South Africa

I'm spending my last couple days in Pretoria, South Africa. I can't be bothered to venture to Jozy (Johannesburg). The primary attraction there would be the Apartheid Museum, which is closed today. Otherwise I have heard nothing but very bad things about Joburg, "It's just so dangerous" I'd been told by locals.

Instead, I'm slowly acclimating to the "civilized" world of comfort and consumption in South Africa's capital; where traffic signals are obeyed, merchants don't haggle and showers have hot water. And though beer is always served cold, the people smile less, the babies whine and cry, and suddenly many people are overweight.

Ironically, this is the first country where I've struggled to communicate with people. While English is one of South Africa's national languages, I have said "Sorry, I'm not from here. Please say that again, slowly" several times today! It's just a strong accent and I have to get used to it.

It's winter here, a mild winter at that. But serious enough that I walk around with knit gloves, a stocking cap and a fleece coat. The University of Pretoria is nearby, so I had a wander through its campus. What a contrast to the other places I've been: maintained modern buildings, manicured grounds, a mix of people--black and white, male and female.

Pretoria is a bustling town with a feel and layout that compares to many cities back home: four-lane expressways, indoor malls, suburbs and car dealerships. Walking around, I am just another person here, indistinguishable until I talk. I feel safe until my eyes catch the newspaper headlines describing some violent crimes. South Africa has an extremely high violent-crime rate, "highest in the world" some say, yet it's considered to be the most developed of all the Sub-Saharan countries.

I begin to think about that Joseph Conrad novel again, imagining my journey into "civilization" as my journey into the "Heart of Darkness." The newspapers support this fantasy, as I read about how not far from here are sprawling shanty towns where there is no law. And just a couple weeks ago, poor South Africans began killing the even poorer immigrants from neighboring countries. Talk about terror! The tension is almost palpable when I ask an ambulant craft vendor where he's from ... he wouldn't tell me.

And just up the street resides a man expected to be South Africa's next president, Jacob Zuma -- head of the ruling political party, African National Congress. True to African form, he's a politician with a controversial past--accused of rape, fraud and, of course, corruption, it baffles me that he's still in power. (Click here to See BBC article)

Ah yes ... Africa, how fortunate I am to have had a glimpse. I have enjoyed it very much. Thoroughly. Once called "The Darkest Continent," more recently labeled "The Greenest Continent," to me--considering all the inspirational landscapes, beautiful people and brutal social struggles--Africa is an amazing mess.

Botswana and Namibia

 It wasn't quite an epiphany--more like an unexpected revelation--the morning I left Zambia. Had I known it would be my last stroll through a "third-world" market, I might have paused to savor more than just the traditional meal served from fire-burnt pans onto cracked plates, still dripping after being rinsed in a bucket of murky water.  

But I do recall enjoying the sounds of a cheerful conversation spoken in a language whose name I can't pronounce. And I wasn't surprised to see a group young boys laughing as they kicked a ball made of tightly wound rags over the muddy trench of an open sewer. By now I was used to the sight of gossiping young mothers nursing their babies -- breast exposed while they carried on with whatever task, indifferent to their  babies and potential spectators. 

My nose was still easily confused as I tried to enjoy the scent of boiling coffee, but wince at the acrid smell of smoldering plastic and other trash burning in a tidy pile on the ground.  I didn't know it was my last chance to wave the flies off my heaping plate of Zambian "nshima," the stiff corn porridge that I'd finally acquired a taste for, which is the dietary foundation of southern Africa (A.K.A. "ugali" in Tanzania, "wusa" in Mozambique, "nsima" in Malawi, "sadza" in Zimbabwe and "pap" in South Africa). Belly full, I paid the equivalent of a $1.50 and set off to continue my roundabout journey to South Africa.  Because the next bus to Namibia wouldn't leave for three days, I found myself hitch-hiking, again. 

Being Sunday morning, traffic was infrequent. I sat on my bag, reading, peeking up every so often to see the road empty in both directions. For a while the only traffic was three unusually healthy-looking stray dogs moseying towards Livingstone; a mom and two grown pups; reddish-tan, with a dark stripe down their backs.  "Of course!" I thought, "I'm in Rhodesia!" (Actually, it was Northern Rhodesia before gaining independence from Britain in the mid '60s -- Zimbabwe was the "Southern" counterpart.) But that really made my day: to pet a Rhodesian Ridgeback (a mix, presumably) while in Rhodesia (That was the unexpected revelation).  

Twelve hours later -- after cramming into an overcrowded car, exchanging money at a significant loss at the Namibian border and pestering people for a ride at a gas station -- I descended out of the musty cabin of a American-made semi-truck that had been crawling at 80 kilometers-per-hour across what must be the most boring 300 kilometers of highway in Africa -- the Caprivi Strip.  Before midnight I would arrive at Ngepi Camp -- an ecologically-minded travelers' retreat settled along the shores of the Okavango River in Namibia. I'd read about this camp in a travel magazine, famous for it's picturesque setting and creative, open-air ablutions ("loo with a view" one toilet greeted, "5-billion-Star Retreat" read another. Note: "ablution", "loo" are the South African and British words, respectively, for "toilet").  

For a couple chilly nights I slept in a rented tent, pitching it on a raised platform, which was good place to be because each night hippos would crawl out of the river and spend much of the night grunting and munching on the grass under and around the platform. I would wake up to see Water Buffalo grazing on the opposite side of the river, and pass the morning chatting over breakfast with a family of South African Boer's on holiday ("Ya, Bootswana, et is viry goot. Ya, ve saw meeny donkeys thea." "Boers" are people, generally from South Africa, who primarily speak Africaans -- the Dutch-based language dating back at least a hundred years). This would be my only Namibian home because time running out on my trip, I had to choose between Botswana and Namibia.  

I chose Botswana because of "The Delta". Vanessa, my girlfriend (my beautiful, patient, supportive and trusting girlfriend), had described it as a highlight of her own globe-trotting adventure several years prior. Not to be outdone, I had to see it for myself. I was not disappointed.  

Slithering slowly along the arid flatlands of Angola and Namibia into Botswana, the Okavango River fans out into the reverse tributaries of the "delta," a swamp, before it is swallowed up by the insatiable thirst of the Kalahari Desert, never having a chance to reach the ocean. What an awesome thought: a massive river, full of life and potential, disappearing into a sea of sand.  I made my way to the delta's innermost village: Seronga. There, I hired a "mokoro" (traditionally a dugout canoe, now typically made of fiberglass) and a "poler" (a guide, who pushes the mokoro along using a long pole). With some basic food supplies and another rented tent, we set out to camp somewhere deep in the delta.  Having recently read (en-route) a few autobiographies that made similar allusions, I could not help but also imagine myself a creation of the novelist Joseph Conrad -- a Marlow type, navigating the serpentine waters into the unknown, searching for Col. Kurtz (Or, for the visual allusion, Martin Sheen's character looking for Marlon Brando's in Coppolla's "Apocalypse Now").  

But there was no Kurtz, no brutal savagery nor dark soul to expose; just calm in the day and peace at night. And stars! Never did the Southern Cross show the way so clearly. And elephants! Walking along one of the "islands" we came within striking distance of several bulls chewing at tree trunks; catching our scent, they loped away suddenly, and miraculously (because of their size) disappeared.  In the delta, I truly felt far away from everything. No cars, no people, and for the first time while in Africa, my cellphone had no signal (such is the true measure of isolation!). I had finally escaped. I savored the moment and made note of it in my journal. 

But I soon realized I had nothing to escape. I was just passing through. Searching for and escaping nothing in particular, I had no need to push the limits. I was just traveling. Yes, this would be the climax of my story in Africa. It was time to make my way home.  

Having embedded myself deep in the delta, it took some patience and luck getting out, as rides back to the main road were extremely rare. When I did get moving again, I was only entertained by donkey sightings (the Boer family was right! ... "meeny donkeys") and sterilization checkpoints until I arrived in Botswana's tourism hub: Maun. (Botswana is paranoid about foot-and-mouth disease, requiring the undersides of vehicles to be sprayed and shoe soles to be soaked at roadside checkpoints every 100 kilometers)  With strip malls and fast-food chains (the first McDonald's I'd seen in weeks!), I didn't give Maun much more than a passing glance. I continued east to Francistown where I arrived in time to catch the southbound overnight train to Gabs (Gaberone), Botswana's capital and gateway to South Africa.

Zambia and Zimbabwe

Africa - June, July 2008

"LEVY DEAD" read the bold letters of the newspaper headlines on the newsstand I passed while strolling the busy streets Lusaka, Zambia's capital. "Levy" was referring to Zambia's current president, Levy Mwanawasa.

"Dead president? Uh-oh," I thought to myself. "This may not the best time for me to be here."

Perhaps it was good fortune I was already walking towards the U.S. Embassy (I needed more pages inserted into my passport). I might have to take refuge. While this was a serious thought, the assistants at the embassy weren't concerned in the least. So I wandered the streets of downtown Lusaka until I could get my passport back a few hours later. No problems, business as usual. But I was still a bit uneasy about being in Zambia's largest city the day the president died.

Passport in hand, and having seen enough of Lusaka to know I needn't stay longer, I took a gamble and hopped on an overnight bus headed south; "a gamble" because most Central African countries had banned commercial driving at night: too many accidents. But the incoming road was smooth, straight and uneventful, so I felt the odds were in my favor.

The next morning I found myself in Livingstone, a small tourist town named after that intrepid Scottish missionary, David Livingstone, who gave the famous cataracts nearby their western name: Victoria Falls.

Passing a newsstand, I was confused by the headlines, "Levy Recovering In Paris". The story read that the Zambian president was not dead, but had suffered a stroke while in Egypt before attending an African Union summit. The South African President, Thabo Mbeki, had prematurely announced the death and held a moment of silence, but soon retracted the announcement (and, I suppose, the moment of silence?) after he received a "clarification". What an embarrassment! All this amidst the controversial results to the controversial presidential runoff election in Zimbabwe, where "Uncle Bob" (the controversial Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe) had all but killed his opponent. Levy (Zambian President) had spoken out against Mugabe and his goons. Mbeki (South African President) had implied his support by remaining silent on the entire matter (For the record, almost every other country in the world has denounced the election as a sham). Though Levy was hospitalized because of natural causes, the whole situation tightens the already very tense relations among the countries (Of course one might wonder, "Why a hospital in Paris? Are the hospitals in Zambia not good enough for a president?" Of course not!)

"Politics here are very complicated," was the second most popular conclusion Africans would offer after trying to explain things to me. The first was, "The problem is corruption!"

Though politics was certainly on my mind the whole trip, I had yet to draw any serious conclusions of my own. Instead of preoccupying myself, I spent a day admiring the vast, powerful falls spilling into a gaping gorge that resembles a giant crack in the otherwise flat surrounding landscape. I even ventured to the Zimbabwean side, to admire another perspective of the falls and check out their gateway city, also named Victoria Falls.

There wasn't much to see, just a modern-day ghost town with almost everything closed because there were no tourists, just a small makeshift market for the locals who were bartering, lots of beggars too. I exchanged some money: 1 US dollar for a 5 billion Zambian dollar note (I think I got ripped off!).

Even the national park was empty. I had an unobstructed view of the falls for an hour, which could have been longer had I not been soaked by the cold mist. I didn't dare go deeper into Zimbabwe, as Mugabe's racist rhetoric continued to inspire the thoughtless murdering of white Zimbabweans (actually, this has largely been the case for the past 28 years he's been "president"). Besides, I had done enough gambling for the day.

The next evening, after a long day bounding down the mighty Zambezi River in a raft like a madman (guided of course), I found myself chatting with some locals, white Zambians, born and bred in Zambia. Naturally, the subject soon turned to politics with all the usual reasoning, "it's complicated", "the corruption", blah-blah. But soon the fingers were being pointed at me.

"And YOUR government is making matters worse."

"I'm sure it is," I conceded.

Unaffected by my concession, the conversation continued in my direction. It was explained to me that foreign aid money was keeping the poor poor and the criminals wealthy and in power. This was not the first time I'd heard this explanation either, so I nodded in agreement.

I was told that USAID was working hard to fight malaria in Zambia, giving out free mosquito nets. People were so happy they were grabbing the nets by the dozen, but sewing them together and using them as fishing nets. With holes so small, no organism could escape such a trap and now Zambia's left with almost no fish, which used to eat the larvae that mature into the mosquitoes that transmit malaria!
Whether a hospital run by foreign aid, or a church-run orphanage, I have been given many anecdotal examples of where good intentions and lots of money are not enough, or too much rather. "Tough love" has been the most reasonable explanation I've come across so far: "Let them hash it out themselves" (of course intervening when human rights are abused and imposing economic sanctions when ... aah! ... so complicated!).

Mozambique

Africa - June, July 2008

The road and events had all passed remarkably smoothly the morning we pulled up to the remote border post of Milange, Mozambique. We (Scott, Tim and I) had rented a small 4x4 back in Blantyre and set off for Mozambique before sunrise. Despite the early hour, many people along the way were already hard at work, carting their produce and wares to local markets. By now I was used to seeing lines women carrying large bundles of whatever on their heads, babies strapped to their backs, heads bobbling indifferently.

The countryside in eastern Malawi is quite serene in the dawn light. Thin lines of white smoke highlighted the groomed valleys of green tea plantations that were slowly unveiled behind the receding shadows of Mount Mulanje, the country's tallest mountain.

Having been dependent on others' language skills, I was excited to be using my (now rusty) Portuguese skills, greeting the Mozambican immigration officer with a cheerful "Bom dia". He replied accordingly, but less enthusiastically, and asked where we were going and for how long. He then asked to see my passport.

"You do not have a visa?" It was more of a statement than a question.

"No. I need to get one here," I replied.

Sliding my passport back to me he said, "That is not possible.' (Actually, "Não é possível") 'You have to go back and obtain one in Malawi."

My heart sank. I sensed Scott's doing the same (he understands Portuguese as well as I do). While Tim already had a visa from previous visits to Mozambique, we were all stuck in the same boat, or car rather.

This problem would be costly. Being Sunday, we would lose at least two days in trying to get a visa from a consulate back in Malawi. The car rental would have been a waste. And with gas at roughly $8.00 a gallon, well ... costly.

I persisted: "Our friends got their visas here." (Actually, I lied)

"Não é possível."

I went into bribe talk: "Surely there must be some way we can pay for one here?"

"Não é possível."

Losing patience, I insisted: "We cannot go back, it is Sunday!"

A blank stare. (I wasn't even sure if I was using the correct word for "Sunday" remembering that weekdays are "Segunda", "Terca", "Cuarta", "Quinta", "Sexta". But Saturday and Sunday are just like Spanish: "Sabado" and "Domingo".)

Meanwhile, another man appeared behind the counter. Overhearing the discussion, he finally chimed in. "Vou perguntar o chefe" (I'll go ask the boss). Of course! Why hadn't it occurred to me to use the standard American line: "I want to speak with your manager"?

Several minutes later the second man returned. Evidently the "boss" said okay. We slid our passports back to the immigration officer. Visas were issued with no extra questions and, surprisingly, no extra money. After a commanding, decisive, ground-shaking, full-armed "whomp" from the Immigration officer's rubber stamp on our passports, we were on our way.

We rattled along the silty, wash-boarded road leaving trail of orange dust a mile long in the wake of our little Suzuki Jimny 4x4. We passed small villages of much huts with straw roofs out of which children would pour, waving at us until they were covered in dust. Some villages were built around the empty skeletons of formerly grand colonial structures; structures that were abandoned after a bitter
independence in the mid '70's and looted after many bloody years of civil war into the early '90's. Such struggles left Mozambique a hauntingly empty countryside, with only improvement in the future for things could not get much worse.

For me, driving on the opposite side of the road (as most Sub-Saharan countries do) was the real treat. This joy alone was perhaps worth the cost of quintupling our daily expenditures as renting a vehicle to cross an international boundary is not cheap! Taking turns driving, we would remind each other to keep on the left, though, to the amusement of local bystanders, several unchecked traffic violations were made along the way.

We briefly stopped in Mocuba and Nampula -- two dirty cities with many stoic, Soviet-esque and Art-Deco buildings built along formerly grand boulevards, now reduced to dusty paths.

Our destination was Ilha de Moçambique, place of that eludes most travelers being far too from most overland routes in Africa. Called just "Ilha" by locals ("Island" in Portuguese), its significance was related to its location along trade routes in the Indian Ocean. The island is also thought to be the origin of the country's name, derived from the name of an Arab sheik who controlled the it until the Portugese arrived: Musa Mbiki.

Ilha is now a small island-town that thrives on sporadic tourism and fishing, having been usurped as the trade center by the costal town of Nacala to the north. If not for the one-lane causeway connecting it to the mainland, Ilha would have been long forgotten by the rest of the world as a colonial relic. And despite a UNESCO "World Heritage" designation, only a few buildings have been restored to their original grandeur. The rest have decayed beyond recognition as Mozambicans do not seem to be terribly nostalgic about their colonial heritage (emphasized by the symbols on their new flag: a machine-gun crossing a hoe overshadowing a book all outlined by a single star--a fair summary of their recent history: war and agriculture trump education, all in isolation), which is understandable because much of that heritage involves slave trade and exploitation. "But the Portuguese
made such nice buildings..."

Walking along the crumbling streets and battered structures, one gets a sense of the sense of the strife Mozambique has gone through. A conversation with a local confirms such a sensation.

"I hate politics," stated Luis unsolicitedly before embarking on a lengthy political diatribe about the disparity of the Mozambican people, especially on Ilha, which he says is deliberately neglected by the more prosperous capital much further south, Maputo. He also had opinions about Reagan, the Bushes, the Clintons and Obama (though he thought Hillary was born in Mozambique, confusing her with John Kerry's wife ... an understandable mistake).

Luis, owner of the guest house we found, had seen and experienced a series of power struggles in his life. The result: Luis was only beginning to get ahead in his late forties despite his savvy entrepreneurial abilities (abilities we experience in negotiating a negligible discount in the cost for a guided sailboat ride to another
island).

"The problem is corruption," he concluded. This statement I heard more than once in every country along the way. It all seemed to be the same story with different names, a formula for poverty: abusive colonial rule, bloody independence, unruly despot, cruel-socialist regime, rigged elections, foreign-aid...

Neglect and poverty aside, Ilha does maintain a lively atmosphere with the charm of something "undiscovered", all surrounded by the pristine pale blue-green waters of the Indian Ocean. Aside from the speeding scooters, the place was as safe as can be. We walked around day and night with minimal pestering, just the ogling of children who had seen few fair-skinned people. The Muezzin's regular blasting of the adhan (Muslim call to prayer) from speakers mounted on a Mosque's minarets
reinforce the distance we had come: a place somewhere between the West and the Middle East, yet still recovering from having gone so very far south. (ha!)

more africa

Malawi

It's a shame I had leave Tanzania on a sour note, having been scammed out of $20 ... then again, it was a small tuition to pay for a valuable lesson in "trust your gut" logic.

Here's how it went down:

Arriving at dusk in the quaint, hilly town of Mbeya in south-west Tanzania, I slipped passed the throng of taxi-hustlers into the almost-empty office of the bus company to gather my wits and get oriented. After sitting for 13 hours, I was hoping to walk to the hotel recommended to me by some other travelers. So I asked the man behind the counter where the hotel was and he pointed me in the right direction. Noticing it was getting dark, he offered to walk with me. His English was clear and he seemed harmless, so I accepted. Walking up the hill to the center of town he introduced himself as Patrick and told me he was from Malawi. It just so happened that I was trying to get to Malawi the next day, so I asked him how I might get to Malawi, which is when I let my guard down.

Long-story-short, he ended up selling me a bus ticket for a bus that didn't exist on the Malawian side of the border. All along I didn't feel right about the paying up front, but he said he was going as well, and the hotel manager at Hotel Sombrero (yes, like the Mexican hat) vouched for him: "This is your man," he said, when I told him Patrick was helping me get to Malawi. But half way to the border, Patrick slipped out of the mini-bus when I wasn't watching.

As I crossed the bridge over the Songwe River into Malawi, I was still hopeful. But learning that there hadn't been a bus in days pretty much confirmed my suspicion, so I decided not to wait or ask around for "my" bus. Again, it was an important refresher course for the over-confident traveler: never let your guard down, especially in port towns (Mbeya was the main junction for all rail and land transit coming to and from Zambia and Malawi, connecting both countries to the Indian Ocean).

If nothing else, the experience made arriving in Malawi all the more rewarding. Crossing the border, the difference was almost instantaneous: people were more relaxed, more friendly and everything was less expensive. Even the domesticated animals (goats, pigs, chickens, cows and dogs) were more at ease around people (often a little too much at ease near the highway, I later experienced). Making my way south, I admired the many farms among the green hills and fishing villages along the giant Lake Malawi. Sure there were the usual annoyances, like the smell of rotting fish juice dripping on my shoes in a minibus, or the horrid squeal of the goat shoved under the back seat. But Malawi was different. Besides, I had a new language to fail at learning: Chichewa.

After a little rest and recreation in the Caribbean-esque oasis of Nkhata Bay, I made my way towards Malawi's charmless capital. In Lilongwe I was to meet Tim and Scott, two brothers from Arizona, both good friends of mine since childhood. In fact, the impetus of this whole journey to Africa was to visit Tim, who is now in his third year of the Peace Corps.

Scott and I had been discussing a visit before Tim even departed in 2006, but we kept putting it off. Fortunately for us, Tim signed up for another year after completing the required two, but time was running out, again.

Now the three of us were converging in Lilongwe on a given day: Scott flying from South Africa, myself via Tanzania and Tim (probably hitch-hiking) from some remote village. After a brief but cordial reunion, we set off on our much-anticipated African adventure, which began in the least expected way: playing a friendly game of softball with a group of other Americans (mostly USAID workers) at a country club. It had been several years since I last swung a bat or put on a baseball glove, but the experience, however surreal, was good, reminding me to let go of my expectations and sense of reality.

The next day we sat on the edge of the main road to Blantyre on the outskirts of Lilongwe, waiting for a lift (AKA hitch-hiking). For over an hour we watched the vehicles passing us with no regard; semi-trucks and buses spewing diesel exhaust; cars and 4x4s racing down the road. Trying not to show my impatience, I sat. Scott asked how long he typically waits: "Sometimes five minutes. Sometimes five hours," Tim replied, gesturing inquisitively at the next vehicle to zip passed us.

As a volunteer living on a couple dollars a day, he was required to live like most Malawians do: simply and frugally. Hitch-hiking helped save money, which was limited, but not necessarily time, which was somewhat unlimited. The previous night I felt a bit guilty that a USAID worker bought us beer for the softball game, another ex-pat gave us a ride across town to another USAID worker's house where dinner was prepared for us; guest rooms and showers with hot water were also part of the deal. When I asked if all this was OK, Tim's nonchalant response was difficult to argue with: "Take what you can. Don't ask questions."

Back on the side of the road, we were soon picked up by a Malawian driving a new LandCruiser. Enjoying the luxury of seatbelts and air-conditioning, the driver cruised passed all the trucks, cars and buses that previously ignored us, arriving in Blantyre in what must have been record time. But upon disembarking I made a mistake, breaking the poor-man's vow of silence, and asked the driver if he'd like 500 Kwacha ($4.00) for gas. "So little?" he responded ... I'm a slow learner.

Two weeks later, sitting beside the same road, now hoping to find a ride in the opposite direction, we waited more than two hours before a semi-truck grunted to a halt, fitting 5 people in the cab and taking us only half way. The second half, we found ourselves tensely braced in the back of a pickup traveling 140km/hour. The pickup driver, from Portugal (not a good sign for those who know of their driving reputation in Europe), said he drove the road several times a month and assured us he knew it well. He also knew where to stop, made evident by insisting we stop for "a drink at a nice little place I know just outside of Lilongwe ... There are three sisters there ... They are very nice!" It was kind of awkward to be drinking lukewarm beers in a dingy whorehouse, but he was paying ("Take what you can...") We soon insisted we be on our way after the second round because a friend of Tim's was expecting us for dinner ("... Don't ask questions.").

After 2.5 years of living in (in my view) extremely humble conditions as a Peace Corps Volunteer, I was surprised to find that Tim hadn't changed much at all, physically. Granted, he could walk barefoot with ease on very rough surfaces, but I was expecting dreadlocks and a shaggy beard, maybe even some traditional native garb ... or even children! But Tim was still Tim. However, over the two weeks we meandered around Mozambique and Malawi, I noticed significant (admirable) changes in his person; changes which I assume to be the result of all the cold splash-baths and Black Momba encounters.

Though I didn't stick around long enough to see Tim's current project: managing food for the World Food Programme at a refuge camp north of Lilongwe. I did have a chance to see the village where Tim was based for two years, in the dusty, neglected, southern tip of Malawi called the Nsanje district. I'll limit my description, so as not to overly misrepresent his experience, but considering he had to walk 3km to get water and never had electricity, I think it's safe to say he had it tough. Adding to the challenge, Tim's original project, working with the local wildlife preserve, fell through early on (due to flaky local counterparts). So instead of insisting Peace Corps officials bail him out, he managed to get a lot done with very little. Among the accomplishments he mentioned were establishing a tree nursery, managing a village jam-jarring project, pig farming, bee farming, guinea-fowl farming, teaching, working with HIV/AIDS sufferers, constructing classroom benches and ultimately coordinating the construction of a couple sturdy new classrooms (doubling the size of the village's school).

The reactions of community members upon Tim's return to the village explained very clearly that he was a valued member of the community; perhaps a symbol of hope, or perhaps just an interesting "mzungu" (white man). We were received as special guests of the school's headmaster, enjoying a traditional meal. This was after a special encore dance and song was performed for us on the dirt "stage" of the mud-brick church. While the paint was still fresh on the recently completed classrooms, most of Tim's other accomplishments were slowly coming undone. But it was most sad to see Tim's frustration upon returning to the hut he called home: finding many of the trees he planted dead and repairs to the structure undone. But I suppose that's the point of the experience: not to change things, but to change minds (and I don't mean just the locals' "minds").

I've often heard people say that volunteering for the Peace Corps is a "cop out" for the "real world." In fact, notions like this have even discouraged me from pursuing such an experience. Exceptions there surely are, such nay-sayers couldn't be more wrong. From what I can tell, these volunteers believe the goodwill of humankind is greater than themselves, transcending borders. These volunteers are not out there to save the world; they're saving America, one village at a time. It's a shame our country cannot afford to recruit and fund more efforts such as these. Then again, "peace" is not as easy to sell as "terror."