Final photo update

Happy new year to all!!!

I finally managed to upload a selection of photos from the rest of my volunteer experience. Click here to sneak a peek at photos from Mozambique, Zambia and South Africa (St Lucia and Cape Town). I will upload a few more from the road trip in the next couple of days so keep an eye out for those.

Enjoy!!! And best wishes for 2010!

TIA demystified

Taking a slight departure from regular travel and work updates, I want to talk about a subject that has been bugging me for a while now. TIA is a term that most Africans are well versed with and probably use on a regular basis. For those of you not in the know, TIA is an acronym, which means: This Is Africa! Within moments of setting foot on African soil, one is bound to encounter and/or experience a TIA moment and hence be introduced to the term. Admittedly, it is usually used in jest but it actually highlights fundamental problems with life in Africa. But before I delve into my rant, allow me to site some examples of TIA moments
• You are in transit in an African airport and en route to your next flight, your hand luggage [which happens to include some alcohol that you bought in the duty free shopping area in the airport of the country you just left] is scanned. The officer says you have to pay an amount to the authorities, but if you pay him half that amount [yes, as in bribe him], he’ll let you through with no hassle – TIA
• Blackouts [as in no power/electricity], water rationing, very clogged drainage systems – TIA. The water source is at low levels or dried up and there is no backup plan!
• Heaps of rubbish in random spots in cities and townships. This rubbish will often be seen being burnt in various parts…meanwhile a few metres away a youngling is squatting, doing a No. 2 – TIA
• Public bus drivers taking liberties on the road and driving around like maniacs; like they own the town – TIA
• Dirt roads or tarred ones with massive potholes, women practically need sports bras to come anywhere close to comfortable while sat in a car driving on said roads – TIA. The government built half the road then realized part of the road was private property so they tarred half of it and left the rest. In some cases, the government didn’t even plan a road, the residents just created one!
• Formal functions and events commence 2 – 3 hours later than the scheduled time with no apologies or advance notice – TIA, in fact we are working on African time here, hello? What world do YOU live in? Have you not heard of African time? No? Well, now you know…TIA!
• You walk into a restaurant and order food which only arrives 3 hours later – TIA, it could be worse you know!
• Children get flogged in schools for disobeying rules or doing badly in tests – TIA
The list is potentially very long but you should now have a sense of what TIA moments are all about

What I find most disturbing about TIA is the ease with which we all accept it, and in fact, laugh over it. I say “we” because I am very guilty of this charge too. But being back here and working alongside Africans and non-Africans alike, while witnessing TIA in action, I have had to question the sense in doing so. If a function starts later than scheduled without apologies, why don’t we protest or hold someone accountable? Why do we accept it or laugh it off as just a TIA thing? It’s ironic, because tardiness is very disrespectful (being late just screams: “I don’t respect your time”) but from our early days we are taught to show respect for our elders and society at large [but maybe that is the problem: we “show” respect without necessarily “having” it]. When the police stop us for no apparent reason and we soon find out that they want a bribe, why don’t we make that individual accountable for their actions? Understandably, sometimes there are extenuating circumstances surrounding these scenarios I’ve just laid out and we can see what is driving people’s behaviour, but even that fails to make it right. These situations are understandable BUT NOT justifiable. The truth of the matter is that by not saying anything to reprimand friends, family, work colleagues, people we meet on a daily basis for acting ignorant; by laughing at and with them and dismissing these situations as TIA moments, we are compounding an already formidable heap of problems

I also wonder why we can perpetuate [and applaud, I dare say] such negative aspects of the African way of life but don’t tout the positive aspects of it with the same enthusiasm. I mean things like:
• Africa is a beautiful continent and each country has its unique [and outstanding] features to offer. They don’t even tell us that at school!
• Its children, though victims of poor leadership, war, poverty, abuse, deprivation, still find the courage to smile and stay positive about life
• That while most of our cultures may seem archaic and extinct, they teach the essence of humanity - to love and care for one another and look for the interests of communities rather than individuals
• That quintessential African hospitality stands the test of time. Most Africans are very happy to welcome strangers into their homes and treat them like family. I always thought this was true only in Ghana and Liberia but my travels have proved it to be a pretty pervasive phenomenon
• That art has always and continues to be a hallmark of our identity. That in the depths of the dirtiest slum, a ragged-looking chum is hard at work on his canvas producing a masterpiece, inspired by God-knows-what. That even though it is not widely known, some of the best artists through history e.g. Picasso, were inspired by such works of art, hopefully produced under less morbid conditions
• That a zillion pounds cannot buy the feeling one gets when somebody beats the drum well and another bells out a tune simultaneously and we all join in dancing and enjoy that feeling of togetherness; we all know that singing, drumming and dancing is an important part of the African way of life but how often do we acknowledge or applaud it?
I just want to know why we don’t talk about some of these things when we consider piping out TIA

By suggesting this, I am not saying we should ignore the negative things that happen around us, brush them under the carpet and focus only on the positives. Africa’s problems are mammoth by any measure and simply cannot and should not be ignored; certainly not by its own. What I am saying is that we should try to fix the negative things around us by starting with the little things that we CAN change – turn up on time for events; organize ourselves in our communities to deal with environmental pollution and appropriate disposal of waste; educate ourselves about issues that affect people in our villages, towns, cities, countries. And while we are at it, let us promote and/or educate others about the positive aspects of our way of life. I see no reason why we can’t turn TIA on its head and make it something that has positive connotations. I long to see the day that happens! But then again, it might not happen in my lifetime, after all…TIA!!!

Spare the rod and spoil the child?

“Spare the rod and spoil the child”, I’ve heard it said many times, usually as ample justification for disciplining [read: hitting, slapping, flogging, etc] a child or teaching them the straight ways of the world. I never adhered to this school of thought, at least not in the literal sense, and being back on the continent, where the idea seems to be fairly pervasive, I find myself asking, yet again, if it really is a good justification. Now I’ve had a fair share of floggings in my time and I’m sure many an African [black person, I dare say] of my age group would confess to suffering the same woe at some stage in their upbringing. I never did accept it and being one of those people who passionately abhor violence, never understood any of the justifications put forward by its proponents. I wanted to share my thoughts on the reasons why I hold steadfastly to this view and perhaps those who think otherwise can take a shot at convincing me

First and foremost, in my experience and as far as I’ve witnessed, adults who hit children tend to do so in a state of anger or frustration [plus, surely it takes that to raise your hand at someone]. Children will always be children, up to some trick or the other and will even sometimes be found doing things they have been categorically warned against. And while I understand the frustration and/or anger that this may sometimes inspire, I’m not so understanding of how that translates into whipping out the old belt or stick to “teach them a lesson”. Hitting someone when you are angry is wrong, period. It doesn’t matter if they are an adult or a child. It’s also ironically, incredibly childish and just the sort of behaviour that mature people do not display. The idea of resorting to violence [cause lets face it, that is really what it is] as a deterrent or solution to any problem is to my mind counter-productive. It also sends children very wrong signals: that it’s okay to hit someone to prove a point…and we don’t understand why people pick up machetes and slaughter each other when there is a disagreement of sorts. We are breeding a society of vigilantes without even seeing the wrong in it. I say this particularly in reference to the post elections violence here in Kenya (Liberia, Sierra Leone and Rwanda popped to mind as well, incidentally) and people expressing surprise at how easy it was for a seemingly peaceful country to break into complete and utter mayhem!

I had an experience with one of the teachers at the school the other day, where one of the kids, after being repeatedly scolded for distracting her classmates and just being annoyingly disruptive, she (the teacher) proceeded to scream at the child, dragged her to the back of the class, instructed her to kneel down and was about to do God-knows-what to the poor kid, when she saw my have-you-lost-your-mind? look. Her question to me then was “what do you do with a child like this?”. “You say you don’t hit children Nana, but how do you deal with this child? Tell me!” she beseeched. The reality was that singling out the child in front of her friends had embarrassed her so much that she had already burst out crying and sobbing uncontrollably. I ignored the teacher, calmed the child down and soon got her to get on with her work. It took a lot of composure to explain to this lady, a while later, that embarrassing the child in front of her friends was more than enough punishment and that hitting her would not have proved her point any more or less. This situation highlights my second issue with hitting children: that people refuse to think of alternative ways of disciplining children and it’s just unforgivable. How about we adopt an approach where hitting the child is not an option? Think, pursue all other avenues of discipline and tell me if you find absolutely nothing that works. Another incident that springs to mind is one that a housemate of mine witnessed at the orphanage/school that she works at. She happened upon one of the teachers mercilessly slapping and pulling the ears of a five year old. She actually walked out of the room because it was getting to ridiculous proportions. She later found out that the child in question was HIV positive, something he was fully aware of, and had bitten one of the other children in a fight. Somehow kicking (apparently another male teacher joined in with that act) and slapping the living daylights out of the child would deter him from ever doing that again. Did they ever consider that this was just an angry child who needed psychological help perhaps? Or even start by understanding what motivated him to do that…no, none of that, lets beat him silly and he’ll know better next time! A blatant display of intolerance for using brain cells and adults just being very lazy at dealing with the challenges that working with or raising kids present. I could give more examples but I think I’ve made my point here

There also seems to be an obsession with “putting the fear of God” in children. Smacking them silly will make them know what is acceptable and what is not. They will know not to repeat their heinous crimes if they get a good beating. While this is true, it also comes with various psychoses; I’ve seen a few of the children flinch when you come close to them and make a gesture any where near raising your hands at them. You instill fear all right, but in some cases these children become scared of their own shadows. They become timid and develop all kinds of complexes. Surely there are better ways to teach a child not to do something. Heck, sometimes they just have to learn from experience!

I’ve been told, in relation to this topic, that someday if I have kids, I’ll spoil them rotten. Well if choosing to not hit them equates to that, then so be it. Working with the children I’ve encountered so far on this trip, just strengthened my resolve to not resort to disciplining children in the “traditional” African way. So “Spare the rod and spoil the child?”, “Yup, guilty as charged!”