My emotional attachment to the community and its people goes up and down, round and round.
I consider extending for another year and then i reject at the prospect of an impossible year dealing with the rural community politics and the jealousies focused on the Library ...built by the yevus..dig up the floor and there has to be gold underneath. and the NGO's funding (as with all NGO's eventually..) dries up.
To some and too many..yevu = money and if that 'some' aren't getting it then someone else is..and why him, why them ..AND WHY NOT ME?
The factions in the community with different families, different funeral groups, disgruntled individuals (yes..you know who i mean) become clearer the longer i am here and the more they sap any go-forward energies that the community might have. To spend so long in meetings arguing over the inconsquential..who is recognised on the Library's appreciation wall and who isn't? And whether this self-appointed committee should have authority and budget control over the Library ..even though in truth it is 'he who pays the piper who calls the tune' and so far these committees have not supplied cedi one to actually operating the Library...ALL the money to date and for the next year or so comes directly from the US.
The petty jealousies that surround the Library and its funding from the US are truly disturbing and take a lot of understanding.
It is hard for me to accept that a voodoo-curse has been placed on anyone because he must be getting lots of money from the white man and they who sought out and placed the curse want that money. And yet, i see with my own eyes the effect it has on the cursed individual who seeks a spiritual cure from that which make him seem so scared and so sick. This is here..and if he and his family believe that he is cursed in this way then it surely doesn't help for me to say..fooey, can't be real. If he believes then it is real. And so I can not ignore it especially when his cursed person is integral to any real improvement in the literacy levels in the community.
In my clearer moments, i say..ignore it, it truly is nonsense..and of course, it is..but the effect on the community politics is not nonsense. The man, my friend, is vulnerable and can be attacked.
For a community with no money, pays no taxes to the District, no market, no speed bumps even, can't even ante up the rent money to pay for this PCV's accomodation which by 'contract with Peace Corps' they are obliged to do, they have some amazing arguments and circuitous discussions over control of a purse that does not exist...the yevu NGO's funds to operate the Library.
Factions and animosities go back a long time...the biggest expense that any family will ever incur is funeral expenses..so much so that people contribute for years to funeral co-operatives..and still families go into hock to pay for funerals even after bodies of the dearly departed have remained on ice for months and years while money was raised to properly send them off on their Calls to Glory. I still don't get funeral co-ops...but on the other hand, who on the other hand wouldn't go for full colour posters bemoaning the tragic departure or 15-foot high erections (oops) lamenting the loss. If i die..then please..etc
But anytime there is money then there are jealousies and plots and murders most foul..and bubbling cauldrens and so funerals are highly politicised and stories abound of funds going astray etc.
i'm just trying to help the children and build libraries and find ways to actually teach children but it gets complicated...fund-raising becomes impossible; grand openings get hijacked and then postponed indefinitely while the non-worthy, non-contributing groups argue as to who runs the show.
Cruelly, i wonder why more of the people I know don't rise up and say 'enough..what about doing something for the children?' but they can't, they have no power and they aren't listened to..small wonder they get disillusioned .
The more i know, the less i understand.
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