). But even some of my best friends will refer to me as nassara (stranger) or bonpieno (the white person/stranger), or sometimes a similar word that translate as “white thing” when talking with others. And it’s not behind my back, which I would be more okay with. It is right in front of my face. Sometimes I sit with a group of friends talking in French, when suddenly the conversation switches to a local language, and I know they are talking about me because I hear nassara or bonpieno, and if that’s not enough of a clue, they start staring at me. I figure they might as well joke about me with the name they gave me. I don’t know. It’s just one of those things that happens here, and I just can’t help but wonder how they don’t realize that it’s frustrating for me.

Another frustration I have is learning the languages. A lot of people don’t realize that French isn’t my first language and expect that I should already know more of the local language by now. But in a village where four or five languages are spoken, it’s really hard to learn just one, and to learn it well.

Sometimes I feel stupid, like I haven’t been trying hard enough-people say when you’re immersed in a new language, you pick it up really quick-like Julian, a Colombian who stayed with my family. It didn’t take him long at all to speak English well (and even dream in English). The difference, and the difficulty here is that I am immersed in four languages. I go around talking to people-for my work, and also just to learn French, but the conversation usually switches to a different language if I am not talking to just one person. The French is only spoken when I am being spoken to directly. This is not always the case—like with teachers or other good french speakers--but when it does happen, it's a little annoying.

One thing I do appreciate is that even though I'm not great at French, people here are used to the improper grammar and having to translate from French to local languages. There are lots of people in my village who can't even talk to each other because of they don't know the other's language. It's hard to imagine that as an American...not being able to talk to your neighbor or the pharmacist and having to search for someone to translate.

Another hard thing is what a lot of volunteers call "living in a fishbowl." When I walk through the market, I can feel all the eyes on me. No matter what I do, I am stared at and talked about. And if you know me very well, you know I don't really like being the center of attention. I actively avoided it back home. But here, it's not really possible to avoid all the excessive attention unless I hide in my house (which is simply too hot). I have decided that my favorite time of day is night time. It is cooler outside after the sun goes down, and I can walk around and people can't tell it's me, and I am no longer inside a fishbowl (i'm a fish out of water...lame?).

Hmm. So all of my complaining might lead you to believe that I'm not having a good time here. But really, I am. This experience has been eye-opening, humbling (times a million), a chance to share culture, knowledge, resources, love...with so many people. All of that is worth so much more than any of my frustrations, and I am so glad I have the opportunity to be here.