I’ve mostly been interviewing old mamas and wazee in the village where I’m staying, and other villages nearby. I wanted to post some of their responses; most are translated from Dholuo.
On direct experiences with the British:
“During time, whites could not manage to be with black people…hated each other. Nowadays, we are together, we can share- not like the olden days.”
“There were no good jobs for Africans. No equal pay for equal work….Europeans were highly educated, Asians followed, Africans were last.”
“When whites entered, they took junior Africans … tried to introduce them into the administration to cool animosity and rebellion. But the real intention of the whites was to take the country.
“Some would say colonialism over independence, because of corruption.
On Independence:
“People were not aware…everyone believed white people were supposed to lead and govern. But Jomo Kenyatta.. who lived abroad and got exposure, informed fellow Africans about freedom of self rule.”
“We expected free jobs, free education. Wrongly or rightly, people assumed Indians and Whites would go home and leave the wealth. Now, there are no jobs. Getting a job is hard labor… Leaders are busy nursing wealth for themselves."
“Everyone had a feeling that self rule by Africans would bring changes and a good life…we would live as brothers and sisters. But, since then, we have not seen that. We are living in a way that people don’t care much about each other.’
On culture:
“ (colonialism) killed some of the African culture. Now…people are not free to share belongings with extended families. Now a brother is not prepared to spare pain for a brother…everyone for himself.”
“We used to pay dowry. Everyone like it, everyone did it. But the whites discouraged it.”
“Before currency, we exchanged grains for fish…it was hard to find the person who wanted what you had. Currency, can be used to be anything- it’s easier.”
“We didn’t mix much with the whites and Indians. Each kept to themselves with respect to culture except for clothes, education and Christianity.”
Friday, July 17, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
What we don't see at home: an observation
Although not directly related to my current project, I was inspired to write this after walking through the vibrant market in Kisumu's town center.
The media images of Africa we receive in the U.S. usually depict nations of violence, failed states, and poverty. I'm not going to argue that mass violence and failed states don't really exist in Africa- they do. However, the images of poverty we receive often portray Africans as helpless, as beggars. When you receive solicitations from charities, whether on TV or through church, what kind of images do you usually see? The wide eyed, crying child staring at you with sunken eyes, and only you can help. In this post, I hope to paint a slightly different picture of what this poverty looks like. I don't claim to speak for anyone, nor be an expert on anything related to the cause of Africa's poverty; these are only my observations and I've only spent extended time in one African country- Kenya.
When you walk through the main bus stage of Kisumu, considered Kenya's fourth largest town, you see shops selling goods of all kinds, from wrist watches to lightbulbs to sardines. Hawkers walk around selling cds, t-shirts and snacks for people about to travel a distance. You can buy a pineapple to take home, or a piece of pineapple if you're on the go. The amount of choices and products is dizzying. If you want to buy shoes, there are vendors selling second-hand high heels, others selling shoes locally made from tires, and still others selling flip-flops, locally called "pati- pati." No two vendors are alike. I'm sure that most of the these businesses got started with little initial capital, let alone access to credit. Most vendors probably make some profit, but not much in a cash strapped economy, and most probably fall into the category of "poor." Still, the small shops show initiative- a far cry from the image of the wide-eyed, begging child.
Those who have formal employment are considered lucky, as Kenya's unemployment rate is rumored to be around %50; according to my host father, "getting a job in Kenya is hard labor." From the looks of the work, from mechanic to waiter to cashier, formal employment looks like it would provide a more comfortable livelihood and be a little easier thank hawking soda to passerbys. This is sometimes true, but not always the case. My friend provides a stark example of this. He worked at a Nairobi supermarket cashiering. On the surface, cashiering doesn't look too strenuous. Yet in order to maintain employment and earn enough to get by, he worked 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. For less than $200 a month. Add a two hour commute in the morning and a one hour commute at night, and what left do you have for sleep, let alone anything else? Such examples demonstrate how hard people have to struggle to earn income- but again, that they are not helpless, waiting for charity.
Efforts in the rural areas of Kenya, where most Kenyans live, also show how people are far from helpless and have their own initiatives to improve their livelihoods. In the village where I stay, a widow's prayer group has become an NGO that serves 2000 orphans and numerous widows in the community and surrounding area. The group receives aid from foreign donors, but the vision and direction originated locally. The group has no paid staff, but relies on a handful of volunteers. In rural Kitui district, where I stayed last year, the self-help group I interned constructed a building for income generating purposes entirely with their own hands, from the brickmaking to laying the foundation with stones carried one by one from a nearby stream. According to the 2006 Kenya Human Development Report, the GDP per capita in Kitui district $312/year- not even a dollar a day for the average person. And still, people in this self-help group, mostly women and old men, found a way to work under the hot, dry Ukambani sun for the betterment of their community. Helpless? I think not.
So is Kenya poor? If poverty is defined as living on less than $2 or less than $1 a day, then yes, most Kenyans are poor. To clarify, I'm not arguing that aid, from foreign governments and private donors, wouldn't benefit Africans. If managed properly and with grassroots input, it can in many circumstances. I'm only arguing that, from what I've observed, poverty doesn't look like what we think it looks like in Africa. In the U.S., many of us like to believe that with hard work comes prosperity and social mobility. Yet most Africans work very hard without the comforts that many of us have and get little more than the very most basic needs- if anything at all. The efforts of people here demonstrate that most poverty- in Kenya, the U.S. and elsewhere- is not caused by a lack of initiative but by complex factors beyond the average person's control. And the initiatives that do exist in the midst of a lack of opportunity and resources are all the more admirable.
The media images of Africa we receive in the U.S. usually depict nations of violence, failed states, and poverty. I'm not going to argue that mass violence and failed states don't really exist in Africa- they do. However, the images of poverty we receive often portray Africans as helpless, as beggars. When you receive solicitations from charities, whether on TV or through church, what kind of images do you usually see? The wide eyed, crying child staring at you with sunken eyes, and only you can help. In this post, I hope to paint a slightly different picture of what this poverty looks like. I don't claim to speak for anyone, nor be an expert on anything related to the cause of Africa's poverty; these are only my observations and I've only spent extended time in one African country- Kenya.
When you walk through the main bus stage of Kisumu, considered Kenya's fourth largest town, you see shops selling goods of all kinds, from wrist watches to lightbulbs to sardines. Hawkers walk around selling cds, t-shirts and snacks for people about to travel a distance. You can buy a pineapple to take home, or a piece of pineapple if you're on the go. The amount of choices and products is dizzying. If you want to buy shoes, there are vendors selling second-hand high heels, others selling shoes locally made from tires, and still others selling flip-flops, locally called "pati- pati." No two vendors are alike. I'm sure that most of the these businesses got started with little initial capital, let alone access to credit. Most vendors probably make some profit, but not much in a cash strapped economy, and most probably fall into the category of "poor." Still, the small shops show initiative- a far cry from the image of the wide-eyed, begging child.
Those who have formal employment are considered lucky, as Kenya's unemployment rate is rumored to be around %50; according to my host father, "getting a job in Kenya is hard labor." From the looks of the work, from mechanic to waiter to cashier, formal employment looks like it would provide a more comfortable livelihood and be a little easier thank hawking soda to passerbys. This is sometimes true, but not always the case. My friend provides a stark example of this. He worked at a Nairobi supermarket cashiering. On the surface, cashiering doesn't look too strenuous. Yet in order to maintain employment and earn enough to get by, he worked 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. For less than $200 a month. Add a two hour commute in the morning and a one hour commute at night, and what left do you have for sleep, let alone anything else? Such examples demonstrate how hard people have to struggle to earn income- but again, that they are not helpless, waiting for charity.
Efforts in the rural areas of Kenya, where most Kenyans live, also show how people are far from helpless and have their own initiatives to improve their livelihoods. In the village where I stay, a widow's prayer group has become an NGO that serves 2000 orphans and numerous widows in the community and surrounding area. The group receives aid from foreign donors, but the vision and direction originated locally. The group has no paid staff, but relies on a handful of volunteers. In rural Kitui district, where I stayed last year, the self-help group I interned constructed a building for income generating purposes entirely with their own hands, from the brickmaking to laying the foundation with stones carried one by one from a nearby stream. According to the 2006 Kenya Human Development Report, the GDP per capita in Kitui district $312/year- not even a dollar a day for the average person. And still, people in this self-help group, mostly women and old men, found a way to work under the hot, dry Ukambani sun for the betterment of their community. Helpless? I think not.
So is Kenya poor? If poverty is defined as living on less than $2 or less than $1 a day, then yes, most Kenyans are poor. To clarify, I'm not arguing that aid, from foreign governments and private donors, wouldn't benefit Africans. If managed properly and with grassroots input, it can in many circumstances. I'm only arguing that, from what I've observed, poverty doesn't look like what we think it looks like in Africa. In the U.S., many of us like to believe that with hard work comes prosperity and social mobility. Yet most Africans work very hard without the comforts that many of us have and get little more than the very most basic needs- if anything at all. The efforts of people here demonstrate that most poverty- in Kenya, the U.S. and elsewhere- is not caused by a lack of initiative but by complex factors beyond the average person's control. And the initiatives that do exist in the midst of a lack of opportunity and resources are all the more admirable.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Realizing what I do not know: an introduction
On my first days in Kenya, our program staff told us to lower our expectations.” Initially, we, students studying abroad, did really know what this meant. We were too caught up the euphoria of a new place; the stimulation provided by even the most mundane things such a boarding a matatu or buying ndizi in the local market..
But, as I spent more time in Kenya, I began to ponder this question. I remember sitting the first two to three weeks at my field placement, in a village called Orongo, wishing I had something concrete to do. Something that would prove me useful to the organization. The CBO I was placed with, a widows and orphans group, always had work to do, but time is fluid, more circular in Kenya. Almost every task takes longer than expected, yet people find time just to exist, without hurry. I knew this, even enjoyed the break from the timebound culture of the US, and still I found myself impatient. When it took awhile for me to find a routine in the organization, I began to think that “lower your expectations” meant that I had to lower expectations of those around me.
Yet, when I tried to assist in the nursery school, I did not get far because I didn’t speak the area language, dholuo. When I worked with my supervisor in a HIV/AIDS training in a local school, where the language of instruction was English, my accent was too thick, my anecdotes irrelevant in the local context. I attended a community health seminar, thinking I would be at least somewhat knowledgeable on the material. Again, I was wrong. I didn’t know which local foods had which vitamins. Compared to most of the women in attendance, who had children, I knew nothing about childbirth or breast feeding. My host mother’s knowledge of traditional medicines went right over my head. Thus, I began to realize that “lower your expectations” meant lowering expectations of myself, not of those around me. I also reevaluated my time that I thought had been wasted, and found that I had learned so much through observation, conversation and new relationships.
I recently graduated from college, but my experience in Kenya is living proof that my degree, a symbol of the knowledge that Western society values, is only one type of knowledge. It is not universal, is not relevant in very situation. There is so much to learn beyond books and academia, knowledge that can only be attained through experience, or many of them. This is stating the obvious, but according to a quote from a book I read on crossing cultures, “there is all the difference in the world between believing academically, with the intellect, and believing personally, with the whole living self” (Aldeous Huxley, Jesting Pilate). I am now back in Kenya, working on a research grant, and I am again reminded that I have much to learn beyond the academic work that brought me here.Originally posted at PulseWire at http://www.worldpulse.com/node/11249
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