So I could update you on what on earth I've been up to since I last posted over a month ago, but I have zero idea where to begin! Sorry if you were hoping for something substantive, but my brain is waaaay too scrambled. But one running thread that has characterized the past few weeks is the steadiness and comfort that goes along with feeling more and more "at home" here in Uganda (not that this is my home... no one freak out that I'm staying here for good!). So, in case you were planning on dropping everything and spending an extended period of time in good ol' Uganda, here are the top ten signals that you've been here long enough to make the "tourist" status on your visa seem so misrepresentative of your real life...
1. Your English skills have noticably declined. Well, I take that back. Your American English skills have noticably declined, but your Ugandan English skills have sharpened remarkably. This becomes apparent when you catch yourself saying "You first come," "Sorry please," and "Good day please" (if only I could type that with the accent!!) but you can't remember common American words and phrases to save your life. I wish you could understand how difficult it is for me to write a coherent blog post, because my vocabulary has plummetted by at least 40%. I use a dramatically lower number and variety of words over the course of the day, which actually has made me realize how few words you need to really get by.
2. You get unduly exited by a hot shower. And by unduly excited, I mean over-the-moon, orgasmically ecstatic. This past weekend a series of random circumstances led me to spending the night in the beautiful, luxurious home of a couple working for the U.S. Foreign Service, and this meant having access to a hot, steamy shower that put me in a good mood for at least the next 48 hours. I swear I thanked the couple Sarah and Dan at least fifty times and offered to buy them a goat for their generosity or something absurd like that.
3. You have a mile-long stretch of children that, rather than yelling out "mzungu!! mzungu!! mzungu how are you? mzungu byeee!" when they see you, yell out your Ugandan name and call you over to them in Lusoga. This is my favorite thing, because it makes me feel like I'm part of a community rather than just a mere outsider. Of course no matter how long you live here you'll always be a mzungu, but to the people of Budondo I at least have a name of my own. And as small as that seems, it makes me oh-so-happy.
4. You have developed a wide array of creative excuses for NOT giving out your phone number to random Ugandan men who ask for your number before asking your name. The most ingenious and multi-purpose of these I have courtesy of my friend Kate: "Sorry, this is a work phone that belongs to my work and I can only use it for work." Direct, polite, and gets the point across!
5. You have on at least one occasion slipped up on your evasion tactics and given your number to at least one strange man who has then called you multiple times a day for over a month even though you never once pick up. I do not understand the mindless persistence.
6. You haven't shaved your legs for four months. For real. But don't take this one as a general rule -- it's probably just me and my lack of motivation to do anything unnecessarily extravagant with regards to my appearance.
7. You have a questionable "tan" that may or may not be a combination of dirt and sunburn. My money's on may.
8. You have a network of free-avocado-hook-ups that shower you with dozens of avocadoes at every chance they get. This isn't exactly a problem, but it can become one when the two dozen avocadoes you have in your kitchen decide to go rotten before you get a chance to eat them...
9. You litter. So much for responsible environmental behavior...
10. You have come to view toilet paper as a luxury item.
Kale bannange nmaze okuwandika. Ngenda okuwumula kati. Sula bulungi ate weekend enungi! Bye!!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Coming to Cambodia
(My CIEE program will be in Phnom Penh, Cambodia for the next 5 weeks. Just got here. I'll be taking the Khmer language, a Poli Sci course about Cambodia post-Khmer Rouge, and a History course. Here's what's up!)
Day by day
The light in Phnom Penh has a distinctly yellow quality to it, and though it might be a little cooler here than in Ho Chi Minh City, it feels like I’m simmering a bit more in Cambodia! For better or for worse, the afternoon rains also last a lot longer here, so it’s been much cooler in the evenings once I sit through the downpours. I was kind of surprised, coming from Phoenix, that life slows down as it does when it rains in places like this. I had always thought that people just trudged through it, but I guess it’s kind of hard to do that when the streets flood halfway up to your knees. Now that it’s the rainy season, I finally understand why there aren’t many pedestrians in Sai Gon and Phnom Penh!
Places
Phnom Penh was once considered the most beautiful city in Southeast Asia in the 1960s, and it shows. There’s distinctive Khmer architectural flourishes almost everywhere you look, which is refreshing after the seeing so many utilitarian buildings in Sai Gon. The city still has the narrow shop-below/house-above style buildings you see everywhere, but the sidewalks are a bit wider and there are trees everywhere. I live near the awesome looking Independence Monument, and from there you can follow a series of parks through the city to the waterfront and to the cultural sites like the Independence Palace and the Parade grounds. At night, the walkers and people playing sports animate the whole park into one circuit. It has such amazing energy that's provided by people inside it, and not the giant billboards and traffic that ring Sai Gon’s Park 23-4. (not my pictures here, for the record-- nice shot though!)
Wealth
Some of the people on the program say that the people in Phnom Penh seem less materialistic than those in Sai Gon— a little more dressed down, from students to street vendors— though we get the sense that that’s not exactly the case. On the one hand, Cambodia is a whole is poorer and more rural than Vietnam. Phnom Penh, which is much, much smaller than Sai Gon or even Hue, has poverty and deteriorated neighborhoods that are much closer to the surface. Still, even when I was exploring the other day, I kept seeing Lexuses parked in these same neighborhoods! We had always heard jokes from the Cambodian students about how there
are more Lexuses in Cambodia (population 14m) than in Vietnam (pop. 85m), and it’s sadly true. You see the SUV’s driving through Phnom Penh every minute with “LEXUS” emblazoned across the side very conspicuously. The most powerful also have no license plates, which, true or not, makes them appear above the law. Apparently you often see no-plate Lexuses and Range Rovers parked outside Phnom Penh’s boutique stores on Saturdays as generals and police chiefs take their mistresses out to shop!
In a way, I think I’m just a little uncomfortable being in political capitals in Southeast Asia. The corruption and opulence that lingers behind closed doors just seems to leak out into the streets, and it’s especially revolting considering the poverty elsewhere. In Sai Gon, the modal share of cars was only about 2% and they weren’t as nice, so I don’t think it bothered me as much. Moreover, I think that Sai Gon’s ostentatious wealth was powered by tourists and foreign business interests; here, most foreigners are ex-pats in NGOs or with the U.N., so the wealth seems more likely to be coming from the government alone— kind of a sad thought.
The upside is that I’m more encouraged than ever to travel off the beaten path to the rural areas of Cambodia, especially now that I have my S.E.A. legs a bit (hardy harr harr). Don’t worry ma, I’ll take my malaria pills and lots of pictures!
Day by day
The light in Phnom Penh has a distinctly yellow quality to it, and though it might be a little cooler here than in Ho Chi Minh City, it feels like I’m simmering a bit more in Cambodia! For better or for worse, the afternoon rains also last a lot longer here, so it’s been much cooler in the evenings once I sit through the downpours. I was kind of surprised, coming from Phoenix, that life slows down as it does when it rains in places like this. I had always thought that people just trudged through it, but I guess it’s kind of hard to do that when the streets flood halfway up to your knees. Now that it’s the rainy season, I finally understand why there aren’t many pedestrians in Sai Gon and Phnom Penh!
Places
Phnom Penh was once considered the most beautiful city in Southeast Asia in the 1960s, and it shows. There’s distinctive Khmer architectural flourishes almost everywhere you look, which is refreshing after the seeing so many utilitarian buildings in Sai Gon. The city still has the narrow shop-below/house-above style buildings you see everywhere, but the sidewalks are a bit wider and there are trees everywhere. I live near the awesome looking Independence Monument, and from there you can follow a series of parks through the city to the waterfront and to the cultural sites like the Independence Palace and the Parade grounds. At night, the walkers and people playing sports animate the whole park into one circuit. It has such amazing energy that's provided by people inside it, and not the giant billboards and traffic that ring Sai Gon’s Park 23-4. (not my pictures here, for the record-- nice shot though!)
Wealth
Some of the people on the program say that the people in Phnom Penh seem less materialistic than those in Sai Gon— a little more dressed down, from students to street vendors— though we get the sense that that’s not exactly the case. On the one hand, Cambodia is a whole is poorer and more rural than Vietnam. Phnom Penh, which is much, much smaller than Sai Gon or even Hue, has poverty and deteriorated neighborhoods that are much closer to the surface. Still, even when I was exploring the other day, I kept seeing Lexuses parked in these same neighborhoods! We had always heard jokes from the Cambodian students about how there
are more Lexuses in Cambodia (population 14m) than in Vietnam (pop. 85m), and it’s sadly true. You see the SUV’s driving through Phnom Penh every minute with “LEXUS” emblazoned across the side very conspicuously. The most powerful also have no license plates, which, true or not, makes them appear above the law. Apparently you often see no-plate Lexuses and Range Rovers parked outside Phnom Penh’s boutique stores on Saturdays as generals and police chiefs take their mistresses out to shop!In a way, I think I’m just a little uncomfortable being in political capitals in Southeast Asia. The corruption and opulence that lingers behind closed doors just seems to leak out into the streets, and it’s especially revolting considering the poverty elsewhere. In Sai Gon, the modal share of cars was only about 2% and they weren’t as nice, so I don’t think it bothered me as much. Moreover, I think that Sai Gon’s ostentatious wealth was powered by tourists and foreign business interests; here, most foreigners are ex-pats in NGOs or with the U.N., so the wealth seems more likely to be coming from the government alone— kind of a sad thought.
The upside is that I’m more encouraged than ever to travel off the beaten path to the rural areas of Cambodia, especially now that I have my S.E.A. legs a bit (hardy harr harr). Don’t worry ma, I’ll take my malaria pills and lots of pictures!
Thursday, March 26, 2009
The ants go marching one-hundred by one-hundred...
So, Wednesdays at work are "office days," meaning there is no clinic and therefore I cannot go pack pills in the pharmacy when I get bored of staring at the ceiling waiting to meet with my supervisor. And if you were wondering what one does at an office on "office day" when one doesn't actually have any office work, I am here to answer that question:
Obviously, you drink a cup of tea and then watch as thousands of ants appear from nowhere to attack your cup of tea.
Only to inevitably fall into a deep well of misery and meet their unfortunate demise:
(Poor fallen soldiers. Never had a chance.)
Obviously, you drink a cup of tea and then watch as thousands of ants appear from nowhere to attack your cup of tea.
Ants are very mesmerizing creatures, especially when you start looking around your tiny little office to see where on earth the thousands of ants crawling all over the place have come from.
Then you see this on the wall:
And if you keep following the windy train of ants up towards the ceiling,
you see this:
(That is the little open corner above the door, by the way.)
And then you begin to realize how extraordinary it is that these ants have been following eachother on a very very long and treacherous office journey (probably the equivalent of several miles if you were the size of an ant) to reach this apparent oasis of sugary goodness...
They proceed to battle eachother across the wobbly confusing mess of a crumpled napkin and ascend the steep vertical incline of my teacup...
They proceed to battle eachother across the wobbly confusing mess of a crumpled napkin and ascend the steep vertical incline of my teacup... Only to inevitably fall into a deep well of misery and meet their unfortunate demise:
(Poor fallen soldiers. Never had a chance.)All this makes me wonder how ants have survived as a species for, umm, forever because this behavior strikes me as incredibly stupid. They expend a whole lot of time and energy to reach this sugar hotspot, and then they keep on going until they die. Hedonism is obviously not working out too hot for them. I hope they were at least really really happy and blissful before they drowned.
If only we had the power to hear the thoughts of ants. That would be so cool, like being able to watch a live-action version of the movie "ANTZ" unfold before your eyes.
Monday, March 23, 2009
What I'm doing here; also, Cambodian history
I don’t think I ever really answered that question in the blog! I decided to come to Vietnam (and Cambodia for 5 weeks) because I knew little of the country except for America's involvement here (and I have a fairly limited understanding of that as well). I also wanted to see another side of Asia, as I had already studied Japan and its language. Also, it's just a thrill to live in a dense city for once! In Ho Chi Minh City (aka Sai Gon), I’m taking a sociology class (Contemporary Vietnamese Society), the equivalent of two semesters of Beginning Vietnamese Language, the History of Indochina, and a political science course called “Nation Building After the Khmer Rouge.” History is the one I wanted to talk about in detail here.
Our professor’s name is Michael Vickery, a septuagenarian scholar on Cambodia. From what I know of his background, he’s an American who’s been living in Southeast Asia for at le
ast several decades. On day one, my first thought was “where did they dig this guy up?”: Vickery looks as if he hiked for 2 weeks through the jungle to get to class. Vickery is bald, white haired, and his skin is splotched all over with different skin tones-- you can tell he's been around alot! To every class he wears what I can only describe as a Chinese-style shirt (think this link without a collar; not the one pictured here) along with tan cargo pants and boots. White hair sprouts up through the neck of his shirt and out his ears. He's still got a pretty incredible memory of historical events, though he does make some slips. Probably his best line was while he was discussing a Cham artifact in one of his slides. Vickery said "this piece was found 10 years ago," only to be corrected by our program coordinator who was also present: "you mean 1978."
Still, Michael Vickery is a well-known expert on the history of Cambodia— he’s shown us photos he took in the 1960s of temples when they were still overgrown with jungle. His scholarship on recent Cambodia history is far more controversial: he considers the Khmer Rouge’s genocide to have been far less a product of a radical conception of Marxism and more peasant revolution. He also contests the official casualty count of the Khmer Rouge genocide, placing it at almost half of what other academics consider it to be. Strange when I sometimes think Vickery looks like he's been tortured by several governments! Be sure to check out the reader reviews for his book Cambodia 1975-1983 on Amazon.com.
Vickery is currently advising the defense counsel to the Khmer Rouge leaders and jailers on tribunal right now. I've been told that he once had Duch (the jailer) as a student!
Our class is currently on hiatus while Vickery is in Cambodia for a month, but when the study abroad group I'm part of moves there for rest of the semester, we’ll resume the course and begin learning about the the 1940s onward— and we’ll also get to visit the site where the tribunals are being held! Still, I don’t know if we’ll get to actually see anything transpire. Should be interesting, so I'll report more then.
As for the class itself, just briefly, it's fascinating when we review parts of history Vickery is clearly well versed in, such as the historiography dealing with 7th and 8th century Cambodia, but the classes on 19th and 20th Century have been a drag, even though I was fascinated by those parts of Vietnam: A History (Amazon needs to pay me for all these links!). Most of our readings are from Vickery himself-- as he tells us, everything else that has been written about SE Asia up to the 15th Century or so is wrong! It's great seeing him rip to shreds the other theories about the region, though his tremendous confidence in his own conclusions worries me; less so when he's talking about the ancient Cham empire, but much more when he has talked about the Khmer Rouge!
Our professor’s name is Michael Vickery, a septuagenarian scholar on Cambodia. From what I know of his background, he’s an American who’s been living in Southeast Asia for at le
ast several decades. On day one, my first thought was “where did they dig this guy up?”: Vickery looks as if he hiked for 2 weeks through the jungle to get to class. Vickery is bald, white haired, and his skin is splotched all over with different skin tones-- you can tell he's been around alot! To every class he wears what I can only describe as a Chinese-style shirt (think this link without a collar; not the one pictured here) along with tan cargo pants and boots. White hair sprouts up through the neck of his shirt and out his ears. He's still got a pretty incredible memory of historical events, though he does make some slips. Probably his best line was while he was discussing a Cham artifact in one of his slides. Vickery said "this piece was found 10 years ago," only to be corrected by our program coordinator who was also present: "you mean 1978."Still, Michael Vickery is a well-known expert on the history of Cambodia— he’s shown us photos he took in the 1960s of temples when they were still overgrown with jungle. His scholarship on recent Cambodia history is far more controversial: he considers the Khmer Rouge’s genocide to have been far less a product of a radical conception of Marxism and more peasant revolution. He also contests the official casualty count of the Khmer Rouge genocide, placing it at almost half of what other academics consider it to be. Strange when I sometimes think Vickery looks like he's been tortured by several governments! Be sure to check out the reader reviews for his book Cambodia 1975-1983 on Amazon.com.
Vickery is currently advising the defense counsel to the Khmer Rouge leaders and jailers on tribunal right now. I've been told that he once had Duch (the jailer) as a student!
Our class is currently on hiatus while Vickery is in Cambodia for a month, but when the study abroad group I'm part of moves there for rest of the semester, we’ll resume the course and begin learning about the the 1940s onward— and we’ll also get to visit the site where the tribunals are being held! Still, I don’t know if we’ll get to actually see anything transpire. Should be interesting, so I'll report more then.
As for the class itself, just briefly, it's fascinating when we review parts of history Vickery is clearly well versed in, such as the historiography dealing with 7th and 8th century Cambodia, but the classes on 19th and 20th Century have been a drag, even though I was fascinated by those parts of Vietnam: A History (Amazon needs to pay me for all these links!). Most of our readings are from Vickery himself-- as he tells us, everything else that has been written about SE Asia up to the 15th Century or so is wrong! It's great seeing him rip to shreds the other theories about the region, though his tremendous confidence in his own conclusions worries me; less so when he's talking about the ancient Cham empire, but much more when he has talked about the Khmer Rouge!
You can take the girl out of Kansas, but you can't take Kansas out of the only bar in town that carries March Madness AND lets me hog the TV for hours
***DISCLAIMER*** This post may have zero relevance to your life and may stimulate little-to-no interest in anyone not familiar with the absolute and perpetual glory that is Jayhawk basketball. Continue reading at your own risk.
So once upon a time (i.e. last Friday), it struck me that never since I've been a conscious, thinking human being have I ever missed my beloved Kansas Jayhawks play in the NCAA tournament. I have seriously spent a good portion of every Spring Break I've ever had curled up on my couch watching and analyzing every game with every team, deconstructing how we the Jayhawks could positively crush them (even on occasions after we the Jayhawks had, in fact, already been crushed). March Madness is that special time of year where one can leave the Real World behind and, between the actual games and the seemingly ceaseless bracket analysis and commentary on ESPN, actually live 24-7 in College Basketball World. And when you're a Kansas Jayhawk, there's no better place to live than College Basketball World.
Now, there are a lot of things I'm willing to give up to be in Uganda (stable electricity, flushing toilets, and Ben & Jerry's to name a few), but March Madness is not one of them. I spent all day Friday (well, I did some real work, I guess) trying to come up with ingenious ways to force the internet to conjure up a live video stream, or at least a live audio stream, of the tournament, but to no avail. Then I began the agonizing process of trying to let myself down easy and eliminate any faint hopes I had of getting to experience even the tiniest taste of March Madness this year.
Just when I had finally arrived at a little spot of zen and acceptance that my life would indeed go on if I were to miss KU playing -- and that my heart would even continue beating if we lost to the NDSU Bison as with the Bucknell Bison -- my friend David called me and said, "Why don't you try to go find some mzungu place with satellite TV and see if anywhere is broadcasting the tournament? Chances are slim, but it's at least worth a shot if you really want to see the game..." And that's when it struck me that I really did want to see the game. Some little parts of me, most especially the parts of me that pump crimson and blue through my veins, just don't let go of wild hopefulness that easy. So I hopped on my bike and sped off to this one bar at a place called Safari Inn where my friend Sacha and I had watched a really dreadful Nigerian movie on DStv a few weeks back and I walked up to the bar and said "Can we check if there is American basketball on the TV?" and then they scanned through all the channels and found ESPN but it was poker and I was like "NOOOOOO..." but they told me to come back later. Boo.
Nearly defeated, I headed over to Flavours (a.k.a. magic coffee shop with wi-fi and the best brownies on the planet) to sulk and eat a giant plate of pasta. But while I was there, trying fruitlessly to get MMOD (mmod.ncaa.com) to load on my sad little computer, I decided to take a stab at it and see if there was a DStv schedule posted online. To my ultimate shock, coming up on ESPN in 15 minutes was the FIRST ROUND OF THE 2009 NCAA TOURNAMENT!!!! I nearly flipped out and promptly hopped back on my bike and sped back across town to Safari Inn, where the staff turned on ESPN for me and miraculously there appeared the image of CBS's March Madness coverage. I cannot even explain the ecstasy that overwhelmed me in that moment. I jumped up and down squealing and gave the bartender a HUGE hug and spent the next 5 hours (yep, 5 hours...) in complete awe at the complete serendipity of this situation. Despite the minor frustration of having to watch more of Oklahoma State vs. Tennessee than Kansas vs. NDSU (apparently defending national champions are NOT worthy of equal coverage... hmmpf), I was in pure bliss. Sometimes life just surprises you in the best way possible, like when you sit back and realize that you are sitting in a random bar in the middle of Uganda watching the Kansas Jayhawks playing live half a world away while a bunch of Ugandans are behind you drinking merrilly to the sounds of Michael Jackson and Madonna circa like 1985.
I am still in awe of this whole thing. In a land where I can hardly get my e-mail to load most days, I can watch Jayhawk basketball live on CBS being simulcast on ESPN International on some TV in some bar. It's beyond wonderful. This is thereby one of the rare occasions when I can honestly say with no hesitation: praise be to globalization.
So every time a KU game is on between now and April 6, I know where I'll be! How about you? For all you Sun Devils out there, I propose you hop on the KU bandwagon for no other reason than that we're in U of A's bracket and if we end up crossing paths you can be sure we'll avenge our regular season loss and demolish them on your behalf. Just a suggestion.
So once upon a time (i.e. last Friday), it struck me that never since I've been a conscious, thinking human being have I ever missed my beloved Kansas Jayhawks play in the NCAA tournament. I have seriously spent a good portion of every Spring Break I've ever had curled up on my couch watching and analyzing every game with every team, deconstructing how we the Jayhawks could positively crush them (even on occasions after we the Jayhawks had, in fact, already been crushed). March Madness is that special time of year where one can leave the Real World behind and, between the actual games and the seemingly ceaseless bracket analysis and commentary on ESPN, actually live 24-7 in College Basketball World. And when you're a Kansas Jayhawk, there's no better place to live than College Basketball World.
Now, there are a lot of things I'm willing to give up to be in Uganda (stable electricity, flushing toilets, and Ben & Jerry's to name a few), but March Madness is not one of them. I spent all day Friday (well, I did some real work, I guess) trying to come up with ingenious ways to force the internet to conjure up a live video stream, or at least a live audio stream, of the tournament, but to no avail. Then I began the agonizing process of trying to let myself down easy and eliminate any faint hopes I had of getting to experience even the tiniest taste of March Madness this year.
Just when I had finally arrived at a little spot of zen and acceptance that my life would indeed go on if I were to miss KU playing -- and that my heart would even continue beating if we lost to the NDSU Bison as with the Bucknell Bison -- my friend David called me and said, "Why don't you try to go find some mzungu place with satellite TV and see if anywhere is broadcasting the tournament? Chances are slim, but it's at least worth a shot if you really want to see the game..." And that's when it struck me that I really did want to see the game. Some little parts of me, most especially the parts of me that pump crimson and blue through my veins, just don't let go of wild hopefulness that easy. So I hopped on my bike and sped off to this one bar at a place called Safari Inn where my friend Sacha and I had watched a really dreadful Nigerian movie on DStv a few weeks back and I walked up to the bar and said "Can we check if there is American basketball on the TV?" and then they scanned through all the channels and found ESPN but it was poker and I was like "NOOOOOO..." but they told me to come back later. Boo.
Nearly defeated, I headed over to Flavours (a.k.a. magic coffee shop with wi-fi and the best brownies on the planet) to sulk and eat a giant plate of pasta. But while I was there, trying fruitlessly to get MMOD (mmod.ncaa.com) to load on my sad little computer, I decided to take a stab at it and see if there was a DStv schedule posted online. To my ultimate shock, coming up on ESPN in 15 minutes was the FIRST ROUND OF THE 2009 NCAA TOURNAMENT!!!! I nearly flipped out and promptly hopped back on my bike and sped back across town to Safari Inn, where the staff turned on ESPN for me and miraculously there appeared the image of CBS's March Madness coverage. I cannot even explain the ecstasy that overwhelmed me in that moment. I jumped up and down squealing and gave the bartender a HUGE hug and spent the next 5 hours (yep, 5 hours...) in complete awe at the complete serendipity of this situation. Despite the minor frustration of having to watch more of Oklahoma State vs. Tennessee than Kansas vs. NDSU (apparently defending national champions are NOT worthy of equal coverage... hmmpf), I was in pure bliss. Sometimes life just surprises you in the best way possible, like when you sit back and realize that you are sitting in a random bar in the middle of Uganda watching the Kansas Jayhawks playing live half a world away while a bunch of Ugandans are behind you drinking merrilly to the sounds of Michael Jackson and Madonna circa like 1985.
I am still in awe of this whole thing. In a land where I can hardly get my e-mail to load most days, I can watch Jayhawk basketball live on CBS being simulcast on ESPN International on some TV in some bar. It's beyond wonderful. This is thereby one of the rare occasions when I can honestly say with no hesitation: praise be to globalization.
So every time a KU game is on between now and April 6, I know where I'll be! How about you? For all you Sun Devils out there, I propose you hop on the KU bandwagon for no other reason than that we're in U of A's bracket and if we end up crossing paths you can be sure we'll avenge our regular season loss and demolish them on your behalf. Just a suggestion.
Monday, March 16, 2009
PATRICK LIVES!!!
Just when you think you are so far away from Patrick, you go to a German birthday party and hear the techno-remix of Born To Be Alive.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Please please read my desperate call to action! We need your help!
I'm serious, help us out here...
http://thehopejournal.blogspot.com/2009/03/open-letter.html
http://thehopejournal.blogspot.com/2009/03/open-letter.html
Monday, March 9, 2009
Job Opening: Umbrella Repairman
One person needed to save abandoned umbrellas from public trashcans. After bringing the umbrellas back to life, they can be re-sold for a profit to others tourists who just threw their umbrella away.
I took a little journey into Vienna this weekend and would say that water would be the best word to describe the city. First off, it rained everyday. The rainstorm resulted in massive umbrella graveyards in garbage cans throughout the city. I captured as many of these sad little umbrella graveyards as I could. You could make enough money as an umbrella repairman to rent an apartment in the same castle that the president of Austria lives in (because in Austria they trust the public enough to let them live in the same building as the president).
Fun Fact about Vienna: Tap water comes straight from the Alps! MMMMMM
Friday, March 6, 2009
Writing poems is a great procrastination strategy, no matter what continent you're on!
I am feeling particularly poetic at the moment (maybe because I'd rather write poetry than rewrite my entire grant proposal), so here are some impromptu poems for your reading pleasure. They have sadly not been written on Fatburger napkins, but I think you'll be able to manage.
Ode to Fene
I used to think that there was only such a thing as fruit-flavored Starburst, not Starburst-flavored fruit.
That was until I met fene, the most magical fruit on the planet.
Tasting fene for the first time was like experiencing Plato's allegory of the cave, but with my tongue.
The first magical thing about fene is that it tastes like Starburst.
It doesn't taste like any particular flavor of Starburst, but more like what the ultimate flavor of Starburst would taste like.
The second magical thing about fene is that it looks really cool on the outside.
It is bright green and bumpy and looks like aliens brought it from outer space.
The third magical thing about fene is that it looks really cool on the inside.
It is bright yellow and looks like some strange flowy sea creature.
The fourth magical thing about fene is that it is really giant.
It is fun to watch boda-boda guys with mass amounts of fene strapped to their bikes.
In conclusion, fene is the best thing ever to happen to the genre of fruit.
I am very perplexed as to why we don't eat fene in America.
Oops
Placing your iPod in your bra so you can continue listening to it while you jolt to the bathroom to have diarrhea may seem like a good idea, but it really isn't.
Why, you ask?
Because your iPod will slip out of your shirt, down between your legs, and into the diarrhea-filled toilet.
Then, without thinking, you will instantly reach into the toilet to retrieve your poor little iPod.
Then you will be left with a wet, defiled iPod and wet, defiled hands, and you will have nothing left to do except laugh really really hard at yourself.
Then you will be stuck in the middle of Uganda without an iPod, pondering how you will ever fall asleep at night because you can no longer listen to Enya and This American Life until you pass out.
At least this is my current predicament.
Oops.
Second Chance Haiku #1
Salvador is strange.
Find Second Chance on You Tube.
You will understand.
#2
Andre is evil.
So is Walter, he should die.
So what happens next?
Okay I really need to stop this poetry business, I actually have work to do.
Ode to Fene
I used to think that there was only such a thing as fruit-flavored Starburst, not Starburst-flavored fruit.
That was until I met fene, the most magical fruit on the planet.
Tasting fene for the first time was like experiencing Plato's allegory of the cave, but with my tongue.
The first magical thing about fene is that it tastes like Starburst.
It doesn't taste like any particular flavor of Starburst, but more like what the ultimate flavor of Starburst would taste like.
The second magical thing about fene is that it looks really cool on the outside.
It is bright green and bumpy and looks like aliens brought it from outer space.
The third magical thing about fene is that it looks really cool on the inside.
It is bright yellow and looks like some strange flowy sea creature.
The fourth magical thing about fene is that it is really giant.
It is fun to watch boda-boda guys with mass amounts of fene strapped to their bikes.
In conclusion, fene is the best thing ever to happen to the genre of fruit.
I am very perplexed as to why we don't eat fene in America.
Oops
Placing your iPod in your bra so you can continue listening to it while you jolt to the bathroom to have diarrhea may seem like a good idea, but it really isn't.
Why, you ask?
Because your iPod will slip out of your shirt, down between your legs, and into the diarrhea-filled toilet.
Then, without thinking, you will instantly reach into the toilet to retrieve your poor little iPod.
Then you will be left with a wet, defiled iPod and wet, defiled hands, and you will have nothing left to do except laugh really really hard at yourself.
Then you will be stuck in the middle of Uganda without an iPod, pondering how you will ever fall asleep at night because you can no longer listen to Enya and This American Life until you pass out.
At least this is my current predicament.
Oops.
Second Chance Haiku #1
Salvador is strange.
Find Second Chance on You Tube.
You will understand.
#2
Andre is evil.
So is Walter, he should die.
So what happens next?
Okay I really need to stop this poetry business, I actually have work to do.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Where I am
Instead of writing a blog post this week, I thought I'd make a map (using Google Maps) to give people a sense of where I am in HCMC and where I go throughout the city. Click on the icons, lines, or boxes to see descriptions. To use a better interface and see a full list of the places I marked, follow this link.
It's also worth zooming out all the way to get a sense of perspective and to see two of the placemarks that are further out.
View Larger Map
It's also worth zooming out all the way to get a sense of perspective and to see two of the placemarks that are further out.
View Larger Map
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Not “weird,” but “different”: Part II
I had some new thoughts on adapting to a different culture.
I was with my friends Dave and Lauren in Ho Chi Minh City’s Chinatown on Friday, seeing some of the mosques and Chinese pagodas in the area and just generally enjoying the city life. At this point, we’ve learned some basic Vietnamese and are starting to try out some of the local behavior.
Photos— As we’ve learned from our Vietnamese
program coordinator Ky, it’s not actually rude here to take pictures of people without asking (Vietnam seems to be, comparatively, a very casual country). Dave is a great photographer and is taking full use of this freedom to take some great shots of people. On the one hand, I understand that he’s not out of line from their standpoint to be snapping away, but I have a hard time breaking with what I feel is acceptable by American standards. I think this is part of a larger problem I’ll have with “doing as the Romans do.”
(Right: One of Dave's photos of a woman on a boat at the floating market in Chau Doc in the Mekong River Delta.)
Litter— Ho Chi Minh City has tremendous amounts of litter in the streets, to the point where it detracts from what would be otherwise beautiful places. I’m fairly repulsed by the normalcy of littering here, even though along major roadways there’s usually a road crew cleaning up. I’ve heard, however, that some Confucian traditions may be playing into how the Vietnamese regard public space. Apparently, in China the concept of public space has arisen only in recent decades, so I’m told [I really need work on finding better citations!]. As a consequence, the public spaces outside homes are treated like something of a no-man’s-land, with less public regard for keeping the streets clean. I’m still stuck, however, on the fact that dirty streets lead to public health issues and less community pride from my American perspective.
Diet — I had thought that I’d be able to just accept eating meat whi
le in Vietnam, but in the last week it’s become more and more difficult to continue doing so because of my reservations about the use of animal products. It doesn’t help that my diet is now more out of my hands as my homestay gets underway! I think I may attempt to go vegetarian by the end of the week, and it may be somewhat feasible with egg and cheese dishes and fresh fruit always close at hand. However, I've had something of a mental block doing so: after so long being a vegan, I see all animal products as being morally equivalent. So, if I'm eating cheese, I feel like there's not really a jump to eating meat as well!
(Right: Fish farm in the Mekong River. We're in sort of a floating structure in the middle of the river.)
All told, I was hoping that while studying abroad I’d be able to adapt to this new culture, but I’m surprised to find myself resisting like this. Our sociology classwork has been helping me with this dilemma tremendously, however. One concept that helps is that of participant observation, which entails “subjecting yourself, your own body, and your own personality, and your own social situation, to the set of contingencies that play upon a set of individuals, so that you can physically and ecologically penetrate their circle of response to their social situation, or their work situation, or their ethnic situation.” So now, instead of feeling like some kind of ethnocentrist for sticking to my cultural norms, now I just feel like a poor sociologist!
I was with my friends Dave and Lauren in Ho Chi Minh City’s Chinatown on Friday, seeing some of the mosques and Chinese pagodas in the area and just generally enjoying the city life. At this point, we’ve learned some basic Vietnamese and are starting to try out some of the local behavior.
Photos— As we’ve learned from our Vietnamese
program coordinator Ky, it’s not actually rude here to take pictures of people without asking (Vietnam seems to be, comparatively, a very casual country). Dave is a great photographer and is taking full use of this freedom to take some great shots of people. On the one hand, I understand that he’s not out of line from their standpoint to be snapping away, but I have a hard time breaking with what I feel is acceptable by American standards. I think this is part of a larger problem I’ll have with “doing as the Romans do.”(Right: One of Dave's photos of a woman on a boat at the floating market in Chau Doc in the Mekong River Delta.)
Litter— Ho Chi Minh City has tremendous amounts of litter in the streets, to the point where it detracts from what would be otherwise beautiful places. I’m fairly repulsed by the normalcy of littering here, even though along major roadways there’s usually a road crew cleaning up. I’ve heard, however, that some Confucian traditions may be playing into how the Vietnamese regard public space. Apparently, in China the concept of public space has arisen only in recent decades, so I’m told [I really need work on finding better citations!]. As a consequence, the public spaces outside homes are treated like something of a no-man’s-land, with less public regard for keeping the streets clean. I’m still stuck, however, on the fact that dirty streets lead to public health issues and less community pride from my American perspective.
Diet — I had thought that I’d be able to just accept eating meat whi
le in Vietnam, but in the last week it’s become more and more difficult to continue doing so because of my reservations about the use of animal products. It doesn’t help that my diet is now more out of my hands as my homestay gets underway! I think I may attempt to go vegetarian by the end of the week, and it may be somewhat feasible with egg and cheese dishes and fresh fruit always close at hand. However, I've had something of a mental block doing so: after so long being a vegan, I see all animal products as being morally equivalent. So, if I'm eating cheese, I feel like there's not really a jump to eating meat as well!(Right: Fish farm in the Mekong River. We're in sort of a floating structure in the middle of the river.)
All told, I was hoping that while studying abroad I’d be able to adapt to this new culture, but I’m surprised to find myself resisting like this. Our sociology classwork has been helping me with this dilemma tremendously, however. One concept that helps is that of participant observation, which entails “subjecting yourself, your own body, and your own personality, and your own social situation, to the set of contingencies that play upon a set of individuals, so that you can physically and ecologically penetrate their circle of response to their social situation, or their work situation, or their ethnic situation.” So now, instead of feeling like some kind of ethnocentrist for sticking to my cultural norms, now I just feel like a poor sociologist!
Friday, February 27, 2009
Born, born, born, born to be aliiiive
Hello again my faraway friends!!! Here are some random photos, including some I would like to dedicate to the Born To Be Alive crew, because I loved Brynna's dedications and I will therefore piggyback off her brilliant idea. Leave it to Brynna to come up with the most brilliant ideas!
Fulfilling my ambassadorial duties as a proud Obamamaniac.
For Erica, the cutest little puppy I found in this village but couldn't pet because I hadn't finished my rabies shots yet. I saw him and after going awww I thought "PULL OVER! THERE'S PUPPIES IN THE TRUNK!!!!" Then I thought, I really wish I could magically transport Erica here to adopt him and give him lots of love so he will not be a wild rabid beast when he grows up
For Wylie: The Gandhi memorial at the source of the Nile where some of Gandhi's ashes were released. I only show you this so you can feel guilty about the violence you are inflicting upon those pigs whose blood you are drinking... Haha TOTALLY KIDDING!
For Brynna: COW TONGUE YUMMMMMY. This is what people really enjoy, i.e. reason number one why my host family thinks I'm really really weird for not eating their numerous meat things. And why I really really wish sometimes that we could walk down the street to get a Cheesy Gordita Crunch, or at least a plain old burrito.
Matooke!!!!! (the raw version that is) This is where I get at least 80% of my calories from.
More to come.
Also update: WE PLANTED OUR FIRST TREES YESTERDAY!!! Most exciting day of my life EVER. Probably even more exciting for Patrick and the women though -- they were soooo happy it made me want to cry tears of joy but instead I just danced a lot and hugged them a lot.
Bye! Much love to y'all!
Sunday, February 22, 2009
I have bartending experience now!
So this Thursday I got to pour wine and sodas for rich Democrats at a County Party fundraiser. Stan Williams was supposed to do it, but he mixed up the dates and realized he had to go to NY for the YDA Convention. So he called me up, and I decided to give it a shot. Wine was definitely the crowd favorite. This one old lady came up to me about four times throughout the night, the second or third time she asked me, "Do you do anything crass like counting?" I told her no, but obviously that's a lie from what I'm writing here. The last time she came up, she admitted she was only a little tipsy. I poured her another glass, and she wobbled away.
I also poured Harry Mitchell a diet coke! I was out of ice when he came up, and he came back later to get a refill of coke, and then told me he knew where to get more ice and took the ice bucket and filled it up for me. I thought that was so nice of him! I was gonna give Terry Goddard a beer too, but this guy came out of nowhere behind me and already popped the top off a bottle before Terry could even ask for it. I was thinking, dude, that's my job.
People seemed to like me, I'm like BFFs with Ann Wallack now, the chair of the County Party. I think it's partly to do with my name, but whatever. Ann says she's gonna throw a party for young people, which would be pretty cool. She also has a son, who I'm pretty sure swiped a beer while I wasn't looking, but that's not important. But seriously, I was wearing a sticker with my name on it, and this couple comes up, and as I'm pouring them glasses of wine, I hear the lady whisper (but not really, because I could hear it) to her husband, "Look at her name..." I was like, really? At least talk about it when you walk away, not right in front of me.
This issue is becoming more prominent as I am getting more involved here. I don't want to use my name to get me places, I want to get there myself. I really hope people never assume that of me. I'm doing this work on my own, and I want to be recognized for it. It really makes me question people's sincerity. I always find myself doubting people's intentions, assuming alternative motives. Maybe I shouldn't assume either, maybe I'm over reacting. Maybe people actually find me interesting and want to get to know me and not just because I'm related to someone important. But I'll guess I'll never know for certain. I just have to keep working hard for what I believe in, and hopefully people will understand what I am in this for. If they don't, then they obviously don't know me at all.
Also, Ann Wallack gave me $60 for helping out. That's like more than $20 an hour! I need to find more gigs like this.
Hmm, other things going on:
I don't know if you guys have IHOPs where you are, but it's free pancake day on Tuesday (ironically, the day of Obama's State of the Union address).
We're having an encore presentation of Street Fight for the WHAM this Wednesday. We've decided to make the last WHAM of every month a movie night since there's not a lot going on right now.
YDAZ Convention this weekend. It's at ASU, and hopefully will be better than last year. At the exec meeting last week I met a guy from the West Campus named Alaska! (well, his real name is Austin, but nobody calls him that). I thought that was cool.
I fell off my bike a couple weeks ago, and my knee is still kind of bruised. That's my excuse for not doing physical therapy yet, but I've been doing yoga!
I'm probably going to dye my hair red, it's getting so long! I'll let you know if I do this.
I think that's about it for now, oh I got Skype! I have no idea how to use it, so someone should teach me. And if it's possible to three/four-way call, we should do that.
I miss you all! Much love from the stupid state of Arizona!
Erica
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Jesus is my homeboy for real
Jesus. God. Good.
That's really what it all comes down to here, and I must say that my prayers really do get answered. For example, last week the power went out on Sunday, but it came back on just in time for us to catch the new episode of Second Chance, and then it went out again until Thursday and returned just in time for the NEXT episode of Second Chance! Coincidence? I think not. Definitely the good work of Jesus.
This is Gloria by the way -- she is so precious, and says hello.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Primer on the Vietnamese language
A couple of friends have asked about the Vietnamese language (tiếng Việt), so I thought I’d write a little bit about it.
The easy part: since the French came to town, the Vietnamese language has been written in the Latin alphabet (esp. since the 20th cent.). Since Vietnamese came into its own from the Mon-Khmer languages in about the 15th Century, it had been written in Chinese characters. Though Vietnamese isn't based on Mandarin or Cantonese, apparently about 40% of the language (esp. technical terms) are the result of cross-pollination. The Latin alphabet makes learning the language a little easier, and it's easier to limp through situations because of it.
The hard part: The alphabet includes accented and unaccented characters (a, ă, â, b, c, d, đ, e, ê, g, h…), sometimes with other accents piled on top, which represent the 6 tones of the Vietnamese language (ă could become ằ, ẳ, ẵ, ắ, ặ ). Pretty intimidating! Moreover, there are North and South Vietnamese distinctions in pronunciation that I don’t always catch, and some consonant combinations make much different sounds (tr comes off more as a ch, i.e. for tea, Trà sounds more like Chà, but it's a little more complicated than that).
Below: Picture of the Vietnamese keyboard
Below: Picture of the Vietnamese keyboard when a vowel (in this case, ă) is pressed, triggering the tone-input layout.
It also sucks when you’re ordering food, and you know exactly what you’re saying, and everyone else at the table knows what you’re ordering, and the waiter looks at you completely blankly! So, my goal for the semester is just to be able to sound out words.
My conclusion is pretty much that the Vietnamese language is designed to confuse foreign invaders. Kind of like how the Japanese don’t have many street names.
If there’s an upside to learning this language, it’s that it encourages me (and other students) to put lots of effort into adopting a more local accent, and not unemphatic American tone that you hear in every language class back in Arizona. It is a little demoralizing, however, to be able to speak pretty good Japanese with my Vietnamese teacher (who taught in Japan) while I still can't carry out a conversation in Vietnamese!
Hẹn gặp lại! (See you later!)
The easy part: since the French came to town, the Vietnamese language has been written in the Latin alphabet (esp. since the 20th cent.). Since Vietnamese came into its own from the Mon-Khmer languages in about the 15th Century, it had been written in Chinese characters. Though Vietnamese isn't based on Mandarin or Cantonese, apparently about 40% of the language (esp. technical terms) are the result of cross-pollination. The Latin alphabet makes learning the language a little easier, and it's easier to limp through situations because of it.
The hard part: The alphabet includes accented and unaccented characters (a, ă, â, b, c, d, đ, e, ê, g, h…), sometimes with other accents piled on top, which represent the 6 tones of the Vietnamese language (ă could become ằ, ẳ, ẵ, ắ, ặ ). Pretty intimidating! Moreover, there are North and South Vietnamese distinctions in pronunciation that I don’t always catch, and some consonant combinations make much different sounds (tr comes off more as a ch, i.e. for tea, Trà sounds more like Chà, but it's a little more complicated than that).
Below: Picture of the Vietnamese keyboard
Below: Picture of the Vietnamese keyboard when a vowel (in this case, ă) is pressed, triggering the tone-input layout.
It also sucks when you’re ordering food, and you know exactly what you’re saying, and everyone else at the table knows what you’re ordering, and the waiter looks at you completely blankly! So, my goal for the semester is just to be able to sound out words.My conclusion is pretty much that the Vietnamese language is designed to confuse foreign invaders. Kind of like how the Japanese don’t have many street names.
If there’s an upside to learning this language, it’s that it encourages me (and other students) to put lots of effort into adopting a more local accent, and not unemphatic American tone that you hear in every language class back in Arizona. It is a little demoralizing, however, to be able to speak pretty good Japanese with my Vietnamese teacher (who taught in Japan) while I still can't carry out a conversation in Vietnamese!
Hẹn gặp lại! (See you later!)
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Pictures that reminded me of the Born to Be Alive Crew
To Erica: There is an H & M on every corner here. 
To Wylie: You need to go to this store. It is just so "Wylie".
To Heidi: This reminded me of your inspired artwork.
To Heidi: This cat is named Hamlet. It doesn't have ringworm.
To Patrick: A fFne Chinese Cuisine Rendezvous.
To Wylie: You need to go to this store. It is just so "Wylie".
To Heidi: This reminded me of your inspired artwork.
To Heidi: This cat is named Hamlet. It doesn't have ringworm.
To Patrick: A fFne Chinese Cuisine Rendezvous.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Not "weird," but "different"
The theme of week one in Vietnam was not “weird,” but “different.” There are many things I’m trying to wrap my head around in Vietnam (more on those later), and I find myself and others who I’m with have an impulse to call the inexplicable parts of Vietnam “weird.” Maybe there’s no harm in some minor phraseology, but I feel like the word carries a judgment that whatever is inexplicable by American standards must be wrong, or at least undesirable. So, my goal has been to accept the reality that I’m in a new country, a new continent, and to start accepting that things here will just be different. Since about two weeks have passed since I came to the country, some of my initial shock has worn off. Still, here’s some of what made me think of not “weird,” but “different”:
• Buildings. Apparently property taxes in Vietnam are, or once were, levied based on street frontage (I am still researching this more). As a result, on any block you'll see over a dozen extremely narrow buildings squeezed up against each other. On the edges of HCMC, I even saw a few 15-foot wide, 50-foot long, and 5 story tall buildings with two very blank side walls glaring back at me. Despite lacking a certain aesthetic (by any standard!), at least the growth of Vietnam’s cities isn’t leading to precipitous drops in density. I was just reading earlier this week about how Vietnam’s arable land is being chewed up by cities, while around 70% of the population still relies on agriculture for a living. That’ll be a transition to watch!
• Meat. This was one 'different' thing I saw coming, especially considering the diet I left behind in the US. Still, the idea of eating duck fetuses and blood cackle takes some getting used to. The latter is a dish of congealed pig’s blood cooked into tofu-like cubes. It's dark blood-red, and has the recognizable taste of pork despite its soft texture. I also had chopped snake and snake wine the first week. To be honest, I find myself trying to outdo the omnivores (though I'm one too now) by eating everything without flipping out!
• The lack of pedestrians in Ho Chi Minh City. Even in a dense city like Ho Chi Minh City (pop. around 7m) you won’t actually see many people traveling on foot. There’s no rapid transit (subways, rail, bus rapid transit; there are local buses, however), which makes getting around the city without a vehicle much more inconvenient. That's not to say that the sidewalks are empty though. The fact that literally 90+% of the city gets around by motorbike means that the sidewalks are always piled up with parked bikes along with street food vendors. On a related note, HCMC is getting me to change my perspective on freeways after seeing a couple of rush hours in a city without them!
So is anything weird?
Yeah, I think so. While gender roles appear to be softer in a large city like Saigon, I have a hard time adjusting to a place where women are expected to handle domestic affairs and the deck is stacked for men when it comes to courtship. Hopefully I'll get a firmer grounding on the situation in Vietnam once my sociology class starts in another week and when I start my homestay.
• Buildings. Apparently property taxes in Vietnam are, or once were, levied based on street frontage (I am still researching this more). As a result, on any block you'll see over a dozen extremely narrow buildings squeezed up against each other. On the edges of HCMC, I even saw a few 15-foot wide, 50-foot long, and 5 story tall buildings with two very blank side walls glaring back at me. Despite lacking a certain aesthetic (by any standard!), at least the growth of Vietnam’s cities isn’t leading to precipitous drops in density. I was just reading earlier this week about how Vietnam’s arable land is being chewed up by cities, while around 70% of the population still relies on agriculture for a living. That’ll be a transition to watch!
• The lack of pedestrians in Ho Chi Minh City. Even in a dense city like Ho Chi Minh City (pop. around 7m) you won’t actually see many people traveling on foot. There’s no rapid transit (subways, rail, bus rapid transit; there are local buses, however), which makes getting around the city without a vehicle much more inconvenient. That's not to say that the sidewalks are empty though. The fact that literally 90+% of the city gets around by motorbike means that the sidewalks are always piled up with parked bikes along with street food vendors. On a related note, HCMC is getting me to change my perspective on freeways after seeing a couple of rush hours in a city without them!
So is anything weird?
Yeah, I think so. While gender roles appear to be softer in a large city like Saigon, I have a hard time adjusting to a place where women are expected to handle domestic affairs and the deck is stacked for men when it comes to courtship. Hopefully I'll get a firmer grounding on the situation in Vietnam once my sociology class starts in another week and when I start my homestay.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
My Hero Patrick
So despite being under pressure to complete the daunting task of preparing a workplan for my as-yet-unspecified project by the end of today (yikes...), I felt compelled to write a post while I have internet access (haha the procrastinator in me will never -- I repeat, never -- die). Anyway, as fate would have it, my new best friend is named Patrick, and his awesomeness (though, unfortunately, not his hip swiveling) rivals that of our very own hero himself, the one-and-only Patrick Hernandez. I'm serious, he is that cool.
Patrick is the leader of the Budondo sub-county food security group for people living with HIV/AIDS, which has 144 members and runs its activities out of borrowed government land and space at the Budondo Health Centre. He got infected with HIV when a witch doctor used the same razor blade to make cuts in him, his mother, and his father (who had AIDS). Those darn witch doctors, always up to no good. Recently the TV news has been following the story of these witch doctors who performed a ritual human sacrifice, and the latest news is that the prime suspect died in police custody and the police have found the chopped up body of this woman but are still looking for her head. They even found a head in a dumpster somewhere, but it alas belonged to another woman. But I digress. Here's the story of how I met My Hero Patrick:
Yesterday, upon dragging my sick little self out of bed to get to work (yeah... I finally got sick... but it's all good now; nothing that couldn't be cured by a couple days spent in bed relistening to all my podcasts and reveling in the soothing sound of Ira Glass' voice), I was indescribably excited to finally get out and meet the community group I will be working with on organizing income generating activities and generating sustainable livelihoods. These past few days I've mostly been doing "research" for my project at the office (read: doing absolutely nothing), so you can imagine how exhilarating it felt to be out from behind a desk and sitting on the back of my boss Robinson's motorcycle -- no jacket or helmet to protect me from the dirt and wind and bugs -- and speeding down the bumpy road to Budondo while holding on to my seat for dear life. Upon arriving Robinson introduced me to Patrick, with whom I spent the rest of the day learning about him and his group and their activities. I proceeded to meet lots of women from the group, one of whom upon meeting me instantly hugged me and proclaimed that we were now "best friends." Those are two things I really really love about elderly Ugandan women: the hugs and the instant friendships (friendships which sadly have a general lifespan of five or ten minutes because I rarely see them ever again after we have a conversation). Patrick and the women showed me the group's garden, which was really really really wonderful to see because it was thriving and I could tell immediately how much work they'd put into cultivating it. Patrick plucked off some fresh basil (yummy!) and mustard (so spicy I had to spit it out) leaves for me to try, and also dug out a carrot for me (which I took home and am going to try to replant in our backyard). He was so kind and the garden that they'd managed to develop with absolutely nothing but their own initative was so amazing that I kept trying to compliment the group and commend his own personal leadership, but every time I attributed positive feedback he would just shake it off and say "With God, everything is possible. We have been able to accomplish everything through God." Yep, there is no avoiding God or Jesus in a single conversation -- any and every occasion is an occasion to praise God and I am right there with them, praising God day and night. So after spending the day digging plants, praising God, and doing numerous things around the centre, Patrick, his orphan companion Job, his right-hand man Kah-bee, and I took a walk back to Patrick's home, where he has many more gardens and grows an unbelievable variety of different crops in addition to keeping chickens, ducks, and pigs (which had escaped from their little pig-hut and were running wild in the forest so we had to go chase after them).
Patrick then very generously offered to give me a live hen to bring back to America with me. When I tried to explain that I live in an apartment and there would be nowhere to keep the hen, he was very confused at the prospect of not having space outside to farm poultry but finally just laughed and said, "You will just have to slaughter it and eat it immediately then." So if I arrive back in America with a living, breathing, clucking hen, somebody with a yard is going to have to adopt it for me because there's no way I'm slaughtering it and/or keeping it in Brynna and I's apartment -- I learned from the "Poultry Slam" episode of This American Life that keeping chickens in apartments is not the best of ideas, and anyway I am refraining from taking in animals of any form after the tragic Crusty incident. Chris and Erica, I nominate you to keep it at the Manor with your kitties. I'm sure they'll get along famously!
Alright, now that I've officially wasted about an hour of my day writing about Patrick and simultaneously trying to figure out via Google how to plant 500-1000 mango trees (Patrick really really wants to grow mango trees), I am signing off. I encourage you to go make friends with a Patrick -- I hypothesize that anyone with the name Patrick is destined to be awesome.
Patrick is the leader of the Budondo sub-county food security group for people living with HIV/AIDS, which has 144 members and runs its activities out of borrowed government land and space at the Budondo Health Centre. He got infected with HIV when a witch doctor used the same razor blade to make cuts in him, his mother, and his father (who had AIDS). Those darn witch doctors, always up to no good. Recently the TV news has been following the story of these witch doctors who performed a ritual human sacrifice, and the latest news is that the prime suspect died in police custody and the police have found the chopped up body of this woman but are still looking for her head. They even found a head in a dumpster somewhere, but it alas belonged to another woman. But I digress. Here's the story of how I met My Hero Patrick:
Yesterday, upon dragging my sick little self out of bed to get to work (yeah... I finally got sick... but it's all good now; nothing that couldn't be cured by a couple days spent in bed relistening to all my podcasts and reveling in the soothing sound of Ira Glass' voice), I was indescribably excited to finally get out and meet the community group I will be working with on organizing income generating activities and generating sustainable livelihoods. These past few days I've mostly been doing "research" for my project at the office (read: doing absolutely nothing), so you can imagine how exhilarating it felt to be out from behind a desk and sitting on the back of my boss Robinson's motorcycle -- no jacket or helmet to protect me from the dirt and wind and bugs -- and speeding down the bumpy road to Budondo while holding on to my seat for dear life. Upon arriving Robinson introduced me to Patrick, with whom I spent the rest of the day learning about him and his group and their activities. I proceeded to meet lots of women from the group, one of whom upon meeting me instantly hugged me and proclaimed that we were now "best friends." Those are two things I really really love about elderly Ugandan women: the hugs and the instant friendships (friendships which sadly have a general lifespan of five or ten minutes because I rarely see them ever again after we have a conversation). Patrick and the women showed me the group's garden, which was really really really wonderful to see because it was thriving and I could tell immediately how much work they'd put into cultivating it. Patrick plucked off some fresh basil (yummy!) and mustard (so spicy I had to spit it out) leaves for me to try, and also dug out a carrot for me (which I took home and am going to try to replant in our backyard). He was so kind and the garden that they'd managed to develop with absolutely nothing but their own initative was so amazing that I kept trying to compliment the group and commend his own personal leadership, but every time I attributed positive feedback he would just shake it off and say "With God, everything is possible. We have been able to accomplish everything through God." Yep, there is no avoiding God or Jesus in a single conversation -- any and every occasion is an occasion to praise God and I am right there with them, praising God day and night. So after spending the day digging plants, praising God, and doing numerous things around the centre, Patrick, his orphan companion Job, his right-hand man Kah-bee, and I took a walk back to Patrick's home, where he has many more gardens and grows an unbelievable variety of different crops in addition to keeping chickens, ducks, and pigs (which had escaped from their little pig-hut and were running wild in the forest so we had to go chase after them).
Patrick then very generously offered to give me a live hen to bring back to America with me. When I tried to explain that I live in an apartment and there would be nowhere to keep the hen, he was very confused at the prospect of not having space outside to farm poultry but finally just laughed and said, "You will just have to slaughter it and eat it immediately then." So if I arrive back in America with a living, breathing, clucking hen, somebody with a yard is going to have to adopt it for me because there's no way I'm slaughtering it and/or keeping it in Brynna and I's apartment -- I learned from the "Poultry Slam" episode of This American Life that keeping chickens in apartments is not the best of ideas, and anyway I am refraining from taking in animals of any form after the tragic Crusty incident. Chris and Erica, I nominate you to keep it at the Manor with your kitties. I'm sure they'll get along famously!
Alright, now that I've officially wasted about an hour of my day writing about Patrick and simultaneously trying to figure out via Google how to plant 500-1000 mango trees (Patrick really really wants to grow mango trees), I am signing off. I encourage you to go make friends with a Patrick -- I hypothesize that anyone with the name Patrick is destined to be awesome.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Help me out -- please and thank you!
So I finally have a direction for my work here: promoting income generation (and thus economic empowerment, food security, and educational opportunity) through sustainable livelihoods approaches and asset-based community-driven development. This entails assessing the multiple components of people's livelihoods, identifying and mobilizing individual and community assets -- which probably won't be physical or financial assets but more in the vein of human, cultural, natural, and social capital -- and channeling collective action to stimulate positive social and economic benefits for all the individuals involved (as well as the community at large).
I think this essentially amounts to being a community organizer for poor rural people. Unfortunately, I know very very little about A.) sustainable livelihoods B.) rural poverty reduction or C.) community organizing.
Oh, and because collective action is always more productive than what an individual (especially a resource-strapped individual) can achieve alone -- and I'm assuming this principle extends to income generation and community development -- I'm also exploring the possibilities of forming/joining a cooperative, something else about which I know nothing about but I am definitely interested in learning more!
So this is an open call to anyone and everyone who knows even the tiniest bit or has even the most limited experience in co-ops, small-scale agriculture, small business development, or community organizing. I want to hear all your advice, stories, lessons learned, and crazy ideas. Seriously, I know you're brilliant people, please help me out here! I'm begging you and you would be an unbelievable help to my work.
Leave a comment or drop me an e-mail at heidi.tenpas@gmail.com (which is, by the way, my new Uganda e-mail address because apparently Heidimail has an adverse reaction to Ugandan computers). I can't promise you I'll reply, because 85% of the time the internet fails when I'm in the process of using it, but just know in your heart of hearts that you are helping me out like nobody's business and who knows maybe one day I'll give you a "personal favor" in return (just kidding). Also you all need to get skype because it's the coolest thing on the planet and, strangely enough, functions way better than the internet. Yeah the internet has biiiig issues which is why I haven't posted pictures yet. But stay tuned they're on their way!
Thanks a ton xoxo
Haha I should get back to work -- yeah I'm sneaking a post on the blog at work. Which I think is okay because I actually don't have anything to do until Thursday when the real fun begins. So right now I will either go 1.) take 4 pills each out of hundreds upon hundreds of containers of ARVs or 2.) play with really adorable kids in the childcare center. I think I choose #2, though counting drugs all day is quite fun. Alrighty goodbye for now!
Oh and shout out to the YDs for being awesome, particularly that fabulous Erica Pederson who is spearheading Relay for Life like a pro. And RJ, I'm gonna send you my ambassadorial update one of these days you just wait. And Brynna, I want the ambassador pin so I can show it a good time here in the UG. Okay bye.
I think this essentially amounts to being a community organizer for poor rural people. Unfortunately, I know very very little about A.) sustainable livelihoods B.) rural poverty reduction or C.) community organizing.
Oh, and because collective action is always more productive than what an individual (especially a resource-strapped individual) can achieve alone -- and I'm assuming this principle extends to income generation and community development -- I'm also exploring the possibilities of forming/joining a cooperative, something else about which I know nothing about but I am definitely interested in learning more!
So this is an open call to anyone and everyone who knows even the tiniest bit or has even the most limited experience in co-ops, small-scale agriculture, small business development, or community organizing. I want to hear all your advice, stories, lessons learned, and crazy ideas. Seriously, I know you're brilliant people, please help me out here! I'm begging you and you would be an unbelievable help to my work.
Leave a comment or drop me an e-mail at heidi.tenpas@gmail.com (which is, by the way, my new Uganda e-mail address because apparently Heidimail has an adverse reaction to Ugandan computers). I can't promise you I'll reply, because 85% of the time the internet fails when I'm in the process of using it, but just know in your heart of hearts that you are helping me out like nobody's business and who knows maybe one day I'll give you a "personal favor" in return (just kidding). Also you all need to get skype because it's the coolest thing on the planet and, strangely enough, functions way better than the internet. Yeah the internet has biiiig issues which is why I haven't posted pictures yet. But stay tuned they're on their way!
Thanks a ton xoxo
Haha I should get back to work -- yeah I'm sneaking a post on the blog at work. Which I think is okay because I actually don't have anything to do until Thursday when the real fun begins. So right now I will either go 1.) take 4 pills each out of hundreds upon hundreds of containers of ARVs or 2.) play with really adorable kids in the childcare center. I think I choose #2, though counting drugs all day is quite fun. Alrighty goodbye for now!
Oh and shout out to the YDs for being awesome, particularly that fabulous Erica Pederson who is spearheading Relay for Life like a pro. And RJ, I'm gonna send you my ambassadorial update one of these days you just wait. And Brynna, I want the ambassador pin so I can show it a good time here in the UG. Okay bye.
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