Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Comin’ Home (email from Jenell Oct 31, 2007)
I realize that America is the land of efficiency and ADD and that soon I'll need to adjust to that and send out normal length emails in regular intervals, but I'm not there… yet. So, I will instead send out an email of a most intimidating length saying bits and pieces of everything I've wanted to communicate to the world outside in the last several months.
Building the bakery!
Bakery
In short, the bakery is being built, but will not be finished by the time I leave Jirapa. It will however be done, "inshallah" – god willing, by the time the next volunteer arrives. She will be able to take over with helping to get the business up and running, then help with advertising, organization, and introducing more nutritious recipes. The bakery has been my biggest reminder that I am doing development work. Nothing has come easily. (For example, right as we were about to start we discovered that the original piece of property purchased was unusable because someday the government wants to build a road through it). We have had many bumps along the way, but we are building now and the women have been working really hard. They amaze me. They have so many responsibilities with other part time employment (seamstresses, hair dressers, kiosk workers, etc), raising children, farming, cooking, cleaning,…. and now volunteering to do hard labor to build their bakery. All this and they are all struggling to get by and put food on the table. Although this reality may surface as an excuse for not having money to contribute, it never comes as a complaint. They have great senses of humor and we have laughed together a lot. As much as I admire the women of Garasie, I don't want to paint an overly romanticized picture of the poor, African woman with a huge smile, in reality we have had our share of disagreements in the group, and I often have to ride my bike to find them at their work, house or fields and let them know they needed to work at the bakery. So, the bakery is coming to life and with it brings problems and benefits, but the way I see it, building will be the hardest part of the project, with the biggest problems. Once the bakery is in action, the women will be able to have stable, self manageable work, which will have the potential to generate the income necessary to reduce a lot of the current problems among group members.
So, this is it.
The 2 years, that at times seemed an eternity, have passed. What can I possibly say about 2 years of living in rural West Africa, about development work, about growing up, about making unlikely friends, or about living poor, but feeling rich? What it comes down to is that life seems much more complex at this particular juncture as I find myself stepping between realities so different it's hard believe they co-exist. This complexity, with which I am both weighted and propelled, has been gained, I like to believe, by simply living life. After I had been here several months, I received a letter from my uncle Matti, who did Peace Corps in '78. I have read his letter countless times to myself and out-loud to fellow volunteers. In it, he passionately advises, "The more heart-felt the effort you put into this life, by truly LIVING it, the deeper it will go into your psyche. The deeper it gets ground into your psyche, the more you will remember what it means to be resourceful and hopefully, the easier it will be to adapt this most versatile and valuable human trait to any future situation, regardless of where you live or what you are doing in the moment… Enjoy the classic small moments; allow them to sink as deep into your consciousness as you can comfortably allow. Those moments will reward and help you years from now in countless, unimagined ways."
I believe, it will be much easier for me to reflect once I'm back on American soil, and not just because I write better with good coffee close at hand, but because my experience has been so rich with so many details, people and stories that I'll probably be trying to make sense of it for the rest of my life.
Where I'll be --
1) Novemer 18th : go to Accra for Peace Corps exit interviews, medical exams, and all sorts of paper work associated with volunteering through the United States government.
2) November 27th : go to Ouagadougou (pronounced Wa-ga-du-gu, much to my entertainment) the capital of Burkina Faso, a country I've been living so close to I could have ridden my bike down the red dirt road to look at it across the river had I been overcome by the desire to do something athletic for 8 hours in the heat of sub-Saharan Africa.
3) November 30th : fly to Casablanca, leave immediately upon recommendation that it's the worst city ever, and continue on to explore all that Morocco has to offer with Courtney Humm and Peter DiCampo for 10 days.
4) December 10th: fly to 'merica!!! Spend a week in Minnesota seeing part of my family, showing Pete around, hopefully playing in the snow, and eating EVERYTHING.
5) December 17th: fly to Massachusetts to hang out with Pete's family and friends and see if eating EVERYTHING on the East coast tastes any better.
6) December 30th: fly to Minnesota to see friends and try to readjust to living in America… in the winter!
Building the bakery!
Bakery
In short, the bakery is being built, but will not be finished by the time I leave Jirapa. It will however be done, "inshallah" – god willing, by the time the next volunteer arrives. She will be able to take over with helping to get the business up and running, then help with advertising, organization, and introducing more nutritious recipes. The bakery has been my biggest reminder that I am doing development work. Nothing has come easily. (For example, right as we were about to start we discovered that the original piece of property purchased was unusable because someday the government wants to build a road through it). We have had many bumps along the way, but we are building now and the women have been working really hard. They amaze me. They have so many responsibilities with other part time employment (seamstresses, hair dressers, kiosk workers, etc), raising children, farming, cooking, cleaning,…. and now volunteering to do hard labor to build their bakery. All this and they are all struggling to get by and put food on the table. Although this reality may surface as an excuse for not having money to contribute, it never comes as a complaint. They have great senses of humor and we have laughed together a lot. As much as I admire the women of Garasie, I don't want to paint an overly romanticized picture of the poor, African woman with a huge smile, in reality we have had our share of disagreements in the group, and I often have to ride my bike to find them at their work, house or fields and let them know they needed to work at the bakery. So, the bakery is coming to life and with it brings problems and benefits, but the way I see it, building will be the hardest part of the project, with the biggest problems. Once the bakery is in action, the women will be able to have stable, self manageable work, which will have the potential to generate the income necessary to reduce a lot of the current problems among group members.
So, this is it.
The 2 years, that at times seemed an eternity, have passed. What can I possibly say about 2 years of living in rural West Africa, about development work, about growing up, about making unlikely friends, or about living poor, but feeling rich? What it comes down to is that life seems much more complex at this particular juncture as I find myself stepping between realities so different it's hard believe they co-exist. This complexity, with which I am both weighted and propelled, has been gained, I like to believe, by simply living life. After I had been here several months, I received a letter from my uncle Matti, who did Peace Corps in '78. I have read his letter countless times to myself and out-loud to fellow volunteers. In it, he passionately advises, "The more heart-felt the effort you put into this life, by truly LIVING it, the deeper it will go into your psyche. The deeper it gets ground into your psyche, the more you will remember what it means to be resourceful and hopefully, the easier it will be to adapt this most versatile and valuable human trait to any future situation, regardless of where you live or what you are doing in the moment… Enjoy the classic small moments; allow them to sink as deep into your consciousness as you can comfortably allow. Those moments will reward and help you years from now in countless, unimagined ways."
I believe, it will be much easier for me to reflect once I'm back on American soil, and not just because I write better with good coffee close at hand, but because my experience has been so rich with so many details, people and stories that I'll probably be trying to make sense of it for the rest of my life.
Where I'll be --
1) Novemer 18th : go to Accra for Peace Corps exit interviews, medical exams, and all sorts of paper work associated with volunteering through the United States government.
2) November 27th : go to Ouagadougou (pronounced Wa-ga-du-gu, much to my entertainment) the capital of Burkina Faso, a country I've been living so close to I could have ridden my bike down the red dirt road to look at it across the river had I been overcome by the desire to do something athletic for 8 hours in the heat of sub-Saharan Africa.
3) November 30th : fly to Casablanca, leave immediately upon recommendation that it's the worst city ever, and continue on to explore all that Morocco has to offer with Courtney Humm and Peter DiCampo for 10 days.
4) December 10th: fly to 'merica!!! Spend a week in Minnesota seeing part of my family, showing Pete around, hopefully playing in the snow, and eating EVERYTHING.
5) December 17th: fly to Massachusetts to hang out with Pete's family and friends and see if eating EVERYTHING on the East coast tastes any better.
6) December 30th: fly to Minnesota to see friends and try to readjust to living in America… in the winter!
