Hello people,

My first month in Pashome village has been interesting, especially since my arrival has been simultaneous with the rainy season. It would have been nice to move into the village in say mid-October to get acquainted with the people and their livelihoods in a less dire situation, but instead reality hammered me in the face with three mortalities in the first two weeks.

When I first arrived in Zambia, it was winter and most of the plants were brown. Now that the rains have come, the plants are lush, wild animals and birds are well fed - Zambia appears to be booming. Yet it is precisely at this time when the people suffer the most.

The rainy season brings the opportunity to grow food, but it also means that last year's food stocks are coming to an end. Grain sheds have been near-emptied for planting and people are trying to stretch out their last bags of maize (corn) until the new harvest in May.

Along with planting comes the additional cost of fertilizer and labor (for the few who can afford either one), school uniforms and school fees - the wallet is starting to look pretty thin.

Then, factor in the price of vegetables. During the dry season, vegetable production is quite high. Farmers have no work in their fields so they tend to focus on small-scale vegetable production using irrigation. But when the rains come attention must be focused away from the vegetable gardens and to the production of groundnuts (peanuts), maize, and cotton. This means that their garden-generated income stops, they must now purchase vegetables, and with the drop in vegetable production, the prices climb rendering them unaffordable for most.

The rains have only just begun, the roof of thatched houses leaks and need repair. If the rains continue they may wash away the mud that is holding the hut together, collapsing the walls.

And then there is disease. Cows and chickens don't respond well to the muddy conditions and they fall ill and some die. This can be overcome, people are strong - the milk and meat the animals provided were luxuries, the plowing the cows did can be done by hand.

The rains too bring mosquitoes and mosquitoes bring malaria. Weakened bodies from hard work and poor nutrition are plagued by malaria and HIV/AIDS opportunistic diseases. The rains bring hospital bills and funeral expenses.

"We Zambians, we are used" I heard one man say. The rains come every year, you are prepared - if not financially then mentally. It is rare for families to be hit by all of the above in one season, but it's been known to happen. You can expect at least half to occur, especially since they are all interconnected.

The link between poverty and disease is one example I have come to better understand this past month. One of the gifts I received on Christmas was a mosquito bite. After a nine day incubation period I was nailed with malaria. In Zambia they grade the degree of malaria a person has, the lightest case being malaria and the close to death case being malaria+++. I was diagnosed with malaria+ but I am almost ashamed to say I had malaria.

Malaria is a parasitic worm that attacks the red blood cells, making it difficult for muscles and brain to get the required oxygen. The result is that you feel extremely tired after only walking from one side of the room to the other. Anti-malarial medication does not prevent malaria but only some of its side-effects - namely death.

Because I was taking anti-malaria medication, I can hardly say I had malaria once having seen the destruction that it causes in bodies not on anti-malarial medication. A healthy young man in my village, Julius, had malaria at about the same time as I did. In 2 days, Julius was reduced to a pile of rubble. He had a 41º fever, his face was covered with sores, he gasped for breath, and had immense pain in his head and side. Two weeks, a dozen pills, and 20kg of body weight later, Julius is now limping around the village with a cane. It will probably take him another month or two to recover. I had malaria, but I'm almost ashamed to say I had the same disease as Julius. My malaria was a day at the beach compared to his.

For now I will bid farewell from a post-mango season, pre-avocado season Zambia. I hope this letter finds you in peace, in good health, and with the knowledge that there is hope for a better world.

In solidarity with humanity;
Paul.

My dearest people;

As I am writing this, rain drops are slowly falling outside, something that is out of the ordinary mid-October in Lusaka. My co-workers are complaining about the cold. "Ah," they say, "have you seen the weather? It's not usually like this. October is usually the hottest time of the year. This year the rains are early and is cold too soon." I try to sympathize but cannot. Fifteen degrees in October!

Zambia is treating me well; it's difficult to believe that I've already been here for more than a month. I'm getting used to it now though.

When I first arrived, life in Zambia seemed similar to life in Ghana, but now I've come to realize some vast differences. First, life in Ghana occurs on the street. In the early morning hours of 5-6am people start moving out onto the street. Every meal can be purchased and eaten on the street. Everything you would ever want is sold on the street, from nuts and bolts to beds and armchairs. There are no stores to buy things. If you need something, you search until you find it on the streets. Only after maybe 9 or 10pm do people move back to their homes to sleep, and even then, during the hot, dry season, some people prefer to sleep on the street. In Zambia things are different. Very little happens on the streets here (although compared to Canada, the streets are booming). There are very few vendours who sell their goods at tables on the roadside, and these vendours have to compete with actual stores that are very similar to the family shops in Toronto or the specialty shops in Europe. Here there are bakeries, vegetable stores, butcher shops, hardware shops, lumber shops, etc. Although there are a few chain supermarkets that have moved in from South Africa, that sell everything under one roof, for the most part, there are family owned businesses. As a result of things being sold in stores, goods are generally more expensive and when you factor in the fact that Zambia does not subsidise its fuel (and the Ghanaian government does), life is considerably more expensive in Zambia, especially if you eat every meal out-of-doors (the evening meal is almost impossible to find if you don't prepare it yourself). Another difference that you notice almost instantly is the fact that there are no open sewers here. Everything is buried here, which is good because you don't have to deal with the smell, but also you don't have to worry about taking a mis-step and falling in.

The next major difference is the class structure. Although in Ghana, there are major class differences, they are not as well definded. Even in the rich neighbourhoods, you willfind people living in one-room shacks right next door. Even the rich are constantly reminded of the poverty in the country. In Zambia however, it is a much different picture. Here things are much more segregated. There are three classes of people. The rich class, mainly consisting of white people -commercial farmers (owners of huge factory farms), mining company representatives, or other investers have their own neighbourhoods, their own places they shop and their own entertainment. The middle class consisting mainly of people of East Indians heritage, own most of the shops and they too have their own neighbourhoods, places to shop and entertainment. Then the poorest class, the native Zambians struggle to find work and live in the poorest neighbourhoods, or compounds as they call them here.

I suppose many of these differences stem from the history of Zambia compared to the history of Ghana. In Ghana and much of West Africa, the Europeans only reached the coast and did most of their trading with the local peoples along the coast. For the Europeans, leaving the coastal areas of Ghana proved too difficult because of the harsh environment: the climate, the rainforest along the coast and of course Malaria. These environmental conditions left most of Ghana uneffected by direct European contact, although there were harsh tribal conflicts due to the competition in obtaining goods brought by the Europeans (ie. the slave trade). In Zambia, and in much of Eastern/Southern Africa, the situation was different. Although the climate was harsh along the coastal areas, the Europeans (mainly the British) had access to cheap labour from their other colony - near by India, to help them build transport routes into the interior of the continent. The British moved thousands of Indian people to Africa to help with the building of the railroads. The Indians were used to being colonized and were more reliable to do work. The local African population was too powerful in their own setting and it was too difficult to mobilize them to do work. As a result, there is an enormous Idian influence in Eastern and Central Africa. Also because the railroads were built, the colonizers had easy access to the mineral resources and to the fertile farmlands of the interior. The countries became quite developed (infrastructure wise) while still under Colonial rule. Since Independence though, countries like Zambia have slowly slid into a deep poverty. Initially Zambia was quite well off, especially when the world copper prices were still high, but since the early eighties, a decline in the world copper prices, a series of poorly advized loans, structural adjustment programs, national industry privatizations and corruption have lead to higher poverty levels and lower government autonomy. All in all it is providing a challanging working environment.

Before I arrived in Zambia, some people had told me that Zambians are the kindest people in the world. I was skeptical however because I remember thinking that Ghanaians were the friendliest in the world. I think that I understand now what the situation is. The main difference between Ghanaians and Zambians is the level of aggresiveness. Please note that I don't mean violent, but aggressive. Here in Zambia, people are quite timid and as a result, I need to initialize the greeting before I am covered in a blanket of friendliness. It is quite easy to walk through a city like Lusaka and catch nothing but blank stares and and shy looks. Only once I smile (and trust me I can't help but do this often), that I receive a smile back or a greeting or an invitation to somewhere. In Ghana all you need to make friends is a beating heart. People will surround you, swarm to you, if there is even the slightest sign that you might be stranger in the area. Deep down inside though, the riendliness comes from the same place and is used for the same purpose - ensuring survival of not only yourself, but your entire community.

To work here, I need to be able to drive a motorcycle. On my first day out in traffic, everything was going well driving on the left side and all. Unfortunately, when I turned onto a side road, I forgot to stay left. Soon a vehicle was approaching and I thought to myself, "Ah, why is this car driving on my side of the road?" It wasn't until I had driven into the ditch and the car had passed that I realized I was the one driving on the wrong side. Fortunately as a learning driver, I had a huge reflective "L" on the front and back of the bike. You'll all be pleased to know that I am alive and the proud owner of a Zambian motorcycle license.

The staple food here is called Nshima. Nshima is a porridge made out of cornmeal that is cooked until its solid. I must say it's delicious. At first it seemed like all I was eating was some tasteless ball of cornmeal - in my opinion it desperately needed some salt, not added later, but while it was being cooked. I soon have discovered the way of Nshima though and must admit that I quite enjoy it. This food truly fills you up, but not to the point where you are uncomfortable like was often the case with Fufu in Ghana, but to the point off true bliss in the stomach.

You pick up a small piece of Nshima and knead it between your fingers and palm until it is a uniform ball. Then you dip it into your vegetable "relish", place it in your mouth and feel your hunger slowly fade into a state of complete satisfaction.

This "relish" is made up of variety of vegetables such as Okra (an extremely slimey vegetable if you boil it), tomatoes, onions, cabbage, or canola leaves. Canola leaves are the national vegetable and it is similar to spinach. An intersting piece of information is that Canola here (and commonly) is known as rape. When rape became a popular crop for oil extraction from the seed in North America, especially in Canada, promoters found it difficult to market a product called rape. So rape seed oil became known as CANada OiL or CANOLA. Interesting what one learns about one's own country while overseas eh?

I've started to learn the local language as well called Nyanja. Luckily this language is not tonal like twi, but relatively straight forward so within a month or four I should be fluent. I've also managed to find a guy who was willing to teach me Nyanja. We decided to meet in my office after work and he would prepare a lesson. When he showed up, he had written the alphabet on the back of poster paper and was ready to teach it to me. You don't know how excited I was to learn the Alphabet for the 3rd time (the Nyanja alphabet is the same as the English and the Twi alphabets). So after the alphabet, and he was very impressed at how quickly I caught on, the teacher pulled out the English-Nyanja dictionary, picked a letter, and started dictating English words, starting with that letter, and translating them into Nyanja, making sure that Iwrote each one down as he read them. Out of all the letters he could have picked he picked the letter "V". We covered the words Vacuum and Vagabond right off the bat. Sweet. In a land where everyone has a dirt floor, concrete at the very most, and the people with electricity are few and far between, how often do I need to use the word vacuum? Or how many times in every day conversation will I explain the airless state in space? Maybe someone can explain to me what the meaning of vagabond is, because I for one, have no idea. As the lesson went on however, we reached words like velocity which of course is useful when you are calculating displacement. Needless to say that was mylast Nyanja lesson from that teacher. I managed topurchase his English-Nyanja dictionary and now I am spending an hour everyday on my own working through differentlessons that I've prepared for myself. As for the pronounciation of the words, I either ask my co-workers, or for the most part the spelling is pretty self explanitory.

I've found accomodation in the "backyard" of a family. I say "backyard" because realistically, this family's "yard" is in the compound, usually known as slums in other parts of the world. Rent is cheap - I'm willing to bet that I'm paying less than everyone who is paying rent, a solid $16 CAD a month - yup living the high life. I have two rooms in what Iwould probably call a shed. I have electricity, although I'm not sure if it is acquired legally, but that is the family's problem and not mine. I do however have to fetch my own water, which is quite interesting in and of itself. In the compounds there are several water stations that serve between 100 to 500 homes, and they are only open between 7:00am and 5:00pm. The only time when I can go to get water is right at 7:00 because at all other times I am at work. This is however the busiest time of the day and I usually have to wait a few minutes before I can fill my 20L container. Fetching water is a very gender-definded role, and unfortunately I don't have the right gender. Waiting for water in the morning could be interpreted as hell. The task of fetching, waiting and carrying the water is really no problem. The problem arises from the groups of little boys who torment me while I am doing "women's work". They quite openly question my manliness and they laugh about thefact that I, a full grown man, cannot convince a woman or child to carry my water for me. What they fail to realize however, is that all Ineed to do is ask them to carry my water for me and they would be obliged (since I am their senior) to do my "women's work" for me... I'm enjoying the living conditions. Sure it's not as nice as some of the places that I could be staying, but atleast I am surrounded by every day Zambians, experiencing true life.

Just a quick note before I start talking about the project, for those of you who might be interested in diving deeper into why I love Africa, or why I would choose to stay in Zambia, I strongly recommend reading "The Shadow of the Sun" by Ryszard Kapuscinski who is a Polish journalist who has spent most of the past 45 years in Africa. His stories really hit the nail in the head when it comes to trying to explain Africa. If anyone does read it, please explain to me what happens at the end of the Chapter called Salim.

Project;

The project that I am working has up to now, not yet been defined. I've been placed in Chipata, a town close to the Malawiand Mozambique border, but before I go into too much detail, I will first explain a little about International Deve dlopment Enterprises (IDE).

IDE is an international development organization that has mainly been doing work in South East Asia, mostly Banladesh. They have developed a low-cost stair-master type of pump that will pull water up from a shallow groundwater table, river or stream, and dispense that water for irrigation. In 1997, the same low cost treadle pump was introduced to Zambia by IDE and they have promoted its use for small scale irrigation. Recently however, IDE realized that eventhough farmers were using the treadle pump for irrigation, and farmers were able to produce crops for two to three growing seasons instead of one, their income did not necessarrily increase. In order toinsure an increase in small-holder farmer income IDE has recently introduced a methodology that looks at all aspects of the small-holder farmer industry. Now IDE is trying to provide crop input linkages, agronomical information linkages, and output market linkages to these small holder farmers, their entry point being low-cost irrigation promotion. Most IDE field offices throughout Zambia have adopted this new methodology, although the Chipata office has not yet started implementing the new methodology. My role will be to work with the person in the IDE Chipata field office and start ensuring that at the end of the day, farmers increase their take home income. Sounds easy eh?

I'm sorry but that is all the time I have for now. I hope this finds you all well, and if not, that soon you will be well.

Peace and Global Justice,
Paul Slomp