Wildcards

Hey all,

I was in Lilongwe for the long weekend, and had a bunch of really good meetings with others from the EWB Malawi Water and Sanitation team. We are working on a new strategy, as I mentioned in my past post, and as such I am trying to get a better handle on what the rest of the team is up to, as well as try to understand how my work at Freshwater fits into our strategy. My placement is a little bit of an outlier because I am working on a water point implementer, not an organization that has much to do with water point operation, maintenance, and sustainability. In a perfect WatSan sector (which is sort of our goal I suppose), that distinction would either not have to exist, OR, there would be well defined and functional roles as to which parties would work on which of those 2 goals, and they would all work effectively to compliment each other. The WatSan sector is very far from perfect: I have a feeling that any of the WatSan OVS who just read that last sentence probably chuckled a bit at the description.

In any case, it was a good weekend and I really enjoyed seeing everyone again. I got a better sense of where we all are, which was helpful. Because EWB OVS are spread across the sector, it’s a challenge to keep each other really abreast of what our goals are. But that also has a great advantage because our team is able to see the sector as a whole in a way that many organizations can’t. Seems like a pretty good thing, especially because EWB’s overseas strategy is starting to venture into the realm of overall sector change at a systemic level as opposed to solely individual partner capacity building.

That’s enough about the sector stuff and team strategy for now. Instead, here’s an update on what’s going on at Freshwater and also a bit of stuff about home.



A developmental love triangle in Freshwater: incentives, obstacles, and trust pushing and pulling each other around

My big Leadership Development approach was presented to the whole organization last Monday, (everyone from the Executive Director right down to the construction staff), and the presentation went quite well. They way I started the presentation was largely inspired by some stuff I read in a really interesting book. The book, “Understanding Organizational Development Through African Proverbs” was written by Chiku Malunga, a Malawian OD consultant who works for CADECO. The book was really great and was lent to me by Wayne Miranda, an EWB OVS working with MoFA in Ghana. Thanks Wayne!

The point of this book is to give a developing country perspective on organizational and leadership development. Because so much of OD literature and theory comes from developed countries, there exists a healthy debate among development types (at least those who are paying attention to OD and thinking about culture) as to whether OD even fits into an African cultural context. I mean, if it’s the norm in African culture to have a highly centralized leadership style, does an OD intervention designed to arrive at a more empowering and decentralized leadership style fit into that cultural context? If not, is it right or just to try to make it fit or is it a cultural imposition? This is a question of values and is just another example of how development is one huge values judgment.

Imagine this: if people don’t want to use condoms to prevent AIDS even if they’ve been told of the consequences, is it the responsibility of the “development sector”, whatever that means, to find a way to change that? Maybe, maybe not. But any way you slice it, by being involved in development you make a values judgment, and you really have to search your soul to figure out if you are comfortable with that. I haven’t quite decided yet. I guess one way of looking at it would be to say that anything you do or choose not to do involves a values judgment anyway, so just don’t worry about it. What do you think?

In any case, this book provides an African cultural perspective that claims that OD does fit into an African culture, but you need to understand your context in order to use it properly. Otherwise you may be using one tool where another is more appropriate even though the overall goals are the same: organizational sustainability, better impact on your beneficiaries, and overall more effective decision making. To send this message, the book presents the African concept of ubuntu, or “the essence of being human”, as a universal value. This concept embodies the notion that, in traditional African cultures, “an individual, family, or institution is not judged primarily by external things like material possessions, skills, or competencies, but by the personification of human values. The ideal individual respects himself or herself and others, regardless of who they are”.

Chiku Malunga’s argument is that, in order for organizations to be sustainable and effective, they too must embody the values of ubuntu. It is in this way that OD fits into African culture: organizational and leadership development can be ways to help organizations and leaders help their cause by embodying these principles. Indeed, traditional African culture informs much of the perspective that African leaders have on the world. One of the really cool things about this book is that it chooses to send these messages using the same vernacular that traditional African culture uses: proverbs!

I’ve read this book and was quite impressed with the level of relevance it has to Freshwater. I used a number of concepts from it when developing the LD framework I shared with you in my last update. More interestingly, I recently shared that Framework with all of Freshwater, including the Executive Director and everyone else all the way down to the drivers and the construction staff. That required a lot of Chichewa translation, which was orchestrated partly be me (poorly) and with the help of others from the team.

As you saw with the LD framework in my last pose, my approach is two pronged: first, facilitated vision building so that people can start taking actions to increase their own skills and experience, and second, constructive relationship building so that people can work more effectively as a group and remove the barriers to success that exist. When presenting the framework, I decided I needed to get people’s attention by touching on cultural chords that would be relevant to them personally. In order to do that, I presented a flipchart with the following Chichewa proverbs found in the book, both in English and Chichewa, to set the stage for the approach I wanted to present:

1. Personal Visions and Change: why?

“A changed place can not transform a person, but a changed person can transform a place.”
“Kusintha kwa malo sikungapangitse muthu kusintha maonekedwe/ khalidwe, koma munthu osinthika angathe kusintha malo”

2. Constructive Relationships: why?

“When spider webs unite, they can tie up a lion”
“Pamene nyumba zokanguade zamangana pamodzi, zikoza kumanga mkango”

“One person can not move a mountain”
“Munthu modzi sangathe kukangka phiri”

As I presented them, I facilitated a half English half Chichewa discussion about what these proverbs mean to people. This seemed to be a really effective way of setting the stage for the next conversation about my actual LD approach. Because this discussion was started in such a non-threatening context of sharing perspectives on some fairly ubiquitous proverbs, I felt like there was some actual positive energy in the group towards the approach.

The next step was to put an action item to the group. I created a sign up sheet for those who are interested in working with me to develop those personal visions, identify relationships they think could be more constructive, and identity actions they can take to get to where they want to be in both of those areas. This week I will be having probably 2 or 3 of these meetings to start discussing what the LD approach means to people on a more personal and individual level. These next few weeks will be really interesting to see how FWP is actually responding to the approach. So far, things look quite promising.

There are, of course, lots of wildcards here, not the least of which is the way in which people respond personally to this. For example, is it human nature to acknowledge a problem you wish could be rectified but not to take any personal responsibility for it? Perhaps. The more important question is: is it the nature of Freshwater culture to view problems in that way? Likely. So far in this post I’ve spun the LD process to be going very well. I think I’ve sent the message that this is not unequivocal, so without going into too much more detail, I think I’ll just leave it at that. I will check in again in the not too distant future to let you know what’s going on.

That’s it! I hope you enjoyed the Freshwater update.


A house is not a home without lots of yelling and love, at least not in my experience:

When I wrote my last blog update, I told you about the family I live with. I highlighted the things I enjoy about living there and things I love about the people. They are really nice people, and my life there is very interesting. The family is extremely religious, as I have said, and they really live those values. They care about me, and particularly about my soul, and I care about them, too. I really value their friendship and am truly glad to have gotten to know them. They’ve taught me a lot, and we’ve had good laughs together. We even cried together when we went to Mikey’s funeral, Mikey being the 9 year old younger brother of Alice who died of malaria in February. They have been kind enough and open enough to welcome me into their lives and allow me to share in their domestic activities, and for that I’m really grateful.

However, I am really finding my life at home to be a big source of stress in my life these days. I am actually considering leaving my place, not because I don’t like the family but rather because living in that context is really starting to wear me down.

The following is a translated version of an actual conversation I had with Evelynne, the mom of my house, last Sunday.

“How did you rise?” I asked.

“I rose fine, how about you?” she replied.

“I rose well, thanks”

“Thanks. Would you like some tea?”

“No thank you. My stomach isn’t feeling that well so I don’t want to drink any, but
thanks.”

“Your stomach is upset because you drank beer.” she informed me.

“Drank beer? No I didn’t, I was here last night with the family.” I replied, assuming she must mean that I was hung over, which made absolutely no sense because I was at home in the village all evening the day before. Of course, I couldn’t imagine what else she could have meant, though. She then said something else about God which I didn’t understand at first, so I just sort of nodded and continued.

“I’m going to town now. I noticed we were out of sugar, so I will bring some today.” I said, expected Evelynne to say “Zikomo” or something like that, which means “thanks”.

“How much?” she replied instead.

“How much sugar will I bring?”

“Yes, how many packets?”

I had planned to bring just one, but given the context of this question I figured that may not cut it.

“Uhh, two?”

“Two? Ok, fine. Also buy potatoes”

“OK, potatoes, sure. See you later.”

“And cabbage, tomatoes, cooking oil, green peppers, and onions.”

“OK, everything to make chips right?”

“Yes, thanks. And you don’t want tea? Because your stomach is upset.” she said, then repeated what she had said earlier. After a bit of back and forth I eventually figured out what she was telling me. A few days earlier, when asked if I drank beer, I said that I do, yes, occasionally. When asked if I had drunk beer in Chileka, I said yes, that I’d had a drink a couple of months earlier at the Premier Lodge, this bar in Chileka.

“Your stomach hurts because you drank beer at the Premier Lodge. God is punishing you because you sinned. When Abusa comes you need to ask him for forgiveness and we will pray for your soul, then your stomach won’t hurt anymore.”

“That was 2 months ago!” I replied.

“Yes but you haven’t prayed with Aphiri for that sin so that’s why your stomach is upset.”

“OK, well, see you later.” I replied with an uncomfortable laugh.

“OK, bye. Thank you.”

Interesting, eh? All of this was of course in Chichewa, which really just underscores even more how much I’ve learned having lived here. I really care about the family I live with. And they do care about me, too, in that they want to convert my heathen soul. That’s why Aphiri taught me to pray in tongues. And, they lived up to the promise of praying with me for forgiveness, too. That happened just last night actually, and I’ve now gathered that this is the main reason that I got static for going to Lilongwe on the Easter weekend: they wanted to use that weekend to pray for forgiveness for what I’d done. Last night, we read a bunch of bible passages that all related to the reasons why it’s sinful to drink and smoke, and I was the star of the show. Aphiri made sure I understood everything he said, and I had to provide my explanations of what the passages meant. That lasted an hour and a half and was really exhausting. Clearly, we come from such different worlds, myself and the family I live with, that I really shouldn’t expect there to be a heck of a lot of overlap in our values and certainly not in the way we choose to embody them.

I had an interesting “ah-hah” moment a couple of months ago related to that point. I was talking with Alice, the girl who is now in Lilongwe going to school but who was there is the house for the first while when I was living there. She speaks English quite well, but the norm in our house is still to speak Chichewa because she’s the only English speaker. Anyway, as we were chatting, the conversation somehow went to a place that caused me to mention the Second World War. I really can’t remember (or imagine) why that would have come up, but it did. The point is that Alice, who had been to high school in Malawi, did not know what WW2 was. This massive event that, in my mind, is such a staple of modern history that I can’t imagine not knowing about it, was not known to Alice. What’s my point? It’s not that Alice is ignorant, no, because there is a whole world of knowledge that she has and I don’t. Rather, my point is that our realities, up until the point that I came to live with her family, have had virtually no intersection. What seems ridiculous to me is normal to her, and what seems normal to me is ridiculous to her.

What this meant for a couple of months ago when I had this conversation is that, despite how difficult it is for me personally, it’s really worthwhile for me to live in a context that is so vastly different from what I know well because of how much I can learn from it. It’s hard, sure, but how often do you come across something that is worthwhile as a growth experience but isn’t hard? In addition, I have built a solid and caring relationship with the family, so it’s not just about learning, it’s about valuing relationships and caring genuinely for the people that have shared their lives with me. I thought back to something I had read about how Nelson Mandela really values the 27 years he spent in prison because of how much stronger a person it made him. He thought of it as a life “crucible”, an event that is not easy but you learn from it and become better for it. No, I’m not in prison, I am living with a caring and loving family in a village in Malawi. So if Nelson could take the 27 years in prison, I sure as hell better be able to handle a few months in a village with a family I find challenging but whose company I value and who cares about me, right? That was my thought process, and that’s largely what led me to stay living at Kwasakanda for as long as I have.

Coming back to my original point, however, how I’m thinking of leaving, the question I need to ask is how long someone can stay in such a situation based on the aforementioned merits when he finds it that difficult. I don’t want to and haven’t tried to impose my values on my family, at least not actively (I don’t think). But I do feel like they have been trying constantly to impose their values on to me, whether that means that they think I should pay substantially more than we originally agreed when I moved in, or that I should convert to Christianity and not go to Lilongwe on the Easter weekend to see my colleagues because I should be praying with the family. And for this, I have no contempt for them simply because of how different our realities have been. It wouldn’t be fair for me to hold it against the family that their view of the world and the model they build of me is so different from what it would have to be if it were easy for me to live with them.

I love my parents, too, and care about them a lot of course. But does that mean it makes sense for me to live with them? Mom, Dad, based on past experience, what do you think? ;)
I’m not too sure what to do, and I probably won’t move out any time too soon. But it does seem to make sense that I should move out at some point because, these days, I really don’t look forward to coming home to the village that much. When I arrive at home I am always waiting for someone to come pound on my door, yell something at me in fast and colloquial Chichewa that I don’t understand, then go and engage in a conversation in which I am often (but not always, to be fair) asked for money or told that I’ve done something wrong regarding prayer or sin. This may sound bitter, but it’s really not. It’s more that I’m frustrated with myself that I am uncomfortable in a family setting that I wish I could adapt to better.

Another question I need to ask was touched on in my last post: is it wrong to stay if the family thinks they are actually saving my soul? After I learned to pray in tongues and was protected from demonic possession, I was really freaked out and uncomfortable. It seems like the family is really staring to think that I have or should have the same religious values as them. For example, this morning, I left late for work and had a headache. I said good morning to Evelynne and Aphiri, whom I told about my headache, and of course they told me I had to sit down and pray. I said, no thanks, I need to head to work, and I got a “tsk, tsk” attitude towards this. This is the same thing I got when I decided to go to Lilongwe, and the same thing I get if I ever do anything that indicates that I’m not a Christian, which I’m not, or that I don’t want to pray single night for an hour or more. I’ve told them that I am not a Christian, but they either don’t seem to be getting the message or they are unwilling to accept my values for what they are. In either case, there is an expectation at home that I will see things the same way they will and I catch flak if I don’t. This is frustrating for me personally, but more importantly, it’s also potentially morally reprehensible. I don’t want to give a false impression because I don’t think its right. This is another wildcard: if it’s wrong for me to stay under these circumstances, then that would render the rest of the discussion irrelevant because I should just leave. Maybe. Thoughts?

I am really wary of talking smack about my host family because I really do care about them, and they care about me, too. They are good people, but maybe just for me personally it’s just not turning out to be a good fit after 4 months. I don’t know. I’ll keep you posted.


Thanks for reading!



Questions for thought and reflection:

1. What’s the deal with tough things anyway? Do hard things make you stronger? If so does that mean you should always be pushing yourself harder? Would you stay with my family in my situation? Think about it: 5 years from now, would I regret moving out if I would have learned more and built a more profound relationship with these people if I just stayed? Or, does that question simply get reduced to one of ethics: if they think I’m converting to Christianity but I’m not, what’s the right thing to do?

2. Referring back to the Freshwater update, what is the mental step you would have to take to go from the acknowledgement that your organization (or general life situation) has issues that you want to see changed to the acknowledgement it has issues that you want to see changed AND for which you will take personal responsibility? This is sort of the wild card in my placement right now. What do you think?