"No matter how long a log sits in the stream, it will never become a crocodile. So goes the Malian proverb meaning, ultimately, you are what you are in any environment. Its funny because two years in village, growing so connected to the people, I realize that my roots and values, fundamentally, will never totally be in sync with theirs. Yes we are all part of the same humanity. But I wonder if this fault line between values systems is sometimes the source of development efforts that mean good, but eventually crumble.
As an American, I value achievement, intellect, individuality. I dedicated 16 years of my life to education and find joy in innovation, competition, and completing tasks. I grew up well- and want the same doors of opportunity to be available to the people here. But what do they want?
“A millet grinder,” said Lauren, preparing to put up the white flag for her adult literacy efforts. After months of training on Bambara literacy, Lauren, as an education volunteer, tried to rally her community to revive a dead adult literacy program in Koyan, Dombila, and Sidian Coro. With the waning interest of community leaders, Lauren feels like she’s fighting an uphill battle. “I don’t know what I can do to help them, what they really want. They want stuff. Any maybe that’s the best way I’m equipped to serve them.” It’d be a lot more rewarding to create a sustainable literacy program, giving adult women a second chance at the schooling they never had, but at the end of the day, there's still millet to be pounded. And as a Malian woman, with no access to reading materials, no reason to write, that millet is what's on your mind.
And what about the youth? After a successful mural project, the village of Tomba with 3rd and 4th graders, I invited the winners of a drawing contest in Dombila's middle school to paint health education murals around the CSCOM. Result: chaotic disaster. "Why didn't you just paint them yourself?" The CSCOM staff asked with horrified looks toward the messy slops of paint all over the walls. Creating perfect masterpieces wasn't the point. The point was to give kids an opportunity to express themselves and exercise their developing talent. But as they went wild painting their shoes and running away with the brushes it seemed like very few of them came for that reason. Then they rushed off home for lunch, where their families anxiously waited for them. Thank Allah school's out for the summer- there are fields to plow. And if you made it to the 5th grade without ever really understanding how to read, as many do, it won't make a difference when you got that plow in your hand.
It's not heredity or even culture. It's poverty. Sure, a few lucky ones with a decent head on their shoulders will move out of the village and become salaried employees in the towns or cities. But overall, no one has found the golden key of pulling this country out of poverty. Education is great. Child survival- fantastic. Cleaner water, solar electricity- love it. But if the harvest is bad, the family goes hungry, whether or not your 7th grader can do long division.
So you and I with a first-world upbringing have come to love achievement, and think of ourselves as pretty smart. Smart enough to help the lowly people rise out of misery. In some ways, perhaps we can. I have access to a lot that can help the people of Dombila- money, knowledge, coupled with my sense of determination should be a winning combo to helping others. And I have helped. But I'm starting to realize the truth in what so many PCVs before me have attested- you leave country realizing that they helped you a lot more than you helped them.
Amidst the constraints of poverty and the lack of access to opportunity, Malians have developed a strong values system. So if not competition and education, what are Malian values? Practicing utmost respect for people. Taking an interest in other people's affairs and endeavors. Sharing everything you have and not taking anything for yourself unless there's some left over. Stopping to help everyone you pass who may need a hand, not thinking twice about if it will make you "late" or if it's "not your problem." And though I've been annoyed with people persistently insisting on helping when I can clearly draw my own water or change my own bike tire, people stopping me to give an unending string of blessings and greetings, people constantly inquiring about my comings and goings or dismissing my polite declines to ask me to eat toh with them for the fourth time in a row, I know now, they just care about me. They give everything, which is nothing in our sense. But blessings, care, small acts of generosity, is all they have. And they have been offering it to me from the day I arrived. They are putting their values into practice and in doing so, show me that maybe the way I do things isn't necessarily right. I'm that girl who whizzes by on her bike because stopping to great a group of 10 women on the way to the market would take up way too much of my precious time. I'm the girl that has nice food and medicines in her home that she hides from the rest of the village. And how many nights have I dismissed someone who wanted to chat because I'd rather have my head in a book? What really gets me- is the individualism. I'm catching myself- my thoughts. Self-centered, so often about me. When I peer into the brain of my fellow Malian, who could be resting but instead goes over to help her neighbor wash clothes, I see her thoughts of society, and love for others suppressing that "me! me! me!" voice that is always trying to scream the loudest in our minds.
After our well evaluation activity with Peace Corps Volunteers in Dombila, four households gave us their prize chickens. One household, having wanting to give us a chicken, gave us 1000 cfa ($2) instead because the chicken got sick and died. Realizing the extent to what they give me is humbling, and I find my thoughts swing between humility, love and guilt.
Peace Corps staff, all Malian, get training on American work values so that the office can be more efficient, punctual, and reflective of an American office. I was once in the office of a certain staff member, and noticed a small-typed list hanging behind his desk: 50 Successful Tips for Working in an American office. There was one highlighted. I leaned over the desk and squinted to read it. "Work first. Family Second."
My heart fell. I pitied him, and in doing so, pitied myself, and the millions of Americans who have internalized that.
I've been up and down lately, and as my transition back home becomes near, that's to be expected. I'm still happiest when I'm busy, and I still have enough to keep it that way. The wat/san committee is doing a lot, and I've picked up a side project with a Women's Rights organization in Kati. But seeing sick children, watching one little girl die of malnutrition, is harder and harder knowing that in 2 months, this will continue and there will be nothing I can do about it anymore. The village is happy with the work I've done, they call me the "Master of Work" sometimes. But there have been times lately, caught in this values fault zone, I've not thought too highly of myself or my way of going about things.
"You're not a bad person," Lauren assured me, "you just have different values. If a Malian came to America, was late to everything and refused to send his children to school, we wouldn't think very highly of him either. But if you appreciate some Malian values, now is the time to figure out how you can incorporate them in your life in America."
I'm not a bad person for having different values. And neither are the Malians. I'm just, well, a log. Still. A log sitting in a rough but beautiful stream, trying to decide how much I'll let it carry me along.
