Joy and deep sincere calm emotions

DSC_0412.jpg
Originally uploaded by JCTownsley

Have you ever experienced fulfilling the mission of your convictions by way of fulfilling your life's passion. It is with tears at the ready and full of gratitude that I tell you that I am living that. Feeling that you are doing what life has taught you is right to do through using your skills that are your life's passion, wow, what else can you want out of life? Maybe food, water, health, a wonderful family, and friends, and I have those too... Al Hamdoulila...Allah Akbar.

I get it. I know what to do. I know how to do it.

dancing 'Ridungo'
Originally uploaded by JCTownsley

This final year of service promises to be fast and furious. Been in Togo for 17 months and I get it now. I know what to do. I know how to do it. I don't have much time left however.

An evolving list of objectives for my final year:
-improved cookstove campaigns targeting tchouk markets and middle school students (middle school improved cookstove contest)
-Continue Moringa powder distribution and trainings at baby weighings
-help feed 10 orphans in Sokode
-cantonwide Agroforestry conference with Bradoc
-Continue radio program-trainings on Radio Tchamba
-teach,assist and work with local middle school students as much as possible, continue penpalship
-Involve the sacred forest in my work
-Can and sell large amounts of mango jam as income generating activity with folks
-help put together a school library at local middle school
-participate in as many football practices as possible and use that forum to further my work
-animal health center project
-collaborate closely with a few select young individuals so that they become models for others.
-collaborate effectively with members of my village living in Europe or the US. Help them help their village.
-well projects/financed projects, possibly a bridge
-Hospital Moringa plantation
-Incorporate moringa Powder into egg-laying hen business
-mass production of Neem pesticide
-Weekend outdoor school among Fulani for village youth
-Continue to sell vegetable seeds but better incorporate non chemical production methods trainings
-Run computer classes with students and teachers at the local middle school where there is no power
-Do trainings by megaphone to the crowds on market days in my village
-Assist to the best of my abilities the birth of a beekeeping project
-Prove to people that Agroforestry and non chemical land fertilization is feasable in terms of required labor, to chemical fertilization
-Have an agroforestry demonstration field in place before leaving
-help provide medicines to a village health center
-help supply a blacksmith with tools necessary to continue and expand his business
- help a kindergarten to obtain needed supplies
-Pursue the other quality projects and opportunities to do good that I have forgotten to mention here and those that I will come across.
-pray 5 times a day
-learn Arabic
-master Kotokoli
-learn Hausa

*Updated* 11/22: the debate and the consequences of its conclusions

Africans want to understand why and how the gap between themselves and the rich world came to be. There are many that espouse behavioralist explanations of "under-development," under-development being a term that Africans who I know employ. This type of conclusion has as a fundamental principle the idea that Africa is "under-developed" because of Africans themselves, African behavior and African mentality. In the opposite camp lie what I will call the materialist explanations of "under-development," whose fundamental principle is the idea that Africa is "under-developed" because of its historical material conditions and its geography.

Sitting on the left in the adjacent photo is a professor who will tell you that Africa is "under-developed" because "Africans are too content with the little that they have, Africans are not driven, they are good at rejoicing, dancing and singing, but not at pursuing progress." If you try to dispute it, he will respond that you have to be African to understand. In addition he will tell you that under-development in Africa is caused by the jealousy that keeps Africans from uniting to achieve common goals. The professor would add: "if you were to tell Africans that their poverty is due to geography, then they would stop trying." Government functionaries tend to espouse behavioralist explanations and point to the villager mentality. A couple days back a functionary looked at a grapefruit tree full of fruit and said “look how lazy we are [we are too lazy to even create plantations of trees that would provide for us].” Does he have it right or is there more to it like tree diseases, too many short term needs, and the lack of a market for grapefruit?

A man from my village who is living and working abroad came back to Togo for a visit and had little hope for his village. He predicted that "Africa will never develop. Look at all the men sleeping on benches all day who wake up and say that they couldn't find any money." This man is echoed by another man from my village also living abroad who declares that "Africans are rich but don't realize it." He points to Leucena leaves, beekeeping, animal breeding, manure use, and fruit trees as some of the many unexploited money-makers in Africa.

In any case, the point of this entry is to introduce you to the debate that takes place among Africans about who or what to blame for historical and present perceived "under-development.” I would also pose the question: what are the consequences of this debate in terms of the outlook of Africans themselves? Afro-pessimism or chronic pessimism about Africa is often fed by behavioralist explanations for under-development. Afro-pessimism is a huge psychological obstacle blocking its development.

Anthropologist Dennis Garvey reminded me today that societies are like organisms. They are made up of many dynamic components, each of which plays a role in the functioning of the whole. Our organic societies also operate in given environments that contain other societies as well as different quantities and qualities of available resources. So why development occurred is a more complicated question than one may think but I am a firm believer in the geography explanation as opposed to the behavior explanation of the level of development of different peoples. It seems to me that Human behavior, while it looks very different as you travel, is more static than one would think wherever you go in the world.

Also see the entry about Sarkozy's speech in Dakar.

"Moringa moringa moringaaaa" we called out at Market.

Moringa powder and its audience
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

The tree Moringa Oleifera has been my best received and largest (in terms of time spent) project.
The tree's leaves are veritable natural vitamin pills. They can provide much vitamin A, as well as vitamin C, calcium, iron, protein, magnesium, potassium, amino acids and may be eaten fresh or in the form of powder, as you see in the photo (though there is less vitamin C in the powder, the other nutrients a more concentrated in the powder than in the fresh leaves). Malnutrition can be combatted effectively with Moringa leaves. Moringa leaves can also be a great source of fodder for animal husbandry and the leaves are not the only useful part of the tree. The pods, the seeds, the flowers, and the roots also have important uses... Read some Moringa literature.

Moringa Activities at my post:
-We (my Togolese counterparts and myself) have trained the community health agents on the importance, production, and use of Moringa leaves especially for vulnerable folks like children, women having given birth, older folks, or anyone suffering from nutritional deficiencies.
-We have performed a Moringa planting campaign with the same health agents.
-We have sold Moringa trees, seeds, and literature at local markets and used that forum to get out the word about Moringa.
-We are putting in place a Moringa plantation next to the local hospital. The leaf production of the plantation will be dedicated to powder production for treatment of malnutrition.
-We are training mothers during monthly baby weighings about how to administer Moringa powder to their children.
-We have trained and or assisted numerous community service providers including nurses, agronomists, teachers, and development workers in Moringa production and use.
-We have broadcast radio show-trainings about Moringa.
-We have animated many formal and informal trainings and distributed seeds, seedlings, and or literature to many different individuals and groups in the region (informal trainings are probably the activity to which the most time is dedicated).

School work and "le jeu de 24"

More 24
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

Working with youth provides a rich source of highly fulfilling work opportunities. I have been stepping-in to occupy students during periods of the school day when they are idle. We play large circle games, learn about subjects from the history of Blues (with a guitar in hand) to the environment and agriculture. We are continuing the penpalship that began last year with students at an American High School. We are also playing the "24" game (as you see in the photo), an engrossing math game that occupied me in middle school and that has been a hit with students here. In the course of these activities a couple students have come up with some promising ideas for other activities to initiate...

Celebrating the end of Ramadan (Eid ul-Fitr)

end of Ramadan holiday (Eid ul-Fitr)
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

My fondest moments here have been sitting with this man, Ticha, smiling and laughing with him, listening to him tell his life's adventures, from listening to Nkrumah declare the Independence of Ghana, to attending an Nkrumah inspired Teacher training college, to living through theft at gun point as a manager in Nigeria, but it isn't the stories, it is him, this father figure...


He is making his first pilgrimage to Mecca this year, May God accompany him.

the battle and understanding's dust settling rains

the Africa misunderstanding blurred
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

In the entry "first year blues," I made reference to the internal battle that I have been going through during my first year in Togo. I believe it was, and is, a battle between misunderstanding and understanding. Misunderstanding and understanding of myself, of Africans, of Africa, of what I should do here, of what I can do here, of humanity, of life.

I thank God for helping me along in the battle, for giving me the idea to take breakfast with villagers during Ramadan, for putting wise guides around me, for helping me listen to and study my mind and its reactions to life, and for giving me just enough humility to attempt to identify my faults and mistakes and then correct them. I think if God gives me the chance, the battle might just bear some wonderful fruits.

It is interesting how much personal progress came during the Ramadan fast.

The battle between misunderstanding and understanding undoubtedly warped the image of Africa that I have been displaying to you. The battle blurred the courageous, patient, caring, joyful, suffering, successful, dreaming, thwarted, striving Africa that I see here in Togo. And though one can observe some very discouraging things here, it is the adjectives that I have just listed that best describe the Africa I have come to know.

21st day of Ramadan

sokode mosque before morning prayer

Today is the 21st day or the beginning of the last third of Ramadan. I have been eating at a different villager's house every morning around 4 am. It has been a great way to get to know the villagers better, tighten bonds, and hatch work ideas.

This morning was the beginning of the period when Laylat al-Qadr can take place. Laylat al-Qadr, or "the night of power," falls during "the last third of Ramadan, commemorates the revelation of the first verses of the Qur'an, and is considered the most holy night of the year." This morning also brought a magical walk with friend Champion to Sokodé's Grand Marché around 4 am to eat the corn paste and sauce that my skittish fasting taste buds desired. As we walked, the women could be heard preparing food and a few old men could be seen studying the Qur'an in the glowing mosques. There is something about the distinctive sounds of a Ramadan morning that for a month find their home in the silence of the pre-dawn hours. The young men that circulate through the neighborhoods chanting their wake-up call, for women to prepare food, around 2:15 am, the Coran recitations ringing out from blasting stereos and radios, the sounds of women at work preparing food and the almost celestial smattering of light orbs coming from the lanterns illuminating their work. And then come the calls to prayer that wean you off the food and water and usher you into another day of fasting.

Pastoralism

the herd (Fulani excursion)
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

Maybe my idea, in an earlier blog, that the Fulani represent "self-confident Africa" came from the fact that they simply have a good job that provides for their needs. Their job also does not require them to move away from their traditional mode of living. Most Africans are stuck trying to get ahead by selling their farm products to nonexistant markets and going to "colonial school." Most of of Africa is jobless and is moving away from tradition, the Fulani have a good job and have remained traditional. This is my distinction between self-doubting and self-confident Africa.

Here is an article that considers the difficulties and importance of pastoralism in present and future Africa:
AFRICA: Can pastoralism survive in the 21st century?

I really have a need and thrist to be in Village right now. This is the last year that I will be able to spend Ramadan in my village and there is a alot of pent-up first year guilt that I can best work out while in village. So I am negociating getting out of some engagements that require me being out of my village.

Among the ideas I have for this next year is running an outdoor school for middle school students that would involve living with the Fulani in the bush. I think that seeing how others live and living among them is a big reason why JFK created the Peace Corps and I think that same effect could be achieved locally and cheaply for middle school students by taking them to live among the Fulani. I have gotten a lot of positive feedback about the idea from Togolese.

First year blues

SSC_0552
Originally uploaded by JCTownsley

Ani Song:
Yo gassana, Mosorou, Yo gassana
doh leanya ga bilay bi somo

English:
Hold yourself right, my friend, hold yourself right
the world isn't like it used to be.

Good news is that I have met a Togolese professor of forest ecology with whom I will work on protecting, documenting, and extending my village’s remaining grove of virgin forest. The remaining grove is a rare storehouse of biological diversity in the small Dahomey gap ecosystem.

I have this consuming sense of guilt about my first year of service as a Natural Resource Volunteer in Togo. I feel like I am slowly emerging from a cloud of work discouraging conclusions that turned me against my host culture and greatly hindered my productivity. The most guilt causing aspect is that I now see how productive I could have been! I now believe that my village is more ready than any other village I have seen to implement improved natural resource management techniques. How did I miss that chance to do good?

I must say that I almost do not recognize myself now. How did I become so discouraged? How did I slip into such a jaded narrow mindset? My first night in village I wrote:

“God is great! What a landscape blanketed with unheard-of luck and opportunities! The trip to post was ravishing, like my entire life these days. The history of the village should be unearthed and well noted. I must do everything, discover everything, try everything, attempt everything, see, hear, and feel everything! Look at the sky! Everything I have always wanted to do and to see packed into one moment!”

How did I go from that enthusiasm to the blog entry where I state:

“In the face of lack of work, frustration, and racism, I have begun farming.”

I honestly do not understand. Could it have been the Malaria medicine? Was I always such a negative person? I thought I was an exceptionally positive person.

In the 2007 Peace Corps Togo yearbook, I stated that my first year could be best summed up by the word: “misunderstandings.” There are bits of truth in everything though; my “cloud of discouraging conclusions” must have come from somewhere. But where? From which misunderstandings? Maybe Peace Corps has revealed a side of me of which I was unaware until now. Maybe Peace Corps found some ugliness hidden in a far-off quadrant of my mind and yanked that ugliness to the surface.

Beginning to emerge from the “cloud of discouraging conclusions” comes at an exceedingly bad time. We are now entering dry season and into Ramadan followed by Tabaski and other festivals. I am about to participate in training a new set of volunteers and then will be home for a month. So I will not be in village all that much until December. How shameful it is to go home after a year, having little to show for it except “misunderstandings” and “a cloud of discouraging conclusions.”

I can identify the 2 main conclusions that discouraged my work. Though I believe the conclusions are false, inasfar as they are applied only to Africans, each has a long history and none was come to lightly. Often it was Africans who most convincingly argued in their favor.

The 2 main discouraging conclusions are:
1) Africa’s socio-cultural dynamics of jealousy and a tendency to undercut successes are holding it back (so until that changes what can I do).
2) Africans’ priority is not development. The means are not lacking, the will is (and my being here just reinforces that).

Once you get to this discouraged-and-less-productive-peace-corps-volunteer state, guilt abounds. When you are jaded or discouraged inside, then doing good work or seeing success provokes a guilt reaction in you because seeing good work reminds you of how you see yourself: as a poor performing volunteer. Was I a good volunteer all along? I must add that if there was one area in which I have always been a good volunteer and about which I have never felt guilty, it is my integration into the community. Damn I love them. I just feel that I haven't worked well for them. But I think the love shows through it all...

Good news is that I have a year of service left.

Ewe song:
Némé kpowo cola éginyé fa
Afrique némé kpowo cola éginyé fa
éginyé fa, éginyé fa
niyum niyum niyum niyum

English
When I see you my heart is sweet
Africa when I see you my heart is sweet
My heart is sweet, my heart is sweet,
Oh so so so so much

cwt

Hungry for Ramadan

Lomé Mosque

Ramadan began according to your country's interpretation of the moon's position. Togo decided to begin Ramadan on Thursday. It is interesting to note that Islam uses a lunar calendar and that African Muslims are Sunni. No water, food, smoking, or sex from around 4:30 am to around 6 pm. Special local radio programs direct and narrate the events to villagers who are tuned in. Power lines to the neighborhood generator were replaced this year to make sure the women had light to prepare food in the early morning dark.

I am going to do it this year. Training myself to not automatically react to the desires of my mind seems very useful and important to me. Going into the third day, it is easier than I had expected or remember from the 4 days I fasted during Ramadan last year.

Natural resource history, songs, and news

small grove of virgin forest

One of the many reasons I can’t wait to get back and see you all in November is that the blog feels like such an inadequate intermediary for relaying life here to you. But I have come up with a new blogging strategy to better transmit life here. I will start and end with a village song and some positive developments…

In Ani
Mosorou dabouda gay tay sa la oh
Bambo no na lay a say sourou na.

translation:
Friend, in life you will often be greeted
but what will be necessary is patience.

Good news this week as it appears the Moringa growing campaign in conjunction with village health agents has been successful. Many of the now Moringa expert health agents now have small Moringa plantations and have distributed and explained Moringa to other villagers. Another promising sign is that wherever I am in the county folks will come up to me to talk Moringa, even a Fulani the other day.

Now some sobering news: First, I would like to thank Jared Diamond for his book "Collapse : How societies choose to fail or succeed," that I had mentioned in a prior blog and have just finished reading. The book gave me a great set of new lenses through which to view my village. With a million new ideas and questions brought on by the book, I went down to the center of village and began talking to young folks about Easter Island and other societies that collapsed after exhausting their natural resources. A couple young folks and I went to speak to the chief about our local natural resource history, something I had done before but without the book to put it context. I specifically wanted to class my village according to the book’s list of reasons why societies make disastrous decisions about their natural resources (I’ll get to my village’s disastrous decision in a sec). Those reasons are: a failure to anticipate; a failure to perceive; rational bad behavior, irrational bahavior, and no available alternative. So without getting into definitions I will get to my village’s story. (And damn, asking old chiefs about the olden days is quite exhilirating)

Before, when our chief was a child, old growth trees 2ft to 5ft in diameter were everywhere. According to the chief, when one fell, you could not see your friend if he was on the other side of the trunk. In fact, since they had no way of clearing the mammoth trees, they had to farm in natural clearings. Wild animals, including lions, elephants, monkeys and many others, were also everywhere, and the meat of those animals was present daily in meals. One did not have to walk far from the house to find a bush animal for dinner. As the chief grew older he remembers hunters from as far as Ghana and Ivory Coast coming to hunt the village’s forest, which occupied nearly the whole landscape. So dense was the forest that the village inhabitants would often not notice the hunters hidden in the bush until seeing signs of them after their departure. As for the elephants, since the hunters were after the ivory tusks, the hunters would bring the meat to give to the villagers. As the chief aged, he remembers the wild animals becoming rarer. These days, well, I have seen a monkey scurry into the bush on two occasions in the space of one year. So, wild game was the first natural resource to be exhausted in the county. Next came forest cover.

In the early nineties, democracy was announced as the policy in Togo. Unfortunately, democracy was interpreted in my village as “do as you please.” And at that moment the old growth forest was literally liquidated. Folks say that you could not nap at one o’clock in the afternoon, the normal nap hour, because of the humming of the chainsaws. (I must explain that my village is a village of land owners. They own the whole county, thousands of acres, and the male heads of family make decisions about land use. Over half of the county’s population is now made up of foreign ethnicities who have obtained permission to inhabit the land from the heads of family in my village.) Back to deforestation…I asked the chief why folks would liquidate forest on land that they knew would remain family property forever? (from the book: the main reason the Japanese decided to protect their forest was because of the long term interest they had in its survival, as opposed to a logging company that may prefer to cut and run). The chief replied that when people saw their neighbors becoming rich from logging, they simply thought, “damn, I want to be rich too.” Folks are also said to have thought, “well, I didn’t plant the tree what loss is there in cutting it.” In recent years the chief has outlawed logging and folks have seen the correlation between rain, wind, and deforestation, but money is a powerful motivator. My counterpart realized that his brothers were logging behind his back after he suggested halting logging. The liquidation was so severe that a 4 km stretch of road that used to be 75 percent shaded is less than 5 percent shaded today. Before the logging, rain came about a couple months earlier and streams did not dry up in the dry season. Because the village was surrounded by trees, the wind from a storm or the yearly harmattan winds could not be felt, only heard, in village. Today, the harmattan winds can blow tin roof sheets off your house. I have feared as much sitting in my house. Before all the logging, the village's soils were fertilized by all leaves that fell from the trees. No chemical fertilizer was used, the soil was just naturally rich. A few years after the liquidation of the forest, the soils lost their fertility and today's soils can barely produce an ear of corn without chemical fertilizer. After wild animals and the forest cover, the soil was the third natural resource to be severely depleted. It just happens to be the most important resource aswell, it is what produces food.

There is one patch of virgin forest left near the village, see the photo above, that was used for animist rituals before the village converted to Islam around 1970. The trees in the remaining patch are between 40 to 75 feet high I would say. One was blown down this year. The soil in that patch of forest is blacker and richer than nearly any soil I have ever seen.

After the chief’s account of the natural resource history of our village, I collected a couple more accounts yesterday. Those interviewees said that if the loggers had not offered money to villagers, the villagers would have, and in fact did, just cut down and burn huge trees without even turning the wood into charcoal. According to this person, folks often cut just to have more farm land, many folks are cultivating over 12 acres today. When I proposed that there are intensive methods for getting high yields on small surface areas, the person laughed and said “if you tried that, other villagers would say you are lazy for not farming more acres.”

So where did all that money from the logging go? Logging money built mosques, bought tin roofing, and ironically meat to eat.

In a prior blog I mentioned that I was following up on the village’s commitment to build enclosures for the cows, sheep, and goats in order to improve village hygiene and benefit from the excrement as fertilizer. At a meeting we held yesterday morning in the Imam’s mosque, I began by showing the village elders photos of the Easter Island statues and proceeded to describe the reasons for the rise and fall of the Easter Island society knowing that people would see how our village’s experience is mirrored by the depletion of forest cover and wild animals that came to haunt the Easter Islanders. It seemed to me that the thirst for money quenched by logging in our village was in some ways analogous to the Easter Island clan chiefs’ thirst to build more statues, which necessitated logging, and I think our village elders saw that parallel aswell.

I then tied in the explanation of the book with the logic behind pinning up the animals and using their excrement for fertilizer and in this way reminded the village of the commitment it had failed to fulfil. At this point I was very pleased with my performance because the village elders proceeded to passionately self-critique and to discuss remedies for the degradation of the village’s natural resources and the pinning up of the animals. It was a joy to see the passionate debate about what village reforms needed to be put in place. I feel like I put the elders in front of their own truth, and in front of the Eastern Island truth, and they did the rest. Getting everyone to confront the truth is often difficult though, especially when tradition discourages critiquing the family chiefs. Many see the family chiefs’ narrow-minded, and sometimes greedy, management of village resources as a reason for much suffering, like on Easter Island.

Good news now and then a song:
We are planning a new animal health center in village. A young man from village that has been trained in animal health at an American training center called OIC is going to spearhead the project. Right now many folks are discouraged from raising animals because of the animal death rate. People have the money for medicines but one must travel far away to find them and paying for the gas to go get them becomes inhibitive. As the young man has also been trained in beekeeping we will equip the village animal health center with equipment to extract honey from hives that certain villagers already have. Often the couple villagers that have hives are forced to call for someone to come from the city to extract the honey. Animal husbandry, good health of the cows used for ploughing and manure, and beekeeping would be good alternatives to logging no?

Another piece of good news is that results are in and the students at the local middle school were the most successful in this region of Togo last year! I have found a magazine for students that I am distributing to them as a reward.

In Ani
Welay chimi tomo
Welay chimi tomo
Lay chimi tomo
Na bay sa na mo

Translation:
Tell me the truth
Tell me the truth
If you tell me the truth
I will be so happy.

Love,
chris

Back last year, I called a meeting to confront the village about two problems plaguing it. Problem number 1 was the non-pinned-up roaming sheep and goats whose excrement was spreading filth and illness all over the village (as well as ravaging my Moringa nurseries despite my enclosures). Problem number 2 was the steady depletion of soil nutrients and growing dependence on expensive and eventually harmful chemical fertilizers in a village that is highly dependent on agriculture. I submitted these problems to the village. Though I had ideas of my own, I asked them, in presence of the chief, what should be done, explaining that the village was poisoning itself with a substance that could potentially enrich it.

The village and the chief independently decided that the best way to rectify the situation would be to enact laws requiring villagers to pin-up their animals, at night to start, from that day onward. Starting January 1, 2007 the animals would be pinned-up, except for grazing outside the village, day and night. The fine to the owner for each animal in violation was the equivalent of 1 dollar. The village also independently decided to have a village clean-up day every first Wednesday of the month (See prior entry) .

The pinning-up or tying up of the animals lasted 3 or 4 nights and the Wednesday clean-up took place one and a half times.

At the time, having been in village for 2 months time and not wanting to insult the chief for non-enforcement of the laws it enacted, after subtly broaching the issue, I did not feel comfortable confronting the village. But I have decided to call the village on its failure to follow through. I feel I have enough respect in the village now to spend on such a move or maybe I missed an important opportunity to intervene before. My counterpart complains of 20 years of similar failures to follow through on the part of the village, leading to his giving up trying to intervene in village affairs and development. Maybe the white guy can turn things around ;-).

A situation encountered by some volunteers :

A situation encountered by some volunteers :

You see some people in need, you go there and perceive that you are treated often mockingly according to your skin color and your richness. You perceive the link of common humanity that you feel towards the people being rejected by them and thrown back in your face. You also perceive that the feeling of human solidarity that motivated you is being baffled everywhere. How does your commitment to idealism do in that environment? If it comes out strengthened your heart will become golden and your life joyful... These are perceptions that can arrise during some volunteers' service...

Living among Fulani

Through my work zone pass nomadic Fulani (about Fulani on Wikipedia). From their calm demeanor to their colorful women to their pastoralist profession or their tasty cheese, they have caused many a Peace Corps volunteer to sit and marvel.

So we went to live with them... ...spent the last two nights in a Fulani (Peul) camp. The experience shook my way of thinking about Africa. The shaking came from the juxtaposition of two experiences, that of my experience of Africa up until two days ago with my experience with members of a different people.

On day 1 we waited all morning. First a seller of bootleg gasoline was trying to secure our adhesion to a group of departing Fulani, then we found out that there was apprehension on the part of the Fulani herders themselves who told our translators that the support of their Alhadji (Alhadji meaning a man who has been to Mecca) chief would convince them to go along with our plan to camp with them for a few nights. Having obtained the support of the Alhadji Fulani chief, and endured various delays, we headed out, passing through a couple sedentary farming Fulani households, a couple small rivers, and 4 miles of bush before arriving, nearly in unison with the cows back after a day of feeding, at camp . Our stay would last two half days, two nights, and one beautifully full day.

I will try to put up my thoughts about this experience because they were important for my understanding of my experience of Togo and Africa. To give a brief taste in the little time I have, I would say that living among the Fulani, granted for only 2 nights, put me in contact with self-confident Africa. I refer to "self-confident Africa" in opposition to the Africa that I have been living in for one year: An Africa besieged by the message that there is something wrong with it, in constant comparison with the West, and at its mercy as for the means "needed" to "fix" itself. In the Fulani I met an Africa sure of itself, creative, eager to learn, eager to exchange, not afraid to do weird things or be different. I don't mean to say that the rest of Africa does not exhibit those behaviors but simply that it seemed that with confidence in who they are, the Fulani could slowly changing, adapting, from the standpoint of a proud people that doesn't have foreign paid experts gathered, crowded around its every activity telling it how to do better... and in this way they may change on their terms and remain Fulani, not become Frenchmen at French school or Englishmen at English school. With their knowledge of who they are they may be more able to make decisions about who they will be. It seems to me that they have escaped mental colonization. They are the proud Africa of before... Questions came to my mind: Who decided that Africa had something wrong with it? Who decided that foreigners needed to come in or send things in and develop Africa? It seems to me that self-confident Africa would be better at developing Africa than a belittled tormented self-doubting Africa. In any case I have spoken in error but have at least began a thought, to be continued...

more photos of the fulani excursion.

(for Peace Corps admin: At all times I was in my work zone and was fulfilling at least two of the Peace Corps' three goals, as well as researching possible future natural resources related collaboration with the Fulani. At all times I had cell phone service).

I have just begun reading Jared Diamond's « Collapse : How societies choose to fail or succeed ». Diamond's ultimate decision to see societies' success or failure as a choice brings more elements into my personal debate about geography, determinism, and free will in terms of my village's present and future. The author's decision to see the societies' interactions with their environments as generally the most important factor in a given society's chances for "failing or succeeding," will make the book highly à propos for my service as a natural resources management volunteer. Thirdly, his highlighting of success stories of collapse avoidance or good environmental management, through societal efforts both bottom up and top down, may have important consequences for how I spend the rest of my service, especially in the my village's and Togo's context of rapid recent natural resource depletion. Maybe most importantly will be the chance to put my experience here back into the big picture. I find it frustrating, though it is ultimately each person's responsibility, that the Peace Corps, and especially the Natural Resources or environment programs, is not more proactive about getting the volunteers to remain in a big picture mindset. It would make their services seem more meaningful and thus important. Too often the frustrations of being a foreigner in a foreign place occupy many a volunteer more than the fascinating corner of the global and historical 'tableaux' that we occupy… Jared Diamond's « Collapse : How societies choose to fail or succeed ».

Tomato Canning

Tomato Canning
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

When tomatoes are abundant, the price plummets and folks are forced to sell before the tomatoes rot. Canning provides a way to preserve the tomatoes until prices rise...

The training went well and in a couple more days we'll find out if the tomatoes were successfully canned.

After past frustrations, I am learning patience and to be satisfied by small successes. Peace Corps: You live there among the folks, you do what is possible, you learn patience to accept what turns out to be impossible, but you never give up on the big ideas you had coming in.

Male slave holding dungeon

Male slave holding dungeon
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

From Cape Coast, the former capitol of the British Gold Coast, were exported a portion of the slaves taken in present-day Ghana and the sub-region. Here you see a holding cell/ dungeon for male slaves and trickling in is the only light that reached them.

Arrival of friend Josh and first sight of Ghana

Arrival of friend Josh and first sight of Ghana
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

A friend from afar arrived in Accra, Ghana where began our discovery of Ghana, the country of Freedom and Justice, and a booming economy...

Reflecting on the Sarkozy excerpt

*UPDATED* Reflecting on the excerpt, seen in the last entry, from Mr. Sarkozy’s speech in Dakar, I must comment that I believe that to the extent that Mr. Sarkozy is right about the African peasant, I believe that the factors that created the African peasant’s mentality are nearly completely geographic in nature. Could today’s Africa be merely a story of geographical imperatives or is that too deterministic? Where is free will in all that?

Secondly, I would comment that though Sarkozy was no doubt referring to some historical African peasant, I know many an African peasant and I believe there is just as much room for “the human adventure and the idea of progress” as the African peasant may decide. What I mean to say is that wherever you roam, openness to new ideas and the ability to assimilate new ways of existing are strengths. Take two villages in my county: I sent two students from one village, we’ll call it village number one, to Camp UNITE this year where they were exposed to many new and carefully selected ideas to help them be successful. Once the two students arrived back in their village, where they were to transmit the ideas to the population, it was as if they themselves knew that the culture of their villagers would hear none of it. The two students just don't know how to confront that cultural rigidity. From village number two I sent one student to Camp UNITE. Once back in village, the student related to me, as did his father, how fascinated he was by the talks about sexual harassment and gender equality at Camp UNITE. The student and his father already have planned out how they are going to transmit the new ideas to their community that they know will listen. They know their community will listen because it is part of the culture of their community to be open to outsiders and new ideas.

So I would say to Mr. Sarkozy that every inch of Africa presents a different situation. Just as in Europe or the States there are open-minded folks and closed minded folks, there are good listeners and other folks too distracted by their culture to listen. What I mean to say is that the keys to success are universal. Some Americans have the keys and some do not, some Africans have the keys and some do not. One's mentality must be a free will piece of the puzzle, and then there is determinism: we all exist in different contexts where we encounter things that are hard to change and that try to shape us, like geography, upbringing, or being born in a market economy or subsistence situation etc...

Mr. Sarkozy in Africa

For anyone interested in the philosophizing about how Africa got where it is and how it could get elsewhere, have a read of the French President's first speech in Africa since his election:

In French:

Allocution de M. Nicolas SARKOZY, Président de la République, pronnoncé à l'Université de Dakar.

The speech hits on a number of fascinating subjects and even more interestingly many of Sarkozy's ideas and judgements seem somewhat philosophically scandalous, but scandalous doesn't mean wrong.

Here is a taste of the speech:

"What is tragic about Africa is that Africans haven't entered enough into the course of history. The African peasant who, for thousands of years, has lived according to the seasons, whose ideal is to be in harmony with nature, that peasant only knows the eternal cycle of time cadenced by an endless repetition of the same gestures and words.

In his imagination, where everything is cyclical, there is no room for the human adventure or for the idea of progress.

In that universe where nature controls everything, one sidesteps the anguish that torments the modern man, and our peasant remains immobile at the center of an unchanging order where everything seems prewritten.

In that system man never launches off into the future. The idea never comes to him to break out of his repetition and invent his own future."

Original In French:

Le drame de l'Afrique, c'est que l'homme africain n'est pas assez entré dans l'histoire. Le paysan africain, qui depuis des millénaires, vit avec les saisons, dont l'idéal de vie est d'être en harmonie avec la nature, ne connaît que l'éternel recommencement du temps rythmé par la répétition sans fin des mêmes gestes et des mêmes paroles.

Dans cet imaginaire où tout recommence toujours, il n'y a de place ni pour l'aventure humaine, ni pour l'idée de progrès.

Dans cet univers où la nature commande tout, l'homme échappe à l'angoisse de l'histoire qui tenaille l'homme moderne mais l'homme reste immobile au milieu d'un ordre immuable où tout semble être écrit d'avance.

Jamais l'homme ne s'élance vers l'avenir. Jamais il ne lui vient à l'idée de sortir de la répétition pour s'inventer un destin.

Neighbors Habilou and Missiliou

Neighbors Habilou (right) and Missiliou (left)
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

Opposite my house are a family of neighbors who have added alot of laughter and smiles to village life. Missiliou, on the left, will begin elementary school next year, though just the thought of that makes us chuckle given his troublemaker ways... I don't know how Habilou, on the right, will make it through days without the big brother, maybe he will adopt the responsibilities incumbent on him as the big brother of a 6 month old sister named Rashida.

The three children and their parents, whose house and courtyard you see in the photo, have become my closest village family. We feel a bit bonded being all on the fringe of village culture, myself going to mosque but still hopelessly fringe, the wife being a non-Muslim and non-native of the village, and the husband not going to mosque married to a non-Muslim non-native... Even more fringe, unlike most husbands, this one accompanies his wife to the bush to cut and carry fire wood, but in order to avoid ridicule he carries the wood only while out of sight of fellow villagers and then has his wife carry it when they arrive back amongst the village houses...

How to explain where we're at or the birth of sorcery

The last couple blog entries, that I have partially taken down, were born of conversations with Togolese friends in which those friends attempted to explain how Togo and Africa came to find themselves in their current situation. I myself was and am confused but here is what I have come up with after further reflection:

As a professor told my training group a year ago, sorcery and magic are nearly always very sincere attempts to rationalize and explain the world. I believe that Togolese, as well as the Beninese and Nigerians that I have talked with, often blame the unexplainable difficulties that they encounter on jealousy and sorcery. Though I don't believe these explanations, I know that nearly all Togolese believe them and their belief in them does have concrete consequences.

I sat last evening with a friend in village and quoted what another African had told me, that "Africans are like crabs in a bucket, if one tries to climb out the others will yank him down to the bottom of the bucket." I asked him if he thought this was true and he immediately said that that was precisely what was holding back the village, jealousy and sorcery. As I looked for concrete examples, my friend couldn't give me any. He told a story of his cashew orchard getting burnt down even after he had cut the grass to protect it from fire. Other examples followed but they all sounded like UFO sighting stories, no real proof. So to conclude quickly, I will say that it seems as if Africans often blame each other for their difficulties, calling it jealousy and sorcery among other things and though I cannot find any concrete evidence for those arguments, I do see their consequences that come in the form of negative and oppressive social relations. Doing something new or succeeding could attract jealousy and dark magic. A while back the chief told me he couldn't enforce a law because he feared someone would kill him. Kill you with what? Answer: "through witchcraft."

Basketheads

basketheads
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

Income generating activity: basket weaving. Mr Ségla, on the right, pays his school fees, necessities, and has pocket money left over through his basketweaving activites. He taught the youth and counselors at camp Espoir now we will try to take it back to village...

Inhabitants of Cabin "Les Lions courageux indomptables"

Camp Espoir, organized and funded by a number of NGOs, the US Embassy in Lomé, and the Peace Corps, confirmed my theory about the transformative capacity of "summer camp" type retreats.
It seems to me that the camp's effect on campers is similar to the Peace Corps' effect on Peace Corps volunteers in that it places the campers in a new socio-cultural setting, where certain positive behaviors can be encouraged and less productive behaviors challenged.

Project Idea: Fish ponds

After a year of testing possibilities and learning about community needs, strengths and weaknesses, it seems about time to passer à l'action.

Constructing fish ponds seems a feasable and beneficial initiative:

Pisciculture links:

http://www.fao.org/docrep/005/AC736E/AC736E01.htm http://cdserver2.ru.ac.za/cd/011120_1/Aqua/SSA/main.htm

I feel like I must first answer the following questions, all of which seem to be recurring ones in my work here:

Why, in all the years of cooperation with government and development agencies, has pisciculture (or other project ideas) not been pursued in the community? If it is a good idea why hasn't it been attempted? Or, if it has been attempted why did it fail? Or of course, if it did succeed where is it?

CAMP UNITE 2007

CAMP UNITE
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

The highlight of a recent string of what feels like productive work was being a counselor at CAMP UNITE. CAMP UNITE brings male and female students and apprentices together at 4 separate camps in order for them to discuss and learn about certain life skills and practices such as self-confidence, planning of the future, STD and HIV/ AIDS prevention and treatment, and gender equity that are judged necessary for a healthy, happy, and successful life. The camp's target group is female youth, but the female youths have pointed out that their male boy friends and colleagues are key to their success, and so the latter have been invited aswell.

The other activities that have made time here feel quite productive of late include a weekly village exhibition of homegrown/ local innovative ideas, village youth teaching about the Moringa tree while selling seedlings, seeds, and supporting documents at the local market, supporting local community health agents in their quest to plant Moringa throughout the county, planning of a field trip to the Université de Kara with local middle schoolers and preparing for another camp in July.

It is said that the pace of Peace Corps work picks up at the 1 year mark, and it has...dieu merci.

Le Foot au village: promising project

Le Foot au village
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi

In an area where woman have difficulty leaving their culturally/ socially defined boxes, why not start a girls soccer team?

In a nearby town I have met a female soccer player and referee, who is frustrated always playing amongst the boys. She is quite enthusiastic about becoming the initiator and coach of a new girls soccer team in my village. An NGO that works for the empowerment of women in Islam is also becoming involved. This feels like some real quality Peace Corps work. Feels good...

Innovative improved cookstove

A woman with no formal schooling, few resources, but a certain adventurous mentality thought up this innovative improved cookstove that saves woodfuel as many cookstoves do, but also allows the use of both small and large pots. Usually improved cookstoves are tailored to only one pot which makes them a bit inconvenient. This design solves that issue. Though this stove may be a little less fuel efficient than would be ideal it is a big step up from the "three stone" cookstoves widely used.

This example of ingenuity, given by the woman designer of this cookstove, also supports my belief that development is a mentality. Development is not money, not cars or even clean water. It is about being the conscientious master of your own existence.

village secretary

village secretary
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

Meet the village secretary. His experiences as a cook for Chinese workers at a sugar factory make him the only person in the area that you can try out your chinese on. This also makes the village quite well staffed in the face of China's growing influence on the world stage.

The secretary is also quite an orator and comedian. His harsh demeanor at first sight melts into a swanky smile, and this along with his cigarettes makes him somewhat of a Togolese Clint Eastwood.

Togolese students recieve photos from American penpals

students recieve photos from penpals
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

Quite a bit of excitement and many smiles could be seen as students saw their penpals. Though it was a meaningful cultural exchange, the truth remains that most of the Togolese students are hoping that this exchange will one day allow them to leave Togo.

market view

market view
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

A young lemonade seller takes a break, kneels down, and eats.

ploughing peaunut field

ploughing peaunut field
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

In "Blood Diamond" Leonardo Dicaprio's character comments (rough quote) that "Peace Corps types only stay long enough [in Africa] to realize that they aren't really helping anyone."

While I can see the logic for that argument I also believe that the least tapped resources in the world are the heart and mind of individuals. So, to the extent that I am able to speak to the hearts and minds, I may be helping and helping develop.

I attempted this little "whiteman" stunt (ploughing and planting peanuts) to get the respect of some folks here and to get their attention long enough to have a sincere conversation. Sincere conversations are hard to have when the other party thinks you are just another rich whiteman that doesn't know how Africans suffer in the fields (no one helped me plough the field, I was adamant about that).

local radio show

local radio show
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

The fine folks at the local radio station have given me a slot every Tuesday at 3 pm. (after prayers of course). The show on this day was about the importance of the Moringa tree. Yes we are quite sweaty, it was a bit hot, and then there are the "on air nerves."

small field behind house

small field behind house
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

In the face of lack of work, frustration, and racism, I have begun farming. This is my small field of okra, corn, and hibiscus. I have also started plowing a half acre in order to plant peanuts.

what a universe

Here you see a view from training back in August '06:
Trainer Paul shows us that life and the universe are only scary if we decide to be scared. Hold that scorpion tight and we just might find peace, love, and knowledge...

Making skin lotion in village

Here you can see the closing moments of a training on how to make skin lotion out of peanut oil, candles, and perfume. Instead of sending their money to Nigeria by buying Nigerian made skin lotion, women can make it with local products. It turned out to be a successful training, but part way through I wasn't so sure.

All the women of the village were assembled and we began to purify the oil by heating it. But as the oil began to smoke and then burn, I sat petrified by the prospect of losing all credibility with the village women. What was shaping up as a nail in the coffin of my village work turned out a great success.

The lotion began to cool and coalesce, one woman dipped her finger in and tried rubbing the lotion into her arm, and suddenly women from all over the village were running to find small containers in which to put the lotion. An argument even erupted over who had the right to the lotion, and it was decided that only those who contributed to buy the materials, would have the right to apply the newest village beauty product.

Barber Adébayor

Barber Adébayor
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

After talking a bit about the frustrations of village work, I had to come back with a more inspiring story. The Barber nicknamed 'Adébayor' is that story.

Waiting for a bush taxi back to village I decided to get a haircut. Fortunately for me, I was taken to 'Adébayor,' a barber located adjacent to the taxi station.

As the locks fell away, Adébayor began to tell of himself, that he had just returned from the ECOWAS games for the handicapped, held in Mauritania, where he won 3rd place in West Africa in the discipline of Weight Lifting.

His strength is not to be contested. Many told him that suffering from Polio, he would not be able to run a barber shop. But after pleading in Churches and Mosques up and down Togo, he put together enough funds to launch the business that you can see behind him in the photo.

Adébayor's mother left at an early age to Niger and his father was killed in a taxi accident in which he was also injured. Adébayor made it through to 9th grade before deciding that he needed to learn a trade in order to get by.

He told me how he cried the first time he met White handicapped athletes in Nigeria. That experience caused him to feel a solidarity with the whole of humanity. As he clipped away at my hair I certainly could feel that he saw me not as another rich White man, but as a fellow human being.

Today's project and yesterday's

*Entry updated* Though all is well, I cannot hide the fact that frustrations exist and the following is an example of one. In this photo you see two projects: in the foreground a tree planting project for which we are filling sacks with soil and in the background the project of a Peace Corps volunteer that preceded me almost 10 years ago and was based in a nearby village. What you can see of the project of the former volunteer are two latrine pits with cement floors and raised foot holds for the user to place his or her feet. These two latrines were paid for with funds from the US. The village's contribution to the project was to build walls, either with mud, branches, and or thatch, around the latrines so that they could be used in privacy. But to this day, to my knowledge, only one of the 15 or so latrines has been regularly used, only one has had walls built around it.

Possible reasonings behind the abandonment of the latrines include:

-The idea that it isn't our actions or efforts that make us sick or rich or poor but God's will. So following this logic, whether you have good hygiene or not has no bearing on your health, either God will make you sick or he will make you healthy.

-"If I do something my neighbors aren't doing, people might think ill of me." As I stated in an earlier post, if your fellow villagers see you developing beyond their level, they might accuse you of something, judge you, or even try to kill you. According to a good source, the university students that come back to village, of which there is now only one, are under threat of verbal and or physical abuse from jealous fellow villagers. Trying to get ahead is not necessarily a good idea in village. It is the same jealousy that blocks personal initiative in village and that reveals my primary job: to make development, or personal initiative (or village initiative etc.), socially acceptable or socially popular. If you are working with the white guy, people are less likely to "sabotage" you (psychologically or physically) as they might if you, as an African, were doing it alone.

-These are just a couple possibilities that might explain why the latrines have gone unused, there are surely many more possible explanations...

More about the latrine story, added 03/14/2007:

As I had long hesitated before writing an entry with negative content, I need to complete my entry about the failed latrine project. My first entry on the subject was not complete and I have done more research:

First off, I should have included in my original entry the fact that a number of months after the completion of my predecessor's project, a non-governmental organization (NGO) came to village and offered to build latrines. So for reasons that I will not speculate about, the NGO built full latrines with cement walls and roofs in many cases right next to my predecessor's latrines. So as I walk around village, I see cement walled and roofed latrines standing right next to my fellow volunteer's unused latrines. This is quite a sight. But in a village of 3,000 the NGO latrines do not suffice, so the mystery of why the others have been abandoned remains.

There are a number of the unused latrines, such as the two in the photo accomanying this entry, that did not have full NGO latrines built next to them. So in those cases, the adjacent families have no usable latrine because they have not built enlcosures around the ones built in collaboration with my colleague. I did more research on why.

According to my best source in village, the lack of will to build enclosures around the unused latrines is not due to the reasons that I proposed in my first entry, though the source did confirm the presence of the phenomena that I had sited as possible explanations. According to him, there are 3 main reasons why the latrines have gone unused:

1)time orientation; many in village just want to eat today, and think less about the future. As long as they are able to put a bit of food in the stomach, they are contented. Thus, given that the latrines necessitate that a bit more importance be placed on the future, they are less considered.

2)lack of schooling; according to my source, many problems in village find their cause in the lack of "ABCs," as he terms schooling. Following this logic, without schooling a villager is less likely to fully understand the importance of latrines.

3)difficulty of collaboration in village; according to the same source, the village has trouble collaborating. For instance, a few people will break their backs digging the latrine hole while other villagers will just walk by and say "good work, good work." Then when it comes to using the latrines, all the folks that did not pitch-in will want to use the latrines that they did not help build. Thus the family that builds a latrine has to clean-up after everyone, or put a padlock on the door as many have done. So if enclosures were built around the unused latrines everyone would come use the latrine at your place...

...and the first two reasons probably result in a lack of motivation to overcome this third reason.

---

9th graders receiving letters from American penpals

9th graders receiving letters from American penpals
Originally uploaded by parisdelhi.

I had to explain to this ninth grade class that their American pen pals do not necessarily fit the stereotypes that they, the Togolese students, may have been drawing upon to imagine life in America. In fact while many differences exist, there are a striking number of similarities between the pen pals on each shore of the Atlantic: both are living in rural areas, both live and may even work in cotton growing zones, both pursue studies in underfunded school systems, both ride bikes without brakes and sometimes with little more than knobs for peddles.

Alaska and his double-dug garden beds

Alaska (the man seen in the photo is named Alaska) is currently reading John Jeavons' "How to grow more vegetables." He told me he wants to be "our village's gardening expert." These garden beds were our first attempts at double digging. We put hay around the beds to avoid evaporation, avoid some soil compaction, and slowly add a bit of organic matter to the soil.

Tabaski events

After a morning Tabaski mass prayer and the slaughtering of our goat, Aimée and I went to say hi to my counterpart at his newly repainted and cemented house.

The Imam's sermon after morning prayer was remarkably existential, he noted that many of the folks who prayed last year on Tabaski had left us, and were not there to pray this year. Given this fact, the Imam continued, we should all attempt to do as much good as possible while we are still alive here on Earth, because a Tabaski will come around when we too will no longer be able to attend prayer.