Joseph Conrad: We live, as we dream - alone...

**The following post has been written over several months' time, beginning in August.
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“It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream - making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream-sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams. No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one's existence - that which makes its truth, its meaning - its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream - alone...”
― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

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Just before I left Africa, I noticed a divot in the base of the nail on my left ring finger, origin unknown. As my nails grew over the summer, I had this one funny deformed nail, all ridgey and bumpy. The bump’s creeping along up my fingernail was a reminder of how long I’d been back. It finally reached the end of its race; today I clipped my nails, and along with it, the funny little reminder bump.

It was just a dumb deformed nail, but it seemed to represent to me all those things about Africa that were slowly growing out and would soon get clipped off.

“Oh my God how was your trip?!”, “I can't wait to hear all about it!”, “Tell me everything!” Sure, I'd love to. But I can’t. Not really. I can give you facts, and events, and details.  But I can't tell you how it changed me.  How does one describe a being, a feeling, a knowing? Like trying to describe that inescapable feeling imparted by a dream, it's simply impossible for words to incarnate the inner experience of one to another. We try, but in the end, we fail.

Three months isn’t so long – it’s shorter than a semester, it’s that summer that goes by so fast, it’s less than the mild panic about income tax deadline after new year’s. But it still managed to change me. I want to write about all that inner change here, but it all sounds contrived and dramatic, and in the end, would fail. I think every day about going back.

Sure, some of it was escape. And in some ways it probably will be when I go again. But then, is it escape if it’s in some ways a life that you prefer? If escaping the pandemic materialism and amassing of riches and image solely for the sake of riches and images is less appealing than living a simpler life and learning new things about myself every day, staying in touch with how most of the rest of the world lives, is that escapism? I had drinks on Sunday with Deo, the founder of Village Health Works, the reason I went to Burundi. Every time I am with him, he utters these profound little nuggets that turn my head upside down a little. On Sunday he just drops: “my escape is another person’s misery.” I have had this thought before.

Upon my return, little things throw me. I scald myself repeatedly at the sink. The heat and intensity of my shower’s water and its pressure actually make me anxious. Every hug concludes with my reaching to shake the person's hand, met with puzzling looks. A gas station attendant reaches through my passenger side car window for my credit card – without thinking, I extend my hand to shake his and greet him.

I don't turn on the tv for days. I don't carry an umbrella when it’s supposed to rain. I don't dry my hands after washing them. I don’t dry my hair anymore, ever. The over-air conditioned stores and restaurants irritate me. I don't care whether I have a towel at the pool. I heartily greet everyone I encounter and ask how they are, reaching for a handshake. I don't care that I've worn that dress the last three times I've seen the same people. I haven’t bought one new thing in four months. Somehow, none of that matters. Sawa sawa.

I miss the clink clink clink that was the soundtrack of my mornings in Kigutu ... the spoons rapidly making rounds in mugs of tea, in an effort to dissolve way too much sugar. I miss the faces that line the triage porch, first with suspicious eyes, followed by bursting smiles when I greet people in Kirundi or Swahili and reach my hand to shake theirs. I miss the bustling market and the chaos of the bus station. I miss being able to hold up my hand and hail a motorcycle to my destination for a $1, my hair blowing behind me in the warm African sun. I miss the ladies selling pineapples, avocados, tomatoes, mangoes, green clementines, and passion fruits by the roadside. I miss the tiny feet protruding from the hips of women carrying babies on their backs. I miss the stunning and vibrant African textiles that envelope and adorn the lovely women of Burundi; I love how those selling goods at market tuck a corner of the fabric wrapped around their waists, and skillfully tie up their earnings. It’s summer here in NYC, and there are many bright colors. But soon enough, we’ll all be in black again.

Fast forward to December. Have I really been back six months? Hard to believe. And none of those things is weird anymore. Like the bump on my nail, it all just sort of grew out. I don’t reach to shake everyone’s hand, I cherish my long hot showers, I wore all black today. I do, however, continue to scald myself at the sink.

The holidays are here. Call me Scrooge but it’s the time of year I like the least. I so dislike what the celebration of the birth of Christ has turned into … the Black Friday stampedes, the stores now open on Thanksgiving, the buying of masses of unneeded things just to have to something to give to someone who needs nothing. The gag gifts that will end up being tossed. The pressure, the expense, the clock ticking down. I have come to dread it.

There is something so tragically ironic to me about the wasted money – money that could be redirected to so many in need, maybe in east Africa – spent on throw-away gifts, that will soon end up in a landfill … maybe in east Africa.

How do I spend holidays with family and friends without silent judgment, make changes without being extreme, recognize the tragic irony without picking fights? How do I use my frustration and criticism (and hypocrisy) to make things better, not worse? I continue to feel like I’m living with one foot in two worlds.

Everything is changing. This summer, a neighborhood friend died – he was the personality of the street, and his passing has left a huge community hole. Friends and fellow community-garden members are stepping down from the board on which we sit, selling their places in the neighborhood, moving out of state. My favorite Singaporean restaurant on the next block was suddenly a Mexican restaurant one day. The block behind mine, to which mine backs up, has been bought by developers – the pre-construction noises wake me some mornings, and the workmen I occasionally see with my groggy waking eyes walking around on the neighboring rooftop just outside my window makes me feel exposed; my quiet private nook in alphabet city will very soon no longer be those things.

I’m not great with such change. It makes me want to escape. It doesn't stop the change, but it maybe removes me from it for a while.  I do plan to go back to Africa, maybe sooner than I thought.  Maybe it will be an escape.  Maybe it will just be a new adventure. Maybe it will be a little of both.  But whatever it is, I do know it will be a blessing - a blessing that will change me, resistance and all, once again.

Maya Bester: Tell me about your world.

In my last post I mentioned the warm and lovely Bester family.  The twins are dynamic, smart, creative, funny, and sweet.  Max got up silly early to ride with Michael and me to the airport the day of my departure, just to hang out.  He starts stories with, "once, this happened ..."  I find this a hilarious counterpoint to the ubiquitous and simply annoying “yeah, that happened” spouted by the current edition of purveyors of pop culture. 

These two started out so shy – like, in-the-folds-of-mommy’s-skirt shy.  By the end of my week’s visit, they were warm and demonstrative, and proudly sported their dynamic personalities and hilarious little attitudes.

The day before I left, Maya, alone with me for a few minutes while waiting for the others, turned and looked at me thoughtfully, and with hand motions that reminded me of my own, said “tell me about your world.”

Tell me about your world. What almost-six-year-old says this? Not only is it outside of a five-year-old’s own world (and many simply don’t leave), but it was such a globally framed question that I immediately loved her for it. I think of this as maybe a glimpse of an old soul.

Last Sunday, I went to a beach club with some friends.  We lounged, they played volleyball, I soaked up the sun and a Primus.   A young girl kept coming by – a total ‘tude’ is the only way to describe her demeanor.  Hilarious and charming, but full of ‘tude.  She would come by with these extravagant and demonstrative gestures, seemingly order us around in half-french, half-something-else (Kirundi?  Swahili?), then run off laughing.  Or maybe stick around and sit down for a few minutes, trying to make herself understood with insistent but good-natured gestures.   My friend recognizes her from the university pool he occasionally visits.  She clearly recognizes him, and continues to come by and vie for his attention.  He said her name is Pamela.  Pamela easily finagles the last piece of his pizza, all of our popcorn, and my water bottle – and maybe a little of our hearts – over the course of several hours. 

I imagined her world.  I assumed she was with the Burundian family that was occupying the sofa area next to ours.  It was riddled with kids – the girls with long-braided hair (most girls seen walking along the roadways between Bujumbura and anywhere upcountry keep their hair very short), pool props like arm floaties and a blow-up tube, nice swimsuits and clothes, ordering pizzas and fantas and ice creams.  I imagine they belong to an upper middle class Burundian family – a very small percentage of the population here – enjoying a Sunday afternoon at the beach with some friends.  Pamela seemed to be mingling in and among them.  I didn’t twig on to how differently she was dressed and coiffed just yet. 

Throughout the day, she kept coming by – employing our table as her own, depositing her juice, her lollipop, her dress.  Wiggling a little dance to entertain us, ensuring we watched – and applauded – as she jumped in the pool.  She helped herself to a piece of African fabric I had with me – the beautiful painted prints worn by African women, known as a pagne – and wrapped it around herself as African women do, in expert fashion.  “Wow, she’s really got that down” noted my friend.  After a while, I realize she is not responding to French in the way a French-speaker would.  She’s throwing words around, but just words.  She would come up and quickly spout something indiscernible – I would ask “quoi?” (“what?”) and she would nod, wide-eyed, “oui!” and run away or jump in the pool.   Hmmmm.  Where has she learned these words?  my friend muses.  I’m now confused – an upper middle class family would have educated children, and that would mean French.  I also realize this family was now gone.  Had they move to another seat?  Down to the beach?

Sometime later in the afternoon, she picks up my iphone and adeptly works out the camera feature; she reaches for my camera and does the same – starts snapping photos and squealing in delight with each one, quickly showing us before the 3-second preview turns back to a lens.  Posing does not seem new to her.

After chancing our popcorn out of us, she scurries over to the group of people at the corner banquette.  She’s working them the same way.  We joke that she’s playing us against each other, creating a competition, hoping we’ll fight for her. 

The sun is now starting to set, and she’s back.  Wrapped in my pagne, she takes off her shorts and we realize she is now “washing” them out in the pool, wringing them as though she’s at the river, and then hanging them over the railing.  Ummmmm…  

She’s now cozying up to us, lounged across the sofa that I too am lounging on.  She picks up my arm and puts it around her, and snuggles in.  We smile at this, but just keep talking.  It’s like she belongs. 

We’ve had a few friends-by-extension come by to see what we’re up to for dinner, and we eventually formulate a plan.  We move to the covered area as we make our way to the car, and we chat with the club’s manager for quite some time.   I am leaning lazily against a pillar.  Suddenly Pamela is close by my side, tucked once again under my arm.  Someone asks where her family is – it becomes quickly clear that the manager had thought all day that she was with us.  She is here alone.  To my horror, with the snap of a finger, she is quickly escorted to the steps leading from the club’s platform down to the beach.  A conversation with a few of the waitstaff ensues, and suddenly, she is gone.

Her world is not at all as I had imagined it.  In fact, it was hard to imagine what her world was.  It was after dark – she was no more than ten.  Does she have a home?  Would she find her way?  I suppose she would find her way – Burundians are incredibly resourceful, and this was clearly not a new racket for her, but what dangers would await her along the way?  As she ran off, shoeless, I imagined this was a regular Sunday for her – hustling food and company from unsuspecting mzungos with her charm and vigor.  This eventually dissolved into my feeling pangs of sickness, heartbreak, helplessness.   

We went on to enjoy an excellent bottle of wine poolside at a lovely hotel under the stars.  But I have thought about Pamela all week, wandering somewhere, under those same stars.  I wonder if I’ll see her again.  I wonder what her days are like, who her family is and do they miss her when she’s gone all day, what her future could possibly hold.  

Will she be one of the incredibly admirable people I’ve met here who have created opportunity out of desperate circumstances, and insisted on a future they envisioned, even when it seemed impossible?  I recently had a conversation with someone who fled the war in the middle of a school day – alone.  He walked for days, being fed by generous countrymates along the way, and found his way to Tanzania.  He spent three years in a refugee camp.  He said it was awful.  He was a teenager and he was alone.  But he stayed.  Why?  Because they offered school.  I’m wide-eyed with awe and admiration.  He is now university educated with a career, a family, a future.   I imagine – in fact see – that this is not the norm.  The long and dark war ravaged the country and many along with it.  People were robbed not only of land, family members, possessions, dignity, but also of spirit.  Rebuilding is a slow and frustrating process.  People are left behind.  People fall through the cracks.  People don’t have opportunities.  If mine weren’t presented to me, I wonder very much if I would have created my own.  I find myself making this comparison often here and being embarrassed by what I believe to be the truth.

I wasn’t planning on tying this particular entry back to VHW, but I can’t help myself, because the segue is now so obvious.  The co-ops that VHW helps to organize and support are just these kinds of opportunities.  People in the rural mountainous catchment area – mostly women – who have had no education and a complete lack of opportunity, are now business owners, tradespeople, respected members of their communities.  This is just some of the great work of VHW. 

me on the Kigutu road with the yoga bags

I visited the sewing co-op again this week and greeted the lovely people who make the yoga mat bags that I’m now peddling at my Saturday morning yoga group.  They were busily filling an order of 100 bags placed by our New York office, to send home with some US visitors returning next week.  I take seven on consignment; I sold three last weekend and intend to top that tomorrow.  I eyeball one for myself – it has a non-descript bird motif (quail? pheasant?  wild turkey?  stunted peacock?) in gold and cobalt, with a sort of vegas-meets-versace flash – I imagine the non-descript bird as a glittering medallion on a giant gold chain around a rapper’s neck.  I decide my world needs this irony.

My world.  My world is my own.  My world is free to acquire things, take trips, make choices. My world is free to write and speculate about the world of others.   My world is whatever I want it to be.  But tell me about your world, Pamela.  Tell me about its hardships and challenges and heartaches.  Tell me your hopes and dreams and what you want to be when you grow up.  It’s with ruefulness that I resign myself to the fact that I will simply never know, and it’s with melancholy that I consider that her world may simply be survival, and that dreaming about what she wants to be when she grows up, may be to her, just completely another world.

Pippin Took: We’ve had one, yes. But what about second breakfast?

Aragorn: Gentlemen! We do not stop ’til nightfall.
Pippin: But what about breakfast?
Aragorn: You’ve already had it.
Pippin: We’ve had one, yes. But what about second breakfast?
[Aragorn stares at him, then walks off.]
Merry: Don’t think he knows about second breakfast, Pip.
Pippin: What about elevenses? Luncheon? Afternoon tea? Dinner? Supper? He knows about them, doesn’t he?
Merry: I wouldn’t count on it.

Food Security. It’s a phrase thrown around international development and human rights circles, but one that many reading this have never heard. I guess because those of us who have it don’t need to think about it.  Or do we?

The World Food Summit of 1996 defined food security as existing “when all people at all times have access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life”.

Food security is built on three pillars:

• Food availability: sufficient quantities of food available on a consistent basis. 
• Food access: having sufficient resources to obtain appropriate foods for a nutritious diet. 
• Food use: appropriate use based on knowledge of basic nutrition and care, as well as adequate water and sanitation. 

My time in Burundi has been filled with the western version of food security concerns. Will I have enough of the food that I want today? Yes, I have enough of what I need. What I need to be nourished, to have energy, to survive. But the selection of prepared food available has been a bit challenging for a foodie like me. 

Fourteen times a week, the staff in Kigutu is presented with essentially the same meal: a giant pot of rice, a giant pot of stewed pink beans, and two other accoutrements: some type of potato or banana (boiled or fried skewers or slices), 

and a stewed vegetable concoction consisting of lenga lenga (amaranth, a healthier version of spinach), or tomatoes and cabbage.

Two meals a day, every day. The food is quite good – in fact I had the beans for the first time in a few days this past week and was struck by how delicious they were. But monotony is the point here. 

 The vast majority of Burundians (of the world, really) would be overwhelmed with gratitude at the prospect of such a nutritious meal of unlimited quantity every day, without worry. I try to keep this in perspective as I silently long for the freedoms and variety available to me at home. 

After a couple of weeks of this, I realize I’m getting fat – a result of the combination of the carb-laden meals (including the fried bananas which I adore and can’t stop eating), the major reduction of fresh vegetables as compared with my stateside diet, my reduced activity level (refer to earlier post…), and the overeating that comes from the quest to satisfy an unnamed craving, despite being physically satiated ... you know the feeling – the constant unspecified hunt for whatever will shut down the “feed me” function.

Occasional supplemental treats grace the meals, such as slices of creamy and fresh local avocado (awesome), 

a “salad,” which is shredded cabbage dressed in mayonnaise laid out on a platter and garnished with slices of tomato (way less awesome), and very occasionally meat – beef, goat, and the very rare fish (usually for special events), stewed in a savory tomato sauce.

We mzungos have brought things with us like granola bars and dried fruit and almond butter. We supplement with oatmeal and the rare but coveted muesli purchased from the alimentation shops in Bujumbura. We work out how to get fresh fruit and vegetables (only those that can be eaten raw – non-kitchen staff have no way to cook), and I wonder what my colleagues are thinking at the meal table as we seem never satisfied with what’s offered to us. We hoard things like a bottle of coke zero, a can of ginger ale saved from a plane trip, a small packet of processed and artificial cookies left over from a small fete, the likes of which we would not be interested in at home. It takes me three days to eat the outrageously expensive European version of a Snickers bar as I carefully ration and savor the luscious chemically engineered delicacy.

I take it one step further and co-opt space in the preparation kitchen’s refrigerator at Kigutu, to ensure I have access to yogurt (locally made, 

local strawberry yogurt

strawberry or plain, full fat, runny, home printed labels), peanut butter (also locally made with homemade labels pasted crookedly onto the jars, fluffy and delicious), and orange juice (from concentrate, yes, but no added sugar – score). 

locally made natural peanut butter

Breakfast is chapatis. The budget is tight, so it’s just chapatis. No butter, no confiture, no fruit, no napkins. They are fried and heavy and greasy and I love them. But I exercise restraint. I have had a couple, but I typically retreat to my oatmeal (which I prepare with the tea served) or yogurt and muesli.

We Americans find solace in our weekend trips to Bujumbura where we are masters of own appetite domain. We eat lovely grilled brochettes (kebab) at local places (our Burundian friends sometimes generously bring us along), or find inexpensive delicious Chinese (frequented by mzungos and locals alike), various varieties of excellent East and West African food, 

or occasionally visit the mzungo places and indulge in things like authentic pizza, solid Indian food, or really, anything with cheese.

Five weeks into my stay here, I have a trip planned to South Africa to visit a dear friend from when I lived in Sweden, now two decades ago. We haven’t seen each other in seven years, and it’s like no time has passed. She is married to a generous and warm South African, and lives in Cape Town with her beautiful family. They use words like “dah-ling” and “shame” and “hectic” (pronounced ”hayk-tic”) in ways that make me smile.  Having (gorgeous) twin almost-six-year-olds means the lovely house is always stocked with goodies and treats.

Karin, Maya, Max, Michael - chill time before bed

South Africa is an aberration in sub-saharan Africa; it might as well be in Europe. They have vast and bright grocery stores – of the super fun Marks & Spencer variety, called Woolworths or “Woolies” to the locals – and somehow, we find ourselves there every day. 

I eat everything in sight. The Woolworth version of Oreos (dare I say they are better than the original), helping upon helping of green salad with baby tomatoes and fresh herbs, roasted cashews, delicious thick lowfat yogurts, crunchy sweet granola, easy-peel succulent mandarins, rusks (if you know of rusks, then you know the joy). We have fresh non-UHT milk, maybe the biggest treat of all. We go out for sushi, and macarons with cappuccinos, and order in Thai. Karin’s sister and California-born husband make nachos grande one night, and I bake a chocolate cake and with a chili-cinnamon chocolate glaze, served with freshly whipped cinnamon cream and fresh figs. We have caught-that-day fish from the harbor down the road and a lavish vegetable medley (always including “buttah-nut”) on the braai, South African for barbecue. 

Karin and me at a local wine farm.

We drink gorgeous wine at home, and later visit the neighboring wine farms for some local varieties – a generous tasting each of six different wines for 30 Rand – about $4. In fact, I do all kinds of indulgent things, like wash my clothes with warm water in a washing machine, blow dry my hair  ( ! ), heat my homemade hot chocolate in a microwave, and take a shower almost too hot to enjoy, just because I can. I use not one, but two mildew-free towels on exit.

I do all of these things because I feel I have been deprived these five weeks.
I find I have been subsisting on a diet primarily of rice, oatmeal, peanut butter, dried fruit, yogurt, and excellent Burundian coffee, peppered with the occasional indulgence from a market run or alimentation stop, and dreamy exotic produce: bananas, avocados, passion fruit, mango, papaya, mandarina (green and tart little delicious oranges laden with seeds). This is deprived.  Hmmm.  My friend Tim tells me no worries – I can survive on avocados – they have everything I need. Phew.

To really talk about deprived, let's talk about the staple of a rural Burundian’s diet - cassava. Common in south and central America, we also call it yuca. There is a popular and delicious restaurant in my East Village neighborhood named after this apparently controversial tuber. 

It’s readily available in Burundi at little or no cost, and as a main supplement to the Burundian diet, is seen filling bicycle baskets all along the roadways. A common sight at the roadside markets is cassava ‘bread,’ a starchy, gummy white ball wrapped in a banana leaf. It has a texture like yeasty-bread-dough-meets-cookie-dough and a mildly bitter taste. 

 The leaves are also stewed and eaten. Cassava has debatable health implications. At best, there is no nutritional value but rather just empty carbs. At worst, cassava may be somewhat toxic when consumed in large quantities. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO UN): “Like other roots and tubers, cassava contains antinutritional factors and toxins.[5] It must be properly prepared before consumption. Improper preparation of cassava can leave enough residual cyanide to cause acute cyanide intoxication and goiters, and may even cause ataxia or partial paralysis.” The FAO UN has deemed cassava a ‘fall-back’ resource to be used as a food security crop in times of famine.

When walking up the road to Mugara the day we visited the baking co-op, Arnaud points out the cassava growing along the side of the road – he introduces it as the enemy.

For VHW, cassava is an enemy. Malnourishment and malnutrition are among the top challenges faced by the clinic staff. One of VHW’s four community programs focuses on Agriculture, Livestock, and Environment Protection, formerly known as Food Security; the program name was changed to accommodate the expanded focus. The major goal of this program is addressing the root cause of malnourishment and malnutrition: lack of food, lack of resources to grow food (seeds / land), and lack of education about nutrition and farming techniques.

The program aims to include participants from the community groups and schools. Women whose children have been admitted to the clinic’s malnutrition ward must participate in agricultural training, and it is available to those who volunteer for community hours at the clinic on Fridays (this is dozens of people from the catchment area who want to give back in thanks for what the clinic has done for the community). 

demonstrations gardens at Kigutu

The program provides training, teaching farming skills (“if you can grow carrots, you can harvest them, and then you can have them in your home”) using the beautiful demonstrations gardens on site. The program also provides farming materials – seedlings, watering cans, organic fertilizer.

VHW also supports the formation of agricultural co-ops – community members working together to produce and sell a crop or a resource. The Economic Development Program provides business training and assists in getting these co-ops legitimized as legal entities. They provide on-going support as the co-ops grow and develop. For the co-ops that are working well together and showing potential, there are occasional perks, like a goat give-away. Twice since I’ve been here, I’ve had the privilege of witnessing a select number of co-ops received a windfall of 20 goats each from VHW. The purchase of these goats is funded by various donor organizations that support the growth opportunities provided to the community by VHW. During a recent give-away, Melchiade, our community organizer, admonished the recipients “don’t … eat … the goats.” It’s tempting, but these goats are here to provide fertilizer to help crops flourish, and to breed and be sold to the benefit of the co-op. 

On a recent visit by a super cool and fun donor from Project Redwood, we had the opportunity to visit one of the co-ops that received goats.

They had built a nice little house for these new assets, and we were able to ask questions like, how have the goats helped you? (fertilizer), what do you grow? (various vegetables for subsistence and to sell at market), where is the garden? (not close by), how do you get the fertilizer to the garden? (on our heads). Wait – what? On their heads. Some of these women I see on the roadways, carrying baskets on their heads, are carrying baskets full of goat poop. The smell was as you might imagine. I tried to envision walking along a hot and dusty roadway, kids in tow and tied to my sweaty back, cars and buses racing by, hot sun beating down on me, with poop on my head. 

In the US, our biggest health concerns are heart disease, cancer, and stroke. By-products of an indulgent, sedentary lifestyle. In Burundi, the biggest health concerns are malaria (treatable, yet thousands die from it on a regular basis), tuberculosis (for which there is an immunization, but not accessible for the majority here), and malnourishment.

Malnourishment. People are dying in this country on a daily basis because they simply do not have enough food to eat. I have an image clearly ingrained my memory of World Vision t-shirts, printed for their 30-hour famine campaign, that announced that 32,000 children a day die of hunger. I had a giant bowl of oatmeal this morning, into which I mixed almond butter, then added raisins and peanuts, topped it with a perfectly ripe banana, and then drizzled it with a ginger honey I bought in South Africa. The minute I finished I declared that I was starving (refer to early reference to second breakfast). This is a word we throw around when we’re feeling maybe a bit peckish, or maybe even truly hungry. But we don’t know hunger the way much of the world knows hunger.

My office in Kigutu butts up against the triage area for the clinic. The doctors, nurses, and technicians here see upwards of 150 patients a day. There are screaming babies most of the morning every morning. Sometimes we muse that they are trying to outscream each other. I wonder how many of them are screaming because of empty bellies.

The six contributory factors to malnourishment in the VHW clinic catchment area are:

• Culture 
• Lack of education of parents 
• Family size 
• Poverty 
• The Child Health system (the health centers are not educated on the issue) 
• Population density, leading to lack of land capacity for subsistence farming 

As to culture, there is apparently conflict between the fact that the women care for the children, but in these traditional households, men make the decisions about the use of money. 

As to family size, I was struck early in my stay here about how often the word ‘family planning’ is thrown around in conversation among my young, mid-20s to early-30s male Burundian colleagues. They ask how many siblings I have – one (super awesome) sister. Wow – they are impressed. Americans know about family planning. They have 6, 7, 8+ siblings. How many young professional guys do you know in the states who have ever even thought about family planning, let alone discuss it over breakfast? I don’t know any. They are talking about Tim Tebow and JP Morgan Chase today. But when I look at the chart below, I understand. These guys work here because they are passionate about the cause – about health and its ability to augment their society and their country. They know far too well the adverse effects of a too-large family.

The chart above shows the number of VHW cases of malnutrition, analyzed against family size, in 2011.  

An intersection of the effects of these two issues – culture and family size – unfortunately happens within the church. As I've written, this is a deeply faith-based society. Many are devout worshipers. I am learning that some denominations within the larger “church” here (I have heard different things about different denominations – Catholic and Pentecostal alike – so I won’t single out any one denomination) have very strong teachings. In some parishes, people have apparently been told they will be excommunicated if they practice family planning. I have heard of people being kicked out of churches because they were not producing enough children fast enough so foul play was suspected. This brings great conflict on these people who are not educated on the issue, think they are doing right by following the teachings of the church, and end up putting their children and themselves in danger as their families grow and they cannot support them. 

In addition, a recent change in laws now allows children under the age of five and maternal health cases to be treated in state hospitals without cost to the patient. While this is ostensibly good for the general health of women and children, it does nothing to discourage the growth of family size.

While some of the causes of malnourishment and malnutrition have solutions (education), the issues of poverty and population density persist. Burundi is a country of about 8 million people, most of who are living in extreme poverty. I put this into perspective by imagining the vast majority of the denizens of the five boroughs of New York City living below the poverty line. Seems hard to get my head around.

So what are the solutions? While the international development and relief community consistently works on strategy and approaches to address this colossal need, the rest of us have the ability to make smaller choices – we can continue to amass things and experiences and space and dividends. Or we can use some of the resources and the blessings we have been given to support the efforts of so many – with our time, with exposure, with education, with funds. There is work being done and it is making a difference. Change can come – buke buke, yes, but it’s not impossible. 

As our world continues to globalize in ways that were unthinkable just a handful of years ago even, has our responsibility grown? How has our response changed? Does knowing more translate necessarily into doing more? Reading more? Giving more? Thinking more? Feeling more?  Have we a responsibility to give of ourselves to help those in great need?  The parable of the faithful servant would suggest so:  "From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded."  It's a personal topic - one that cannot be dictated, but must be felt.  I'll close this (very long) post with these thoughts and questions.  While my version of food security is getting grumpy if I don't get second breakfast, can I keep the perspective of my global neighbors, and stand in solidarity with those who don't even get first breakfast?  We can find ways to accept this responsibility if we choose.  It's up to us to decide if we will.   

Amos Lee: The people on the street, out on buses or on feet – we all got the same blood flow.

Amos Lee's wistful lyrics tell a story of a changing neighborhood, an evolution of life as time passes, as money changes people's circumstances.  He reflects "but sometimes, we forget what we got, who we are, who are are not."

We do forget what we've got, don't we.  Or maybe we remember too much - and get wrapped up in these things we've got, forgetting (ignoring?) that across the globe, we are an anomaly.  Yet we hold our belongings as a sense of pride, collecting more and taking inventory.  Which easily feeds into us forgetting who we are, and who we are not - trading our true identities for ones we've crafted and built with our stuff, and have then faked others into believing.  

I imagine what the lives of my colleagues - outside of our almost uncomfortably close work-life imbalance - might be like, and then start to have occasion to put the facts to the imaginings.  I have created these pictures in my mind of how people here have grown up, based on what I see around me.  I dare not ask where people buy their nice clothes - there is no Gap or Ben Sherman, but rather all I see are dilapidated market stalls, or roadside stations with clothing - sometimes new - in rice bags or laid out neatly on tarps, or young guys walking around the city carrying shoes or belts to sell to passersby.  I am surprised when our vehicle stops by a colleague's family home to pick him up before heading to Kigutu - he lives behind a giant wall with a guarded gated entrance in an exclusive neighborhood.  He was educated in France.  He speaks three languages fluently.  I am embarrassingly reminded of how important it is to me that people have the right image of me - the image I want them to have, that in some ways I've crafted - and this encounter, which scolds me about misperceptions I've created out of nothing, reminds me of how beyond my control that all is.  As I type this, I am silently wincing, wondering why it matters at all.

As I watch life roll along here, and hear the new and mysterious sounds, smell the vaguely familiar smells, and feel my reactions to the chaos, wonder, danger, and energy around me progressively shift, I am also struck by this reminder, this truth that we do all have the same blood flow.  Why do I feel that these people are so different from me?  Is it this image I've created of who I am, which differs so vastly from who I think they are?    

A day in the life of most Burundians does however tell the story that, while we do all have the same blood flow, the realities of our lives are, as a simple point of fact, vastly different.  It's a stark reminder of what we've got - and in some ways, who we are and who we are not.  And to me, in this context, "who we are not" is not a source of pride.  I see my inner accusatory finger scolding me, imploring me to remember that at the end of the day, we are all people -  a simple and undeniable (and beautiful) truth.

So without further ado, a small glimpse into a day in the life ...

The day starts with cooking breakfast:

cooking in our houses is done outside over open wood-burning embers,
as in most households and restaurants

a brisk walk

a refreshing shower.



Errands fill the to-do list:



Swing by Home Depot to pick up some building materials for the weekend's home improvement project ....


Also need to pick up some underwear


Stop by the shoe store to feed the guilty pleasure ...


Drop some alterations off at the tailor ....


Quick trim at the salon



Out of phone credits, so a quick stop at the payphone to check messages ....


Also need to grab a case of bottled water.


Pick up a friend at the taxi stand



Have a nice lunch together at an old local stand-by.


Pick up the kids from day care (need the double stroller)



Traffic jam on the way home!




Whoops forgot to refill phone credits - stop by the corner shop ...

Now rushing home for the new furniture delivery!



Landscapers are there cutting the grass.

grass being cut by hand with a machete - the typical method

Finally at the end of the day, a moment to rest ... sunset.


In the chorus of the song, Amos Lee implores us: "... we got a chance, to make it right. Keep it loose, keep it tight."  It's up to us to decide what's important and real, and what's simply our own fabrication for the sake of striving so determinedly for that American ideal of setting ourselves apart.  Can we not just embrace that we've all got the same blood flow?  This small realization makes me feel a sense of camaraderie with Leance who runs the shipping-container kiosk across the road from my Bujumbura home, and Pierre who washes my clothes, my dishes, and my bathroom. Even if I can't communicate much with them beyond greetings and gestures and smiles, at our core there is blood flow.  And it does all flow the same way.

ZZ Top: Have mercy, old bus be packed up tight.

When Dusty and Billy wrote this song, I have to wonder if they were recounting an experience in Africa.

Though probably not, because unlike the opening line to this song, you never have to wait all day for the bus.  They come by every few minutes in fact – hold out your hand, wherever you are along the way, and if there’s room, they’ll stop; and often even if there is not room.  They’re all packed.  And I mean packed.  They are not the city buses you are thinking of, but rather small vans, much like an airport shuttle, so everyone is seated.  In theory anyway.  The four rows all have a small collapsible (and debatably stable) seat at the end, so in transit, not an inch is wasted.  And I mean not an inch at any given moment.  Rows that seat four will often have five or six adults squeezed in.  Yet that doesn’t deter the drivers from stopping or the porters from taking on passengers – people are arranged to sit on strangers’ laps, the porter will often stand, hunched over, for long chunks of the journey, his rear end maybe hanging out of the slid-open window or hovering in someone’s face.  I spent a good half hour of one bus trip basically on my knees, shins digging into the hump behind the driver’s seat, fighting to keep a portion of one butt cheek on the torn and taped-up seat behind me, as the passengers on either side slowly inched me out.  Periodically throughout the trip, the porter watches my arm as he gently pokes it – I think he’s waiting for a bruise to form under my thin skin.  Towards the end of this ride, the porter, the guy on my left, and the guy behind Claire engage in a conversation peppered with uproarious laughter and the word mzungo over and again.  I’m slightly uncomfortable imagining the unsavory content of the conversation; Claire assuages this by imagining they’re telling the mzungo version of “your momma” jokes.

The drivers are mostly maniacal and are on the horn – hard! (no polite “toot toot”s) – more than they’re off it.  They will come up behind a bicycle (carrying, say, a bed, or a bundle of 10-foot poles) with unfathomable speed, and then lean on the horn.  The cyclist doesn’t flinch.  The chickens and goats scurry out of the way.  Everyone knows the drill.  Dust-covered small children sit along the roadsides, inches from the buses roaring past.  One driver pulled on his seatbelt as we approached a military check point (they do spot inspections and occasionally check papers), and promptly removes it once out of sign of the soldiers.  Before I left for Africa, I received countless exhortations of “be careful!”  I assume my family and friends meant from alligators and snakes, or terrorists and bandits, or forbidden trans-continental love.  I don’t suppose they were referring to the bus.  But as it turns out, riding the public bus is probably the most dangerous thing I do in Burundi. 

The roads are trashed – the smooth portions are a brief respite from the jostling and jerking that colors most of the ride. 

And colorful it is.  While stops are made on an as-needed basis at the wave of an arm, there are a few pre-determined stops at the small towns that dot the route.  At these stops, the buses are swarmed with women and boys peddling their goods, elbowing each other out of the way to get the windows – baskets of fruits and vegetables on heads (“Madame Madame!  Mandarina!  Mille francs!”), platters of banana-leaf encased cassava “bread,” bunches of onions, hard-cooked eggs (also stacked on heads), peanut packets, freshly grilled skewered “brochettes“ (kebab), bunches of miniature bananas. 

The sight of a mzungo on the bus will elicit particular enthusiasm; I imagine they envision a profit in their future.  I love the excitement of these roadside transactions (and the prospect of having some fresh produce at my disposal) – but make it fast … when the bus is ready to go, it goes, whether or not your hand is out the window in mid-exchange.  As the bus takes off, the porter is without fail still hanging out of the open door – he eventually piles inside and slides the door shut with an authoritative slam.  

There is of course no schedule – as soon as they’re full, they go.  The city buses operate from the area just outside of old market in downtown Bujumbura, which sadly has recently been rendered inoperable by a fire – arson is suspected.  We can take these buses back and forth between downtown and our house in Buj. The chaos is dizzying.  How anyone knows which bus goes where, I have no idea, but everyone seems to know. The buses are parked so close to each other, one has to almost turn sideways to pass between them.  A guy is walking around holding two live chickens upside down by the feet.  Somehow, my colleague Peter finds the bus that will take us to our street’s corner – it costs just under 20 cents.

Catching a bus between Kigutu and and Bujumbura is less confusing, but no less chaotic. The very second we step out of a cab or a VHW vehicle at the depots (which are just the gas station or street corner where buses once began convening and have done so ever since), we are surrounded by young guys anxious to outscream each other and win our business.  On a journey this week to Kigutu with a Burundian friend, there is a fierce negotiation as we arrive at the solicited vehicle to discover the only seats left are in the first row, next to the doors.  Arnaud tells me he is insisting that the porter not add three more passengers to the already-full front row, which is of course common practice; at each stop, Arnaud gives the porter the hairy eyeball, ensuring the promise is kept.  The guy next to me has a giant television on his lap. 

As a sidenote to my friends in New York, I am apparently not the last living person with a tube tv; I now know there are two of us.  When tv guy exits at a stop along the way, I slide over toward the door.  As the porter goes to close it, people in the back admonish him “don’t break the mzungo.”

Claire and me - risking it all in the front seat.

If you’re lucky (and enjoy danger), you score shotgun, which keeps you immune from the fight for butt space or the violation of the sanctity of your own lap.  On a recent journey, my friend Claire and I were hurriedly escorted from our VHW vehicle to the front seat of a bus headed for Bujumbura, as two passengers disembarked.  I figured we had gotten lucky, not noticing that these two passengers simply climbed in the back to continue their journey.  I later remember my friend Gerard having an intense conversation in Kirundi (they always seem to be intense) from the front of our VHW vehicle through the open rear doors, with the porter.  Sometime later, I twig on and ask him if he negotiated that front seat for me – of course, he says.  He didn’t think I’d be happy in the back, strangers climbing over me, huddled among the masses.  I never cease to be touched by the way my Burundian friends take care of me.  

Money is exchanged informally at some point (no one knows when) along the way.  A tap on the shoulder and a rubbing of fingers indicates it’s time.  Money is passed from the back of the bus from passenger to passenger to reach the porter.  The two-hour ride from upcountry (any place outside of the capital, whether north or south, is “upcountry”) to Bujumbura is 3000 BIF – less than $2.

The vehicles are all in unbelievable disrepair.  The sliding side doors and exterior luxuries like bumpers hang on by a thread, everything inside is filthy, dusty, cracked, torn, taped, peeling, uneven, inoperable (ahem, seatbelts), wobbly.   In contrast to the dilapidation is the names of these buses.  Bright metallic letters shine on windshields with proud names like Bless of God (sic), God is One, God is Power Full (sic), Only God, Fils de Dieu (son of God), God Love Me (sic), Chance of God.  Others have seemingly random names like “Doucement” (softly) and Old Secret – I’m sure they mean something profound to someone.  Many of course are in Kirundi or Swahili, and I do see the word “Imana” on several – Kirundi for God.  Some have hilarious juxtapositions, like “In God We Trust” on the front, and “Lakers” across the back.  My favorite so far is “Elvis.”  Even in Burundi he’s the king.

I sit with a South African on my flight to Johannesburg.  He has worked in Angola, Rwanda, and presently Uganda.  We discuss the buses – his face expresses horror as he eschews the idea of ever riding the public bus in such countries (his stories about the buses in Tanzania are so outrageous that I now think Burundi comparatively safe).  My South African friends in Bujumbura would agree – they wouldn’t get on the bus if you paid them.  Well, easy for them – they have cars.  But we do not.  So travel between Kigutu and Bujumbura, if schedules don’t coincide with a VHW trip, necessitates the bus.   And without fail, have mercy indeed – old bus be packed up tight!