Africa » Zambia
Africa » Zambia
Letter #7 - Wednesday, August 8, 2001
by Ratty
July 17, 2001 - Letter #7
Still there? I'll try and pick up where my last letter left off. Life is still great here on the banks of the Luangwa River. It's dusk now, and we've just watched a group of buffalo and an elephant family cross the river. Just like in National Geographic, the baby elephants use their trunk to hold onto the mother's tail. One of the elephants was so young it was entirely submerged and had to use its trunk as a snorkel! Every morning we are awakened by the burping and grunting of hippos. Imagine the sound of an incredibly obese man making guttural noises and its something like that. Sort of a cross between a laugh and a fast, very undignified. [Editor's note: I think "fast" was meant to be "fart" - very undignified indeed...]
July 18: We awoke this morning to find 3 elephants chowing down on acacia trees less than 10 feet from our front door -- I guess we're still in Africa. After a very British breakfast of baked beans on toast, we were off to a nearby village for today's training: Participatory Rural Appraisals. In a nutshell, the idea is that in order for local people to believe in a solution to a problem, they need to solve it themselves. For example, in this area very near the park, rapid growth has brought rapid problems: petty theft, an occasional assault, the usual stuff that comes with more traffic, people and money. Currently there is no land use plan, no zoning of shops, no building codes and no vision of a desired future. Six years ago a Canadian firm designed a program to address all of these issues, glossy cover and all. The 6 local chiefs (analogous to county commissioners, sort of) tossed it, and went back to no plan, and things have continued on a predictable path since then.
The (now improved) development dogma is for we outsiders to simply act as facilitators in a community discussion of how THEY wish to develop. We as Peace Corps trainees have been reminded countless times that the answers to most of the problems that a community faces lie within the members of that community; we, the all-powerful Americans, are not here to provide solutions, but to simply get people talking and organizing themselves (and to see a hippo or two while we're at it!)
The other half of today's formal training was a visit to the Wildlife Law Enforcement Office. This is the front line of the battle against poaching of large animals. Groups of 8-10 local scouts (often wearing second-hand uniforms and armed with ancient rifles) go into the park for 6- to 8-day tours, either reporting poaching activity or apprehending the offenders themselves. Often the hunters work in groups up to 25 and are armed with assault rifles from either Angola or Congo. If the deck weren't stacked already, throw into the mix a government that is unable (or unwilling) to financially support its wildlife program (said scouts have been working without pay for 4 1/2 months) and a populace that until very recently viewed wildlife as a liability rather than a treasure. (Granted, it's difficult to view the wild animal that just destroyed your crops this year as anything but a liability.)
On that note, yesterday's activity was to attend a "Community Hunting Revenue Distribution Meeting," a program that is starting to play a role in changing people's attitudes towards wildlife. I'm not completely clear on how much money is at stake, but the system works to distribute 90% of hunting license fees back to the communities bordering the national parks. (The hunting occurs in these areas surrounding the park, never in the park itself.) The community is then free to use the kwacha as they see fit, often infrastructure and local teachers' salaries. (Did I mention that ALL civil servants, including most teachers, are on strike to protest minuscule wages? Problem #78....)
July 21: Back in Lusaka now, just back from my first Zambian haircut. Prices for a buzz cut are around 1,500 kwacha (about 35 cents) but I paid 2,500 kwacha (about 60 cents) because my white-boy straight hair gave the barber and his clippers much trouble. Probably the first time this guy had chopped non-African curls, and a fine job he did.
Returned from Eastern Province today via public transport, affectionately called "D.O.A. Bus Lines" by the local PC volunteers. Yesterday we spent the morning at an agroforestry research center - very interesting. Their gig is not reforestation (though Zambia could use that, as it is ranked #3 world-wide for rate of deforestation, just behind Brazil and the Oregon coast range!), but soil fertility improvement through the use of (mostly leguminous) trees. Several of the species used exhibit "copsing" -- resprouting from a cut stump. Once established in a farmer's maize field, they are cut at ground level and the copious foliage is used as a mulch when the rains begin. The newly planted maize benefits both from the green manure as well as the additional nitrogen from the trees' root nodules. (Still with me?) The trees never compete with the maize (for sunlight at least) because by the time the stump has put out any tall shoots, your maize crop is already done. Brilliant! In theory...and how to get people to use it...which brings me to my next point:
It is said that Peace Corps volunteers who go to Central America return home and are more political, those that serve in Asia return more mystical, while volunteers in Africa come back laughing. Seems true so far!
July 22: Back "home" near Kitwe now. Our host family was overjoyed to see us again. They have become so dear to us, it'll be difficult to leave in two weeks. That's right, two more weeks of training, then we will be posted in another village far from here (about 50 km by bike northwest of Zimba. We may get a P.O. box there just so you can write "Zimba, Zambia" - sounds sufficiently foreign.) Between now and then we have several more technical sessions including one on beekeeping (buzz buzz), a language test that if we fail we'll be sent home (though no one has EVER failed - sound like a hollow threat?), and some commencement ceremony involving all 9 of us singing the Zambian anthem -- on television! Our true talent finally discovered.
P.S. JP just noted that within 2 years everything that we own will be broken, lost, used up, moldy, covered in candle drippings or eaten by termites. Good thing we'll be practiced at doing without!
Every day we see beautiful things and wish you were here to enjoy them with us.
Love to all, JP and RT
- Created:
- Tuesday, October 12, 2004 at 12:43 PM