One hot Afternoon

I’ve been thinking a lot about winter lately. I suppose that happens when you find yourself in a place where extreme and constant heat is a way of life. It’s just this realization I’ve had that all my comforts have to do with creating warmth in some way or another and I find myself at somewhat of a loss… Here in the CAR I can’t curl up with a blanket and a hot cup of tea – I’d probably pass out. Cooking requires proximity to fire – not ideal. Yoga gets the blood flowing and in heat like this you mostly want it to come to a total standstill, body and soul.

And I’ve missed four consecutive autumns. For four years I haven’t seen the transition between summer and the colorful fade into cold. I haven’t smelled the wood smoke of living room fires or carved a pumpkin. Instead, Africa’s heat has installed itself in my very bones. I write from my logistics office where I sit directly in front of a fan and avoid all unnecessary physical exertions.

But in some strange way, I miss the cold and the space it creates for solitary reflection.

Currently, I’m looking for another job. The fact that I write this while at work hints at my gradual yet definite demotivation. This stems from a number of factors including an ever-increasing sense of futility. No, not in the larger humanitarian sense – but in the here and now of my current job. IRC is not organized. We have no funding, we lack staff, and everyone is tired and frustrated. It’s not exactly an atmosphere that encourages engagement nor creativity.

So I’ve been daydreaming…about winter and the ocean and the inevitable question of what I want to do- I mean really want do. It’s quite clear to me that the aid industry is ‘not my thing’. It’s been a long time figuring out exactly why and I’ve finally boiled it down to this: I really like Africa. I mean, I honestly do. And the thing I’ve realized about Aid Workers is the majority…do not. It’s a fault endemic to a field which focuses on this generalized idea of ‘helping people’. Superficially this seems like a good idea. But when you get right down to it, if you don’t feel some sort of connection to the people you’re supposed to be helping it becomes something of a farce.

But I can’t rely on pure love of place to carry me through. I need a job – a source of funds, a means to an end. Currently, this entails applying to every hint of an opportunity to which I might be qualified and offered a penny for my troubles. As so many know these days, it’s a rather unpleasant task, this job search thing.

And therefore I prefer a return to my daydreams. I’d like to start my own business. My head is filled with patterns and designs for a simple yet striking collection of clothing made uniquely with African fabric. I’ve been toying with the idea of opening a small eco-tourism hotel like Ghana’s Green Turtle Lodge somewhere on the shores of East Africa. I picture a remote beach accessible only with run-down African bush taxis. There will be no electricity or running water but I’ll build small thatched bandas with large comfy beds and luxurious pillows. There will be omelets and fresh fruit served on the beach each morning and a Rasta bar tender who stirs up refreshing concoctions for the after-swim beverage.

The hotel will be small, simple, tasteful and inexpensive. It will be a destination for the adventurous – those who wish to explore. Next door, or perhaps somewhere in the back next to the garden I’ll build an open-air studio where I will make my designs and teach local women to sew my patterns from the fabric I’ll buy in the market on Saturdays or from my trips to the capitol city each month. Once I develop a rhythm, a base of successful patterns, I’d like to learn the art of batiking. Perhaps I’ll vacation in Ghana for a month where I’ll take a course and bring back a supply of colored dyes and photos to share with the girls who help me sew.

These things I’ve made will then be sold. Small-time at first. A display beside the bar – things for the beach. But as the quality improves I’ll look towards other hotels in the area and perhaps a small shop in the town. Maybe, if things go really well, I’ll begin to bring my creations to the states where they’ll be sold in a teeny corner shop in Provincetown – beach to beach.

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Back here in Kaga Bandoro, I’m working on a quilt. I’ve finished about 12 of the 70 or so squares I’ll need before its completion. Each square consists of four tinier squares which, in turn, each consist of four strips of colored fabric hand-stitched together as I sit in front of the TV watching France 24 each night. I take my bucket bath at the end of each hot hot day and think of my eco-hotel out somewhere on some hidden beach in East Africa. I wake up each morning and go to work and apply to jobs hoping that someday I’ll wake up realizing I don’t have to apply to jobs any more because whatever it is I’m doing – I’m doing what I love. Now if only I could find THAT advertised on ReliefWeb.