Thoughts on a Lazy Sunday

Date: 30 December 2007

Time has been a strange concept during this entire trip. It seems to go by gradually, and calmly, but at the same time it's zooming past. I can't believe that in exactly 2 weeks from today, I'll be on a plane out of here.

Today's been a very relaxing day: I slept in, washed my clothes, had some fufu (I swear, I'm going to probably crave the stuff once I can't have any more of it - Clara actually asked me whether I wanted fufu or spaghetti and I opted for fufu. I don't understand my thought pattern here). I finished reading a book, listened to some music while I sat in the sun just staring out into the distance, thinking and pondering about the world at large and my own place in it.

The concept of "working" has also been changed for me completely. Things like structure, organisation, deadlines, and tasks are totally different to anything I've ever experienced. Being someone who likes to know exactly what's going on, have concrete, tangible outcomes to work towards, and who, I admit it, is irritatingly stubborn and perhaps inflexible when it comes to certain things, being in Togo has really challenged me. I recently came to the realisation that getting really angry and frustrated about people not keeping appointments, or not having a clear, definite blueprint of what your "boss" wants you to do (I use quote marks because... okay I'm not even going to get into that) - yeah, it won't do you any good. In fact, nobody cares, and you end up just getting yourself worked up into a very agitated and tense state of mind, which then impairs any ability you might have had to turn the situation around and take initiative to do something about it.

For example, I finished translating the kids' songs about 3 weeks ago, and the Director told me that he'd let me know when he wants me to start teaching the kids. So I was twiddling my thumbs, waiting, wondering when the heck this was going to happen. It started really getting to me - I hate having to be dependent on someone else to decide when I can do what I'm supposed to. Then earlier this week, while I was at the office, a bunch of kids were hanging out, playing, and I decided - yeah, you know what, the songs are ready to be taught, the kids have nothing to do, I'm just going to go right ahead and create my own little classroom situation. So I called them over to the other room, got the blackboard and chalk happening, and we practised singing the new songs for a couple of hours. It was AWESOME. They picked it up really fast, I was amazed.

I was dead at the end of the class though. While I was standing, pointing out the words as they sang, I was carrying one kid who fell asleep on my shoulder and being pulled at by another one. It was very hot, my voice was hoarse from repeating the same lines of the songs over and over, my back was killing me, and occasionally I had to break up a fight between these particular 4 boys (all under 6 years old) who kept attacking each other intermittently, which was a challenge seeing as they spoke no English and I, obviously, no French. That night, though, I went to sleep feeling very happy and content.

After several weeks of intense frustration at the lack of organisation and direction, I finally learned this week that you don't actually have to wait around. Just get up, do it. I don't know how the Director feels about me defying him and just going ahead with the lessons, but frankly, I'm leaving in 2 weeks, time is running out, so I kind of don't care. The guy's M.I.A. a lot of the time and I'll end up being the only person in a position of any kind of authority at the CTM centre, so I kind of needed to grab the bull by the horns.

I have to say - if it wasn't for these kids, man, I don't know I'd cope. On several occasions, when I've felt like I've had it and am going to explode, and get into the worst mood I can muster, all it takes is one of these kids to come along, and we'll play for a little bit, or have a simple chat, or just sit together, and my mindframe totally shifts. It recentres me and reminds me why I'm here. We (okay, I) get so hung up sometimes on needing to be able to identify a clear result of the effort I've put in to something. I've realised that by doing that, I limit myself, because there are some invaluable lessons or insights that we learn, but you can't compact them into 'result X' or 'outcome Y'. A whole collection of events and experiences, over a long period of time, can result in one small, but important lesson that one needs to learn. And conversely, through one tiny experience, you can unravel a whole new perspective on something, which maybe you never considered.

(Sort of concerned that this isn't making much sense, but hey, it's my blog, I'll be as nonsensical as I want. HA.)

Sometimes we just need to slow down. Take a breath, look around, and just be. These days I've been making myself sit down, evacuate all irrelevant thoughts, worries, wants, and stresses from my head, and just ask myself, what are the things which I wouldn't have learned if I hadn't come here? (I'm having a problem with the masked double negative there, but somehow it's easier for me to answer that question than "What have I learned?") It forces me to press the pause button, stop getting angry or irritated, and take a step back, as if I'm an outsider looking in. This happens a LOT - I'll just disconnect from where I am, who I am, and feel like I'm watching myself from another place. It's very weird, but very helpful.

With every new experience, there are lessons learned. And everytime, I think, wow, I've definitely learned that, but then you'll see an entirely new perspective on that in a subsequent experience, and realise how little you actually know. You learn things you didn't even think you could learn, or needed to learn. Where you are, who you meet, what you do, and the challenges and obstacles you face, so many factors, make you interpret the world differently (I know I'm stating the obvious). Maybe in an initial experience you learn the core of a vital insight, but then with everything that follows it, it's like it branches out and develops what you thought you "knew". Knowledge isn't meant to be static, or finite - and knowledge is nothing without challenge to that knowledge. At first it's a little unsettling - finding out that you will never know everything, but now I see it as exciting - imagine, every little thing you experience has a treasure waiting to be unearthed, and these treasures aren't definite in number, they're everywhere. You get guided towards them, no matter what decisions you make, or what feats you underatke.

Okay, I should probably stop myself before I get too philosophical.

On a different note - I'm going to a Togolese nightclub with some friends tonight. They seem really adamant that I experience this, even though I expressed that it wasn't essential, and that I'd live quite happily without it. But yeah, it's happening.

....

(Samar I'm aware of how you're looking at me right now.)

BY the way, thanks to all of you who are reading this - it's very encouraging, and motivates me to update regularly, which is really a bonus for me, since I get to have a written record of this experience. I appreciate it! (I acknowledge the great effort required to get through the piles of incoherence, you deserve a medal.)

P.S. This is completely unrelated, but okay, has anyone tried Microsoft OneNote????? UM. IT'S AWESOME. I actually can't wait until uni starts so that I can start using it.

All In A Day's Work

Date: Wed, 5 Dec 2007

WOW. Today was an amazing day. I finally felt like I was here to do what I came for. Kind of hard to explain - but I'll try. Even though I tried to eliminate all kinds of expectations before coming here, I constantly had this picture in my mind of what I'd be doing, and today was the realisation of that picture. Note that when I say "picture" I mean an actual picture - a certain scene, certain colours, certain people, etc. It was one of those moments where your imagination, your dreams, and reality combine and you feel extremely balanced, and centred, and like everything has come full circle. It was incredible. And it's set in motion events that are probably going to last until the end of my internship. I shall explain.

Okay, so I think I mentioned before that part of what CTM does, is the teenagers/early-twentysomethings go around to various villages and perform skits and songs that aim to sensitise the local populations about children's rights. Today was our first trip out to a couple of the villages - the entire day I had this sense of well-being and wholesomeness. A couple of posts ago I was sort of down and out about the state of the world, but today was like the universe's reply to that - because I saw things, and met people, which reassured me that nothing is static. Progress is being made whether we realise it or not; there are good people in the world - lots of them! And they're doing great things. And even if we don't come into contact with a lot of them, there are forces beyond us, working behind the scenes, making things happen.

I travelled with the Director, and a few of the performers - a very long ride in a rickety old car in the scorching heat, but the entire experience was non-stop enjoyable. We all met up at 6.30am, but good old African time did it's thing and we hit the road at about 8.30am. Fine though (I almost said that I'm getting used to African time, but I'd be lying - getting better slowly though).

Me and a couple of the guys in the skits - Selom (yellow) and Dwak (white):

Squished in the backseat in the rickety old car (clearly I'm pondering some weighty questions about the world [I was actually thinking about how I'd kill for a Coke at this point])

You're probably going to have a really hard time finding me in this picture since I blend in so well.

Outside the home of the village chief

I was very apprehensive about accepting this drink since it smelled like nail polish remover. They assured me there was no alcohol, so I took a sip, nearly died, and thought it was better to leave it at that.

This guy next to me, Selom, is a life-saver. He's become my personal interpreter and it's been SUCH an enormous help. At this event they were talking about the importance of registering births and issuing birth certificates for children, and how that will affect their rights and opportunities in the future - as you can see I'm concentrating very very hard. Oh yes.

What I loved about today was that I saw in front of me people taking initiative to address issues in their communities, and they did it in a way that wasn't blaming anyone, or scolding anyone. It was light-hearted, informative (based on the translation I got), and seeing the looks on the faces of the audience was really cool - lots of nodding and sounds of agreement, lots of smiles, just a very positive atmosphere in general. We're going again tomorrow, and I can't wait. I'm determined now to learn more sentences in Ewe so that I can have some simple conversations with the locals. "My name is Rasha, I live in New Zealand" leaves more to be desired, plus I feel very lame ending it at that.

Will keep posting more pics and more of my rantings! Hope they're not heinously boring :D
By the way, does the system of most recent blog post to least recent post bother anyone else? I find it very unnatural, even though I know it's meant to be more logical. But still. Annoying.