WHO ahh YOU?

Mma Machete is old. Really old. Older-than-all-of-the-nations-in-Africa old. But, like with many people, her "oldness" is more about her attitude than her age - compare her, for example, to my grandfather. In human years he might even be older than Mma Machete.* But he has as much fun as any eight year old I know.

Mma Machete is a social worker at the Holy Cross day care centre, and has been from its founding in the early 1990s. By her own admission, the day care centre is her "family." Despite having spent three months in a diabetic coma in South Africa, she returned this fall to finish out her contract, and kicking.

Which may be why, in what I have learned is her typical approach, Mma Machete upbraided me last week for working on the inpatient hospice rather than helping the day care centre ("Jesus knows what you are doing!"). I calmly and politely reminded her that I had been asked to do this work by the Holy Cross Board of Trust, and that she was not, in fact, my boss.

Now, given the respect for age here in Botswana (see previous post), any sort of back-talk to an elder is the height of rudeness. At the prodding of a friend's father I went back the next week to Mma Machete, determined to apologize and ask her forgiveness - not least because she has valuable knowledge about the hospice's relationships with local donors.

As I walked into her office, however, Mma Machete looked up at me, bristled, and said,

"Who ahh YOU?"

Convinced that she had finally tipped off the cliff, I thought I had a chance: if she can't even remember me, she won't remember that I spoke back to her. Right?

"Mma Machete? I'm Mark, the-"

"Who ahh YOU?"

It dawned on me that the old badger had not in fact forgotten me, but was simply being an old badger. I continued an attempt at an apology; having come in with a mission, I was not ready to abort quite yet. But I could not get a word in edgewise:

"You ahh rrrude, and I am not going to speak with you until you leave my cohntrrry." Get ouut of my office."

I scratched my head and walked out. I was immediately consoled/laughed at by the kitchen staff, who could read the entire affair on my face as soon as I exited Mma Machete's lair. They filled me with bush tea and stories of Mma Machete's belligerence, and I left the hospice considerably buoyant.


*named changed to protect the innocent (namely me, from Mma Machete).

Age before beauty?

Traveling, for me, brings innumerable opportunities to reflect on one's own cultural assumptions and biases. An example:

Botox, Laguna Beach, breast implants, anorexia, neglected nursing homes, that orangy tanning-bed color and men too old to be sitting on that barstool. All bad things, right?

- but -

What do they have in common? Their common root: the American obsession with youth and appearing youthful.

You won't really find any of those things here in Botswana, save the men that should be at home with their kids instead of on that barstool. Why not? Because in Botswana age, not youth, is the common value.

Hold on there a minute, though, before you start wishing that America could revert back to the days where we listened to our parents. As I see it, there may be a trade-off involved here. American college graduates, more than in any other country I know of, have little trouble finding jobs - and good ones. Fresh ideas, creativity ad innovation are all words with positive connotation and the currency of ladder-climbers. Questioning authority is a veritable American past-time, one that has ended wars and changed civil rights laws and liberated women. Could not all of these things, as much as the list above, be related to our obsession with youth?

Why there are no McDonalds in Botswana

OR

"A primer in international political economy."

My cousin Meredith asked me the other day if McDonald's had yet conquered Botswana. Botswana does have KFC and a Portuguese chain called Nando's (America, you're missing out on some serious peri-peri), but no McDonald's.

How come?

In its burgers, McDonald's regularly uses calf meat. That, however, is outlawed in Botswana, whose second largest export behind its increasingly precarious diamond supply is beef.

A McDonald's in Botswana would therefore have to import beef from South Africa. Not impossible: Gaborone is some fifteen miles from the South African border. Still, not going to happen. The main destination for Botswana beef is Europe, which is a stickler for food safety. Were something like mad cow to occur in cows in South Africa, Europe could put a halt on Botswana beef. Botswana would then ban South African beef, and just like that you'd have a vegetarian McDonald's.*

Batswana do not do vegetarian. Period. In fact, I think I might have gotten scurvy at some point in the last two months. No beef means no McDonald's, and that's not a risk the Big American Arches are willing to take. No sir.

Which brings me to another question: with all this beef floating around, why in the world aren't there more hamburgers? They have beef out the wazoo, and I know I've seen hot dogs everywhere. Two plus two, Botswana.

Now THIS is cool

So getting my new assignment went something like this:

Me: Nick, I've finished the website and am a little frustrated by the day care hospice here. I'm thinking about packing up and going to Mozambique for the next couple of months to learn Portuguese.

The Dean: Well, what about this residential hospice in Tlokweng? I could really use someone to take the reins on that one and push it along.

Me (thinking): Inpatient hospice? Let's see... do I know anything about paliative care? Nope. Fundraising? Well, I sold popcorn when I was a boyscout. And there was that christmas wrapping stuff, I think I ended up winning a cool phone out of that. Construction planning? Eh, two months in Shreveport... not really enough. Project management? Nuh uh.

Me (out loud): Ok, I'll do it.

You learn to swim in the deep end, right? If you know ANYBODY interested in AIDS, cancer, palliative care, or sub-Saharan Africa, please send them my way. I need experts, I need money, and I need all the advice I can get to pull this off.

This, by the way, is what the site looks like now. The plot I'm working with goes from the wall on the left side to the point of the triangle on the right:

Cowabunga, Dude

Since I went to Scotland, I have been fascinated by the way that hand gestures vary from country to country. In Scotland, adding the index finger to the middle finger means the same thing. In Nicaragua, to express anxiety you take your hand, open and palm up, then pull it downwards while bringing all your fingertips together (you don't want to know where that comes from, I promise).

Here in Botswana, I have noticed two. First, hold your hand in front of your chest, palm in, and wave it back and forth a few inches. That means "I don't know" or "I don't have any," depending on the context. Second, Batswana (particularly younger ones) give a thumbs-up instead of a wave in order to say hello.

The second, I have decided, is in need of some Ninja-Turtle-style modification. I have added the pinky to the thumbs up (as well as a little shake-shake). And, just like that, "hello" becomes

COWABUNGA, DUDE

I anticipate that if I give the COWABUNGA on a regular basis, I will have little Batswana children giving it back before I leave in two months. I'll let you know how it goes.

Big Safari Number Two (For real this time)

For my second adventure, I headed north with roommates Carl, Jason and Emma. To see photos (with a bit of commentary) click here:

http://vanderbilt.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034723&id=4704956&l=bbd01.

Big Safari Number Two

Sorry, my roommate has all the pictures on his computer. In the meantime, I have a couple of articles to recommend. My friend Luke, my brother, and a few others have developed a chain of emails about two recent phenomena in the American church: the Emergent church and the Reformed church, two very different movements gathering pace across the States.

This is an article Luke found on the Emergent church, and this is an article in Christianity Today about the Reformed church. The effect? Check out this NYTimes article, also linked from Robert's website, about evangelicals' fears that they are losing young people, and fast.

From what I can put together, both movements attempt to move "back to the basics," though they have drastically different understandings of what that means. For the Emergent church, it is a return to the sense of community that defined and set apart the early church. For Reformed churches, it means harkening back to a form of Calvinism, alternately called the doctrine of the elect or predestination, depending. Together (but separately) they are poised to transform the landscape of American Christianity. Check it out - and if this is remotely interesting to you, bookmark Robert's blog.

New Job, New Adventure, New Supplies

Three pieces of good news:

1) Had a meeting last night with the priest I was living with earlier and Howard Moffat, Botswana's presidential doctor and descendant of Robert Moffat, legendary missionary/explorer. They have asked me to be the point man for the next two months on the planning of Botswana's first inpatient hospice, which you can read just a little about at the Hospice website.

2) Headed off this morning to the north country - Tsodilo Hills, to be exact, in the panhandle of the Okavango Delta, by way of Ghanzi. If we're lucky we may have time to go by Kubu Island, reported to be one of the most ghastly, surreal natural experiences on earth. If you want to check some of these places out, I recommend Google Earth's National Geographic feature.

3) bought some darts, ping pong balls and a set of poker chips for the house. Life is good.

Me haces falta, Latinoamerica

Don't get me wrong; my time in Botswana has been incredible (see photos), and I wouldn't trade it for the world.

But when my friend Michelle introduced me to Ana, a Peruvian woman living here in Gaborone with her sister and niece (the entire Peruvian community in Botswana) I was reminded, forcefully, that Latin America stole my heart long ago. It has not given it back since. Ana, Michele and I spoke in Spanish for three hours before I began to get antsy, about Peru and Botswana and Latin America and learning Spanish and English and everything else we could come up with just to keep speaking Spanish. Three hours? Shoot. I haven't been able to sit still that long since about seven months before I was born.

Cuidate, Latinoamerica - estoy veniendo a casa.