Congo Days

Shaking the dust off my blog

2009-06-12T17:10:00.005+02:00

A year ago I was still in Congo. The rush of the last couple of months in Kinshasa was at its peak and my Guate days still seemed like a desirable but distant possibility. I dreamt of bookshelves for my geeky anthro books and for my favorite historical fiction, for my pseudo-copper Cameroonian cats and the gray and blue water jugs that survived the bullets from March 2007. I am here now. My books are patiently awaiting their shelves but the sofas that will see many hours of reading are already in place. So is my energy efficient fridge (another important element of last year's imagining).

We're in Guate now. Despite having plunged right back into work here, and after getting reacquainted with the local forests, I still need to remind myself that the key to our place is indeed THE key to OUR place, never mind the mortgage. Funny how I have stocked up á-la-Kinshasa with enough non-perishables to last a small-sized siege. I suppose Kin will never completely leave me, nor do I want her to.

I toyed with the idea of changing blogs and start a Guate Days one, but I think I will stick to the Congo one for now and go from there. After all, I think of Congo almost daily, here in the city and particularly when I am in Petén, where the heat and the humidity confuse me at times and I feel like the forest here is the forest there and one day I WILL merge my memories into one long journey down one long river.

I know just a few folks will appreciate the following picture in its fullest (Lisa, Paya, if you are reading). Things are similar but certainly not the same. Following the Congo-Guate analogy, I suppose that Flores and Santa Elena would be my Mbandaka. This is where I spend the most time when I am out in the field. The "Auberge the Bolls" would be the Casona and the Congo River would be Lake Petén Itza. Voilà my new "chez moi."

The awesome Guate pics were taken by Charlie Watson. Thank you Charlie!

Time to move?

2009-03-04T04:42:00.004+02:00

Well, I have been home for two months now. This was my first February in Guate since 2005. I left Kin six months ago and I don't think I will be returning to Africa any time soon. I thought I would, or at least I wanted to think I would, and so I told myself and my friends "but I will come back, we will meet again," while life was already making it harder to happen. One day, maybe. In the meantime I have been thinking that perhaps I should start a new blog. I have stuff to write about and I don't think it will fit the tone of Congo Days...I am pretty sure it won't. Why? 1) I feel my geekiness coming back in full force, 2) I am always more serious in Guatemala, 3) I am counting and enumerating things already.

So, I will probably move to a new blog and just visit my Congo ones from time to time, make sure things did happen and it was not my imagination. I will go back and remember how I missed what I now have, and be happy I am here. But I will also go back and feel nostalgic, and I will be happy because I love missing beautiful and tragic places. Like I missed home.

Wild horses

Guate Days

2008-11-07T18:11:00.005+02:00

High time I updated my blogs...I am still unsure of how to go about writing about Guate after moving back. The Congo is still quite present in my everyday life, though. I am trying to familiarize myself with the environment crowd again and I keep drawing examples from Congo and Central Africa all the time. It has been fun (and helpful!) to be able to compare gossip on the BINGOs and the general conservation situation and mostly to feel like I can work in my own country on subjects that I care and see some change (if minor) happen in my lifetime.

I do and will miss the vastness of the Congo Basin forests. The pressure on Guate's resources is immense and the little forest left seems to be under serious siege by the usual, scary suspects. I do enjoy being a national again. I never got used to being an ex-pat, specially an obviously white one. I love blending and speaking Spanish and working with colleagues that care as much as I do about the environment, economic development, health, etc. etc. etc. I have so many plans I'll have to take good care of my health because I might need to work well into my 80s to do what I want to do.

I will miss Africa. I am disappointed that the trip I had planned for this year will not happen and hope I'll get to go back in the near future. I miss AB, Martin, TGV, Jack, Nina, Hugette and the rest of the crowd, gossiping with the girls and discovering the globalization of crash diets :) I miss aquagym and not having to wear a sweater in the evening.

I had missed Guate. I am glad I caught the last days of the rainy season and am loving every single November day with its random kites in the sky. I got to walk in the mud and wear my field boots (¿vio Manolo?) hear Q'eqchi' spoken again. I thought I could still say a few words but soon realized all that was coming out was either Lingala or French...

I can't wait to have friends and family visit next year and be, once more, the insufferable Chapina that believes that even if not all is well here, it is always better to be "in my country."

P.S. Congrats to all my friends on Obama's win. We have been shameless supporters of Barack Obama and are thrilled to share the excitement with all the peoples of the United States. Another great November!

Forget Kentucky!

2008-08-19T18:39:00.001+02:00

or "El Pollo Campero" for that matter...

Happy Left Handers Day

2008-08-13T08:56:00.004+02:00

August 13, Left Handers Day.

Being a lefty has always been an integral part of my identity. Not sure why, but I always found solace in the fact that I was left-handed and was born in October, don't ask me why. Ever since I was little, I always noticed lefties in the room.

When I was in elementary school I hated art class because of all the rules. All those instructions felt claustrophobic. I was never given a break when it came to cutting with scissors, sewing, or mastering any basic skill with right-hand instruments. Some teachers were more understanding than others, but one or two gave me a hard time for doing things "backwards" despite the fact that I still got very good grades doing things my way. I wish back in the third grade I'd known I was in such good company. I know this would have irked Mrs. S, but I would not have resisted dropping a few names. Here you go, Mrs. S...

Some famous and infamous left-handers: Simon Bolivar, Napoleon, Charlemagne, Alexander the Great, Fidel Castro, Gandhi, Helen Keller, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rubens, Toulouse Lautrec, Billy the Kid, Jack the Ripper, Mark Twain, Franz Kafka, Marie Curie, Jerry Seinfeld, Drew Carry, Spike Lee, and of course, my friends J, A, T, and others with whom I have bonded over our left-handedness.

My Congo Days are Numbered

2008-08-05T17:30:00.011+02:00

My Congo days are numbered and I feel sad. I keep thinking of reasons to stay and I keep finding reasons to return to Guate. I want to go home. Home is Guate. "Home" to me also means a place where I can invest myself because I belong there. I can complain about what doesn't work but I also can legitimately invest myself in living according to my principles and accept the risks that come with this. This sounds horribly lofty and it may give you the wrong impression about how I see myself, but I don't know how else to phrase it.

As much as I will miss the Congo, I need to leave. Being here has taught me many lessons in humility and one of them is acceptance of how little impact we really have on the world. We're just passing through the world, really. The causes that we adhere to may sound altruistic but the reasons why we join have often a (strong) selfish component. In my case, this has been a desire to feel useful. And it is this need to feel useful that drives in part my need to return to Guatemala. The other reasons are obviously selfish and need not be elaborated upon: most of my family is there, most of my friends are there, D. and I like it there, the weather is nice, we love the food, the roads are better, there are far fewer power outages and water usually runs where we'll live.

The usefulness factor is the only one that I feel I need to explain. Here in Kin I feel quite useless. My work may or may not mean a thing in the short term OR in the long term scheme of things. Things in Guate may not be that much different but at least the little dent I'll make will mean something to me. Yes, to me me me.

When people ask me how I came to be in the Congo I answer with the truth: "my boyfriend moved here, I looked for a job, I moved here." I can tell from people's expressions that they find my story a bit disappointing. No, it was not the desire to navigate the Congo River, or walk in the jungle, or see elephants in the wild (I never did, btw). I did not come to save anyone or anything. If we want to talk about saving, it was rather the Congo and its culture shock therapy that saved me or at least forced me to reassess my life. This is why I am sad. In some strange way, it is the Congo that feels more familiar now. I have at least a dozen concrete dreams and plans for Guate and many enjoyable things lined up, but these are all plans that were born on this side of the Atlantic and I sometimes wonder how will they fare over there?

To end this (probably too private) entry, I need to clarify that I am thoroughly enjoying all these thoughts and reflexions. I am happy to be sad about leaving and I am grateful for every day that I've had to say goodbye to my favorite baobabs and rambling Art Deco houses, the strangers that I've come to recognize on the street, the sunsets and the tiny, electric blue Martin pecheurs and all the other birds that live, to quote my friend G., in this giant "cage" that is Kinshasa. I have fewer and fewer days to spare some change for Moïse, my little cheguez friend, to look for the Writer of Wagenia, to wave at the Incorruptible Traffic Cop, to gossip with my friends at work, and for so many things that up to last year would have been easier to leave behind. I'm happy to be sad.

This particular forest

2008-06-25T11:40:00.003+02:00

They want a forest.
This particular forest.
A forest far away.
They want to say they're there.
They want to say they've been.
They want to think the monkeys
are happy in between -
The tug of war,
the human fights,
the obvious question marks.
They want this forest.
But, why this forest?
I have not understood-
what is so special about these monkeys?
Have they got diamonds on the soles of their shoes?
Do they know about their walking blues?

On this side of the Atlantic

2008-04-17T09:17:00.008+02:00

I hadn't visited my own blog for a while. I think that the last time I checked it was back in October, when I began writing about being in Guate. I never finished the post. Back in September I felt I was somewhere over the Atlantic, neither here nor there. Last year was a strange year and 2008 has been stranger.

Elections came and went, I got my Leuven ID card, my free bus pass, an email address that looks academic, and the best of all: access by proxy to the online library. Guate was fun, sad and busy, made new friends, met old friends and traveled. Leaving Guate was not as hard as I thought it would be, though. I suppose having my sister with me made it much easier. Once back in Kin, I was very busy working (for $) and working (for PhD), traveling to interviews and going to the beach in Cameroon and crossing the border to Brazza, for more interviews. Brussels, NYC, and Memphis, amazed at how fortunate I am to get to do what I love, see the people I love, have things happen the way I imagined them.

Congo has also changed, or perhaps it has changed me. I miss Guate but I am not that eager to leave the DRC anymore. I never thought I'd feel this way, much less admit it. Some ex-pats talk about the "Congo bug" that keeps you coming back regardless of how vehemently you promise this is the last time. I thought I was immune because the Congo bug couldn't possibly coexist with the Guate bug.

I have been turning the idea of the Congo bug over and over in my head. Perhaps it is simply that after three years here I'm more or less settled and used to the system. Something similar happened when I was in the States, right before I returned home. Perhaps it is the knowledge that once back in Guate I'll become more sedentary and not be able to take off as easily. No frequent stopovers in Belgium. I won't get to come back and won't probably see AB, mini-Ale and the rest for a long time, maybe forever. Also, I think I miss the field. I haven't done any real hard-core fieldwork for a while. My boots have cobwebs and my dry sacs rest rolled up with the Thermarest and the mosquito net in the spare room. The only action my dry sacs see is when I lend them to friends who do get to go out to the forest.

Maybe it isn't the Congo, maybe it is. Part of me doesn't want to leave yet. I haven't seen Katanga nor returned to the Ubangi. I haven't taken a cheap flight to Johannesburg to see South Africa. I haven't seen the hippos swim in the ocean. I haven't picked enough rocks for my collection!

Maybe it is true that after coming to terms with the idea of staying here for another two years, life suddenly became simpler. We got furniture and plants, so the apartment finally feels like a home. I can remember how I felt before, counting the days until the next trip out. Now it isn't so bad. I don't mind it as much, and I don't count the days, and I am no longer somewhere over the Atlantic. I am here.

Somewhere over the Atlantic

2007-09-11T16:11:00.000+02:00

With all the recent happenings in Guate (elections, hurricanes, etc.), I feel like my head isn't 100% in the Congo. I'm somewhere over the Atlantic, it seems. Work is fine here, I'm moving ahead with my thesis and I enjoy the work I do. I'll be heading home in about a month, so I know I need to get moving and finish all I need to finish before leaving the DRC.

I'm anxious about the coming weeks. The run off is the first Sunday of November. If the weeks preceding the first round are any indication of what is to come, the next month or so won't be pretty.

This was a somewhat strange year. Not as much work as last year, more trips out of Congo, less fieldwork. I started the PhD but it doesn't feel real yet, since I haven't been to Leuven since I was admitted and I don't have a student ID (it sounds silly, but I'd like to have an ID so that it feels real and I can get student discounts, too).

After coming to terms with the idea of staying here for another two years, life suddenly became simpler. We got furniture and plants, so the apartment finally feels like a home. I can remember how I felt before, counting the days until the next trip out. Now it isn't so bad. I don't mind it as much, and I don't count the days. Still, I feel my mind is often elsewhere. I miss Guate a lot.

I guess I am somewhere over the Atlantic right now. Hovering. I feel a bit on hold.

March 2007, after the bullets

July 2007 with furniture and plants

Flipping disappointment

2007-09-03T10:30:00.000+02:00

I was hoping for a snake or at least some centipedes. I wanted to contribute something tropical to Via Negativa's initiative. This is the Congo, after all.

My friend Sonia and I left no rock unturned in her garden (except for one that was too close to an active bee hive) and found close to nothing. The few bugs that we saw, buried themselves before I could take a picture. They were small and brown, sort of looked like tiny roaches. Sonia and I were both surprised at the absence of life under the rocks. She did suggest that N., the driver/avid gardener probably cleans even under the rocks. I'm posting several of our disappointments.

In defense of the Congo I must say that not only Sonia's garden, but Kinshasa in general, is not the most exciting place to flip rocks in the DRC. Maybe next September 2 I'll be somewhere sexier.

2007-08-27T11:45:00.000+02:00

Kinshasa is nicely tucked away from hurricane areas, so I could safely enjoy yesterday's storm. It started around 9 am and only lasted an hour or so. It was magnificent.

People living close to the river do suffer from seasonal flooding and people living close to eroded areas are in grave risk of landslides. I think these risks are mostly of human origin, though. The areas surrounding Kinshasa are heavily deforested. I know nothing about geology but someone explained to me that the "hills" around Kin are basically sand dunes, that is why they erode so easily.

Kinois are lucky because they're out of hurricane and earthquake zones. Coming from Guate, I have great appreciation for this relative safety. It makes a big difference to see the gaps in the outer walls of the staircase and know that they were caused by gunfire* and not by an earthquake (Kinshasa is so far from the ongoing conflict in the east, that it feels like a different country all together) . I also feel better about loving the rain and the storms so much knowing that there is no threat of a hurricane. I am fully aware that I can say this because I live in a solid building (even if there are multiple leaks in the water system and electric connections work simply out of luck) in a flat area above river level.

*In two and a half years I have only experienced two "situations" that involved gunfire and fighting. Demobilization is still too recent to see it's effects in terms of available weapons on the streets. Petty criminals in Kinshasa normally do not have fire arms, nor do most police.

Sept. 2: Rock flipping day

2007-08-24T19:34:00.000+02:00

How I love it when grown-ups remember important stuff like rock flipping. Today I read in Sheep days about this important initiative. This led me to Via Negativa where I learned more about it.

I started and stopped writing various posts today, including one about Che Guevara in the Congo, another one about carbon sinks and environmental credits, and other subjects that somehow don't work for a Friday evening at the office, waiting to leave for a beer and then dinner with the usual suspects. While these extremely serious subjects didn't pan out, thinking and writing about rock flipping did, so I decided to join in the announcement of Sept 2, rock flipping day.

Picking rocks is an old hobby of mine. Looking for the "perfect" rock I have stumbled upon interesting and sometimes scary animals. When I was five or six I picked up a fairly large rock and found what I thought was a "giant worm" and turned out to be a poisonous snake. The memory is still fresh, and I can hear my father saying "Mija, ¡eso es un cantil!"

That's the sexiest rock flipping story I could remember.

The picture above is from Mvudi, a recreational place outside Kinshasa where I spent a few hours last year picking and flipping rocks with friends' kids.

I'll have my camera ready for the 2nd.

Looking Guatemalan

2007-08-08T10:59:00.000+02:00

I was told, yet once more, that I don't look Guatemalan. I used to find the remark amusing and "collected" nationalities as people guessed where I was from. It stopped being funny when I realized that while some people were simply ignorant of the different faces of Guatemala, others' comments were attached to questions that went beyond appearance. What do you answer to someone who says you're not a "real" Guatemalan?

For a while I made a point to offer people who brought this up a crash course in Guatemalan political history. I realized most weren't interested. They simply wanted to make me fit into one of their racial slots, I didn't fit, and that bugged them. I appreciate when people simply accept my answer because, after all, I know what I am. I don't appreciate people who feel entitled to ask my "pedigree" as if I were a fine horse or a competition dog.

This last incident happened when I was in the company of friends from three other countries. The commenter was a Latino. The people I was with weren't told they didn't look like nationals of their countries. Yet, I didn't look Guatemalan. One of my friends shook his head regretting the commenter's insistence. This friend ha lived overseas and has been to Latin America so he knew this fellow should have known better. He asked the pedigree question and for the first time ever (I think) I managed to feel less bugged by his questions and more...let's say, "compassionate" of his ignorance. I didn't fall into the genealogy discussion, but told him I was Guatemalan and that maybe he should learn more about my country before commenting on the subject.

This isn't something that makes me lose sleep, but being interested in issues of race and identity myself I do use these encounters to reflect upon what I think makes me Guatemalan. What makes people feel Guatemalan, Belgian, American, Congolese or Timorese? You can be born in a certain country and not feel from that country. You can identify with a country where you have never lived. I've met Belgians whose families have been in the Congo for 5 generations and they still consider themselves Belgians above all, and I've met people who are the first in their families to be born in a country and yet their attachment to the place and their alliances are strong. In my case I know that the insistence of people who feel they know what I am better than I do feels a bit like a threat because I know that feeling Guatemalan defines much of who I am, what I do, and how I see the world. Without my Guatemalanness I'm left in a sort of identity limbo. I never asked myself whether I looked Guatemalan or not until I was told I didn't. I never thought, and still don't think, that appearance should precede the other elements that make a person Guatemalan, Belgian, American, etc.

I've written a bit about identity on my blog in Spanish, where there is also a post written by Brett on adoption and identity and a link to Esme's great post on her experiences fostering in Guate. While thinking about these issues I remembered a great film I saw almost two years ago that touched upon many of these subjects. Sandrine recommended it first and I loved the movie. It's title in French is Va, vis et deviens ("Live and Become") and it is a beautiful story that touches upon identity, race, religion, adoption, history and love from one child's perspective.

Yaël Abecassis

© Les Films du Losange	Galerie complète sur AlloCiné

Interpretive dance

2007-08-02T11:06:00.001+02:00

One of my first memories of Kinshasa includes the "Bebe Rico" commercials. The guest house where we stayed the first weeks in the Congo didn't have cable, so every evening we watched Congolese TV. Sometimes there were kids at the dining hall when the commercial came up. Invariably everyone would sing along.

Yes, it is that Ally Mc something woman TV show dancing baby. I love the Congolese commercials because they are a wonderful example of interpretation and adaptation of the media.

During my first field trip here in the DRC, we stopped at a tiny village/military post on the Ubangi for a couple of days. I became friends with some of the local children, including little D. who was gracious enough to share with me, and now with you, her interpretation of "Bebe Rico."

Miscellaneous stuff

2007-08-01T19:25:00.000+02:00

I realize I have been writing a lot more in my Spanish blog. I don't want to force stories to come out in English, though. Rather than waiting for a long, coherent story to pop up in my head, I am going to include today some miscellaneous and random notes from the past few days.

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Failing French: so far, little luck breaking the writing in French barrier. I had been forcing myself to think and write in French, instead of taking notes in Spanish, writing in English, and then translating to French. No luck. I was getting nowhere with a report for the garden until I gave up in French and wrote it in English. Phew. Done now. A friend lend me his translator and now I will revise and correct the obvious and give it back to my secret helper to make sure it's properly written.

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Bad culinary choices: Last Saturday was a bad day food-wise. First, I made the mistake of eating salad in the sun. The salad dressing had some lemon and now I like I'm beginning to grow a mustache. Later the same day we went for pastries at the one place where they prepare cake filling like my childhood's bakery. I got greedy so instead of asking for the tried and true cake, I went for a different one that looked fatter. I was hoping to get the maximum cream filling for my bucks. Big mistake. The filling was whipped cream and not the egg and sugar thing I was hoping for. A friend ended up eating it.

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What a trivial post. Better put add some anthropology.

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I got word from the university and all's fine and well, KUL folks are the nicest most helpful people. Now I need to start working on the 20 pages I need to present in less than 3 months............................aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

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SfAA 2008, Memphis
I hope all the anthros are still on board for Memphis. Registration is open, BTW. If you want to organize a session, like we discussed some weeks ago, let's get started.

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My Belgian sister and beautiful sobrinita are a few days away from their trip to Guate. I cannot wait for them to see my country. I'm sorry I won't be there to share the fun, but I'm sure it won't be the last time :)

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The last Harry fan: I have a feeling I will be the last Harry fan to get to read book 7. I am extremely grateful to Françoise, who will buy it for me and then drive to Bruno's town close to Brussels to drop it off. Bruno will kindly bring Harry along my KUL paperwork. I plan to buy a dozen or more bags of bugles (nacho flavor), diet coke, and the other basic foods to fully enjoy Deathly Hallows.

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A couple of weeks ago we attended a concert at Halle de la Gombe (same place we go for Friday Chicken). It was a wonderful concert organized by some very dedicated folks here in Kin. I took several mini-clips. Here is one of them. Claudia, can you figure out what they're saying?

My favorite singer was the girl with the bell. She looked so happy!

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Random information I can certainly help you with...like the country code for Panamá. Being Latina I should know these things, right? 507. I love those random questions about things all Latinos should know. the only comment I do not like very much is when people tell me that I don't look Guatemalan. Fortunately here in the Congo most people do not know much about Guatemala, so I don't get that very often.

Now, some good (K)atholic news

2007-07-20T12:50:00.000+02:00

At least I think they are...yeah, they are.

I finally got word from the KUL (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven). I have been officially accepted to the PhD program in Cultural Anthro. Yikes. Funny butterflies, sporadic mini panic attacks, mostly happy. Somehow an idea I had been flirting with materialized (or rather "virtualized" because the letters arrived by email via Nivelles) into actually becoming a student again. Yikes again. Many people have encouraged me to do this. It's nice to now I have a great net of family and friends to support me (sounds like I am going to walk across Africa, I know, but it feels a bit like that to me.)

This will be my longest formal commitment to something. We'll see how it goes.

Catholic guilt: a note to friends from other churches

2007-07-12T13:24:00.001+02:00

Well, today the guilt is of a different kind. I didn't do anything myself, the pope did. It's his fault.

Growing up, I thought all Catholics were the Vatican II type. It wasn't until I was an adult that I realized that Vatican II had arrived too late in most of Europe and that not everyone believed that the whole thing about social responsibility, openness to other denominations, etc. was important and necessary. Ecumenism has always made a lot of sense to me, so did bringing the church closer to people and their realities. For all the mistakes of the church, I have to give credit to my (Vatican II and post Medellin and Puebla) Catholic upbringing for many important decisions I've made in the course of my life.

Now, this pope is taking it back. First the deal about the mass in Latin...now his claims about other Christian churches not being as good or as real...what next?

Many of my English-speaking friends will not care about this post, but some of my best gringo friends are Christians of denominations other than Catholic. I wanted to post this note to let them know that I count myself among the many Catholics horrified at what is going on in the Vatican right now.

Domestic affairs

2007-07-06T17:49:00.000+02:00

I finally finished fixing the apartment, so here are the pics I promised a long time ago. I love my work area. I can see the river from there, it's well lit, and there are always the comforting sounds of my neighbors' children playing and dancing outside, people conversing around the little peanuts, bananas, and beignets stall.

I like a lot where we live. It's an oldish apartment building from the colonial period that is attached to a building of private clinics and an ER. We have a corner apartment, more than enough space for the two of us, plus there's good natural light and ventilation. We don't need A/C.

It took us two years to finally get some furniture but finally, between having a couple things made by a local carpenter (my desk, the bookshelves and the dining table), stuff we bought from friends who moved back to France (the rattan couch and armchairs), and the armchairs lent by other friends, we had a place. Various expeditions to Ikea (in Bxl) with Françoise, Collette, Joelle and Sandrine completed the basic minimum to go beyond the "squatter look" to "something I can look at and not feel depressed."

I set up two armchairs to "honor" the living room at my parents' old house in Guate. It doesn't look exactly the same, but I get the same feeling. I like having once more my own reading corner from where I can see the trees, read, and keep homework for "later."

I had just finished rearranging the new furniture yesterday, when the door bell rang. The building's plumber and electrician were there to fix some problems I had asked them to look into. I must confess that it took me a couple of days to ask them because I have the feeling that once we start looking into mysterious leaks and pipe noises, the apartment will start collapsing. The building was built with the best materials of its time, I'm sure, but it's been several decades and the years are starting to show.

The first problem was quick to fix. The water heater had been making weird noises for a while and the pipe was also leaking. Like good Congolese handy men, the two guys arrived with the minimum number of tools possible. When they looked at the "problem" they both laughed and explained that since the water pressure is getting poorer and poorer, the water heaters need to be adjusted. That was it. The leak was fixed with something that looked like human hair. The plumber pulled out what looked like part of a blond wig out of his overall's pocket, tied it around the faucet, pushed it back, and voilà.

The other problem was more serious and hasn't been fixed yet. We started hearing "waterfall" sounds in the laundry room a few days ago. By the time the plumber came, water was already seeping from under the wood pane that covers the pipes. He removed the pane and we saw A LOT of water. Unidentifiable stuff came out too, it was all gray and wet, except for some small mammal bones that stood out because they were whitish.

The leak came from somewhere upstairs so the guy went up and later came back and told me it was in the 5th floor. What I didn't get is why the two apartments between ours and the 5th didn't say anything. If we're getting that much water three floors down, the other places must be flooding. The plumber said that he couldn't work on it yet because the owner had to be contacted first to get his permission to break the floor and the wall to fix the leak...So water kept falling and after staring at it for a while, it dawned on me that the main problem wasn't the water. Two years ago, Didier and AB sealed every single hole and opening in the apartment because of the RATS that move between floors through vents and openings.

About two hours had passed between the time the plumber removed the pane and my epiphany about rats. I closed all the doors and proceeded to nail back the pane. Unfortunately, the pane had begun to rot at the bottom, so it wasn't enough to protect us from the rats. Around that time Didier called me from Brazza and gave me some tips to secure the barricade against the rats.

I closed every door, moved the coffee maker to the bedroom (I was not going in the kitchen in the morning if rats were hanging around), locked myself in (rats can be smart), watched a horror movie, panicked when the power went out, realized it wasn't just at our place, fell asleep, and woke up to a still rat-free apartment.

Didier returned this morning. When he saw the result of the rat prevention work, he announced that he'd leave Kinshasa if rats ever made it through my barricade. Maybe I overestimated the local rats' skills. It'd be indeed unfortunate for us to find ourselves face to face with rats that made it through this.

After two years of plastic chairs and a mattress I am not even considering sharing our living space with whatever lives in the hollow spaces in this building.

Sadly logic or logically sad?

2007-06-22T12:06:00.000+02:00

Yesterday Didier and I were asked to participate in a selection panel to evaluate six candidates for an internship at the Kisantu Botanical Gardens. The profile of the candidates constitutes a good example of the educational and economical crisis that this country has been going through for...ever...

The six candidates were close to, or in their thirties. Only one of them had any paid professional experience. All had completed their university education in 8 to 10 years instead of 4. All tried their best to convince us they were the best candidate using the most "logical" arguments possible.

Most people here take a long time to complete their studies because they face all sorts of financial problems, including having often to support a family while going to school. Also, sometimes they have to wait 1 or 2 years until a certain course is offered. Professors are paid so little that they often have other jobs to complement their salary. Material and academic resources are very limited. And so on.

Many of these problems are similar to what Guatemalans face. Still, I often get the feeling that things are even more desperate here. After working in the Congo for two years the limitations of the candidates shouldn't come as a surprise to me, but still they shock me. It still makes me sad.

While the technical adviser and the Garden's director asked very specific questions about trees and stuff, D and I asked more general ones, such as the classic "how do you think you can apply your field experience to this internship?" and "what do you expect to learn from this experience?". Part of the reason why we asked more general questions was because we know nothing about plants, but also because these more general questions sometimes help see if a certain candidate has potential, despite his or her academic shortcomings.

The question about applying past experience to the internship resulted in answers that would be funny if they weren't desperate. We're no angels, so I'm not going to say that we didn't chuckle at a few of these answers. Still, the overall feeling elicited by these "logical connections" was sadness. They showed how desperate people are to get a paid job or internship.

It appears as if one of the more active professors in the Biology department at the UNIKIN is very involved in research on rats. Three out of the six candidates had worked with rats. Urban rats. So how does catching rats in the shanty towns relates to training as a field guide in a botanical garden 120 km from Kinshasa?

I tried my best to send the candidates telepathic messages with the PC-interview-proof-get-an-internship answers: "My experience relates to this internship because collecting rats requires the ability to adapt to difficult field conditions, pay attention to detail, etc. etc." It didn't work. I obviously don't have supernatural powers. These are some of the answers we got:

"I worked with rats. Rats are omnivores, therefore they also eat plants. The work at the Gardens involves plants. Logically, my past work relates to this internship."

"I worked with rats. Rats are part of the Animal Kingdom. The Animal and the Plant Kingdoms complement each other. I now want to work with the Plant Kingdom. Logically, my past work relates to this internship."

I think we thought we'd be helping them by asking more general questions, but apparently these "classic" interview questions are only classic on the other side of the Atlantic. Their answers were somewhat sadly logic. Applying for your first internship at 35 seems to me logically sad.

Vanilla Hearts

2007-06-21T11:25:00.000+02:00

Mandarina, sorry it took me almost a month to update you on the yogurt quest. We have been saving a few $ every week but I must admit that we're eating less yogurt now than before. I need to spend more time at home to diversify the flavors. I have been using part-skim milk and Canderel sugar substitute in crystals. I'm not yet sure if it is good or bad to use artificial sweetener. The difference in calories is not that significant. I'm using less that 1 teaspoon per jar, so maybe I'll switch back to regular sugar, don't know yet.

That said, the vanilla yogurt turned out very well. I have been freezing it to make mini-yogurt bites and that, at least, has been a hit with Didier (at least I think so). I takes one jar of yogurt to make one tray, but somehow having it in bite sizes makes it feel like there is more. Also, you can have one or two as mini-snack. The hearts come out prettier but the one in the pic below was already melting by the time I took the picture. The red stuff behind the heart is gazpacho. I'm addicted to it.

Croquet day

2007-06-18T15:55:00.000+02:00

On Saturday we were invited to David and Sonia's.

Some of the guys played ping-pong, but the game of the day was really croquet. Didier and I aren't really croquet people (I'm more of a foosball person, specially at David and Sonia's, where the foosball table is set up for lefties), so we observed and commented during the first game.

We ended up playing. I last played when I was 8 or 9 I think. My brother's got a croquet set, but in Antigua I always have excuses not to play. Here are some pictures Sonia took while we played.

I was certainly dressed for the occasion. I picked the yellow ball so it would match my skirt. Didier was wearing his SDSU t-shirt to match my skirt. We were very color-coordinated last Sat!

William and Adso

2007-06-16T11:38:00.000+02:00

I have been thinking about the principal characters of "The Name of the Rose" lately. We bought the DVD on our last visit to Belgium, and watched it a couple of weeks ago. I loved the film when it first came out, and loved the book, too.

When the abbey's library burned, I identified with William of Baskerville. I would have done the same thing and tried to save as many books as possible. I would have mourned for the lost books. Even though the story is fictional, I still felt sad when I watched the film.

I often think about all the knowledge that has been lost to accidents, ignorance, war, and intolerance. I miss the books I'll never get to read. I crave the smell of libraries and to think of the possibilities, of the things you can discover in forgotten shelves in far-off libraries. I love books.

I spent Wednesday and Thursday at the Botanical Garden of Kis@ntu. I went there to discuss a small participatory research project with the director and Francesca, who is the technical adviser to the garden's rehabilitation project. I was sitting outside the Garden's tiny library when I heard some commotion inside. Francesca came out a few seconds later carrying some old documents. She was furious.

Termites had gotten into one of the oldest collection of plant books the garden has. We took the books out and started killing the bugs immediately. The new garden intern helped us, too.

I felt sad and angry. The collection includes drawings for the flora of every province of the Congo, and the drawings are delicate and detailed. They come from a time before digital cameras and GPS, they're over 100 years old.

I could understand if the library held thousands of tomes, but there aren't even 1000 books in that library. Where was the librarian while the termites feasted away a few meters from his desk? The collection still has the original receipts, so we know they were delivered to the priest who founded the garden from the editorial house in Belgium. The books survived dictators and wars, only to be destroyed by bugs. I took special pleasure in decapitating and squishing as many termites as possible.

After our termite killing spree, we left the gardens for the cité where we were to lodge. The Catholic sisters that run the local hospital make ends meet by lodging visitors at their house. Having gone to Catholic school all my life, and after interacting with nuns on a relatively regular basis, I felt right at home in the simple but comfortable house.

At dinner, conversation turned around the upcoming project, which will focus on improving some of the living conditions of the cité, or village that neighbors the gardens. The sisters agreed that having a market next to the hospital wasn't ideal, and that in general the living conditions in the village weren't the most salubrious ones.

I thought about Adso and how he confronts what he sees and lives in the abbey with the poverty he saw outside. It was the XIV century, things were pretty bad. Listening to the sisters say how people couldn't pay for their surgeries, how different government divisions owed the hospital thousands of dollars in medical fees for their employees, and how they struggled to keep the hospital running, made me think of the termite-ridden books again, and of the library. And of the story of the abbey.

Do those books matter when thirteen year-old girls are coming in for C-sections because they're too young to deliver naturally? Is it normal to feel sad and angry about the loss of beautiful books AND about the dire conditions around the garden? What do you say to a librarian that struggles to feed his family? does it make sense AT ALL to point out the value of the books, the fact that they're part of the Congolese heritage, of the garden's heritage, of you-name-it heritage? Can he still be asked to do his job?

I left the gardens yesterday with all these questions in my head. I thought that I was William and I was Adso and that it was hard to make sense of it at all. The little participatory project is supposed to find a few doable solutions to improve the living conditions outside the gardens. The goal of the director is to deter encroachment on the garden. He fears that when the last tree outside is turned to charcoal for a few francs congolaises, the end of the garden will begin, and then there'll be nothing left. If the garden starts making sense to the people, perhaps the abbey won't need to burn.

Sometimes things seem not to change.

Kids from an orphanage leaving the Garden after a school visit.

Friday chicken and massage

2007-06-11T09:44:00.000+02:00

On Friday I stayed home. My shoulder was hurting badly and I thought I'd feel better if I worked at home and combined computer work with watering the plants and having the fridge near by. I wasn't feeling very well when my friend Sonia called saying that she would come by to return the yogurt container (she came over last week to use the yogurt maker). Sonia talked me into going with her and use her massage machine to make my shoulder better. I was really feeling like cr@p because on top of that I had m. cramps, so Sonia also offered to make one of her herbal concoctions to help with that, too.

I'm glad I listened, because Sonia saved the day. Turns out she learned massage techniques back in Equator (the country, not the DRC province), so she did a great job on my shoulder and I felt much much better. I felt well enough to go out that evening for Friday chicken at the French Cultural Center, where we met Sonia, David, Lisa and Paya.

Friday Chicken at the FCC is the best deal in town. For $10 you get a whole chicken, plus fries and plantains. It's so much cheaper than the average Kinshasa restaurant that the first few times we ate there we didn't know how to handle such a small bill. We normally pay over $10 per person when we eat out, so dividing $30 between 8 or 9 people feels so improbable that it takes a long time to divide the tab.

Thank you Sonia for insisting on taking me under your wing last Friday.
I managed to take some unauthorized pics of Didier before he noticed.

Random views

2007-06-04T16:57:00.000+02:00

We're not allowed to take pictures of public places in Kinshasa. If you're seen walking around with a camera, you will be stopped. When it comes to pictures, random individuals will approach you and tell you that you are breaking the law. This is why we can't take pics of the street where we live, and that is why I'm not posting any forbidden views. I just wanted to share some views OF our balcony (not FROM).

The first one is of my avocado plant that I started growing from seed.

This one is of the iron bars that protect our balcony. We live in a third floor, but you never know. Apologies for the baobab in the back.

Another detail of our wonderful bars. Apologies for the building and the lumberyard in the back. I almost had to apologize for the river but it was too hazy so, phew.

I wish I could post a picture of our view of the river. We've got only a partial view, but still, it is the Congo. Unfortunately the Congo is also an international border, so nope.

Mini-Ale and Marthe stopped by today and Ale helped me upload the pics. She tried my vanilla yogurt today and loved it!!

She checked the views and pondered for a while and then she let me know it was ok to post the pics. She's still a very serious little girl so I trust her opinion.

Marthe and Mini-Ale will be flying back to Mbandaka on the 16th. We'll meet once more before they leave, then it won't be until I go to Mbandaka next time that I'll see Marthe, Tinda and Alejandra.

This is my favorite pic because they have the same expression.

Marthe also loved the yogurt. She wouldn't touch the black beans, though. This is in the country where people eat grasshoppers, caterpillars and most members of the animal kingdom...Marthe eats beans, I know, because she prepared them for me once in Mbandaka. She just thought the color was weird or something. Oh well.

When in doubt..."do"

2007-06-01T17:24:00.000+02:00

Didier was at a meeting all day yesterday. I stayed home, away from temptation #1 (blogging), so I could get more work done. I had planned to crash the meeting in the afternoon to hear Didier's first presentation, which was supposed to be at around 3:30. There was a cocktail afterwards, well, after his second presentation (the one that regular folks like myself could attend), so I dressed up a bit. I arrived at the hotel where the meeting was held just in time to sneak into the meeting room, but then I chickened out.

Yes, chickened out.

It was a small meeting and when I peeked into the room several people turned around to look who was coming in, so I quickly closed the door. Then Jef, a friend, came out to talk a phone call, and I asked him if he thought it was ok to go in. He said "of course" but he was smirking, plus, I know Jef's standards for "ok" (his quite fearless of the ridicule) and so thought twice and stayed outside.

Cold feet twice within 10 minutes. I usually don't care and I don't know what I was up to yesterday. I felt very self-conscious and out of place. I thought I had dressed inadequately, and worried I would disrupt the meeting and then Didier would get mad because I had walked in right before his turn. You name the fear, I felt it. I freaked out.

So, I was stuck in the hotel with two hours to kill, no laptop (I feel so naked without my laptop!!), no chance of walking around the neighborhood (a notorious hot spot for petty crime), and nothing to read.

I went down to get a coffee and managed to kill about 15 minutes sipping my tiny 5 bucks expresso and writing about the incident on my pocket notebook. I didn't want to pay for another overpriced coffee. I was starting to get bored out of my mind and tired of feeling silly for not having walked into the meeting. I started wandering around the hotel (very, very slowly, to make the most out of the place). It was mid-afternoon so not many people were in the lobby. I wondered if the hotel had a hair salon.

I'm pretty sure that all hotels that receive a fair number of business and official visitors have hair salons. It may be a universal requirement to get a star or something. I decided to check. The shop area at the Memling isn't very large. There's a pharmacy, a flower shop, a cellphone store, Air France's in-town desk, and a souvenir shop.

I passed by all these shops wondering if the Memling was going to be the first unfortunate exception to the hotel and salon rule, but Memling delivered. A small sign announcing "hair salon such and such, upstairs", and the best news of the day: "ouvert" saved the day.

I spent the next hour and a half getting my hair washed and dried, and observing the fascinating world of Congolese Hair Science. I was the only mundele there. Five other women were getting five different treatments/cuts/extensions done. Next to me, a young stylist was weaving wavy human hair to a lady's tresses (the package read "100% human hair" and I immediately thought of Tess Monaghan of Laura Lippman's novels). The stylist was dressed in full Congolese hip hop attire including the mandatory diamond stud on one ear and the baseball cap. He did his art while singing along the radio and stopping from time to time to do some moves when a particularly popular Congolese song was playing.

Another stylist was busy reading the apparently very complicated instructions for the application of a product another client brought in a silver tube. After consulting with his colleagues he proceeded to apply the cream only to the ends of a few strands of hair of his client.

Next to the works of engineering the stylists were doing, my own straight brushing must have seemed very boring. Still, the guy dedicated a lot of time to my hair. He even tried three or four times (unsuccessfully) to keep my bangs in a sort of wave and laughed when the "wave" collapsed under his very eyes.

By the time I was done it was almost 5:30. Everybody was friendly and I think a bit surprised to see a mundele in a hair salon that obviously specializes in African hairdos. Time flew. By the time I paid for my $15 do I was in a great mood, complimenting stylists on their skills, women on their new hair looks, and the cashier on the good service. I was complimented back, invited to return soon, told I was a very friendly mundele. I left the place in a true hair high.

I went back to the floor where the meeting was taking place in time to steal some spicy olives and two mini-sandwiches before the important guys arrived. The rest of the evening went very well. Didier's main presentation went great, and the cocktail included some mini-samosas that my friend Sonia and I devoured while hiding under a strategically located potted palm tree.

Yesterday I confirmed the transcultural power of the blow drier.

Below: Didier, Ale, Jef (the picture doesn't do justice to George's work, btw.)