DON'T JUST SIT THERE!

Did you ever wonder about why things are as they are? Or why we see atrocities in other countries but not in our backyards? It's all a manifestation of human nature. In the end, we're all screwed, but we can at least get some satisfaction from understanding and anticipating human behavior.

I just had a series of conversations with a colleague from Ghana who is in on a temporary duty assignment with us in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). He is based in Kindu, and I have to admit I have a soft spot in my heart for Kindu because I spent three weeks there in April 2004 on a short-term contract. The interesting aspect is that, for some reason, Africans think that there is little variation in conditions, customs, and context between the different places on the continent. Then they either come to the DR Congo (for the foreigners) or they take a trip to another country in Africa (for the Congolese), and it is like a slap in the face for them when they see the differences.

For example, a few of our staff in the Finance Department spent a week in Nairobi for workshop recently. Now, Americans sometimes refer to Nairobi as “Nairobbery” because of the crime rate and the frequent theft of items from baggage in the Kenyatta Airport. But these Congolese staff came back wondering why their country could not be at least equal to Nairobi. Why were the differences so stark and obvious? Kenyatta Airport is relatively clean. Ndjili Airport in Kinshasa is a shit hole relative anything but a sanitary landfill. And the airport staff are the equivalent of the scavengers in the dump.

So, getting back to my conversations with my Ghanaian colleague, whenever we spoke of some glaring injustice or downright shitty conditions, I found myself frequently shrugging my shoulders and saying that it was normal, with the qualifier that “normal” is relative to the context. Normality has many implications.

In Egypt, a largely (+/- 90% of the population) Muslim country, a discussion with my staff led us to the following: A man slaps his wife around every other day. So, it is normal. Does that make it right?

In southern Maniema province in the DRC, a baseline study found that at least 1/3 of the women had been raped, and that to visit family members in the local jail (families must provide food), they usually are subjected to rape. It’s just normal.

I just saw an article in the news that a “political party” in the Netherlands (Neverland?) wants to lower the age for females to become prostitutes from 16 to 12…Normal?

It’s all relative, I guess, depending on your frame of reference.

Another colleague, a Kenyan, was with me in a small Cessna airplane. As we flew into Kasongo in rural southern Maniema, he asked if we would see any animals from the plane as we landed. Well, just outside of Nairobi, there are game / safari parks and you may see giraffes or other wildlife from the plane as you come in. Personally, it had never occurred to me to look for animals in any space touched by the Congolese. They’d have eaten them all already. For example, on a return trip to Kinshasa in the same small plane, as we taxied up to the hangar, we saw five boys attacking some brush with sticks. They were hunting field mice…in an urban environment…so, I guess that makes them rats. Normal, or maybe not, because tonight, they were putting MEAT ON THE TABLE!

This is the first country where I have worked that does not habitually use a reference to God or some superior being. You know, the Muslims say, “Insha-allah,” the Latin Americans, “Si Dios quiere,” the Malagasy, “Manenteina,” and on and on. Here, it’s “Débrouillez-vous.” Loose translation: “It’s your problem, deal with it!” How could they possibly have any social cohesion in this context? However, sometimes I see a sort of “community spirit” when the Kinois (people of Kinshasa) gang up on foreigners who have been obliged to stray into their domain. But I am never sure about whether the spoils are actually shared or just shown off as a sign of superiority. I had a conversation once with a boy of 11 years old who had been demobilized from a militia. He said he had no problem to break into a neighbor’s home, killing him if necessary, to rob his riches if they were relatively abundant as compared to those in the community. I then asked him how he would feel if he was the one with the abundant resources. He replied that he would have already distributed his wealth to others. HA! I may be jaundiced on this, but once he has his hands on it, he would only spread it around to increase his position in society, and he would make a big deal of his “generosity”, no less.

People aspire to be like those they envy. Their degree of moral flexibility is probably directly related to their degree of poverty and desperation. The powerful ones here get away with so much it sickens me, and makes me want to leave, after smacking them in the face, of course.

One of the most frustrating aspects of working here is the impunity that will impede any changes at the necessary level to get rid of the thieves at the top. I enjoy my work because the objective is to work myself out of a job. It’s something to aspire to. And it is particularly gratifying to see someone who has learned and taken over, in a competent manner, the work you so diligently performed, and you can walk away and not feel that things would fall apart as soon as the door slammed behind you.