In
response to my last blog post, thanks for your encouragement to be brave and
describe my experiences here more openly. I've been looking through my journal
and am relieved to start sharing some of my entries over the last months.
"The hardest stuff here is way more twisted, confusing and mind-blowing than anything I could have ever imagined or can easily sum up in a clean response to people's question, "so what's the hardest part of being there?" I'm planning on writing a book about all that is hard to encounter and literally unbelievable - this place is not as undeveloped and deeply troubled, despite (because of?!) the developed world's massive interventions, nor has it long been called a savage and dark continent, for reasons that are easy to swallow and mentally wrap my head around, let alone articulate.
I’ll take an example from today that is completely normal and un-extraordinary in its depiction of life here. I started teaching a reproductive health/HIV/AIDS course today at the most legitimate, organized higher education school in my city, a management institute that has international exchange students, gets outside funding and has classrooms with the first whiteboards I’ve seen in country.
After class, I met with the assistant director, and in speaking of AIDS, he quickly made his beliefs clear that he knows as surely as he knows he is a man, that HIV was created by western powers to suppress Africa, maintain their global position on top, and create tons of jobs for scientists, researchers, and health workers who would otherwise would be unemployed (apparently there are no other health or science or development issues that we could be putting resources toward if AIDS was not on the table.) He and his other colleagues in the room ALL believe that we already have the vaccine, that the whole thing is just a political and economic ploy, that we benefit HUGELY from the AIDS epidemic, that instead of spending untold amounts, the Western world has made out like bandits by, among other things, marketing and selling condoms as necessary. I am the first to recognize that the AIDS response has been politicized and misdirected and manipulated for special interests (I just finished the book Tinderbox on this subject, fascinating). But the fact that they believe the whole thing is a "white man" plot against them, wholly self-serving, gives a peak into their love/hate complex with the west.
And if this is a widely held view, are people perceiving my information about HIV as relevant and true, or all part of our scam? YIKES!
If this was a drunk guy on a rant in a bar it would be one thing, but this was a professional sitting in a nice office in a fine suit, leading a well-respected school, and having been well-educated with an extensive training and professional background. I have had two other high level regional government employees in the last week alone unleash their unwavering convictions and vast accusations of exactly the same nature, and the colleagues whom I respect the most, who I have turned to for support, can only say “Well, who knows for sure?”. Serious arguments from this highest level of well-spoken, well-traveled Cameroonians include: “Tess, I don’t know if you can understand this example. It’s like all the people who go into cahoots with sorcerers so that one can put a spell on people to give them epilepsy, and the other can offer a cure for it, and they both get rich.” I know well enough by now not to get distracted by objecting that epilepsy is not a disease that is spread by witchcraft spells…everyone just laughs and says I don’t know Africa when I suggest that it might be anything else.
It definitely makes you feel like you are going crazy when you are the only one in a room who believes what you feel so surely to be true, when, at an outdoor community event you say “thank goodness it’s not raining today” and your lawyer, masters degree-holding counterpart says “well, I’m sure the organizer paid a rain chaser”, then five people laugh at YOU when you playfully push back on that explanation.
Cell phones juxtaposed with impassable roads and pit latrine bathrooms, widespread use of Facebook by young mothers at risk of dying during delivery, obsession with modern fashion next to witchcraft stories of women flying around the world at night in a sardine tin airplane, Rihanna blasting in the midst of full on AIDS-denialism… Welcome to Cameroon in 2012, where very Western-looking women believe they have to have lots of sex during pregnancy so that they will not close up and their baby won’t get stuck inside, but that they can’t have sex while breastfeeding because semen gets into their breast milk and rots it- THAT’S what gives babies diarrhea. So to try and stop their men from going to prostitutes while they breastfeed and abstain, they instead stop breastfeeding after a month, and their babies die, but blame goes to the malicious uncle, who must have killed the baby by snapping a chicken leg (from a person who he had transformed into a chicken) during a spell."
May 29, 2012
"Some weeks it seems not an hour goes by I do not run into a new challenge that has my head spinning as to how to react in line with my principles. Each of the staff that I worked with on [Project X] mentioned casually or directly at least once that I give them “motivation” at the end – one of their many code words for under-the-table money. Knowing that the budget was maxxed out, and having participated themselves in all the trainings, gained all the info, and having made the products, eaten the free meals, and taken all the leftover materials and food to divide among them…plus having benefitted from the association of working with Peace Corps, the informal prestige that their group got for carrying this out, and how much it helped their clients…they are pressuring me to give them a cash bonus.
They did work hard, and I am incredibly grateful, but the position they have put me in feels uncomfortable, unfamiliar, and unprofessional. I started by writing them all nice cards on the beautiful Wave Hill stationary that Syretha sent me. The woman I worked closest with opened hers and said, “You will give me all the other blank cards”. So typical of what I hear every day - using accusatory, demanding statements like this to show affection and thanks while also inducing guilt and feeling out how much more you can get (whenever I call someone they spend most of the time talking about how I've "abandoned" them, and why don't I call more...but I know that's them telling me they miss me!).
Knowing that the staff put in extra time and came in on at least one extra day, I tweaked the budget and gave them each $10 as a thank you / transport and phone credit allowance. This was something I had to reflect long and hard about doing, and still do not know how I feel about it, or what it represents and if it's ok. But they never even have a near-sufficient operating budget, let alone bonuses or tips, so a little thank you seemed appropriate. I'd probably hope for the same were I in their shoes. Thought that'd be that.
As soon as I did so, the head of the unit publically called me out for having inappropriately given her the same amount as her inferiors, and how improper and insulting that was, though one of those inferiors had actually taken the lead on their side. I almost started crying I was so confused about what to say or do, and was so annoyed that she would throw this at me, when I was clearly already navigating strange cultural waters with visible unease. I told her this is how I work as an American, with transparence and equality within a team– she shot back that she has already worked with an American organization, and it was not like that. I said she could write me a letter if I had acted wrongly, but that this was all strange and new to me, so excuse me. The several Cameroonians I asked yesterday about how these things usually work just said it depends, that I should do what feels right. Once again, what the heck is that?
This is what it’s like to be in charge of something I suppose – all the tough shit comes flying straight at you, there is no one else who is taking care of it as you just do your simple job on the side. In that sense I am proud of myself and can feel my capacity for taking on stressful situations ballooning."
August 13, 2012
income-generation techniques like soap-making and jewelry helped me get to know a number of these women better, and now when they come once a month to pick up their drugs and attend my educational sessions, they are happy to see me ("Tata Alicia!"), and I them. I ask them about how their skills are coming along - a LOT of them are now making soymilk and tofu! - but also especially like learning about their stories and how HIV has impacted their lives.
The porch where they wait to be called in by the nurse is a great place to have informal discussions, and one woman pulled me aside when I asked how she was. Her case is so touching, and hard to hear, but the epitome of what is complicated about AIDS work and realities. This petite quiet woman opened up to me - she is HIV+, as is her husband, but he refuses to get the tests he needs to start treatment, or to even discuss going on treatment or admitting that the disease is real, a threat, something that needs attention. She is being responsible about taking her drugs and staying healthy otherwise, but since he also refuses to use protection (even when she tries using a female condom), she is getting constantly re-infected by his HIV, which is very dangerous and harmful, even if you are already HIV+. He doesn't want to read materials, listen to the urgings of the nurse who has done home visits, or have their second child tested. It seems like until he gets sick himself, which could still take years, he won't be open to making any changes personally or in their relationship.
In the meantime, they are legally married and have two kids. He supports them all, which keeps her from being able to leave - he won't send them any support if they are not under his roof, and the law would not be at all on her side in an attempted divorce. She knows that each sexual encounter is negating the work of her ARV drugs and healthy lifestyle, but does not know how his stubborness can be overcome and feels completely up against a wall. She has even offered that he get another wife (polygamy is legal) and just leave her on the side to raise his kids (what an idea to feel desperate enough to want to present to your husband), but he is not interested.
I stood there with her, absorbing and trying to share her heartache, realizing I had no actual suggestions to offer, it's just a heart-breaking situation that stands to stay that way for some time. I took her phone number and will try and be a good friend. I hugged her for a long time. What else can I do? What can she do? What would you do?
These are the tough moments, but also the ones that further emphasize how much I want and need to be involved in this type of work, bringing together public health, cultural and gender issues- infinitely fascinating and challenging, and where the real answers to making progress will have to come from, I believe."
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