A Few Thoughts

Every week I write, I begin with something like “so much has happened this week”. Somewhere in the process, I end up deleting the first few lines and come up with something a tad more insightful.

This week, I’ll leave it at that – so much has happened. My desire to write about ‘work’ volunteer activities – the Rafiki Link, Teachers Without Borders trip, CTC Education programs, etc – decreases the more work I do during the day. And the last few weeks have been filled with meetings, deliberations, and long long hours spent sitting in front of a computer screen, compiling proposals etc. Last weekend I took time away and worked a record 30 hours from Friday night to Sunday morning – a significant achievement even for a veteran workaholic!

So rather than tell tales of what I’ve done – I’ll describe two recent conversations recently – to give a bit of a flavour of the ideas which have been coming up in recent discussions.

COMMUNITY OWNERSHIP

This evening, I came back late from meeting the new Teachers Without Borders arrivals (who thus far seem Terrific, yes that’s right with a capital T). I arrived to the first rainstorm I’ve seen in months – yes, real rain! And mud! Not having a jacket, I ducked into the closest restaurant (Cheers, appropriately enough) and take a tasty meal of peas in soup and chapo – chapati, cut up in uneven squares.

After I eat, a familiar man calls me over – I think oh shoot, what’s his name again? I have forgotten twice already, let me write it down now so as not to forget again – Jau (which means a large calf, not quite a heifer). The Chief of Maai Mahiu is taking a Tusker with some friends… and they want to discuss CTC with me, though I insist that I can speak best only to the education programs. A man in the group, Kifarafara (it means ‘big highway’ in Kikuyu), brings up the topic of Sustainability. The beer he’s taken increases his passion for this important topic.

His comment is that he doesn’t want CTC’s programs – especially the centre for disabled children, which has benefited a previously unrecognized group in the community – to fade away after a few years, as projects started by other organisations have. The eternal development challenge: how to have outsiders assist and participate in a process of positive change, rather than merely foisting a ‘project’ on passive ‘recipients’.

He proposes that CTC host a ‘baraza’ – an information / training event, to talk about the long-term sustainability of programs such as the disabled childrens’ centre. He throws his arms wide to indicate the numbers of people who would be involved in the event…

Synergy, I think! Alison – director of CTC here – has been talking about ‘barazas’ from a model from Uganda. And Paul Leringato, recent visitor from Laikipia in central Kenya, is a perfect model of building community ownership into such programs.

I’m going to end there for today. Short, especially after such a long time; I’ll promise an update & photos soon.

Mali