Motivation From Darkness

This is an entry with some strong content so those sensitive might not want to read. It is written more for my friends working in Africa and international development in general, but it might be good for others to read as well, to understand the context of the situation I work in. Writing this is primarily a way for me to vent and release so I can deal with the situation. Writing is cathartic for me. I wrote this a couple days ago and have been sitting on it since, wondering whether or not to publish it. I decided to post it in the end.

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Monday, Aug 25, 2008

I don’t know if anybody else, especially those working in Africa, are having this experience but the incredibly high death rates are starting to wear on me. I mean not to the point where I want to quit or anything – I love my work here, its what I want to do and I am seeing it through there is no doubt in my mind – it’s just that its difficult to have to deal with suffering and death on such a massive scale, especially in such a peaceful country where the people are so warm, friendly and hardworking.

We’ve all see it on TV, read the papers, talked about it at conferences, discussed it in class but working in the midst of it is another thing altogether. At first I found it odd and annoying (not to sound harsh or inhumane). It was interrupting my work schedule at least twice a week; I couldn’t go to assess villages when the whole community was in mourning for two days. I only have three months on this contract so losing two days a week was seriously compromising my schedule. But what can you do? You just deal with it and become efficient when the time is right. Make hay when the sun shines, as the saying goes.

It was OK for the first month, but then someone I knew died. Macdonald, the program officer from WUSC Malawi who met me at the airport, helped me out during my first week, introduced me to his two darling little girls, such a kind person, died two weeks ago. I’m not sure what he died from, I was told asthma. At first I was shocked and thought I could just sweep it under the rug like I’ve done with every other death here but when I told my supervisor about it I lost it and starting crying in her office. I detest crying at work. I think its weak and doesn’t help a woman’s position in a challenging workplace (it seems like all the work I’ve done I’ve had to prove to men I was strong enough). I am normally so composed and tough, you know me, but at that moment I lost it. Fortunately my supervisor is another strong woman and she understood and a half hour later I was back working again.

While Macdonald seemed fairly strong until his death, I’ve also seen the slow suffering death of full-blown AIDS. About three weeks ago, after a meeting with the aquaculture specialist at Bunda College, a co-worker of mine, Spriano, said that since we were close to his brother’s place he wanted to stop by to see him. He was sick and perhaps I could raise his spirits, he said. Sure why not, I thought. I just wished he had prepared me for what I was walking into. We entered the house (it was a lovely home, upper middle class for Malawian standards, he was a university educated engineer). Spriano told me we had to greet him in his bedroom because he was weak. OK. We went into his bedroom and the dear soul was lying on his bed resting under a quilt. He had wasted away to just skin and bones. His face was gaunt, eyes hollow. He could barely lift his arms. I was given a seat, placed directly in front of him, in the centre of the room, surrounded by all his relatives. I was rattled but tried not to show it. Spriano said, go-ahead talk with him. I’m not sure what I said, I started rambling on about who I was, the work I was doing, made some stupid jokes about getting chambo and chamba mixed up (fish and marijuana), anything that would take his mind off his impending death. After a half hour or so we left.

Now don’t get me wrong. I have no problem visiting those suffering from HIV/AIDS. I have no stigma or prejudice. I’ll shake their hands and treat them with respect. But when it comes to seeing someone on his deathbed I just want to be mentally prepared for it. For both my sake and the person who is ill. I don’t want to make them feel even worse because of my reaction. If he had told me the condition his brother was in it would have been easier for me to deal with the situation at hand. But here people won’t tell you the severity of the situation. People here are either fine or sick, there is no scale of how sick someone is so you’ll never know what they mean until you are right there. No one ever says that someone is dying from AIDS. You have to figure it out for yourself. So now I have to prepare myself for the worst everyday. And that’s tough.

I found out today that he had died. Spriano didn’t show up for work this morning and Judith told me that he had gone home for the funeral and wouldn’t be back until later that week (we were supposed to go to Ntcheu to meet the fisheries officer to work out the details for the workshops I have to conduct in two weeks – now I’ve lost 2 or 3 more working days).

There are constant reminders of death all around me. The ubiquitous coffin shops on the roadside, the funeral notices in the media, the HIV testing and counselling centre across the road from my house, the orphans, the requirement of including HIV/AIDS aspects into every proposal I write. These deaths are hard to deal with in so many ways. It affects every aspect of daily life here. Of course there is the emotional side of it, but from a more practical side, it greatly impacts work productivity as well. How can you keep working when your family member has died? Then the frequency of the deaths means that there is always someone taking time off for funerals. Everything gets delayed. Deadlines are nearly impossible to meet. The productive and well educated are dying en masse and the country loses its most valuable resource, its people.

This whole situation can be depressing, yet in a strange way it can also be motivating. I feel my work is going to help people – they need to produce more food, have protein to eat, learn income generating activities to buy medicine – so that’s how I’ve come to deal with it. My work will help improve the life of people here in a small way. I never thought that growing fish would be like this!

I think I’m done with my vent. I just needed to write this because this morning was crappy. Not even sure I’ll post this to be honest. But I feel better now, more focused, so I will get back to work. After all, the people of Dedza need fish to eat!