BLungerHog

How to crash a Kikuyu dowry ceremony

As I was catching a ride home from work on Friday afternoon I began wondering just how I was going to pass my first [long] weekend back in Nairobi. Most everyone I knew was already out of town, and the prospect of wasting away in the Pact guesthouse all weekend seemed unappealing, especially because two of my good friends back in the US were getting married on Saturday and I was missing the event. That’s why, when Paul, the driver, practically read my mind and asked aloud what plans I had for the special “May Day” weekend, I honestly answered, “I have no idea.” The entire week Paul had been throwing out future invitations for me to go on various outings with his family, so when he suggested a Saturday afternoon of eating lots of African barbecued meat with him and his friends, I thought, “Why not?” Since my Summer in Argentina I’ve learned better to turn down local meat :o).

The next morning I received a text message saying Paul would pick me up at noon. Unsure of exactly where I was going and what sort of environmental conditions to expect (and it’s a muddy, rainy season here), I put on a pair of jeans and a sweater, and my Chaco sandals (read: easily washable). Paul arrived on time with two of his friends in the backseat. We made introductions and drove off to a nearby area where Paul lived.

Again I was unsure of the day’s events and got fairly obscure explanations when I asked, so by the time I arrived in Paul’s living room I decided I should stop asking questions and just follow along with whatever was going to happen. The room was modest, heavily furnished with couches and large padded chairs. A small TV sat in a large wooden shelf, playing dubbed over Japanese skits – this was my first time actually seeing African TV, so I had trouble taking my eyes away from the screen. I found a comfy space on a couch and Paul’s daughter brought all of us milk tea and heart-shaped biscuits. Paul explained that we were waiting for people to come meet us (namely the wives of the male threesome), and then we’d be off.

Soon as promised, beautifully decorated and dressed women began to enter the house. Their clothes were made of pastel lace and their hair was wrapped up in intricate knots and wraps. Looking at my own muddy sandals and cropped jeans, I felt a little out of place. I felt even more of an oddball when they began to tease their husbands for wearing casual shirts and sneakers – enough so that they returned home to change. This is when I got my first inclination that the event was more than just an eating activity. This became even more apparent when seeing my camera, I was invited to attend a future event the following April – they explained to me that they did activities like this 3-4 times a year. I felt very honored to be part of the day, but I still was very unclear as to what the day entailed, especially as they reassured me that my clothes were perfectly appropriate.

Finally Lucy, Paul’s wife, arrived in a gorgeous black, red, and gold dress. Her hair was also in intricate knots on the top of her head, but decorated with pearls instead of a colorful wrap. After sitting in the livingroom with her puttering about the house for the next 40 minutes, I became engrossed in an “ABC Family” movie and the blaring screen juxtaposed with the afternoon’s household activities was bizarre to say the least: “After-school special land goes to down-and-out Nairobi”.

Apparently whatever needed to be accomplished was taken care of in the next ten minutes and Lucy led me out of the house down the muddy road. I had been so engaged with the TV, because lets face it, being in an unpredictable situation can be anxiety-wrought and mentally exhausting, so I had completely missed it when the other men and women had left ahead of us.

We walked for another 10 minutes, passing by little children yelling, “how are you?” to the confused Misungo (me), and women in corrugated metal storefronts selling fruits and vegetables and maize. When it became less and less clear as to where we were going, Lucy ducked into a metal doorway in a large fence, and we arrived at another house. Inside were nearly 20 people, piled on couches that again framed the entire house with their large cushions decorated with lace coverlets, the same ABC Family movie blaring in the background. Women were fussing with their dresses and hair and greeting one another (you have to shake EVERYONES hand when you walk through a door in Kenya) while the men stood outside, apparently arranging the day’s transportation. Large sacks from Nakumatt (the local grocery store) were carried into the already overflowing room, and the women gathered together to stuff Costco-size packages of tea, sugar, ugali, and rice into striped straw bags, covering them with cotton sheets embroidered with flowers. One of the ladies next to me explained that when you visit someone’s house for a party, it’s customary to bring gifts, but they have to be wrapped nicely and the women attending will usually wrap the bag straps over their heads and present them to the family.

This was definitely appearing to be a much more formal event, and when a beautiful buxom woman walked into the room wearing a bright yellow outfit and a huge grin, someone explained to me that her parents were the host of the event. She had two little girls following around behind her and I assumed her husband was outside, so although I knew the host of the event, I was still clearly confused as to the meaning of the occasion.

Once the men had arranged to rent a matatu (a large van used for public transport throughout Africa) for the day, the group assembled to figure out how to split the cost. This took another 10 minutes of discussion amongst everyone and when I pulled out some cash to hand to Paul and Lucy, they refused to take any contribution whatsoever. The woman next to me explained that since I was their guest it was their responsibility, regardless of how much I wanted to help out. It was funny because they insisted on having the transport negotiations in English so I could understand, but I wasn’t allowed to help pay for anything.

Next a man called Lucy to the head of the room and requested that she said a prayer. I’m not sure if I mentioned earlier, but Paul’s wife is a preacher at a church in Naivasha and the entire group is extremely religious, so it was only fitting for us to say a few words before we hopped on a matatu to who knows where to eat some meat :o). We bowed our heads and Lucy gave thanks for the opportunity for us to meet that day and a bunch of other things that were lost between her mumbling and the ABC Family movie still playing behind our head. She knew what she was competing with, though, and strategically placed her head exactly in the center of the TV screen.

After the prayers were completed, we all helped to lug the huge straw bags outdoors and into the trunks of a few waiting cars. Then I followed a woman named Esther into my first glimpse of the inside of a matatu. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of this because I wasn't certain if it was a)Safe to take my camera out and b)Appropriate, but I can give you a rundown of one of these notorious forms of transportation. It's basically a large bus, heavily worn from stuffed bodies and overladen cargo. The engine barely putters along with a fierceness necessary to get over the clumpy mud streets of rural Nairobi and the windows are highly decorated with dayglo decals of disco scenes and party phrases. Exhausted plush seats supported by rusty metal frames contain bodies upon bodies of wall-to-wall passengers. The presence of seatbelts is only slightly reassuring - these vehicles have some of the worst accident rates in Africa. I felt in a virtual sea of carburator cacaphony, jubilant laughter, and the familiar scents of Clairol hairspray.

This is when I had to ask myself again, where the hell was I going? :o)

We drove for about 30 minutes through Nairobi and out the other side. I barely noticed we were in the countryside until the matatu stopped and we all filed out into a very muddy road. It was also at this instant that the sky decided to open a veritable floodgate onto all party-goers. In a mess of muddy splashes we walked down the road to the house of the hostess. Outdoors a large tent was set up with rows and rows of folding chairs, sinking deep into the grassy mud wetness. A table covered with silver serving dishes steaming in the cool air.

Paul and Lucy pushed me through the crowd of people and we found seats near the back of the tent. Finally I figured it was safe to ask Paul where the heck we were and who's party it was. Lucy finally admitted that it was a dowry ceremony for the woman wearing the beautiful yellow outfit. I had to laugh to myself, only in the developing world could you be mistakingly lead to an event such as this under the pretext of eating meat :o).

In Africa when women get married, their fiance's family needs to pay a dowry to her parents - quite the opposite of Asia where the woman's parents pay the groom's parents for the marriage. This meal was provided by the bride's parents in preparation for the dowry negotiations that would happen afterwards. Apparently women can live with their fiances for many years (including have children) before the actual marriage ceremony, without any judgment from the community.

Soon it was our turn to file up and fill our plates with food. I was a bit wary. I'm not a huge fan of African cuisine and Paul promised me there would be goat meat intermixed with some of the dishes and I was hoping to avoid it. We first rinsed our hands under the hot water in a silver canteen. Then plates in hand, we walked down the row of dishes, having heaps of local favorites piled high on our plates. I'm totally going to botch the names, so instead I'll describe them to you. The first dish was something like ugali (made of white corn flower) mixed with green vegetables and maize (corn), then there was something almost a purple color - another starch mixed with thick black beans, some beef stew, a dish of black beans, bones of the goat (I avoided this one), flavored rice, and a red and green pepper salad.

Never in a million years would I ever have eaten this much food at a restaurant I loved, so I was a bit nervous that I might not be able to finish all of the food on my plate. That paired with the conspicuousness of being the only white face in a crowd of 100 was a bit intimidating. I plunked my spoon into the ugali green clump and went for it. Nobody really spoke as they ate and ate. Paul kept looking at me to see if I was doing alright with all the food. I actually got a lot of glances throughout the meal. I'm sure everyone [as well as myself] was wondering, "what is this white chick doing here?"

After I had made a significant dent in my food, people began to clear the plates and hot milk tea was passed around. Then came plates of pineapple and watermelon, and a donut pastry (who's name I also can't remember). I think at this point I finally began to catch my breath and feel a little more comfortable in my surroundings. People began asking me where I came from and seeing my big camera at my side, asked me to take their pictures. There were two little girls in particular who were enamored by seeing themselves on the LCD screen. Finally, just before the introductions for the dowry negotiations began, halved gourds were passed around and these bowls were filled high with "oogie", fermented flour porridge. At first I was especially wary of this dish, but after much coaxing I gave in and admit that I really enjoyed this sour-sweet warm liquid. It was also very fun to eat in a gourd. I'm sure my head was thoroughly confused - less than a week ago I was eating Cambodian food and a week before that watching some Vietnamese friends eat frog-legs. A culinary paradise, or something like that.

The bride, Eva, soon sought me out and began dragging me around the tent taking pictures of all her friends. Her father (I think it was her father) kept insisting to me that I had the run of the place and could take whatever pictures I wanted. This became fairly awkward once introductions were made and people were standing up and introducing themselves - I wanted to capture the event for everyone but I didn't want to get in the way of anyone actually viewing the proceedings. Eva and her dad brought me around the compound, into the house at the start of the negotiations, out back where the dishes were being washed in a backdrop of lush green hills, and up the road where Lucy and her friends were collecting crates of soda (8 in all, because 7 is an unlucky number) to carry down to the house once the dowry had been settled.

When the light grew too dim to take anymore pictures - and secretly I was thankful because there is nothing like wedding-like pressure for a photographer (one reason I will never do that as a profession - the women assembled at the top of the driveway to carry down the sodas. One of Lucy's friends gave me a Kikuyu name, "Shiku", and from that point on began hollering to me with it anytime she wanted to grab my attention. With my hand on one side of a soda crate, we sloshed through the mud, beautiful dresses, fancy shoes, and all, shaking the bottles (they're glass here) up and down while many of the women began to sing. We marched towards the house, singing echoing over the lush green hills and Eva glowing. I thought the sodas or my fingers would break with all the sloshing of bottles - a completely surreal experience.

Once the sodas were presented we were all allowed to take one (this was the first time most people had drank during the whole meal) and party attendants sat in groups and chatted - men in one group, women in the other. The group of women I sat with were excited about the amount of food they had eaten. In fact, many of them were counting the rolls on their stomachs! What a fantastic practice - I think the supermodels of America could learn something from this practice ;o).

Soon it was time to go, and the groups of people piled into cars and matatus. Paul let me ride in his car this time (the matatu was just so I could have the experience, apparently). The driveway had grown so muddy and slippery that he had to completely gun the engine, dodging party-goers and small children (probably goats too) as we plowed up the driveway. The colorful matatu plowed on ahead of us, dancing through the mud like a woman's hips on a disco dancefloor.

Walking in Africa

March 9-15, 2006

A few weeks ago I was privileged enough to accompany my colleagues in Africa – Erica and Marcia – to a WORTH launch training in Mbale, Uganda. Since working in Kenya was my first time in sub-Saharan Africa, Uganda was quite a new and amazing experience for me also.

The training originally was to have been held in Kampala, Uganda, and I was looking forward to catching up with some of the other hunger fellows based there (hi Todd, hi Peter!), but unfortunately, it was much more convenient to hold the training workshop out in the field, where the beneficiaries of our program (and local implementers) are based.

That’s how I found myself on a plane to Entebbe, Uganda, peering out the window at the beautiful and quite massive Lake Victoria below. The plane ride itself was short, and once collecting our bags, we were whizzing away with Sully, our taxi driver, alongside the gorgeous lake (Entebbe is stunning), on our way to Kampala.

In downtown Kampala – which looks completely different from Nairobi, and a bit more visually appealing – we stopped at a famous hotel (Hotel Speke) to change money (ugh, more shillings, different exchange rate), and then on to the Rwenzori Café to meet up with our donor counterpart, Holly for a late lunch.

One thing about Africa, they have phenomenal coffee - after being completed detached from it in Cambodia (lack of to-go cups), I became a complete addict in Africa. That explains the iced lattes Marcia and I made sure to grab after our yummy lunch with Holly. The restaurant reminded me of some place back in the states, and it was in a strip mall - which I guess has become a popular form of architecture in Africa.

After collecting Holly, her things [and our lattes!], we drove off towards the countryside of coffee and papyrus plantations, mud houses, and little school children in their brightly-colored uniforms - like dancing Easter eggs prancing along the highway. One of the most popular colors was a bright pink, and they just looked magical wandering next to the lush fields.

Uganda is a lot greener than Kenya - it seemed tremendously lush, comparatively. But in Kenya's defense, I've spent little time out in the countryside, other than the "bush", so I could be completely wrong in this assumption.

The four-hour drive seemed to go relatively fast, as we all had a lot to discuss about the upcoming training. The gorgeous landscape provided a great cinematic metronome that supplied a soothing background and helped us pace our discussion:

- good highway: talk about work.
- horrible road: watch with curiosity as Sully maneuvers along the wrong side of the road, while trying not to let your head bump the ceiling.
- Coffee plantations: Wait for Erica’s announcement and then try to catch these with a quick glance before they zoom by.
- Cross the start of the Nile River: ooh and ahh, then talk about PR for WORTH

You get the picture. (I’m actually amazed that weeks after we made this trip, I’m still remembering that kind of detail :o)).

Once in Mbale – a very rural town at the foothills of a mountain range [I can’t for the life of me remember], we drove up a gradual hill and around a bend to the Mbale Botanical Hotel. In the driveway were a pack of potential WORTH-ees who greeted us with big hugs and smiles. We were shown to our rooms – very basic with shared bathrooms – and after a brief tea with the Director of Women’s Ministries, we turned in for the night.

The next few days were a blur of all-day training gatherings, after-hours meetings, and planning sessions in our rooms, munching on bagged popcorn and apples and fresh peanut butter (the lunch food was pretty awful).

We began most mornings with a 6 am walk around the neighborhood where we watched cattle grazing, women working in the fields, and little children on their way to school. (I actually think this is when it *finally* hit me that I was in Africa, because it was the first chance I'd had to explore any of it on foot). Even if we didn’t go for a walk it was nearly impossible to sleep past 6 am as the roosters were crowing by around 5:30 am. Then it was time to shower, which was always a challenge. Holly and I shared a bathroom that consisted of a large bathtub, stained by clothes dye (I’m pretty convinced), and no shower tap. Regardless if we had hot water (every other day, but barely) or cold, I spent my showers squatting in the tub, pouring buckets of water over my head, a muffled shriek slipping out for the first dunk, if it was a cold-water morning. I thought I was being especially quiet in my reaction, but later on Holly pointed out that she could almost hear my body contort (which it did) as that first chilly splash soaked me.

Breakfast was usually some pineapple slices, a few hard-boiled eggs, and French-press style coffee, without the press. It was also intermixed with morning worship and devotionals as the Salvationists are very disciplined in their religious practices.

Once the training began, all of us were running around, hooking up equipment, tracking down TVs and VCRs that could play Western-recorded videos, chasing down markers and pads of paper, and trying to keep everyone on-time for the next portion. It was completely exhausting, and I did very little of the presentation part. The energy of the participants was inspiring though, and they frequently broke into song – albeit usually referring to Jesus and all his glory – but the music was gorgeous. As an aside, after visiting both Kenya and Uganda, I’m convinced Africa is “Jesus Land.” Missionaries, STOP, everyone is ALREADY converted. Save your money. Woah.

My favorite part of the training was getting to know all of the local implementers and hearing their reaction to WORTH and the appreciative methodology (APA). It was unbelievable to watch them transform overnight, from slightly timid and dubious, to complete micro-finance WORTH converts. As I began to discover in my graduate thesis, discourse plays such an important role in international development, and seeing “it” in action, was extremely fulfilling – like everything has finally come full-circle.

At the end of each day, we closed our workshop with a type of evaluation, and then the participants took over. Literally every day, without fail, we were summoned to the front of the room (and I didn’t deserve this praise as much as Erica and Marcia), where the attendees cheered for us and shared “Coca Cola’s”. I don’t really know how to explain a Coca Cola without physically demonstrating it, but lets just say it’s an exaggerated pantomime of people shaking cans of Coke and spraying them all over the training leaders. It was hysterical to watch, I felt like I was back in elementary school – yet it achieved it’s desired effect, I felt completely “washed over” with appreciation.

In the evenings we wandered into Mbale town to find something more palatable than the poorly-cooked Ugali, Mtoke, and bone stew. Similar to Kenya, there are tons of Indian restaurants in Uganda, even in remote areas like Mbale where we managed to find two. On the other days we went to another restaurant in town that seemed to have the best variety of food in the area. I think we went there a total of three times to indulge in their kabobs (not like KB at all, Rob). The place was usually packed with other Westerners – lots of Americans, lots of missionaries.

Every other day the power went off, for the whole day. We had a generator for training purposes, but it was extremely loud and made it difficult for us to concentrate. It was also fairly hot (though I’m laughing while typing this because today was one of the hottest days I’ve ever felt in my life, in Cambodia), and without well-operating fans, it got really sticky. At night I wrestled underneath my mosquito net, which didn’t fully cover my bed. When the power was on I turned on the fan, but it just blew the net around so much I felt like it was attacking me during the night. Even once I got comfortable I was usually awaken by a revival out in a field nearby, some animated discussion from the “doily room” (everything was lace, like a grandma’s valentine), or a female coming-of-age ceremony that concluded at dawn with a loud worship a few buildings down. Needless to say, I got little sleep and each day wore us out completely.

I thought we’d get a bit of time to catch up on our sleep on the Sunday where we weren’t training, but it seemed as though we worked straight from dawn till near midnight (in my case). We did get a ride over to the Mbale Resort, where we worked in a bungalow out on the lawn, had a large thermos of coffee, and ate salads while we typed up presentations and I worked on the monitoring and evaluation system. The change of scenery was nice, and it felt *so* good to be doing challenging work, all the time we spent actually working, was relatively painless. It just felt amazing to be useful.

When the training neared its end on the 15th, the participants threw a little party for us with a cake, soda (mmm Stoney!), cupcakes, and Cadbury Eclairs (yes folks, they make more than “eggs” in Africa). Poor Erica and Marcia had literally made themselves sick from working so hard that week, and Marcia barely had a voice, however I think this last day for them made all the hard work worthwhile. We all wandered outside and stood in a circle to make our personal commitments to the program. It was so wonderful to see everyone so passionate and dedicated to the program and it was sad to say goodbye to these amazing women and men that we had spent the past seven days with. I really expect incredible things from our Uganda program, absolutely incredible.

The ride back concluded the way the ride to Mbale began – good road, bad road, good road, Rwenzori coffee. Then we hit traffic, relatively BAD traffic. We all tensed a bit because we thought we might not make our plane, but about 45 minutes later the traffic cleared and we neared Entebbe, alongside the gorgeous Lake Victoria.

The training [and all my time in Africa] really renewed my spirit and passion for development work – it was where the rubber really hits the road, and where we as change agents, foster real – and in this case internal – transformation. Being there made WORTH come alive for me in a way I hadn’t yet experienced. The energy there really was beyond description.

People’s lives have changed because of our program and this first [of many] training, and these were just the implementers being inspired. Wait till the women get hold of WORTH. The whole week was an absolute self-discovery of how I could positively contribute to the broader spectrum of development work [and how unbelievably hard development work is]. I have to say I couldn’t have two better mentors – watching them make our program come alive was awe-inspiring and I can only hope that someday I have equally strong facilitation and programming skills.

For any of you who are more versed/experienced in development fieldwork, I’m sure you’re likely rolling your eyes at the description and my reaction, or better yet, saying to yourselves, “this was how I felt before I got jaded.” Call me a non-cynic or rather an optimist, but I actually believe that this program is different, that how it works is completely different, and that it really will change these women’s [and men’s] lives. Instead of doubting these emotions, I’m embracing them, because if there’s one lesson I’ve really learned in the past eight months of working overseas, if you don’t have hope and passion, you have no power.

Rubber-tire hammocks and bamboo dreams: Day 1 in Kien Svay Province

Over the 19th and 20th of September, we conducted another set of baseline surveys in Kien Svay Province. Both Thavy and Sakphea have been working extremely hard visiting other provinces - conducting surveys and literacy training for our volunteers - during the past week and a half, but since our budget is limited, this was the only other time I was able to make a village visit.

Sakphea and I left around 6: 30 am with Theary – the acting director of our partner NGO Khmer Women’s Cooperation for Development (KWCD). The car was *much* better this time around with no errant gasoline smells and much better shocks.

The road to Kien Svay (and its surroundings) looked very different compared to my trip to Takeo – very lush and tree-covered. We even passed some resorts that I think Khmer people go to on weekends. Houses were built high on stilts, but much of the ground below was flooded with deep water. Huge ceramic pots used to collect rainwater for drinking/cooking/bathing were floating around in the watery mess – the tops of large plants barely visible in the rippling water.

We stopped at a local restaurant and Sakphea and Theary ordered noodle soup with meat slices and meatballs. I began regretting wimping out with my bagel and hummous from Java.

We arrived on a narrow dirt road around 8 am, and quickly found our Empowerment Workers (EWs) and set off on our first few interviews. This time in order to get to some of the houses we actually had to walk under someone else’s house, and then across steaming heaps of mud, garbage and feces before we reached another narrow road.

The houses in this part of Kien Svay looked a lot more substantial than many I had seen in Bati and for the most part where made completely of wood, including the roofs. But there was no mistaking the level of poverty here, not to mention some seriously potential health hazards.

During the first interview, a young woman who’s face showed years of hard work in the sun, answered our questions as her children climbed all over her. I don’t think you can really understand the level of distractions present during these interviews – something is always going on with these women, whether they are working, bathing children, nursing, watching their grandchildren, cooking, or cleaning.

Omnipresent funeral bells tolled the death of a 13 year-old girl who was collecting snails to eat and fell into the river and drowned. I was told that this was the second death in two days from drowning. The other victim was 14 years-old.

After completing a few interviews, the EWs seemed ready to go off on their own. Although they weren’t that competent at first, they seemed to pick up on the surveying technique rather quickly - this helped us speed along.

Obviously I can’t go into every story and every home I visited, but I’ll share some moments that particularly resonate in my memory.

I think it was very obvious to me how poor the area we were in was, but I think it really hit home during the afternoon of our first day. We took the car to an even more rural area where most of the houses looked like bamboo shacks on stilts. Plastic blue tarps billowed in the wind like parachutes, as dark clouds hung overhead - characteristic of the monsoon season here. A group of people were gambling on a straw mat on the ground and quickly dispersed once they heard why we had arrived.

As we tried to figure out where some of our interviewees lived, a crowd surrounded us. Children with bloated bellies and dusty tan hair (evidence of severe malnutrition) played with one another and stared intently at the "Barang" woman with the large black camera. Mother's stood around listening, their hands snaking through their daughter's hair, separating small pieces and dragging their nails through the strands in search of lice which they expertly pulled out and popped between their fingers. Teenage daughters combed through their mothers hair, finding small pieces of gray hairs and quickly pulling them out from the root. Naked infants stood in flip-flops too big for them, chewing on biscuits and occassionally dropping them on the ground - then putting them back in their mouths.

Everyone was looking at us and the crowd began to grow as it seems to do every time I play the role of "strange foreigner" during a village visit. Sakphea and Thavy say they have the same reaction even if they are barang-less.

We walked to a more remote area and settled at the underside of one house. This time the different women on our list came to us. A women in her mid-50s found a seat on a grass mat. Children surrounded us, chewing on the sweet juicy insides of a long stick of bamboo, running their teeth through the firm yellow strands, sucking the remaining juice through their molars (their front teeth - as well as most people I met there - were severely rotting and for the most part resulting in a huge gaping smile). When they had finished gnawing on the bamboo, they'd spit it onto the ground where a vast collection of bamboo "fossils" had accrued.

The woman wrapped her arms around her legs, holding herself close in a ball. As her story unfolded we discovered she had acquired HIV/AIDs from her late husband (he died 6 years prior). Obviously he had been cheating as many men seem to do in the country - this is one of the leading causes of the spread of HIV/AIDs in Cambodia, and it's a *huge* problem. She has two young children - one 11 and one 5, and she is too weak to work anymore. She has no income and can barely feed her family. A local NGO is providing limited drug treatment for her, including Nevaripine, but she knows that her time is limited and worries about the future of her children.

During the interview she began to silently cry and everyone just stared at her. At one point I couldn't take it any more and I reached out my hand and placed it on hers. I know we're supposed to behave professionally, but we're all human and she has nobody to help her. I told her that she was beautiful and strong in Khmer and she responded that her body was weak and that she always falls on the ground and feels dizzy. She says her heart is bad. I tell her that her heart is strong. I had to try so hard not to start crying myself. After the interview was over we visited her home and met her children. I gave her a small amount of money - I don't want to set a precedent that we're going to be handing out money, but I couldn't help myself. This is really what being at the ends of the earth feels like.

After her interview another young woman took her place. Men sat in the background starting evening fires and children lounged allover the mats, draping themselves on her ankles. Her story was different but altogether equally heartbreaking. She and her husband have a two year-old son with HIV/AIDs. Neither of them have the disease, nor do their other 3 children, but suspect that when another woman was caring for their baby, she let him breastfeed, and she had HIV/AIDs. The parents are too afraid to tell a local NGO that the baby has the disease because they fear the stigma attached and how people will perceive the parents. There is so much "saving face" in this country, to a fault. This child will likely never receive care for HIV/AIDs and his chances for survival grow slimmer and slimmer everyday. When you are constantly living in filth and malnourished, there is little your body can do to resist the strength of the disease.

It was a sobering day, which I'm still continuing to process. As I swung in a hammock underneath a house, hung up by stretched out rubber bike tires, I thought how the day's experience reminded me that so many poverty issues are interrelated and how there is only so much organizations can do to help people. And I wondered, what will be my role in all of this? I can't have my hand in everything, it's just impossible. But, I wish I could.

Bati, Takeo Province: First day in the field

I think I need to first preface this recap before I launch into my experiences the past two days.  Being in the field left me in sensory overload. It gave me context for my work in the coming year, but it also overwhelmed me with new sights, smells, and visceral experiences.  I will do my best to recapture what I did, saw, and learned, but I’m sure this narrative won’t be comprehensive. The overall experience, however, will be something I remember for the rest of my life.

On Monday morning I woke up at 5 am to get ready for our ride to Takeo. Around 5:45 am I left my apartment just as the sun was beginning to rise over the Tonle Sap. It was gorgeous and a true reminder that I need to do this once in awhile in order to really have the *full* Phnom Penh experience. There were hundreds of people outdoors – running, playing badminton, laughing with friends, and participating in group exercises similar to Tai Chi in front of the Royal Palace.

My fear that it would be difficult finding a moto to get to work that early was unfounded. As I whizzed by, the cool morning air was another reminder that early *is* better for day-to-day comforts. I met Thavy and Sakphea in front of our office building, and we were off in a small Toyota Camry, with a driver who thought I was 18 and who’s vehicle had a leaky gasoline smell and absolutely NO shocks.

There is no better way to describe our path of motion other than break-dancing. We left the city in a direction I had never been, and I marveled at the gigantic sizes of the Japanese and Royal Thai Embassies (for those of you who are embarrassed of the monstrosity that is the new US Embassy, we’re just about on par with those other two). The shop stall bedecked streets soon turned to mobs of young women waiting for the work day to begin at a number of textile factories. Judging from the dreary, rust-covered buildings, I doubt the conditions were any better. Girls (and I mean girls) come from as far as an hour and a half to two hours to work in these factories for around $1 a day (or $30-$40 a month). If they live too far away to go home every night, they rent rooms with 5 girls apiece, in 3m x 3m spaces. Bathrooms are communal, overcrowded, and Filthy. Sakphea knew a lot about this because she completed a lot of research on factories in a previous job.

After we bounded along past the factories, the roads became even bumpier (or the car shed more and more nuts and bolts holding the axles together) and we found ourselves in a countryside that was flanked by wide expansive fields of green, sparse palm trees towering over the horizon, and deep blue skies painted with cotton-ball clouds. The roads were so bumpy I felt my shirt straps keep slipping down my shoulders. I think at one point my head may have even hit the ceiling.

After about an hour of grinding we drove through a small town with a few established food and shop stalls. The road turned to gravel once again and we turned down a narrow road that lead to Bati.

We first went to the house of Din, one of our Empowerment Workers (EWs). The way the WORTH program works is that Pact Cambodia and 5 partner NGOs will train 10 local Empowerment Workers to facilitate and supervise our women's groups. Much of our work (as does mine) involves capacity building on the local level. This is important because once our organization finishes establishing the WORTH program, the local people will be able to continue building social networks and informal financial infrastructure on their own. Din's four children were waiting outside for us and seemed surprised at the sight of a car, let alone a "barang" or foreigner. This was just a preview of the villager response to me (and us).

At Din's house, we also met Sopoa - the other EW working with us in this district. We sat down outside on chairs and wooden platforms that I've come to know as outdoor "furniture" in Cambodia. After introductions were complete, Sakphea and Thavy began to go over hte process for our baseline survey. The questions are to guage the quality of life and awareness of trafficking of women in the areas we are implementing WORTH. Since our program involves 2,000 women total, we set our sights on a 30% target. This still leaves over 600 women for us to survey, and only about 4 weeks to do it. 

Since the capacity of our EWs is not that high, it took a bit of time for Sakphea to ensure a modicum of clarity. Once familiar with the process, we decided to take the survey literally out into the field. In our random sampling, the first two women on our list happened to be working in the rice paddies, harvesting rice plants and bunching them for transplanting. We wandered up the road to a field area and I found myself balancing on the high, narrow walls separating each of the rice fields and wandering past krama-covered women knee deep in mud and water, heads rarely looking above waist-heighth.

Both women we interviewed literally climbed out of the rice fields to sit down on the grass or narrow walls between fields to answer our questions. At one point our EWs were standing in the fields to get a better view. We began to amass a crowd of local girls who were helping their mothers out in the field - it seemed that everyone wanted to know what the strangers were doing. This is good for us, because the more interest there is on the community and family levels, the better chance our program has to self-replicate and proliferate countrywide.

After our first set of interviews as a group were complete, we returned to the underside of a random house (where all daily activities occur in the Cambodian countryside as the house itself is too hot - underneath you'll find hammocks, platforms for sitting, weaving looms, kitchen supplies, livestock, and vehicles) to debrief. Once Sakphea and Thavy felt that Din and Sopoa were ready to do interviews themselves, each paired up with one of the EWs to practice. I stayed with Thavy and Sopoa at the house we were already at.

As Sopoa went through the questions, albeit slowly and shyly the first time around, my eyes wandered to my surroundings. Behind the house were large pots of water - storing what was collected from the rain and used for cooking, drinking, and washing. Three children had come to sit behind me, curious as to what I was doing there. A man held a young child lovingly in his arms - the boy was completely naked and as I looked at him I felt that something wasn't right.

I saw a wooden contraption on the side of the house that looked like it had straps for a small child to stand up in and strengthen their posture. There was a sticker for "handicapped" smack in the middle. My gaze went back to the child and I looked at him again. This time I saw it and my heart went into my throat. Later Thavy explained exactly what was going on. He wasn't a baby, he was a 7-year old boy, mute, and with 7 digits on each appendage. It looked like the family was getting some help, but it can't be easy growing up in such a rural area with such special needs.

Trying to collect myself, we finished up the interview, thanked the family, and were on our way. This time we interviewed an older woman - in fact, we interviewed *mostly* women in their 50s - which surprised me. Our program is to target potential trafficking in village areas and I had always thought this included mostly young women without other income options. However, by targeting older mothers and grandmothers, younger girls will have more options as they grow up and this can also be a way of targeting potential sex traffickers.

During the interview, Sopoa seemed much more confident, and I had fun making faces with the children the interviewee was minding. I also couldn't help but notice the chickens and baby chicks constantly underfoot. Behind the house, a man was *showering* outdoors wearing the traditional krama and a little girl was popping in and out of the house chewing on a crispy rice snack and peaking around wooden beams to catch a glimpse of me.

Once the interview was done we walked along the dirt road and completed a few others before meeting up with Sakphea and Din. It was hard finding many of the woman as they were completing different types of work out in the fields. Overall, we felt fairly satisfied with our morning accomplishments.

The driver took us back into the small town area where we ate a *very* local restaurant. When I'm not totally adventurous in eating local food, you have to know it's *very* local. However, I managed just fine. I have learned that you can always pour a bit of the sauce on your rice, even if you don't want to eat the fish heads mulling about within it :).

There was also a bathroom here, which was good since the village houses have nothing resembling a building to do your business privately. The women usually squat surrounded by their krama since there is never any place without other people watching - which I'm sure takes a bit of getting used to (and I didn't have mine with me!). Luckily this squatter toilet was quite clean :).

After lunch, I went off with Sakphea where we conducted many more interviews. This time we attracted a ton of children who were curious about what we were doing. Some of them helped us find the women we were looking to interview. Most of all, they found me fascinating. When they realized what my camera was and that I could show them photos of themselves, they did everything they could to appear magically on my LCD screen. One of the little girls</a> (when you see my photos you'll know she's my favorite) kept making a circle with her fingers and covering her eye, trying to tell me to take more photos. Then, all of the kids came together and made shapes of circles with bamboo to show me they wanted to take pictures too. It was adorable. Her smile was addictive and as you'll see, very powerful.

This was a wonderful experience for me, but the at times very large group (up to 15 children) made it difficult for Sakphea to ask the interviewee questions without her being distracted. Cambodians in general, are an extremely curious people and there are no social norms against wandering into your neighbor's living space to eavesdrop on conversations, climb allover furniture, and interrupt daily goings-on.

At her suggestion I motioned to the children to "shh" and put down my camera. They soon realized that they would have to wait to play with me again until the interview was over, but that didn't stop them from periodically reaching over to touch my camera buttons, the lens, my toes (I think my white skin was just as much a marvel to them as the electronics of my camera).

We moved on (as did our audience) to another elder woman who makes baskets for a living. This interview was probably the most difficult as the woman had a hard time understanding our questions. She also helped us realize that we had forgotten an important question on our survey about existing debt. This woman had a tremendous amount of debt, was unable to provide for herself on a daily basis  (she makes $.25 a day and spends $1.25 a day to live). She had lost her husband and many of her children to sickness, and another deaf son had gone to Phnom Penh five years ago with some friends and never came back. Imagine not having the means, support, or knowledge to go and find him. My heart broke for her. When we were done with the interview, I bought two of her baskets (each was $.50) for Thavy and Sakphea.

We continued on to more houses, entourage of children following us, holding my hands, and eager to see more photos from my camera. One of the children pointed at a cute little girl and asked Sakphea, "You think she's a girl? No, she's not, look!" Pulling up the little girl's dress you could see that the child was likely a hermaphrodite. The kids still seemed friendly enough to her, but obviously wanted you to know that she was different.

The sky darkened as we approached our last house. The "backyard" was an expansive, lush green paradise. Rice paddies as far as the eye can see, darkened storm clouds filtering a soft evening light that reflected a dark purple in the watery fields. I sat patiently as Sakphea went through our list of questions, and the children of the house piled onto a nearby motobike and watched me intently. I snapped a few cute photos of them once the interview was over.

Sakphea and I returned to a central house to wait for the others to finish. We sat on a wooden platform with an older woman who was weaving baskets and I showed Sakphea some of my photos while we practiced some of my Khmer. Life has really gotten in my way the last few weeks and I've been slipping a bit.

After debriefing with everyone, we piled back into our rickety old Camry with even fewer shocks than we likely had before we arrived, and drove off into a beautiful countryside sunset. Sakphea and Thavy kept asking the driver to stop at different roadside stands to inspect some of the meat and fish for sale. At one place, there were tons of vendors selling just-netted goldfish-sized fish, hopping up and down in their rattan basket like Mexican jumping beans. Sakphea scooped up some of those and some tiny river crabs, tossed them in the trunk (there are completely different ideas about transporting perishible items here), and we were off again.

As I laid my head back in the rickety car I felt exhausted, unbelievably sticky with dried sweaty, and oh so dusty. My mind reeled at all of the people I'd met and things I had seen and experienced. There were so many that branched into questions and curiosities and new thoughts as I tried to parse everything, one thought leading to the next. I tried to put my head down behind me to take a momentary rest, but the bumpy carriage of the car saw to it that my eyes saw no refuge. As we sputtered and lopped down the highway roads I thought, "But this is just the first day...", and I knew to expect so much more.

Cambodian Photos

Hey gang,

I uploaded 10 of my favorite images so far. I'm finding the Cambodian people and countryside even more beautiful than before and I'm having a blast exploring and taking photos.

Work is going well too. I think we will *finally* get our funding next week which means I can actually begin my project. The staff is phenomenal and I'm looking forward to getting out into the field and meeting some of the women when we do our baseline surveys and literacy pre-tests.

Can't wait to hear what everyone else is up to (and see photos). If you want to post a photo album for yourself you have to do that under the "hungercenter" login. Then you'll be all set.

ps. Have any of you experienced *really* obnoxious local hip-hop music? The "you better not come home" song is KILLING me :).

Getting settled in Cambodia

So I've been in Phnom Penh for a little over a week now and I'm still in the process of getting myself a place to live, but we're definitely moving in the right direction. 

As I've told a few of you, Cambodia is HOT, so that's taken some adjusting to as well, but it's also a great excuse to drink lots of cold fruit shakes at all meals and to ride motos for a mere three blocks to get to work without breaking into a large sweat.

Working at Pact has been great so far. The local staff is fantastic and they helped me find my bag when it was lost by the airline and purchase a cell phone so that I could be reachable in an emergency. They are also - like I'm sure most of your organizations are - extremely busy.

Last week Pact hosted a 500-participant anti-corruption workshop and this week the WORTH program (my program) is training empowerment workers on communication, facilitation, and math skills. The training is all in Khmer so I had a bit of a problem following it, but it was great to meet some of the women and our NGO partners.

Otherwise, I've finally acclimated to the time difference and have begun having a social life in this very social city. I've found an apartment I love but it lacks a washing machine (like most expats here, I feel badly paying someone to handwash my clothes ), so we're hoping to resolve that soon and maybe I'll have an address by Friday! I'm very eager to unpack and set up my life (as I'm sure you can all relate).

Other than that, I've been making concrete plans with my manager to discuss my role for the next year and thinking about future weekend travel (there is so much to explore here). I can't wait to take out my camera.

Hope everyone is settling in and enjoying their positions!