Goodbye Family, Hello Family

Today I depart for the west. Home. I feel sick. Or maybe the sick feeling is imminent, but I know its coming. How bizarre to leave this family that has provided so much for me. I am neglecting them as they move, as the make huge decisions, at Christmas! They are confused and frustrated and alone in Africa, and I am a horrible person. They are in pain as they watch me pack up the Christmas presents I am to deliver to their friends in Nashville because they know that I will soon be with the people that they want so badly to see.

They have been too good to me. It was so easy to join this family. They welcomed me with open arms and open hearts. I have learned so much about children and parenting as I watched Kara and Jeff respond to Claire and Carter, and the open conversations that they have as a family. I have learned about marriage from watching Kara and Jeff together working side by side and running the family together. Mostly, this family has enabled me to learn so much about myself.

I was in a funny position. I spent the last 4 months looking in on their family, judging, thinking and forming my opinions, and analyzing them.

Kara and Jeff raise their children to be caring, aware, friendly kids who are already at such young ages capable of so much. We visited the new house at Kampala recently to check on some things before the big move. As Claire Marin and I stood looking at the house, I asked her “Do you want to move”? She looked up at me with her huge brown eyes and said, “Sure, I don’t really care. It will be easier for us here.” This nine year old girl who will move 3 times in 9 months understands the importance of making sacrifices for her family. She doesn’t complain, ever. Kara and Jeff have raised her to be humble and to take such joy in small things like Christmas trees and mangoes. I’m in awe of her. When I asked her if she would go to boarding school like Jeff did, she said, “I would leave and Carter would still be at home. I couldn’t leave him.” She’s smart and sensitive. How did she get to be like this? I only wonder what she will be like in 10 years if she is this mature now.

The Olivers are not only a family, they are a team. When one person is down and out, the whole family soon feels the same. They are tired together, excited together, and working together. Maybe this experience has brought them closer or maybe they were already like this, but regardless the patience and understanding that they have for each other is admirable beyond words. I cannot count the number of times I have walked into the living room after a long stint of homework and found all four of them sitting together enjoying each others company. In fact, as I write, they sit, a foursome together chatting.

The community here adores them. The work they do is long, tedious, often uncomfortable, but they do it so well. Anyone can see that they were meant for a life in mission. They relate to people so easily and have clearly won over the affection of the community. As they figure this country out, they take genuine delight in each new piece of information they find instead of being annoyed that they didn’t find it sooner. And their friends here are humored by the disorientation, puzzlement, and glee the culture in Malawi provides the Olivers with.

They are passionate, high spirited people who don’t allow their feelings about home or personal struggles get in the way of their work. They work hard and know when it is time to rest.

This morning they filed into my room to give me a beautiful wooden bird from Kenya and a card to read on the plane.  They stood their in a line and again I can’t help but feel that I am neglecting them and the important work they do. But of course I don’t only feel guilty, I feel sad. They are my family, I love all of them. The Olivers are incredible.

Saying Goodbye is Hard

Saying goodbye is hard. I feel like I’m waiting and waiting for the moment of truth where I actually have to look into their eyes for the last time and say ‘so long, farewell’. Eventually that time will arrive and what will I do? I will stand there like a fool, tears in my eyes, just staring. I have no idea how to say good bye. I wish I didn’t have to.

How can I say thank you to the little girl I have a sisterly affection for or the family that welcomed me into their home….who I ate with every night, who I traveled with, who I laughed with? I have no idea.

How can I say goodbye to the people that introduced themselves to me on my first day of school, who I hiked up a mountain with, who I spent hours talking to but haven’t even begun to really know? How can I say goodbye to the teacher who offered me an outrageous opportunity or the teacher who taught me to love poetry?  How can I say goodbye to people that I may never see again? How can I say goodbye to the people that made these months what they were for me?  How can I say goodbye and also thank you?

“It has been a pleasure to know you.” Not sincere enough.

“I love you; never forget me.” Too dramatic.

“Good luck with everything.”Too brief.

“Words cannot express…” Too cliché.

I can’t come to terms with the fact that in my existence, there will be people who will float into my life with great import, make an extremely strong impression on me, and float away because of distance. Distance is such a curious thing. I think often about how funny it is that I was ever able to meet the people that I met here. I never would have thought, but by a long string of chance events, somehow, we managed to cross paths, and to briefly land on the same cloud.

I let them into my heart because I wanted to know them, because I knew that they had some small, remarkable thing to bring my attention to and I to them, but all the while knowing that I would have to say goodbye very soon. Maybe as I did it, I believed that I would see them again. But how realistic is that really? Is every promise I make an empty room?

“Sure, let’s meet up in Greece!”

”Holland next summer!”

“You’re welcome in my home anytime.”

“I’ll write to you once a week.”

“You would love my brother. I’ll set you up with him if you come to the states.”

If I have made such an impression on them that they will remember me, their memory won’t be the last thing I said to them, or the look in my eye. I suppose, they’ll remember me by the time that we shared. As will I.

Reflection

As my time in Malawi comes to a close (I have about 8 days left), I have no choice but to begin and reflect on the last four months as a whole.

Slowly but surely I began to love this place, to love everything about it. I began to love the people at church that shake my hand and greet me with smiles. I began to love the student, Chimwemwe who drops by the house unexpectedly just to chat (often for hours), and the students at my school who complain about Malawi, but clearly take pride in this country and the fact that they call it home. I began love the Jacaranda trees that bloom wildly around the city, the hot air, the stillness of a night with no electricity. When I stand up in front of a group to introduce myself, I start by saying, “I really love Malawi”, and it couldn’t be truer.

But at the same time, I’m startled at how routine things have become; my life in Africa has normalized. I never thought this experience would stop being an experience and start just being life. But, I think, that’s part of the experience.

When I’m gazing out the window at Ndirande Mountain during my geography lesson or I’m sitting around the dinner table with the Olivers. Maybe it’s late at night and I’m cross-legged on my bed in the dark or driving through the Malawian bush, mashed into the back seat. Or at the lake, sitting on the deck of a boat watching the sunset. It’s during these times that I become conscious of how lucky I am or how crazy I am, depending on the way you look at things. But day-to-day, its just life. Dangerously easy to get used to.

Dangerous because it would be so easy to stay. Strangely enough, I’ve fallen into a comfort zone here. Going home will be the difficult part. I think to go home and face all of the sacrifices I made; to face my friends and everything I have missed, and to face my future will be the tough part.  Plus the fact that I am really, really going to miss it here.

So for what reason am I going? Why do I feel compelled to leave a place if I love it so much? It’s very simple, actually. I need to go home. I need to see my family again. I miss them tremendously. It’s True, I have a family here but, I’m ready to be a Bryant again.

And I need to graduate high school.

My feet are cracked, and perpetually black on the bottoms, my hair is ratty, split and damaged from the dry air. Even Reverend Nkata tells me I need to brush it. My nails are not transparent as they should be and I miss my family and friends, but somehow I just can’t imagine leaving this place and these people that I have learned to love. How can I even begin to say goodbye?

 

Language

Being around all of these bilingual, trilingual, quad lingual and etc. people really makes one feel dumb. It’s what happens at an international school. The official language of the school is English, but if you listen, there is always someone jabbering into a cell phone in an unrecognizable tongue, or two kids shouting across the quad in Afrikaans. Gosh, that’s the beauty of the place.

In the past several years, as I’ve begun to think about my future, and what on earth I’m going to study and do with my life, the idea of French has been almost constant. I must learn this beautiful language. I will minor in French, then I will spend time in Francophone countries, and I will speak to my children in French and English. I really love the language and I think it’s extremely valuable to have the ability to speak to people who are different than you.

A thought has occurred. My friends who can speak several languages and understand even more have not necessarily learned them in a classroom. They know these languages because they have grown up in households and locations where it is a necessity. A friend of mine fled from Zimbabwe to Mozambique and became fluent in Portuguese in 4 months. As a single woman, she needed to support herself and the only way to do this was to learn the language. She had no choice and her desperation drove her to be hasty and precise. Her fluency in English, French, and Shona (native to Zim) weren’t going to help her in Mozambique.  And of course she takes for granted how incredibly impressive she is.

In most of Africa, if you want to make decent money, you must know English. Must. It’s a sign of education. Of course, I look at this in admiration but as my French teacher says to me weekly, “Don’t be discouraged, Marie Claire. Il n’est pas un chose facile apprendre un langue.”  It isn’t an easy thing to learn a language.

But I think the best way to learn a language is out of necessity. As English-speakers, a necessity to learn another language is becoming harder to come by. As the world learns English, we allow ourselves to get lazier, because the world makes it easier for us. I ought to feel relieved of this subject that is no longer necessary for me, but instead I’m disappointed. Strangely, I would love to be forced into a situation that pushes me to learn a new tongue.

So maybe, it would be a waste of time and money to study French in college. How much more can I really learn in a classroom?  I could use maybe one more year of schooling, but after that I think there is very little I can be taught. I have to speak it, hear it. I have to be immersed. This is a new thought for me.

African Rain

In Africa, rain is powerful. I don’t mean that necessarily in a physical sense, though it is, I mean its affect is powerful. It gets inside of you, into your bones. It’s beautiful because it’s so rare. I have never seen rain like I see it here. It sounds different, smells different, looks different, and it well may be exactly the same as it is in my hometown, but it’s different.

Before a big rain, clouds become big and mean. They turn dark, dark gray, bulging down from the sky, seeming touchable. The greening trees stand out boldly against the angry, floating, gray masses. You can sit outside and literally watch the storm roll in like a great big hovering bird.

Today, I had no desire to get out of the rain. Despite the fact that I was wearing a white, partially see-through oxford shirt, I couldn’t help myself but to stay and be doused by the downpour. Me, who has been sweating nonstop for 2 weeks needed to experience standing in the African rain with my new African friends.

Things continue in the event of rain. At school, if there is cricket practice and it begins to pour, so be it, you’ll get wet. Afterwards it’s ten times more satisfying to peel of your clothes and curl up with a cup of Chombe tea.

The whole city is transformed in the midst of rain. Everyone is thankful for a break from the seemingly relentless heat. People relax in the presence of rain. Perhaps it’s the cool air and the light, chilly breeze. Maybe it’s the lack of fervent sunlight, and the fact that you can open your eyes all the way when you walk outside. Or maybe it’s the reassurance that for this year, there will be no drought, and at least there will be water.

The stillness in the aftermath of a rain is also powerful, as well as the strong, musty smell of the stuff. Obviously, the city streets are wet, but they are strange to me who has never seen them in this state. It’s all just really exciting. It’s a variation in the usual manner of things, and it goes on and on.

Coconut Cookies

I have been asked to compose an ode to something that has become so important to us here in Malawi that it’s almost indispensable.

 

Ode to Coconut Cookies

 

For 75 Kwacha

They’re Indispensable,

To say the least.

$.40 has never bought

Such delicious eats.

 

A thin,

Buttery biscuit,

A snack for the old and young

Like a savory, saccharine cloud

Resting on my tongue

 

In Malawi we have no

Parmesan cheese

But scrumptiously, indeed

We have Coconut Cookies

 

In its lackluster box

One would never suppose

Such a light, mesmeric taste

Inspiring this bit of prose
Jeff Oliver

Can eat a sleeve in one sitting

For the rest of the family

This is a pity.

 

 

 

Africa Time

I don’t know if it’s Africa, in general where I feel so completely at home, or Malawi exclusively. I like to think I have a special connection with this continent. Or rather, sub-Saharan, because I’ve never been north. It must be the way that time moves slowly, and you can spend all afternoon just talking to someone. Several weeks ago I expressed astonishment at the time, realizing how early it was, and a friend of mine shook his head at me and said, “This is Africa time. We move slowly here, just relax, Marie Claire”. So I did because I loved the way he said that. Africa time. Time is often completely irrelevant here. In the US, it dictates our lives. We would be lost without time.

If you come here you‘ll recognize immediately the carefree nature, and lack of stress. Or even in the midst of stress, the ability that people have to laugh at themselves. People have even commented on the pace in which I walk! And I’ve come to terms with the fact that no matter where I’m going, I move extremely fast! Why is it that Americans are always in a hurry? We are constantly trying to get through life faster and faster. We have no patience!

I’m quite proud of my new ability to loose track of time, move slowly, and spend an extremely large amount of time doing absolutely nothing productive. In the US, we are scolded for spending time idly, but in Malawi, loosing track of time is part of their way of life. Its fantastic!

The Farewell

The Farewell

To dance like I did. Nobody can dance like me.

When I dance I run away

I know that

All anyone wants is to be free. And by the way

Lets all decide for ourselves then. Perhaps that’s what

our fathers did.  This year I shed my

 

skin. On a smoldering hot day in Tennessee

the breeze is icy in the city of farewell. After a hollow embrace, I flew

away.

She just stands there.

Tears stood on her eyes.  A thin, gray woman with a trace of a

smile. Watching for a final

 

glimpse of her little girl. Because they’re

 

Scarcely connected by a string of electricity.

A tone distant,

and eager on the

Stupid telephone line. Someone said to me one time

 

You’re speaking to a

plastic box

 

I can’t see or touch or smell

that old smell.

That old perfume. Sweet to me and strange to others.

And five short years later I will

catch a trace of it in a public restroom, but its

Gone.

It departs as suddenly as it comes.

Mocking me as I recall the last time

I spoke to them.

And how I

Ran away so early for a

good thing but

a painful situation.

-          31 October 2009

Mulanje

6 hours up the mountain. 3003 m, thats almost 10,000 feet above sea level and i think, the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But it was the kind of beauty that you can only find in Africa. The arid, scorched yellow kind. The unknown kind. The kind that reminds me why i feel such a connection to this continent.  When you’re in the middle of it you feel completely removed because you could walk for ever and never see a building or a road, and because your in Africa, IN THE BUSH!

I was in my happy place on top of Mulanje Mountain. I think mountains are my comfort zone.  For 3 days we cooked over a campfire, hiked about on the plateau, took baths in the cold mountain springs, and got to know each other better.  Both nights it rained, and my lazy group tended to start trying to build a fire about that time every night. It was amazing the optimism we still felt, the six of us, sitting cross-legged in our mammoth tent listening to the rain. Even the sound of that was beautiful and uplifting.

We hiked to a giant basin called the ‘Crater’. Essentially, we were looking at the end of the world. Or so it seemed as we stared at an enormous, never-ending bowl. I sat down in front of it, my legs dangling over the edge thinking about how weightless and free I felt in Africa, looking down into an eternal abyss. We were infinite on this mountain. Bliss.

And suddenly I was homesick. I thought about my friend Meredith and my brother, Tim at home. Both of whom would find so much pleasure in this dry beauty.  I thought about the bleakness of dying and never seeing this magnificence that was before me at this very moment.

The hike down was nice. I was determined, but at the same time lost in thought. It was probably the reason that I tripped and slipped and slid so much. It was very rocky, but was made enjoyable by Michael Jackson’s greatest hits booming out of someone’s rucksack.

It was a perfect trip. It was breathtaking, and engaging, and just plain fun.  At the bottom of the mountain on that last day I felt mostly dirty, but also heartbroken that it was over. I will never for get the austere beauty of the Mulanje Mountains.

THIS ENTRY DEDICATED TO MY MULANJE GROUP:

Yu-luen, Roberto, Mike, Ruan, and Abraham

America the land of fat, stupid people

All Americans are fat and stupid. I don’t believe that, but everyday I am surrounded by people who think I am the only exception to that stereotype. The hardest part is that there are very few Americans in Malawi to prove the stereotype wrong.

I ‘ve been told that when Americans do come to Malawi, or other parts of Africa, they arrive off the airplane, head to toe in khaki safari suits, wondering where all the savannahs and wild animals are. I laugh because I know how true that is. To many Americans, Africa is a simple land of wildlife, desert, and poor, uneducated aborigines that are impossible to communicate with. A white person walking around downtown Blantyre in a safari suit is reason to laugh.

And of course they all have their opinions of each region of the US. And when friends found out that I hail from Tennessee, the land of Jack Daniels (and cowboys????) the jokes began to pour from the sky! The stereotype of the south is ten times worse outside of the US than inside the US. And as usual all they know are the negatives. Do you ride horses everywhere? Do you live in a forest? Is your house made of only wood? No, really? Well that’s not very American?!

My absolute favorite is when people try and tell me how racist the south is. The comments usually start along the lines of, “We were talking in history today about how racist the south is….” One can only assume that the British teachers at my school are just as anti-American as the students. I’ve heard about the global perspective of Americans, but OH how true it is.

And the worst question of all, Do you like America? My oh MY. After several weeks I began to catch on when asked this question. They were just sure I was another ignoranant American who thinks I’m the best, and so on… They couldn’t wait to bash in my face everything they know about why America is full of capitalistic cowards who don’t think of anyone, but themselves. This is problematic for me because I do love America, and I love the south, and what we try our hardest to stand for. We’ve made our mistakes, quite a few, but it’s a beautiful country with good people, and it does a lot of good in the world. Now, can I be educated and aware of the errors that my country has slipped up on, but still have pride and enjoy living there? It makes me sad that the general opinion of educated people in and outside of the US, is that America/ Americans are sliding down the drain into a increasing  mound of fat and stupidity.