ABDF

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Hi everybody!

Only five more weeks until the end of the 2008 season. All but two of our big projects are finished. One project, the water tank in Navatkadu, is actually complete, but I still need to get pictures. There is a small festival at the kovil next door in a week; the official opening ceremony will take place at the same time. The other project, our coconut seedlings, will finish October 1, when we distribute them to the recipients. Other than that. I’ve been engaged in a few small projects of the quick-n-dirty sort. Sometimes, however, even these can be complicated.

Friday I went with two friends, Vive and Gabriel, to visit a widow who needs some help. Vive and Gabriel are members of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, which I have mentioned in past dispatches, and they are the ones who pointed me to the Widow Nesamany, the lady for whom we built the awning two weeks ago.

This particular widow has three daughters, and lives in a metal and thatch shack partially resting on a concrete slab. She had two problems. First, the septic tank had a break in it, causing sewage to leak out. The second was her small kitchen, which had a dirt floor. During the rains, the kitchen becomes a patch of mud.

I looked at the site, and decided to get a contractor friend of mine to visit with me to get an idea of the costs involved. If I had the money, or could find the funds somewhere, I would try to make the repairs.

So yesterday my friend and I showed up at the lady’s house. But by then she changed her story. Now she did not want a cement floor for her kitchen; she wanted a whole new, larger kitchen! I told her, through my friend, that I did now have that kind of money, and reminded her that last Friday when I came with the St. Vincent guys she had not said anything about a new kitchen. The lady was adamant; it was to be a new kitchen. I told her she wasn’t going to get a new kitchen, but I might be willing to cement the floor. She refused outright; it was a kitchen or nothing. So I agreed to give her nothing and, not bothering with the septic problem, turned heel and walked out. There are a huge number of people who need help, and I can better spend our money elsewhere. And now this lady gets neither new kitchen, nor cement floor. And she still has a leaky septic tank. She ends up with nothing.

It’s really frustrating, but this is a very common story here. Many people assume that foreigners are here to be taken advantage of, that we are made of money, and that we are gullible. And they just assume that if they wish hard enough, that what they wish for will magically plop into their laps. This is why it is so important to spend time here, to become part of the community, so as to avoid these people and their pitfalls.

I really can’t blame the lady for wanting a new kitchen – I would too, as it was small and barely functional. But I can blame her for not being upfront about her goal for a new kitchen. To the St. Vincent guys she said one thing, to me another. I can also blame her for assuming that I was there just to give her whatever she wants, and getting greedy about it. If she had asked “I would like a cement floor, but what I would really like is a larger kitchen. Can you do this for me?” I would have politely refused the kitchen, but probably offered her the floor, and the septic repair.

So now she sits there in hope that someone from an NGO will walk onto her property and announce “Guess what! We’re going to build you a new kitchen!” I know that hope springs eternal, but good luck!

Now I know that I have kvetched a lot in the past about the fraud and dishonesty and the lack of willingness to work that you frequently find here. I don’t want to give the impression that everyone here is like that. They aren’t. I know many hard-working honest folks. That is why I need to be here; to avoid the bad and encourage the good.

Examples of this are my St. Vincent friends, Vive and Gabriel.

Vive is in his late thirties, speaks good English, is very poor, has no job right now, is a devout Catholic, and is extremely charity-minded (hence his work, despite his own poverty, with St. Vincent). I’ve spent a great deal of time with him, and I’ve seen the house where he lives with his parents and siblings. He has shown me several St. Vincent-sponsored projects. And yet he has never asked me for help for himself. Well, not strictly true. He has been admitted into a business and accounting program at a prestigious college, and has asked me and several others for help in paying the fees. So I mean he has never asked for anything to help him directly and materially, like for a motorcycle or new roof. Education is another thing and, in my mind, falls under a different category. Also, he has asked everyone he knows for aid, not just me, the presumably millionaire foreigner. So I think he’s being reasonable. I wish I had the personal cash to help him, as it wouldn’t qualify as a legitimate ABDF project, but right now I don’t. Maybe in the future, next year, I can throw some money into the pot.

My other friend, Gabriel, is President of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. He’s a distinguished older man of about 60. He too is Catholic, poor, and very community-minded. Unlike Vive, he does have a wife and several adult children. Unfortunately, his health is not good; he has heart trouble as well as Type 2 Diabetes (the non-insulin shot kind) and as a result has lost several toes due to bad circulation. Gabriel is very much committed to the charitable work done by St. Vincent; the problem is that it is entirely supported by Sunday collections at church, which are meager, to say the least. Again, like Vive, he has never asked for anything for himself, only for the poor his group tries to serve.

Thus far the ABDF has sponsored one of his projects, Mrs. Nesamany’s awning. I was struck by how responsive and responsible both men were with regards to this project. The required information came quick. The initial estimate was for 6,000 rupees, or about $60. It actually turned out to be under 4,000, and not only did I get the receipts, but I got the change back as well. Usually an estimate is what I end up paying, but in this case they were able to cut costs AND they did not try to keep the difference. I suppose this is because they are a charity, not a business. Because of this and some of my other project interactions (remember the lady who wanted an electricity hook up?) with them I’ve come to the conclusion that they are honest and committed. I would like to do more projects with them next year, and am also interested in linking them up with Catholic groups abroad. You may recall I sent out an email about this two months ago.

My point is that I have come to admire, respect, and trust these two guys. So not everyone here involved in “charity” work is dishonest. When I get pissed or frustrated at the corruption I see, I try and remember people like Gabriel and Vive, who are trying to help, for real. Or my friend who had to leave the country recently.

On a different topic, a friend of mine, Dilakshan, is leaving this weekend for a three-month contract working in Uganda.

Overseas remittances, wherein someone works abroad and sends the money back to Sri Lanka, is one of the major sources of income for the island. In most cases, people work in the Middle East. If they are lucky, they work for an established company, preferably foreign. A great many people, especially women, end up working in domestic service as drivers, maids, child care providers, etc. The stories of abuse and violence done to these workers are horrific and extremely common. People are often never paid, and then deported. Sometimes people are held in complete isolation and treated as slaves. Often there is sexual and/or physical abuse. The reasons are complex; including class, race, gender, culture, and religion (most Sri Lankans working in the Middle East are Buddhist and thus regarded as infidels by Muslims). But really, it’s ultimately all about power and control. Lately there have been moves to discourage employment in the Middle East, and divert it to Europe and Southeast Asia, where people are treated like human beings, and paid more.

But my friend is going to Uganda. His cousin lives and works there, is even married to a Ugandan woman. Dilakshan is going to help him manage a construction project. So while I will miss him while he’s gone, he will be back by the time I return next year.

As I spent time in Kenya, and studied Swahili in university, I’ve given him a small list of basic Swahili words he can use in Uganda, where it is widely spoken. It should tickle the locals.

On the topic of language…

In my Synergy class I’ve taken to handing out a weekly list of 10 vocabulary words. We define, discuss, and then have a test the next week. Usually I get my list from questions I’m asked about English (What’s the difference between “whose” and “who’s”?) or misspellings I receive in text messages (“Is it argen (urgent)?”). Sometimes I just use words that sound the same but mean different things. “Mail” versus “male” was easy, but sometimes it can be a challenge. Last week it was “their” versus “there.” It took all of one class to get them to understand the different uses of the two. Lots and lots of practicing. But then at the end of class Pushpakan suddenly asks “What’s the difference between “their” and “theirs?”

Oy vey.

I don’t know grammar. I know how to write well, and I know when something is wrong, but if you ask me to point out the predicate nominative, or to define the pluperfect tense, I go glassy-eyed. However, in general I mange to figure it out as we go along. I may not be able to give the name of the grammar point, but I’m able to get them to understand how it is used. Which is ultimately more important anyways.

So today we continued our “their” conversation by talking about possessives (my, mine, his, hers, ours, etc.) Now they get the difference between “their” and “theirs”, and even “there” and “there’s!” It’s kind of fun when I see one of the kids suddenly understand a point. And then he or she will start to chatter about it in Tamil, and then suddenly everyone else also gets it.

Also, to the great amusement, enthusiasm, and interest of the kids, I’ve been teaching them one bad word a week. Last week it was sh*t, this week it was Bitch. Now some think that bad language should never be taught. I disagree.

First of all, every language has its obscenities, and when you learn about them you gain tremendous insight into a culture, its values, and its attitudes. This is something I stress to the kids when I teach them these words. Not just literal meanings, but cultural meanings and why they have these meanings.

Second, these words are, let’s face it, the FUN words to learn. And you can use them to introduce other less-dirty words as well. So as a tool they are very effective.

Third, I refer to the Synergy staff as the kids, but really they’re all adults and are able to handle the language; I mean, they speak the Tamil equivalent all the time I’m sure.

Lastly, these guys get exposed to such words anyways, so you might as well understand what they mean, and their implications. I will take Bitch as an example.

First I told them that originally Bitch was a proper word for a female dog, which it still is. They were then able to intuitively understand why calling a woman a bitch is such an insult. I also told them that in scale of obscenity, bitch is mild and there are worse words to use, but still it should not be used in daily conversation. I used Rap music as an example where it has caused controversy (they are all familiar with Rap).

I then used it as an example of a common feature in English, where a word can be used as a noun, adjective, adverb, or verb; English is among the most flexible of languages in this way. Thus in English we have: a bitch, bitchy, bitchily, and to bitch. (Incidentally, I used this same line of instruction for sh*t.) After practicing the different forms in sentences, I then gave them some common expressions, meanings, and sayings, using the word. Life is a bitch, for example. And while only women can be bitches, either gender can bitch about something. I had to explain the (to them) subtle difference between bitch and complain, and scored a new vocabulary word at the same time. And of course from complain we got to complaint – another new word! All the while the kids were having a good time, which is the best way to learn. Makes teaching easier too.

It’s sometimes a challenge to teach the kids. There are only four of them. And they are all of different ability levels. If it were a larger class, I could teach to the more advanced students, give them an activity and turn my attention to the less advanced, and the vice-versa. But since the class is so very small, I’ve decided to teach at a higher level. The two least advanced (Pushpakaran and Bathsala) can take as much as they can from it, and it’s good to expose them to a higher level of speaking anyway.

Pushpakaran is probably the least advanced of the group. On the other hand, he is not shy about speaking (which is good) and he will do so at great length, but incorrectly. Trying to slow him down and speak properly can be difficult. Bathsala is a really good learner; her spelling tests are always 100% correct. But she is very shy at speaking, and so I particularly encourage her to talk. Janetdarsheeni speaks well and has a decent grasp of English. But she tends to rely a little too much on her past knowledge and thus scores low on the tests. The top student is Shanthan. He speaks well and always gets a perfect score on his tests. But most importantly he uses the new grammar and vocabulary outside the class. I see the kids outside of class and after hours a lot, and if we’ve had a new word in class he inevitably finds a way to use it in conversation; correctly, I might add. He, Pushpakaran, and I sometimes go to a local bar together (women don’t go to drinking establishments) and even inebriated Shanthan manages to use his newly acquired skills. Good for him! To be able to that shows true learning!

I’m very comfortable teaching this class. In fact I really get a kick out of it. I like the small size. The small size means we’ve gotten to know each other very well, and while oft times it can become rather informal, we accomplish a lot. I’ve also gotten close to the kids, and I care very much for them. I know their families (we’ve made several field trips to their houses for lunch), their problems, their complaints, their hopes. In a larger class this level of intimacy wouldn’t be possible. It allows us to really communicate. So I get a lot out of it too, and that makes me happy. As always with me, I need the human touch. Without it, I would be less than enthusiastic; it would be just another job.

Well, OK. That’s all I have to write to you about for now. Next week Claire comes from Ireland. I’m so excited about her arrival; it’ll be the first time we’ve seen each other since the tsunami days. Huzzah!

xoxoxoxoxoxo

B.

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