You wake early in the morning, sometime around 4:00 a.m. You gather what belongings you have not already packed and hastily shove them into your knapsack. A sense of urgency is in the air and is only being perpetuated by cab driver at the gate laying on their horn.
You grab your bags and guitar knowing full well that this much luggage will make for most bitter travels. You tiptoe, careful not to wake anyone and make sure to lock all the gates which you have opened in order to get out of the house. You swing the gate open, the poorly greased hinges protesting in the surprisingly cold morning air. You wish you had worn a sweater. Everything is dark. Everything silent.
When the gate is finally opened you are greeted by the blinding lights of the taxi which you had arranged to pick you up the night before. The outline of the driver is all that you can see. The hum of the engine the only sound. The driver grabs your bags and puts them in the backseat of the car he is driving. Your gear needs to be lowered through a partially opened window because all of the latches on the back doors are broken. You climb into the sagging front seat and wait for the driver to take his position.
You explain to the driver that you are going to the bus station and that you will give him 35 000 kwatcha to get you there. In typical Zambian cab driver fashion he explains to you that it is very far and he will need more money. Now an new comer to the city might readily agree to his price even though it is well known amongst the locals that this trip should really only cost 30 000. After about a minute of arguing you finally convince the driver to cave and accept your original offer. You have an awkward drive ahead of you.
On the way to the station the cab driver only speaks to you occasional, he is bitter that you have beat him down to a price lower than he thought he would get. When you do talk the conversation is choppy and even less meaningless than one would expect to have with a driver. The car is uncomfortably hot because although it’s ten degrees Celsius outside the driver has the heat on full blast, assuming the heater in the car you’re in works. The seat you’re sitting in is covered in a dirty Manchester United seat cover. The whole car smells of vomit and cheap cologne.
When you finally reach the bus station you immediately see about ten men running beside your cab. This is a tactic common among the bus attendants to create confusion and in the process hopefully encourage a ticket purchase you may not have wanted to make. The cab stops and you start to get out, every single one of the runners trying to open your door. When your bags and other belongings are removed from the car you have to wrestle to keep it out of the hands of the nearest attendant. You walk, followed by even more men than were originally attending to you until you reach the bus you intend to get on. The driver of this bus is annoyingly revving his engine and honking his horn. You find the man selling tickets and tell him where you’re going. As you wait for your ticket to be prepared you are still heckled by sellers from other bus companies who are ‘encouraging’ you to change your mind and accept their service. Finally your ticket is ready and you can climb aboard the bus.
Once aboard the bus you begin to look for a free seat. At first it seems like an easy task until you realize that you are not going to be able to get the aisle seat that you would like to have. They are all occupied. You decide to take a window seat and make your way down the aisle being careful not to step on one of the 45 bags of luggage that are carelessly placed in your way. You kindly excuse yourself as you pass by and take your place in your seat. You place your bag between your legs and your guitar rests on top of your knees. If no one else takes the seat beside you the trip will be great, you will be able to spread your luggage out and have some room to breath. No sooner does this thought occur to you than a large woman wearing three sweaters, wrapped in a blanket and dragging two young children behind her makes her way to the seat beside you. She sits one child on her lap and the other is in limbo between your seat and hers.
The bus ride is long, 17 hours to be exact. The seat in front of you so close that you need to pick your feet off the floor and raise your knees in the air just so that you can fit. There is no way to move your legs, let alone stretch them out and you are going to have to maintain this position for another three hours before the bus stops again. The temperature inside the bus is already uncomfortably hot and is rising yet you notice everyone is wearing multiple sweaters coats and blankets. You take off your sweatshirt but it isn’t helping, the window must be opened. You undo the latch and slide the window back enough to let some cool air in. The lady who sat down beside you gives you a dirty look and her child begins crying that it is too cold. The window is opened a reasonable amount but still this lady is trying to make it apparent to you that she is cold. On the flip side if the window is closed you will die of heat stroke. Just as the stalemate seems as though it will break out into blows the window is slammed shut by a man behind you. You feeling like someone has lit a fire beneath your seat and open the window again. This process is repeated until it is apparent that you will not budge and the window stays open a crack. A compromise has been reached.
You are tired but can not sleep. The child beside you is crying uncontrollably for no apparent reason. Maybe if you put some music on and read a book the time will pass quicker. You pop your headphones in and turn on some Arcade Fire, you open your book and begin to read, this isn’t to bad. Just as you are getting comfortable and settled with your new pass time a terrible noise breaches the barrier to the noises of the bus, that is your headphones. The tvs mounted on the ceiling have come to life and the operators of the bus are blaring Zampop and rumba (both terrible terrible forms of music if they can even be called music) as loud as they will go. You frantically try to turn the volume of your own music up but it is no use, the music coming through the speakers is always louder and clearly audible. You take your headphones out, no use ruining the sound of your own perfectly good music, and try to read again. Soon this becomes increasingly difficult as the child beside you has begun dancing and is slowly migrating on to your lap. Once the child has realized that they are almost on top of you they begin to cry again.
‘What is wrong with this kid’ you wonder.
Just as the crying reaches it’s climax the mother leans over and explains to you that the child is afraid because you are white. It looks like this isn’t going to stop and to make matters worse the mother is trying to force the child to touch your arm. She thinks this whole episode is hilarious. Just then you reach your first rest stop.
You don’t want food but you get out of the bus anyway to stretch your legs. Maybe you should try to find a toilet. You look around and see a sign that says ‘toilet’. You walk into the entrance and pay the man 1000 kwatcha, about 20 cents. This is so not worth it, there is water everywhere, leaking from the ceiling and covering the floor. Buckets and blue drums are everywhere and were at one time used to collect water falling from the ceiling, they are now overflowing and serving absolutely no purpose. You make your way into a stall only to find water spilling out over the top of the toilet, you move to the next. This one looks safe. You walk to the toilet and have to assume a half standing half squatting position, it has no seat. After you finish your business you check the stall for toilet paper, there is none. You check the next stall to find the last bits of paper clinging to a roll propped on top of a toilet. This’ll have to do.
You board the bus again and it starts off. A man is now walking down the aisle handing out bottles of soda and cookies for people to drink and eat. It’s 6:30 in the morning. You eat and drink anyway because, well, the food is there. Once your finish you continue the drive in much the same fashion as before except now you manage to catch some sleep. Just as you are entering a vivid dream land you are awoken abruptly. Luggage has began to rain down on top of you from overhead compartments. You help the bus attendant pile the luggage back on top and fall asleep again.
You awake to find that you have almost reached your destination. This is great! Finally you can get off this bus that has begun to smell more and more like sweaty feet and body odour. The bus stops and you gather your luggage. When you finally reach the door you realize that you have a battle ahead of you. About 15 taxi drivers are blocking the door, waving their keys and shouting ‘taxi, taxi’. You hold your bags tight and enter the swarm. Your bags are being pulled every which way and people are yelling at you incoherently. You finally emerge through to the other side to see that two men have followed you still yelling ‘taxi’. You explain to them that you do not need a taxi and watch as they both walk away defeated.
You exit the bus station, but you still have a ways to go. The cheapest way to get there will be a mini bus ride. You find one waiting outside the station and climb aboard. You immediately notice that the bus is full and probably in violation of about 300 safety standards. You climb over seats and people until you reach the one free space, about 6 inches across. You sit down and watch as two more people enter the bus, sitting on other people’s laps. The driver starts to drive and plays some reggae through broken and torn speakers. The conductor then begins to ask people where they are going and collects money.
‘Back seat’ he says
You hand him k3500 and tell him where you’d like to be dropped off at. He begins to collect money from other passengers when suddenly the bus’s door flies open and crashes to the ground. The driver hastily pulls the door less bus to the side of the road just barely avoiding oncoming traffic as he does so. Everyone piles out of the bus as the conductor runs down the road to collect the fallen door. As everyone is climbing aboard a bus that has just arrived you survey your surroundings. It looks like you are withing a twenty minute walk of your destination. You decide to walk, anything would be better than another bus ride.
We’ve finished packing the Canter, creatively named Mama Yoyo by a JF before myself, and are going to head out for a two week trip to see what field work is like. I’m not all that fond of this city, however it has provided me with a great deal of insight into urban Zambian life and the most excitement I think I shall see this whole trip.
I arrived in Lusaka off a bus from Katete. I was met at the bus station by Mark and Chiko, who was then waiting for his bus to leave for the from which I had just come from. This was my first time meeting Mark in person. We drove back to his place where I had a most needed shower and some food that was more Western than nshima na kasombi (that’s nshima with chicken in Lunda). I was also acquainted with the manager of Northwestern and Rent-to-Own accountant.
While in Lusaka I spent most of my days doing computer work both maintenance and programing in order to clear some work up on the plate of Rent-to-Own. I spent a great portion of everyday writing a program in Visual Basic, a computing language which I had never encountered until reaching Lusaka, to write a program that would synchronize field report data and hard data output by Rent-to-Own’s accounting software. I worked to design a new format for recording and reporting on data collected in the field which I will teach to the agents and people who I will be travelling with.
I have also gone around Lusaka to meet with suppliers from whom Rent-to-Own buys their equipment to be distributed in the field. We’ve gone from warehouse to warehouse picking up diesel engines, fridges and freezers, hammer mills and bicycles. From what I can see this company is the only way that many people in Zambia have to access high quality and much needed equipment. This seems to be poverty alleviation at it’s finest. People are provided with high quality equipment with a payment plan that allows almost anyone to afford the services and grow their own enterprises.
My nights were spent in the company of team lead Anna Marrie and fellow Fredericton resident Scott Bell. Evenings and nights were a chance to experiment in the kitchen, reflect on the days work and share interesting stories with friends and just take a break from the work of the day. I think I will be missing meals like french toast with fried bananas and authentic home made Mexican cuisine (courtesy of Anna Marrie). Once I leave Lusaka in the morning I won’t see any of my friends who I have become fairly attached to until mid summer retreat. Mwinilunga is a good day’s travel from Lusaka, 16 hours if you want an exact time.
I think that this is the perfect opportunity to put my summer work plan in writing for those of you out there who would like a short preview of what is in store for this New Brunswick boy.
My work plan will be divided into three sections which all lead towards one common goal; increasing the capacity of a growing Rent-to-Own.
The first part of my plan will revolve around working with two incredibly skilled young men who do most of the field work for Rent-to-Own. One is Patel, a 27 year old field tech who was picked up in Mwinilunga fixing watches at the age of 16. Patel, who I have met and worked with here in Lusaka, has a knack for fixing any mechanical problem with just about any mechanical machine. While in Lusaka I have had a chance to work with Patel and witness him fix a gearbox that even the local trained mechanics could not work on. I will be working to teach Patel how to do work on electrical systems like motors, switches and generators. If all goes well with the electrical work I will shift my focus to teach Patel computer repair, a skill needed since Rent-to-Own has begun selling laptop computers to business people in Zambia.
I will also be working with a man named Daniel Kameu, a bonafied salesperson and record keeper for the company. I will be working to teach Daniel how to use the new record keeping tool that I have been building here in Lusaka and will also be teaching him some computer skills so that he can optimize use of his new laptop. It will be up to Daniel and Patel to specify what exactly they would like to work on over the summer and I will do my very best to teach it.
The second part of my placement will see me working along side a brand new Rent-to-Own agent by the name of mr. Simon Lafunda. I will be travelling around Mwinilunga with mr. Lafunda trying to get a better sense of what it is that he does for his job. I’ll be working to create a work plan similar to that that I will be working on with Daniel and Patel. Hopefully by the end of the summer mr. Lafunda will be a strong and efficient agent to help with the ever growing client base for Rent-to-Own.
Last but certainly not least I will be working to gather information on what makes agents work successfully. It will be important for Rent-to-Own to perfect it’s agent model (the way in which agents are hired and operate in their respective districts and towns). This task will see me determining where it is acceptable to have one agent and where it will be necessary to either hire a new agent or train the existing agent to work with other people that he or she might not be able to reach. If all goes correctly Rent-to-Own will be able to maximize it’s agent efficiency by making the best possible use of the agents that they currently have working for them.
I’m looking forward to my time in the field, camping out under the stars and getting to see the realities of life all around Zambia. I look forward to meeting and working with my new colleagues and experiencing everything that rural Zambia has to offer.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot to mention, the town that I’m staying in is just about as remote as you can get. Looks like it’s nshima for a good long time. I will be missing the pizza shop here in Lusaka.
So I have managed to get myself into some trouble here in Zambia but have learned a very important lesson about the way in which business is conducted in Zambia in the process. Where has this trouble arisen from you may ask. Well as a result of an expired Visa I came incredibly close to having myself arrested. Here’s the story and the lesson.
The date was June 13, 2011, my visitor’s visa had been expired for two days. I was sitting in my room working on a manual aimed at teach a Rent-to-Own field technician how to properly perform electrical work while in the field when I got a phone call from the AVC Zambia team lead, Anna.
‘Are you near your passport?’ she asked.
‘Yes I am’ I replied, slightly confused
‘Check how many days you were given on your Visa, some of the other Jfs were only given thirty at the border, their visas are expired’ she explained.
I pawed through my knapsack until I found the ziplock bag that contained my passport, yellow fever vaccination record and some other important pieces of identification. Sure enough my visa, stamped into my passport on May 11, 2011 had expired. I was advised to get to an immigration office and explain what had happened. Hopefully this could get straightened out.
I rode my bicycle through Mwinilunga until I reached my colleague Daniel’s house. I explained my situation to him and suggested that he accompany me to immigration, he agreed to take me there. We set out from his house down a small dirt road until we eventually reached the immigration office. We took our bikes to the back of the building only to find the door to immigration locked and a worrying lack of staff. It appeared that immigration had closed about a half hour ago and my visa would be three days overdue when I would finally be able to meet with an officer.
The next day I awoke early and made it to Daniel’s by eight o’clock to ensure that we would make it to immigration in time to catch an officer. We once again pedalled back to the immigration office and found the door locked with not a staffer in sight. We asked a man working in the same building how we could get immigration service. He explained that the officer would return to the office very soon. No sooner had the words left his mouth when the immigration secretary came walking down the drive.
‘There he is now’ said the man we had been talking to.
Daniel and I rushed to meet him as he opened the locked gate to his office. He invited us inside where greetings and salutations were given. This man seemed fairly reasonable and could be a valuable ally. I spent some time explaining the situation that I found myself in and asking if there was anything that could be done to get my visa renewed. My explanation went something like this:
When I had arrived at the Zambia-Malawi border I had requested that I receive a double entry 60 day visitor’s visa. I had paid the $80 American fee and the officer had stamped my passport. When I checked my visa the day before I came to the office in Mwinilunga I noticed that the officer had only written 30 days. As soon as I noticed I got to the immigration office but it was closed, and that’s how I found myself at the office that day.
The officer, looking rather unimpressed, asked for my passport. I gave him the passport and he looked it over quickly.
‘This is an offence’ he told me ‘you’re going to be detained.
‘I’m sure that won’t be necessary’ I replied calmly.
‘You’ve broken our laws and need to go to jail’ was his retort.
I tried explaining my situation again and got more of the same replies. This guy wasn’t budging. As I got more and more frustrated with the man who was making my life difficult he became less and less likely to renew my expired visa. As the man told the friend that I had brought with me that ‘people in my country are too harsh and immigration was to strict’ and that he ‘would not stamp my passport for that reason’ I became furious. My tone changed and I began talking harshly to the immigration officer. If he was not going to rational then neither would I. After seeking help from friends who had resided in Mwinilunga and were well known and respected in the community, explaining my situation and getting mad at the officer I left the building with a still expired visa, I would have to go to Lusaka.
My colleague and owner of Rent-to-Ow, Mark Hemsworth, told me that my composure may have hurt my chances of getting my passport stamped. ‘When approaching a situation like this in Zambia you must realize that to the person behind the counter they are not just offering good customer service but are doing a personal favour for you’ he told me ‘keep this in kind next time you go to immigration’.
I caught the next bus to Lusaka and head to the immigration office. I was met by a secretary who informed me that it really wasn’t good but was still sympathetic. He told me to proceed to office 41 where somebody might be able to help me. This was my last shot for me to be allowed to stay in the country or avoid a fine. I turned on my charm and smile and stepped through the door to find a large open office with windows along one wall, multiple desks and one lady sitting in a chair behind a desk. I walk up to her and shook her hand. We exchanged some pleasantries before she finally told me I could take a seat. I explained my story to her.
‘You know that if your visa expires that you have to go to court?’ she asked
‘yes, I understand that and I’m sorry that this has happened but if there’s anyway you could help me out I’d really appreciate it.’ I told her
‘I think I can help you’ she said ‘Take a seat over there’
After about two hours of waiting the same lady called me back into her office, she had prepared my passport and I was once again legal. While I had been waiting I had been talking to two men that worked at the office, each had given me there number and asked for mine. Once I got my passport back from the lady I continued to talk to her, she gave me her number and told me to give her a call if I ever got into a situation like this again, or if I ever needed help.
So by approaching a situation knowing that customer service didn’t really exist and wasn’t important to the immigration officer, with a smile and all the charm I could muster I achieved the outcome I was looking for. By not sucking up to a guy and demanding a service I had not gotten what I wanted (and probably because I didn’t give the guy a bribe). So the moral of this story is this, Zambia is not like Canada when it comes to customer service, business and just doing something because it’s a nice or the right thing to do don’t exist. At the end of the day getting something done for you requires that you make friends with the person you are requesting assistance from.
So I haven’t had internet fast or consistent enough to post my blog entries until now. Over the next few days I will be posting what I’ve written while here in Zambia.
So yesterday was looking like it was going to be pretty slow and uneventful. In Zambia people generally follow the biblical tradition of keeping Sunday for a day of rest, which actually is pretty appealing given the fast pace of life and activities which I’ve been keeping. Anna Marie, head of the AVC team here in Zambia suggested that Scott, Raquel and I (Scott is my friend from Fredericton NB and Raquel a friend that I met during per-departure) head over to the little town of Chongwe to meet and talk to some agro dealers and find some ‘green maize’ for supper.
We hoped on a mini bus and paid our 3500 kwatcha a piece and headed out for Chongwe. The bus ride was pretty standard, cramped and loud. The mini bus drivers around here like to blast reggae or zampop as loud as they possibly can, it might sound novel and even fit with one’s romanticized views of Africa but it gets really annoying after a while. We pulled up in the town of Chongwe and got out of the bus. There were quite a few agro-dealer shops spread out down the main stretch, it looked like our quest would be easier than we had originally thought except for one minor detail. It was Sunday and all of the shops were closed.
We walked through the town trying to locate an open shop when we finally saw it, the one open agro dealer shop in town. We walked up and a kind looking man sitting out front rose to greet us. He told us he was the owner of the shop and that it was the only agro dealer shop that was open in town. He could do this because he was Seventh day Adventist and took Saturday as his day of rest. He worked the shop on Sundays and one of the two employees he had worked the shop on Saturday while he attended church. He said he thought it was important that the shop be open seven days a week to show his customers that he was serious and always ready to meet their needs.
We talked to him for a while and found out some interesting details about how he runs his shop and what the farming scene around this town was like. He told us that business was rather slow this time of year because farmers were no longer planting nor growing crops. This actually surprised me at first, I figured that since Zambia would rarely see temperatures much colder than about 10 degrees Celsius that farming could be performed all year round. When I thought about it it made sense though, crops generally don’t take the entire year to grow, especially not maize, and time would need to be left for harvesting, storage and preparation for the next crop. He said that he was mostly selling pesticides that the farmers could use to keep pest off their drying crop and preserve crops that had already been harvested. He told us that he had gone to school to learn business and had opened the shop about ten years ago. He was well known in the community and had many loyal customers who learned to appreciate his service back in the days when he ran the only agro input shop in Chongwe.
He allowed us to take a look at his record books and it soon became apparent what a difference and education can make. His records were neat, tidy and contained useful information. Some of the other records that I have seen being kept are little more than receipts stapled together. Most times information is incomplete or simply not there. This man told us that much of what he learned he learned from going to school. It really does seem to make a difference.
After a quick meat pie and fries dinner the real adventure started. We were to find the green maize for supper and no one was willing to accept failure. We started our searching in the most obvious place we could think of, the market. We went from shop to shop and stall to stall but found no green maize, although I did find some delicious fresh pressed peanut butter. #Just getting side tracked here. One thing I don’t understand is that they call peanuts groundnuts here in Zambia yet they still refer to the butter made by grinding them as peanut butter… not groundnut butter.# So here we were having searched the market from top to bottom and still no green maize. Being the keeners that we are we decided that we’d find a field of maize then track down the farmer who had planted it and ask if we could take some green maize.
We found a large field right by the main stretch and began asking people if they knew who owned it. We were passed from one person to the next each claiming that the person that owned the field lived ‘right over there’ (each person pointed in a different direction. We ended up walking to a nearby school where we met two boys who were able to help us. They said they knew whose field it was and would take us right to see that person. We followed them through town to a small gated house in the middle of everything.
As we stepped inside two men made one of the boys who had led us to this place remove his hat, everyone around carried their hat in their hand. We were lead a little bit further into the compound where we were introduced to an older lady in her Sunday bests. We had been lead to the chief of Chongwe. She invited us to sit and talk to her, she had just come from church. We sat and talked with her about our organization, how we liked Zambia, the weather, all the usual things you talk about with a person who you have just met. When we asked her if we could pick a couple pieces of maize from one of her fields she said we could but it would be no good. All of her maize was dried. We told her that it was ok and we would just head home. She stopped us and said that she could see that we had our hearts set on getting some green maize for supper and that she would do everything that she could to make sure that we got what we wanted.
She introduced us to two men, both farmers in the Sori tribe, they had large tracts of land that would still have some green maize that we could pick. Their farms were about fifteen kilometres away and they would need to take us their in their land cruiser. We set off down the road until we finally reached their fields. The two farmers drove us around showing off all the land that they had. They were proud and had every right to be, planting and tending to that much maize would’ve been quite a task. They took us out to one of the fields and picked us twenty ears of fresh maize. We got back in the truck but the adventure was far from over.
They took us a little bit further, out to see their village and show us the palace that the chief lived in. We drove to their house where we were introduced to one man’s wife and children and were shown his goats, rabbits and bees. They showed us all around the village including the soccer pitch, palace and brand new community centre of sorts.
We went home that night and ate fresh maize for supper. It has nothing on corn on the cob but was still pretty decent.
I made it to Lusaka Zambia, traveling through and staying in Lilongwe, Chipata and Katete. Africa is absolutely breath taking, whether it be rolling planes dotted with trees that seem to go on forever beneath the bluest sky one would ever see or a dirty river carving its way through beautiful green valleys and hills (That’s all the poetic stuff I have in me for now). It isn’t just the scenery that’s amazing here, the people are absolutely incredible. For instance, I had a good half hour conversation about American politics with a guy I met while buying eggs (Scott and I made french toast and fried bananas tonight).
We started off our time in Africa with some in country learning in Malawi. This was actually pretty fun, we were given a scavenger hunt with a list of items and places that we needed to find in a market. I ended up loosing my group and just wandered the market for a while until I found a friend. The markets here are amazing, you can buy fresh produce for incredibly cheap prices. For instance I bought a huge bunch of bananas, probably around 30, for a little more than a dollar Canadian.
In Malawi I also had the opportunity to travel to Chisapo where I talked to two agro-dealers about their businesses and life in rural Africa in general. One girl who I talked to was working at a store owned by her sister. Her sister had been able to purchase the shop and goods within with the help of a grant provided by a friend who also owned an agro-shop. She was working for her sister in hopes of raising enough money to go back to school and finish the degree she had started in marketing.
It seems to me that the people of Malawi and Zambia poses a very anti-capitalistic approach to economics. For instance, the two agro-dealers that we met with did not view each other as competition, despite the fact that they were right across the street from each other. Instead they were friends, part of the same community and looking to help increase the fortune and prosperity of the entire community rather than just the prosperity of themselves and their businesses. This lead me to wonder how much better the society I know back in Canada would be if people, governments and businesses viewed each other as friends and part of a community as opposed to obstacles to gaining wealth. What if everyone was willing to promote legislation, business practices and personal habits and beliefs that were collectively promoting the success of everyone instead of just the success of themselves?
After leaving Lilongwe we traveled to a small community called Chipata. Here we stayed the night in a chalet right out of one of the romantic views of Africa people seem to hold. The group of us stayed up late into the night singing songs and enjoying each other’s company. Yet another lesson learned in Africa. I have learned that one does not need technology or heavily marketed objects and processes to make you the most happy. It would seem that sitting around a picnic table with some of your best friends in the world and a $30 guitar that somehow made it to Africa on five different airplanes is the best way for one to be truly happy with their life.
The next day I left our group and met up with one of the rent to own staff named Jasford. Jasford and I enjoyed the 8th meal of nsima I had had since I arrived in Africa and then got on our bicycles. We traveled about ten kilometers through cotton and maize fields until we reached a small farming community in the middle of the bush. Here I was introduced to a fairly successful farmer named matias who had returned to the village from Lusaka after his parents insisted that he be there with them. I got a chance to ask him questions about rural African life and what it meant to be a successful farmer. He told me that knowledge and a strong sense of community were two very important aspects. If one has good connections and status in a community finding help on farms is not difficult.
I also hate to burst anyone’s bubble but almost everything you think you know about Africa is wrong. People here may not be as well off as people in Canada but they are not a sad pitiful group of people with no real purpose in life other than to wait for Westerners to come and save them. They are strong, smart, entrepreneurial and possibly even more friendly than the good ole East coasters back home. From what I’ve seen so far developing Africa’s greatest asset is it’s people.
And so my journey has finally brought me here to Lusaka. Lusaka is huge! Probably on scale with a city like Halifax. I even saw a KFC… This lead me to wonder, what are we working to develop Africa towards? A mirror of North America and the western world with it’s rampant and disgusting consumerism? If so what’s the point? Shouldn’t we be letting the people decide where they would like to see their world go and maybe, if absolutely necessary, lend a helping hand every once in a while like a good neighbor in a world wide community should be doing?
Hey all who are reading this,
My name’s Chris Pelkey, I live in Fredericton New Brunswick and am currently going in my third year of the electrical engineering program at the University of New Brunswick. I’ve created this blog because I was chosen to take part in Engineers Without Border’s Junior Fellowship program and will be spending this summer working with Rent-to-Own in Zambia
So you’ll hear more about this summer, right now I’m just doing project training and personal development stuff, which no one would really care to hear about. As such I guess I’ll just tell you, the reader, a little about myself in case you were wondering what I’m like.
I’m 20 years old and live in Fredericton New Brunswick, as I’ve mentioned. My hobbies include hockey, skiing, playing guitar, canoeing, cooking and racquetball. My favourite movie is ghostbusters and most other movies that would make my top ten are pre 1970. I don’t even know why I mentioned my favourite movies because I really don’t watch movies or tv all that much. Anything by the Coen brothers is totally awesome! Anyway moving on.
My favourite band is Arcade Fire although I do tend to almost any music, except for pop/rock country (keith urban and stuff like that) and metal. Right now I’ve been listening to quite a bit of american folk music, you know the stuff made between 10s and 30s yeah that stuff. I find that I draw a lot of inspiration from music and it can really help influence my mood and affect how I think about different situations. Basically it’s a very important part of my life.
I enjoy reading as well. Right now I’m reading under the dome by Stephen King. I’m not s big King fan but the book was in my house and my dad said it was good, so far he seems to be right. I think my favourite book ever is the portrait of the artist as a young man, I like Joyce’s writing style and find the story entertaining and thought provoking. I also enjoy reading most classic literature whether it be Greek, Persian, American etc. it’s all pretty good.
Anyways, that’s all I’ve got for this blog post.
Stay tuned.
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