I have been having trouble sleeping lately. Sleep is never a problem for me, I usually drift off before I even remember to set my alarm clock for the net morning, pop up 5 minutes later to set it, then fall dead asleep again in seconds. I distinctly remember periods in my life when I haven’t been able to sleep, and they have always been surrounded by some degree of anxiety, ranging from mild to severe…this time I am not anxious, and trust me, I know the difference. My recent restlessness on the brink of sleep is caused by something less daunting, just a fretful mental disquiet, interestingly, just at my one month mark in
I have been here long enough now not to be considered a tourist (which is actually an obstacle I am proud to say I have mounted with significant ease and success, and all of my friends here concur that I am not like most other blanches that find themselves in Kpalimé – which means more to me than I can even explain) but not long enough to even begin to claim that I know the ins and outs of Togolese culture and society, the truths of relations between men and women, parents and children, yovos and ameyibos…but I have begun to notice that I have different set of eyes than I did when I first got here, and I have had them WIDE OPEN. Subconsciously, I have developed a new way of observing, a more broadly perceptive – critical, judicious, yet still idealistic and curious – way of viewing things that before were just absorbed in a sort of sensory overload.
What has been troubling me, I think, is that without me knowing it, a certain process of learning to question these observations is taking place. I will never abandon idealism, couldn’t if I tried, and wouldn’t if you forced me, but I cannot deny that I am starting to contemplate an underbelly of the situations, people, colors, smells and structures (in all senses of the word) I experience every day and have experienced since I stepped off the plane in Accra.
I have also been reading this book that I borrowed from the Peace Corps volunteers in Kpalimé, by an ex-volunteer named George Packer. His book is called The Village of Waiting and it takes place in a tiny village called Lavié, which is about a 40minute drive from Kpalimé. The situations and cultural references are all too familiar, and I have enjoyed relating to them, but his cynicism is startling. Note that he served and wrote his book in the1980s, when independence was not even new enough to be considered history and the cult of personality of Eyadema presided over
Cynicism about Africa has its value, and I appreciate that fact even more after having seen the real poverty and development predicaments here and their cyclical, stagnant nature…but haven’t I found
One passage in particular gave me chills. He wrote, “A century of promise and exploitation, the treaties and forced labor of early colonialism, the long, slow submergence that led to independence, the new promise of development and the new whites that came to help, the disillusionment of even the best-intentioned, continued domincance of the economy by foreigners, continued poverty – all of this, and the white was still welcomed, still admired.” This is the uncomfortable feeling I get when Daniel’s wife won’t let me help her clean up the dinner table, when Akpene’s brothers offer me gifts, when Yao drives me into town to go to the bank because it is just too hot – when I know damned well anyone else in the office would have to walk there themselves. I am the yovo, and while it is genuinely good-natured and it is one of my favorite things about this place, the sheer attention I get because I am a white girl is pretty disturbing when you think about it. And I have really started to think about it.
Innocent, one of my friends at FECECAV, is a soft-spoken 22 year old from the North of the country with 2 years of his degree from Univeristy of Lomé under his belt but, as he explained matter-of-factly, “When a job, let alone an office job, turns up, you just take it.” The other day he showed me some Ghanaian rap music videos, which he really likes, on his computer. It was a slow Saturday, as only half the office comes in on Saturdays (like the banks here, la caisse and all those who work directly with it and with the clients – the collectrices, the cashiers, the agents de crédit, etc.work on a Tuesday – Saturday schedule) and we were sitting in his office, sharing his chair to see the monitor and so that we could both sit directly in front of the fan. I was captivated by these African rappers...I’ve seen a lot of African music videos since I’ve been here – as they are the only TV channels that occasionally come in besides France24 – but mostly hip-hop from Togo, Benin and Ivory Coast, a sentimental genre called zouk. The videos themselves are incredibly low-budget, boast mediocre camerawork and 80’s style backdrops, and feature full-screen shots of large, African buttocks shaking and gyrating. They incorporate the West African dance and style, including the large and sensual women that naturally accompany its music. The Ghanaian rap videos were different. They had names like Le Distroyer, not quite English, not quite French – Inno had to ask me what it meant, because “destroyer” is an English word, in French, “to destroy” is detruire. The rappers were all wearing oversized G-Unit and 50Cent t-shirts, driving 2000 model Honda civics (I have never seen a make newer than 1985 here, let alone a Honda,) wearing baggy, low-riding, American-style shorts (I have also NEVER seen an African man in jean shorts, and guarantee I never will,) and dancing with both African women and white women, all of whom were stick thin. Fascinating. If I were still at McGill I would go to one of my cultural studies professors and profess the topic for my next term paper, would analyze the hell out of it. Idolization of the black-American – definitely not a yovo, but definitely not a real ameyibo either. So what is he? And what the hell is he doing in a Ghanaian music video?
After a few videos they all started to look the same and I decided I had had enough. Innocent asked if I could send him a Dolce & Gabana belt from
But I disgress…
There are other things I have started to notice. I love the kids here, which is something that I’m sure will surprise most of you. They aren’t brats. They work harder than most of us will in our lives, physically and otherwise, and don’t complain about it. And they are obsessed with me. In my first two weeks in Kpalimé I can categorically say that my two best friends were an 11 year old and a 8 year old, Grace and Jesu. Not only did they love the American chewing gum I gave them, they were at first shocked and then elated by the way I interacted with them…I played a game of edito with them, bought them a lollypop, ruffled their hair, gave them a high-five…all foreign exchanges between adults and children here for the most part.
The parent-child relationship that I have experienced here is one of mutual dependence and a high level of distance – either in kilometers or emotionally, or both. Children work in their parents’ stores from the time they can count francs, carry boxes or just make sure no one steals the avocados off the tray. While Maman or Papa is off at the marché or working in the field so that everyone can eat tonight, who do you think is watching the store and the younger siblings? The kids. Reciprocity out of necessity. The survival thing again. This however, for better or worse (and I am really not sure which way I lean on this one) leaves little time for the kind of coddling and fussing that is so characteristic of Western parenting and replaces it with healthy obedience, discipline and respect. It’s not that African parents don’t love their children, of course they do, and that is apparent as well, it’s just that the circumstances and tribulations of daily life render their relationship much less indulgent. This explains the childrens’ terrified glances at their mother or father before busting into euphoric giggles every time squat down to their height, grin and say Wofo? (Pronounced, Wefowa, meaning how are you, in Ewe) Jesu, every time I allow him to take a picture with my camera, looks at Daniel almost shaking in fear (or at his grandmother, who is quite the menacing authority figure, good thing she is not that strong…I saw her hitting him one of the first nights I was here, shrilling about something in Ewe. I couldn’t decide whether to start crying myself or to intervene, but clearly I just waited quietly until she was done and saw that Jesu was fine. Five year old boys can be naughty, but it was more likely he forgot to carry a bucket of water twice his weight over to the stall for her shower.)
Mensah’s kids (he has 5 children with 2 different women, neither of which are Akpene…but here this is not frowned upon, nor indicative of any negative character traits, nor unusual, so please bear that in mind before you judge my Togolese father J) are the same way. They were petrified when I asked if I could play edito with them, as they had been sitting alone in the entry of the hotel for hours. At first I was upset that Mensah wouldn’t spend time with his children when they were there for the day, and still am to a certain point, but he was resting because he wasn’t feeling well. If he didn’t rest he couldn’t work, and if he couldn’t work he couldn’t give money to the kids’ mother to feed them that night.
This brings me to another point. Mensah hasn’t been looking so good lately…he has mentioned often that he doesn’t feel right, gesturing towards his chest/heart/lung area with a pained expression. And when an African says “Ça ne va pas” you know it’s not just indigestion. This has been going on for almost two weeks, despite my pressuring him to go to the doctor. I, on the other hand, had an infection and was rushed to the clinic in hours, treated and released in the same day. Mensah needs some tests done and he can’t afford it, even though it will cost less than $50, so I have offered to pay for them. He is going to see the doctor on Tuesday. In the meantime, he went to another doctor because he was in pain, who prescribed some medication that will act as an expensive and truly ineffective band-aid until he can have a consultation to figure out what is actually wrong with him. Then I will probably have to give him somemore money to buy the medication he actually needs. This is the tragic story of third world health care systems, a whole different crisis that I am honestly too afraid to delve into right now.
How many children die this way every day, or are crying in the morning because they have dysentery, malaria or tuberculosis and their parents can’t afford to take them to the doctor? Sure, this is the world’s health crisis and I’m not revealing some shocking discovery thus far kept secret, but it is one thing to hear about it, realize it, and understand it but quite another to see its penetrating and devastating reality.
And now, at my halfway point, I have started to think already that my impact on this place will be so small. Not insignificant – I think that I have done some great things that will change the way FECECAV uses Kiva and will hopefully bring them more free money, more easily – but miniscule.
I, like every other volunteer, doctor, NGO worker, missionary, peacekeeper, all of us with our mosquito nets, foreign passports and optimism without borders, will leave. I will leave because I was not born here. I will go home because I am fortunate to have a one – with a family that loves me too much and far too many pets, and they are all in
But the thought of leaving this place and these people is already breaking my heart and turning my stomach.
What is a sacrifice anyway? Is it staying here forever, in isolated dread of the sheer knowledge that I will never see NYC again, in loneliness for my family, but knowing that I have made the ultimate submission and dedication to the people who were born here? Is it marrying a Togolese friend so that he can get an exit visa, because he needs to make more money in the
I think that I am lucky, that so far I have been able to observe and submit to the discouraging truth of this place, yet maintain an adoration and exhilaration for it and from it. A friend who is thinking of visiting me wanted to know, when I mentioned that everyone is really poor, “Yea, is it depressing?” I didn’t even hesitate when I burst out with an emphatic no.
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