BrianJBecker.com

The campaign period is in full swing now.  Campaigning is limited to the month before the polls which are slated for July 30, but the banners and posters have mostly been blooming in the last week.  Hundreds of thin fabric banners are strung over the streets with red and blue painted slogans, candidate names and their precise location in the massive ballot.  These are the first significant elections in about 45 years here and they have everyone talking.  It’s easy to tell which candidates are members of the party that is currently in power.  They are the ones with billboards in brilliant, eye-catching color.  Those signs must be printed many hundreds of miles away and flown in to be pasted up.  I saw one in progress with only the top half of the president’s head showing and I was told that it would be a national disgrace to take a photo of him in that state.

For a country with lacking infrastructure, Congo has something like 40 television stations.  Keep in mind that the vast majority of the country lacks electricity and so only the 20% of the population that live in cities are able to watch.  Almost all of the stations are controlled by major political parties.  In an attempt to keep the elections fairer, the candidates are not allowed to use the television to make speeches during the campaign period.  But they are using the TV to run lengthy documentaries that play inspirational music and show them speaking to adoring throngs.  Supporters in suits are quoted hailing their candidate as the clear-cut choice for the future, the provider of peace and prosperity.  Some are even declaring their candidate the carbon copy of Christ.  Because the candidate is not speaking on his/her own behalf, these lengthy documentaries are not illegal.  And in a place where entertainment options are often lacking, I’ll admit they can be transfixing.

There are also special parades with hundreds of people wearing special shirts that were given to them by the candidate.  They chant and sing his/her praises in full voice.  I got stuck in the middle of a lengthy campaign parade while I was driving to the central market.  This parade was composed of vehicles and they were moving slowly.  I didn’t want to ruffle any feathers, but I also didn’t want to be construed as a political supporter so I passed them up very gingerly.  The road is very busy with bicycles carrying passengers and cargo, pedestrians, motorbike taxis, and a few cars.  It’s not wide or even, more like a dry rutted creek bed than a road in places.

With the elections now less than two weeks away we are coming into an interesting time.  I’m excited to watch a little bit of history.  I’m upset that the attacks in the Middle East are going to take much of the attention these elections would have gotten in the world press.  (It’s worth noting that it’s highly likely that both sides in the current Middle East conflict draw some significant resources from the Congo.)  Whether it’s in the news or not, it’s time to hope and pray for continued peace.  I’ve been reminding people for months now that elections themselves cannot bring peace.  God is the source of peace.  People of faith must also be people of peace.  If you are someone who prays, please pray for Congo especially in these next few months.

We went to a loan disbursal today and one very direct campaign banner caught my eye.  A candidate for the national assembly proclaims that he “will not steal” from the people.  That’s plain talk if I have ever heard it.  If he is elected, I hope he has the integrity to hold to his promise.

At the disbursal The people were very friendly and I had a good time mingling with them asking them about their families and their small businesses.  One woman told me that she sells chickens and eggs in the market.  She said that she wanted to come by the office from time to time to sell me some eggs and I said that would be nice.  She said that I should be ready to buy 15-20 eggs.  I told her that there is no way that I will be able to use all of those eggs.  She scoffed and said, “Just eat two or three a day!”  I politely declined the offer, telling her that if she came by I would buy five or six.  I do very well with most all of the available foods here but eggs can give me some mild to moderate troubles.  I’d be in a world of hurt if I was trying to consume a baker’s dozen.  It was great conversing with our clients.  Beyond the office work it puts me in touch with my reason for being here.

I’ve been looking for a cat for some time now. We have a mild to moderate problem with rats in our office compound. If I leave any food or anything that has ever touched food in the waste basket under my desk overnight – it will, without fail, end up shredded on the sofa in the morning. (Apparently the rat likes to chill on the sofa.) Now we all call them rats in French and we make jokes about them, but I’ve seen them running around in the lawn and they are really like brown spotted Afro-field mice. They are cute but I wouldn’t get near one. The cat would be a solution to the rat problem and also bring a little extra joy the way animals can.

In Kinshasa there are people that stand on the side of a busy street holding sad looking pets for sale. There are kittens and puppies, parrots and little monkeys. (Incidentally, there are also often large scaly fish hanging from tree branches, but I don’t think those are for sale as pets.)

We’ve all heard of the horrors of puppy farms and the pet industry’s cruel reputation. Extreme poverty exacerbates the problem. A man came to the office some weeks ago with a kitten in a box in the hopes that I would buy it. The tiny kitten had to be just a couple of weeks old and I was told that it is best to take them that young so they remain loyal to their owner. This guy wasn’t going to be eating anything but milk for awhile, he was very thin and too young to eat much solid food. One of its eyes was quite bigger than the other and it couldn’t close properly. There wasn’t much explanation offered for that issue. I refused to purchase the cat.

Since then I have been making offers on healthy looking cats wherever I see them. Some stores have cats to patrol the mice and those cats are pretty healthy and friendly. I usually ask for the standard items, “I’ll have one box of curry, two boxes of fruit juice, two onions, and the cat! It’s how much for the cat!?” They invariably chuckle and refuse to sell.

Today I was attending a Community Bank distribution that was held in someone’s home. There was a beautiful, healthy looking kitten appearing to be about eight to ten weeks old roaming around the crowd. (It’s hard to tell here because pets are generally smaller and skinnier than back home.) She seemed outgoing yet independent and both of her eyes were the same size. I made my standard offer to buy the cat and this time to my chagrin, it was accepted! As we left, they wrapped her up in a basket, put her behind the back seat of the jeep, and we bumbled down the potholed road back to the office. About halfway through the drive I noticed that there were no more faint meows. I half-jokingly suggested that maybe she’d either escaped or died of fright. When I opened the back door of the jeep, she was not in the basket! She had in fact escaped. But we quickly found her hiding under one of the seats and brought her into the office.

She ate some canned corned beef like a champ and sat in my window sill like cats worldwide seem to love to do. (Somehow canned corned beef is for sale everywhere here, one popular brand is named “Texas”. I don’t know who eats it, besides the cat.) Her heart stopped racing and she started exploring the office. She might be shredding the curtains and pushing things off of my desk until the day breaks. I fully expect that anything wacky can and will happen with the cat, but I figure it’s worth a shot. I’ll probably wait a bit to officially name her, but the name of the community bank where I found her is “Lumiere” which means light in French. I think I might call her “Lumi” for short.

When our driver went back to the community bank to pick up a couple of staff members still there, he had a flat tire. Then the jack wouldn’t support the car and the nearby mechanic wouldn’t loan his jack. During this time the skies opened up with torrential rains. I was in the office chatting online with two of my coworkers, watching the cat, and watching the power flicker off and on again. I’d been planning to do a bit of grocery shopping but I was stuck at the office.

It was about 8:00 PM by the time the car finally made it back to the office and I decided to go shopping late and in the rain. At the first store I paid about $10 for some butter, tomato paste, tea biscuits, and a can of coconut milk (the first time I’ve seen it in Kisangani). The rain really kicked up and the nice man that manages the store casually mentioned the rain. I said, “Maybe I should wait until it dies down and drink a soda.” He called out to one of his employees to bring a bottle of coke and when I reached for my wallet he told me it was on the house. We chatted while I drank the coldest bottle of soda I’ve had here so far, our conversation accompanied by the music of the rain hitting the street and dripping down from the ceiling. He told me how the owner’s wife flies to Dubai for a week to buy twenty tons of groceries and supplies in bulk. She has it loaded into a shipping container and it goes by ocean liner to Mombasa, Kenya. From there the container is trucked overland to Kampala, Uganda where it is taxed and put into smaller trucks to be driven a short distance to Entebbe and loaded into an old Russian Antonov cargo airplane that charges $12,000 to fly it to Kisangani. They pick it up at the airport with their own truck. This is definitely part of why imported groceries are so expensive. I asked him if canned might be coming in this next shipment. He said, “Tinned tomatoes? Probably not.”

Then I went over to another store with another very nice shopkeeper. She was braiding another woman’s hair in the middle of the store when I showed up. I joked that I was there to have my hair styled. A couple of sisters came into the shop to buy three eggs. I watched them open up a giant beach umbrella when they walked back out into the rain together. It’s the unpredictability and quirkiness, the odd little improbable practicalities like that keep life here amusing.

Friday afternoon I said goodbye to Curtis as he left to catch a flight to Kinshasa.  He was here for about four months to study ways that HOPE can work to reinforce local agriculture through microfinance.  It was great having him around, especially as these have been my first few months in a challenging new place.  Curtis came to Congo with little or no experience in French and he made remarkable progress during his stay.  He was able to carry on conversations, conduct his research and even build some friendships.  I am very impressed.  Most of us are afraid of the awkward moments and silly mistakes that are made when we try to learn a new language.  Curtis dove right in head first and he was blessed for his efforts.

Thursday afternoon the power cut out across just about the entire city.  The word was that they were quickly working on the breakdown, digging up the street someplace nearby.  It was off all day Friday.  Fortunately I had meetings and work to do without the help of the computer, but a few days of this can really slow down our operations (as computers don’t do much for you when you can’t power them up).  Friday night I lit my candle and sat next to it listening to Radio France International.  It was either that or nothing and I was entertained and informed.

I was exited when I woke up this morning and saw that there were some lights on in the apartment.  That meant that I could boil some drinking water, charge up my electronics and flashlights and maybe even check my e-mail.  I had a meeting with some church youth at 10:00 AM but I wasn’t sure if they would keep the meeting and I wasn’t really sure who they were.

They turned out to be Clarice and John, an engaged couple that are youth leaders at one of the Nazarene Churches in town.  I’d met them once previously.  They wanted me to go with them to the church to meet with youth that had assembled.  So we went to their neighborhood and stopped first at Clarice’s house where I met her family and saw their parcel with its bread oven and well.  They share their well with everyone in the community.  Neighbors were coming by to dip a bucket on the end of bamboo pole down deep in the ground.  Before we left Clarice’s father told me that it is traditional to give gifts to guests and handed me two chickens eggs, one in each hand.  I told him that even though I am a big guy, he really didn’t have to give me TWO gifts!  Nonetheless I accepted them and now they’re sitting in my fridge.  Two eggs may not be a fortune, but here it means more than it might in San Diego.

The church was really out in the thicket and it was fun driving the jeep down some footpaths and under low tree branches, up hills and through some small streams.  It is tricky getting out there on Saturday because gangs of local youth work on the roads and set up roadblocks to demand money from people who want to pass.  I am a big deal here wherever I go, so the roadblocks can be a real problem.  The first one seemed innocent enough so after some refusal I tossed a little something into their collection basket and they all cheered and allowed us to pass.  About 300 feet down the road another group stopped us and they weren’t as friendly.  They were also letting everyone else pass freely but us.  So I turned the car around and we took another route.

I really had a great time with the youth group at the church.  This group was quite the opposite of the road construction teams.  They ranged in age from about seven to seventeen and there were only about 25 of them.  It was a good low-key time.  There really wasn’t anything planned so I asked everyone to share their name, their favorite subject in school, their favorite food and their prediction for the World Cup.  That out of the way, they sang a few songs and three little guys played their hearts out on the drum.  Then I gave a brief message and sang a couple of songs for them and one that we could all sing together.  Just before I left we all danced a bit, to round out the meeting.  It was a special time together.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with Clarice and John.  They bought a pineapple on the way back and I had some bananas here at the apartment so we ate together and spent the afternoon talking.  It turned out the be a great day.  And just now I decided to check my e-mail and the electricity has cut out again.  I’d better power down my computer before the battery runs out completely.  My candle is already lit.