Nape's Space

Dennis Tessier
with Jill Valentine


Jill is joined for the walk home along one of Ngonga's many paths


Where are the graves? That is the question someone once asked me when I had brought them to Friends of Tanzania’s “Watoto Wetu (Our Children)” project in Kyela, Tanzania. It was a good question considering how we had previously discussed in length the impact of the AIDS pandemic in the District. According to TACAIDS statistics Kyela is the second hardest hit district in Tanzania with 13.5% of its inhabitants infected with HIV. The question was simple and honest…if the infection rate is high, the number of people on ARVs low and the health system inadequate one must assume that there are a lot of deaths (and sadly there are)…but then why are there no cemeteries? Why are there no mass graves? With the rhetoric of AIDS campaigners, using such words as "PANDEMIC", this volunteer expected to see corpses stacked in piles. The truth is there were none, and that is precisely why the AIDS pandemic continues to rage on. In Africa, AIDS is a slow Tsunami that just is'nt going away.

After two months away, September 20th was my first night back in Ngonga village. I had come with a Canadian and a Swiss volunteer who were helping to dig a well, install solar panels and paint the newly built school kitchen. After a twenty hour voyage we hit our beds like sacks of rocks. At around 3a.m. the silence of the night was broken by the piercing cry of a woman’s screams. The screaming grew louder as more women joined in the chorus. After an hour or so the screaming subsided and was replaced by waves of wailing from a dozen or so women in mourning. This haunting sound of wailing fills the night air far too often in Ngonga and sadly this time is was because our neighbour had died.

Our neighbour was in his early 50s and was sick for a long time with everything but HIV. According to friends he had fever, he had malaria and he had pneumonia “but he did not have HIV.”

Around noon the following day the village had assembled on the piece of land that lies in between the main trail and the family property. It is a sliver of land maybe 8 meters in width. Village rules prohibit anybody from building on land along the trails as it is reserved for graves. The trees and bamboo can be harvested and property can be claimed but any major disturbance to the land is prohibited.

The hastily made preparations for the funeral were in accordance to Kynakusa customs. The body was wrapped in a simple grass mat and placed on a bamboo bed frame. This makeshift coffin was then carried by six men to the burial site followed by his weeping wife and family, the village elders, friends and neighbours, and finally, by a throng of young boys who had joined the procession because they had nothing else to do.

A five foot hole had been dug a few feet from the trail. The family gathered on one side on other grass mats they had brought along and watched while the body of their loved one was placed into his final resting place. About a hundred people had gathered around the small grave to bid their farewells. Closest to the grave the family wept and wailed consumed by their sorrow, across from them an impromptu chorus began singing upbeat hymns, while the others socialized and joked around. As outsiders we were surprised to see such jovial behavior in a time of sadness, but admitted to ourselves that to attend six funerals in a week would numb even the most emotional of people. After the last song was sung the speeches began. First was immediate members of the family, then the woman who rented his rice fields, followed by the pastor and finally by the oldest man in the village. The speeches paid respect to the family and to the deceased.

Once the speeches were finished everyone took their turn throwing a handful of dirt into the grave. The woman who sells local brew broke out in tears and ran away screaming, “I have lost my beloved drinking partner.” Soon the handfuls of dirt were replaced by shovels full and the grave was quickly filled with a mound formed on top. Two mud bricks are place at either end to demarcate the location of the burial site. The crowd disburses and we returned home…the funeral was over by early afternoon.

In time the mound of dirt and two mud bricks that mark the grave will slowly sink and break down and by the end of the next rainy season will no longer be visible. Like the mud bricks, the body and grass mat will also quickly breakdown and within a few years our neighbour will have made a full return to mother earth. Like mother earth, those still living will quickly forget the death of their fellow villager. He has become just another tree in a forest of funerals. His grave will have grown over with new vegetation just as their memories will have grown over with the losses of many more beloved ones.

In the Swahili language, "m" is the prefix to indicate a person in the singular and "wa" is for plural.

For me I am "mchina" or in other words, a chinaman. My name is Dennis Tessier and I was born in Canada to French Canadian parents, but I am Chinese...Well, at least in rural Tanzania I am.

Some times in Dar, but mostly in rural areas people will believe me to be Chinese. They greet me by saying, "hello Chinaman," or "good day Chinaman," or "hey Chinaman, do you want a taxi?" The children greet me with respect by saying, "shikamoo mchina," literally translated as "we hold your feet Chinaman."

Once while visiting a family in Shinyanga Region the son of 5years entered the room, finished off my soda, turned to me and said, "thank you Chinaman."

My most memorable experience was in Kyela Town market when I was trying to change 20 USD for Tanzanian Shillings. An old beggar came up to me and asked for his cut, "nipe zawadi mchina (give me a gift Chinaman)." I refused. He continued by loudly exclaiming how cheap Chinese people were. People around began to laugh. He persisted. Beginning to get frustrated I rebutted, "I am mzungu (white or European), not Chinese." The old beggar paused for a moment, then began, "are you calling me a liar?" He did not give me time to reply, "young man, I've been around much longer than most and I promise you that you are a Chinaman...I know a Chinaman when I see one!"

Defeated I retreated back to the security of my guest house.

The truth behind the matter is that China's influence in Africa has been growing enourmously over the past decade. Cheap Chinese goods are flooding local markets, the Chinese are building roads, power dams, power grids, and making huge business deals for oil, gas, timber and other valuable natural resources. The reason for this is two fold. First China is seeking to expand its markets...especially for low quality manufactured goods and, second, to secure raw matrials for its manufacturing sector.

China has proven to be a much better business partner than Western governments...they do not interfere with local politic. They turn a blind eye to human rights abuses and mismanagment and they offer alot of development assistance in exchange for business.

Really it just boils down to the fact that China is taking Capitalism up a notch...or perhaps just reverting to the old rules depending on how you look at it.

So, what does that mean for me constantly being mistaken as a Chinaman...nothing really. For Tanzanians, labelling me as a mchina or mzungu or mhindi is just a way to identify me as not one of thier own. I am not swahili. However, I must note that the original meaning of "mzungu" is "devil from the sea" so perhaps I am better off being a China man!

This past week we had a guest from Canada visit our home for orphan and HIV+ children here in Dar es Salaam. Jesse is an education student at McGill University. A very energetic and open-minded person, she enjoyed visiting the home and playing with Mboni and Dhokus, the two 5 year old girls who are still too young to go to school. When I suggested we visit the primary school across the road, she jumped at the opportunity. We crossed the road, entered through the gate and waded through the children on our Way the Head Masters office. Teachers sat outside of packed classrooms marking beat up exercise books.

Mburahati is a poor unplanned residential area in Dar es Salaam. What we would call the "other side of the tracks." If you are an expatriate your embassy and friends would tell you to definitely not go there as if you were guaranteed to get robbed. However, for a grass-roots organization working with vulnerable children this is our first stop, a place we visit every week. In fact, it is much more friendlier than any tourist area where you might actually get robbed!

We met the Head Master, and after some time speaking in Swahili we switched over to English so Jesse could understand. I asked the Head Master some questions about the school and the children and Jesse listened with curiosity.

I commented on how many children were present and she gave me a break down of the school population...2298 children attend mburahati Primary School. There are 19 class rooms and 37 teachers on staff, but usually the number of teachers present is much lower. The class average is 129 children and the student/teacher ratio is at best 62:1. Often the teacher doesn't actually fit into the class once the children are in and has to lecture from the door way.

The Head Master continued telling us that the teachers had no staff room or supplies and the school had no electricity or water. The children had to bring their own drinking water and water to flush the toilets.

Jesse was silent through the whole discussion. I asked her if she had any questions and she simply said, "I have to let it sink in first." It was at this point that I realized how shocking this must be for a Canadian teacher, accustomed to the quality of a Canadian school, to be presented with such realities. Personally, being in Tanzania for some time and having seen much worse conditions within and outside Dar es Salaam, I was thinking the school was relatively well off in comparison. When I think of a school that is in rough shape I think of Kilosa Primary School, where kids walk several kilometers to attend class in a room where the mud brick walls had collapsed a long time ago.

In an attempt to shed light on the current circumstances I explained to her how crowding of schools has become a severe problem in the last two years due to the fact that as a Heavily Indebted Poor Countrie(HIPC), primary education in Tanzania was made free to all two years ago. As a result, literally over 2 million children showed up to class the next day. Schools are still struggling to meet the demands, and progress is being made, slowly.

I guess this meant to serve as an eye opener to those of us that need to step out of our bubble. I think how lucky I was to have the chance to attend school in Canada. I regret being such a pain in the ass to my teachers. I regret not taking more advantage of the educational opportunities avialable to me at the time.

What a gift it is to have the opportunity to be properly educated..to have a book to study from, a pencil to write with, a pair of shoes to wear to class, a teacher, or better yet, a teacher with a lesson plan and a class room to say, "this is my classroom."

By: Uzodinma Iweala Washington Post, Sunday, July 15, 2007

Last fall, shortly after I returned from Nigeria, I was accosted by a perky blond college student whose blue eyes seemed to match the "African" beads around her wrists."Save Darfur!" she shouted from behind a table covered with pamphlets urging students to TAKE ACTION NOW! STOP GENOCIDE IN DARFUR!

My aversion to college kids jumping onto fashionable social causes nearly caused me to walk on, but her next shout stopped me."Don't you want to help us save Africa?" she yelled.It seems that these days, wracked by guilt at the humanitarian crisis it has created in the Middle East, the West has turned to Africa for redemption .

Idealistic college students, celebrities such as Bob Geldof and politicians such as Tony Blair have all made bringing light to the dark continent their mission. They fly in for internships and fact-finding missions or to pick out children to adopt in much the same way my friends and I in New York take the subway to the pound to adopt stray dogs.This is the West's new image of itself: a sexy, politically active generation whose preferred means of spreading the word are magazine spreads with celebrities pictured in the foreground, forlorn Africans in the back. Never mind that the stars sent to bring succor to the natives often are, willingly, as emaciated as those they want to help.Perhaps most interesting is the language used to describe the Africa being saved. For example, the Keep a Child Alive/" I am African" ad campaign features portraits of primarily white, Western celebrities with painted "tribal markings" on their faces above "I AM AFRICAN" in bold letters. Below, smaller print says, "help us stop the dying."

Such campaigns, however well intentioned, promote the stereotype of Africa as a black hole of disease and death. News reports constantly focus on the continent's corrupt leaders, warlords, "tribal" conflicts, child laborers, and women disfigured by abuse and genital mutilation. These descriptions run under headlines like "Can Bono Save Africa?" or "Will Brangelina Save Africa?"

The relationship between the West and Africa is no longer based on openly racist beliefs, but such articles are reminiscent of reports from the heyday of European colonialism, when missionaries were sent to Africa to introduce us to education, Jesus Christ and "civilization."There is no African, myself included, who does not appreciate the help of the wider world, but we do question whether aid is genuine or given in the spirit of affirming one's cultural superiority . My mood is dampened every time I attend a benefit whose host runs through a litany of African disasters before presenting a (usually) wealthy, white person, who often proceeds to list the things he or she has done for the poor, starving Africans. Every time a well-meaning college student speaks of villagers dancing because they were so grateful for her help, I cringe. Every time a Hollywood director shoots a film about Africa that features a Western protagonist, I shake my head -- because Africans, real people though we may be, are used as props in the West's fantasy of itself. And not only do such depictions tend to ignore the West's prominent role in creating many of the unfortunate situations on the continent, they also ignore the incredible work Africans have done and continue to do to fix those problems.Why do the media frequently refer to African countries as having been "granted independence from their colonial masters," as opposed to having fought and shed blood for their freedom? Why do Angelina Jolie and Bono receive overwhelming attention for their work in Africa while Nwankwo Kanu or Dikembe Mutombo, Africans both, are hardly ever mentioned? How is it that a former mid-level U.S. diplomat receives more attention for his cowboy antics in Sudan than do the numerous African Union countries that have sent food and troops and spent countless hours trying to negotiate a settlement among all parties in that crisis?Two years ago I worked in a camp for internally displaced people in Nigeria, survivors of an uprising that killed about 1,000 people and displaced 200,000. True to form, the Western media reported on the violence but not on the humanitarian work the state and local governments -- without much international help -- did for the survivors. Social workers spent their time and in many cases their own salaries to care for their compatriots. These are the people saving Africa, and others like them across the continent get no credit for their work.Last month the Group of Eight industrialized nations and a host of celebrities met in Germany to discuss, among other things, how to save Africa. Before the next such summit, I hope people will realize Africa doesn't want to be saved. Africa wants the world to acknowledge that through fair partnerships with other members of the global community, we ourselves are capable of unprecedented growth.Uzodinma Iweala is the author of "Beasts of No Nation," a novel about child soldiers.