Thoughts from a New Education PCV
By Jed Augustine
On January 3, 2011 sixty-five trainees became the newest Peace Corps Volunteers in Rwanda after eleven weeks of training in Nyanza. We are the second group of Education Volunteers since the reestablishment of the Peace Corps Rwanda program in early 2009. To introduce the group, allow me to share a Swear-In story that captures our spirit.
Ten minutes into the ceremony, United States Ambassador W. Stuart Symington stood to speak. He complimented the musical acts and ordered an impromptu performance from the trainees, explaining, ―The only thing more important to me today than your becoming Volunteers is the health of the Rwandan people. So, in the words of the old television shows, "We‘ll be back after the break!" As he turned and walked into his home to take a call from the Minister of Health, the unexpectedly offered responsibility hung over us. This sensation, unfamiliar when we first arrived in Rwanda, now no longer surprised us.
Soon, Genevieve Williams and Gelsey Hughes, who had already given an excellent ukulele-enlivened mash-up of The Beatles "In My Life" and Todo‘s "Africa," honored Ambassador Symington‘s request. They once again took the lawn to perform a reprise of their talent show number, Ingrid Michaelson‘s "You and I." With the Ambassador still occupied, Jeff Monsma, having already performed "Rock Me Momma" with LCF Valens Hasubinzimana and the stunning dance talents of Dan Serwon, Patrick Malone, and Thais Fournier, took up the musical mantle and began strumming the opening chords of The Flight of the Concords song, "The Most Beautiful Girl (In the Room)." Though the reason still escapes me, Jeff insisted that I sing with him.
Rather flustered and panicked, I replied, "Not that song, Jeff." If you know the song, you know it isn‘t one for regaling dignitaries. (You‘re so beautiful, you could be a waitress…/an air hostess in the 60s…/a part time model. / You‘re so beautiful, like a tree, or a high-class prostitute). But Jeff played on in spite of my increasing anxiety. "NOT THAT SONG, JEFF!"
Jeff kept playing, but he mercifully switched to a different song. That is, he switched after I sang the song‘s opening lyrics. But we learn from failure. Unaware of the averted comedic crisis, the crowd enjoyed Jeff‘s serenade, the ceremony went on, and we were soon Volunteers.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, this situation sums up the disposition of our group fairly well: flexibility and good humor are the tools to manage frequent and unexpected challenges. A few more examples illustrate this attitude:
During our field trip to Nyungwe National Park in mid-December we discovered that most of our Rwandan IDs were invalid. We would be considered foreigners and pay accordingly. Grumbling, we paid and split into groups to enjoy walks which differed in scenery yet shared torrential rain and grape-sized hail. The hail was the first frozen thing we had seen in two months, so we greeted it with excitement. Who expects ice to fall from the sky so close to the equator? Back at the park headquarters, we pooled our communal calories (bread, peanut butter, and Nutella) and laid our soaked clothes and selves in the tropical sun.
Arriving in Butare for our second banking day, we were greeted by the news that the government body in charge of transferring funds to the Peace Corps had, in fact, failed to do so. We took the little money we had and left, our accounts empty but our stomachs full of Butare burgers and bowls of ice cream.
In addition to communal conundrums, we have each had our own personal problems: illnesses, bike accidents, hacked accounts, identities and money stolen. We have all faced a myriad of resource family challenges, such as the "Are You My Mother" problem of an ever-changing cast of characters every visit. We‘ve also confronted the chronic question of "What am I eating and how do I politely stop eating it, right now?"
More than anything, Peace Corps Volunteers share a dream, and our group is no exception. Firstly, of course, we all dream of transforming our communities. A very close second is more a nightmare than a dream, namely the kaleidoscope of diseases that movies and hearsay have taught us to fear deeply. Fortunately for all of us, we had the pleasure throughout PST of listening to the gloriously French Dr. Laurent Clerc assuage our ailment anxieties. After his excellent health and wellness sessions, we are all happy to be in his and Dr. Elite・s capable hands. After Dr. Laurent・s stories of Niger, we are also very happy to be in Rwanda and not in Niger. Favorite hyperbolic examples of his tales include:
- "How many of you do I expect to get amoebic dysentery? In Niger, you would already have had amoebic dysentery, if the Ebola didn't get you first."
- "In Niger, the sun is black."
- "In Niger, all the plants are carnivorous."
- On the Peace Corps' Mental Health and Wellness Scale, 1 is healthy and happy and 10 is crippling Depression. "In Niger we had to add 30 more points."
- "Niger is where all of your missing socks go. In one giant, filthy pile."
- "In Niger water sanitation is simplified because there is no water."
- "In Niger, they've weaponized children・s affection. That's not snot they're wiping on you."
The pleasures and pains of PST are now fading into the background. As we come to the end of our first month at site, many of us are realizing that PST is not the same as Service, and Service remains a nebulous, ever-changing concept. At the dawn of our two years in Rwanda, our goals seem as attainable as the horizon.
For many of us, this slow, uncertain time offers a chance to reflect on the questions that the fast pace of training suppressed: What is the value of education? What is our role here in Rwanda? How can we help? What is needed? How will we know that we are actually helping or addressing needs?
I feel I speak for many when I say that those of you have faced the same difficulties we face now and persisted through them provide us with great comfort. We have begun the first chapter of a story lived by 50 years of Volunteers who have found order in the chaos and found a route through the briar patch.
Our doubts are ensconced in the daunting promise of two years; the promise that two years from now we will look at Rwanda—and life—with very different eyes.
Indeed, our perspective transformed the moment we landed in Rwanda back in October 2010. As our plane descended through the wood smoke and trash haze of Kigali, the constellations in the sky faded and the city‘s white fluorescent lights rose from the horizon to replace them. Thirty minutes later we rested in the airport parking lot, bags in hand, trying to make sense of having awoken in Philadelphia, having eaten lunch in New York, breakfast in Brussels, and now standing dazzled under the full African moon. As the day‘s heat dissipated into the night, all around us the artificial lights shimmered on the city‘s hills like mounds of stars, as if fallen from the broken, once familiar sky.
Only when we returned to Kigali in January 2011 for Swear-In did we realize just how much we had already changed. The overwhelming experience of the new, the strangeness of being strange, the sensory onslaught of burning sun, smoldering trash, roaring radios, beeping motos, vast poverty, burns and blisters from the charcoal stove—the whole Rwandan arabesque—had become our new normal. The foreign had become familiar.
As we once again search for and unexpectedly discover new routines and habits, we will live as and for the Rwandans we serve, and who, whatever our experience, give us purpose as Volunteers.
No comments:
Post a Comment