Power of Ideas

All the PACE participants finished their focus groups today. I spent four hours walking from classroom to classroom in the basic school where they were holding their focus groups and sat in for a bit. My translator went along with me but had to hop in and out periodically in order to deal with any logistical issues that came up - a cup went missing, someone ran out of tape, there wasn't any more water left in the jug someone had brought. When he was not with me I was left to practice listening to Swahili, trying to pick words out here and there. The ones I recognized the most were the words on the lists of problems that I had written down and heard dozens of times by this point - poverty, transport, poor harvest, discrimination, school, hatred, etc.

 

Of course, my mind wandered off every now and then. I can only strain to listen and understand about five percent of what is going on for so long. I thought about the fact that for the past four days eighty people - eight groups of ten people - had been meeting for two hours each day to discuss problems in their community. What had made them all come together to discuss these problems? Why were the PACE participants spending eight hours of every week to sit in a classroom with me and talk about problems? There was no offer of money. Even the participants of my workshops themselves do not yet know that I have twenty million kwacha - over 100 times the amount of a good monthly salary - to give to whatever projects they decide to implement in the community.

 

Up to this point, I have offered nothing but ideas (and watches, t-shirts, and some kool-aid) to the participants. And I have only begun sharing the ideas. We're only one quarter the way through the curriculum. The most exciting stuff is yet to come. I sometimes forget how exciting and truly empowering it is to be introduced to a new idea that has the potential to change your life. When I think back on the past two years in graduate school, where I learned most of the things that I am teaching here, I remember that feeling of sheer exhilaration when something we were talking about just clicked in my head, and suddenly a part of the world that had been cloudy and gray to me before was suddenly illuminated. Some days I would literally bounce in my seat, my head filling with ideas sparked by what I was learning.

 

The best part of gaining new ideas is fitting them together with all the things you already know. It helps you to realize and appreciate all the things you already know. The participants in my workshops already knew most of what they are using to identify and understand problems in the community. They knew transportation and poor harvest were huge problems, they knew those problems' causes and effects, and they knew how to get people to talk.

 

As my translator came back in the classroom and sat down next to me on one of the wooden benches, I tried to understand what I was doing here? How had the few ideas I had brought motivated so many people to do things they would never have done before? My thought was cut off by my translator, who started to tell me what was being said. They were talking about FORGE. I wasn't sure if this was just for my benefit. I'm sure it must have been a little bit, but it was probably also genuine. One thing I have learned about people here is that they rarely sugar coat their opinions in such situations. If you disappointed them, they'll tell you to your face.

 

One of the men said, "We are seeing things we have never seen before in our community because of FORGE. They have come and are asking us about our problems in order to solve them. No one has ever done that before." I couldn't help but smile. It's hard to imagine a better compliment.