It’s a rare brisk morning here and I want to fill you in on some of the weekend’s news:
My friend John finally made it back from his river trip. He walked in on Saturday morning and we had a great time catching up. He told me that he brought back a baby squirrel for me and that they are going to build a cage for it.
Later the same day, we drove out to Papa Wembonyama’s house and I sat under his shade hut with him for some hours talking and telling stories. He told me that squirrel has a great flavor. He told me that Congo is at a turning point, an infancy of sorts and needs a lot of help to get on its feet. He gave me blessings for my upcoming travels and said that if God had given him that characteristic that he gave to snakes and he could shed his old skin and be young again- he’d travel with me.
Youth scouting programs are popular here. There are all kinds of little scout troops in uniforms with neck scarves and hats and flags. This weekend was some kind of jamboree right in the middle of town, in front of my building. On Saturday I started to see groups of scouts being led by their scoutmasters, marching in from the outskirts of town. As I drove by a couple of these groups I spontaneously saluted and like clockwork 20 little hands went up to salute me back. I don’t know if scouting is popular all across Africa, I’ve never noticed it when I’ve traveled. It seems like a very American thing that they’ve really picked up on. One troop even went by carrying standards that I recognized from my youth as the three levels of the Cub Scouts of America. We don’t have much American culture here beyond this, except for a voracious appetite for American pro wrestling.
Sunday was a day of good timing. I drove out to the airport to pick up the external auditor from Price Waterhouse Kinshasa. I took a book with me because airplanes here aren’t so much known for timeliness. As I drove up I saw his plane taxi off the runway head toward the terminal. Then later on we picked up Christilla, one of my new French friends and drove to where her husband Jerome was playing in a local soccer match at the Jesuit Church. We drove up just in time to watch the last five minutes of the game and then head to the fabric factory along a river to sit and talk into the evening. Good timing is a rare thing here. When I arrive at just the right time to meet a plane and to hear the whistle at the end of a football match and all in the same day… that’s worth writing home about!
This morning there was no electricity at the office. I worked on a document for about an hour until my laptop’s meager battery power went dead. Then I spent the rest of the morning catching up on filing away paperwork. It’s got to get done sometime. And it’s a simple pleasure not unlike doing the dishes. At first there’s a big pile and then with some mindless diligence, the pile shrinks as the uncomplicated task is completed.
I realize that a year ago this month was one of the craziest in my life. I’d accepted the position with HOPE International and was cleaning out my apartment, rapidly selling most of my possessions and packing up some plastic boxes with the rest. I was writing letters of resignation and looking for someone to buy my car. Then there were all the thoughts of leaving a city that I love and so many people that I love. I traveled to see family and to stash those plastic boxes away. Then there were about four meals a day out with various friends and three or four going away parties. What a crazy time. Two blessed angels (Leigh and Matt) packed my bags for me as I was meeting with more people and sweeping through Target like a hurricane for last minute items.
I wouldn’t wish all of that on anyone in such a short time frame. From this angle though, it was all worth it. Congo is often pretty crazy, but I do love my job. I get to work (in french no less) with a great staff and our objective: helping people with small business loans that promote strength in their own initiatives, their families, and their churches. I am so thankful for this blessing. In the last year I have learned more and experienced more than I could make up in a lifetime. Much of this knowledge is troubling, but some is quite inspiring. At times I feel that I have been pushed to the edge of hope, but never beyond what I can bear.
This year’s memories are rich and vivid. I can remember boarding the Air France flight in Philadelphia and realizing that tidy drab terminal was my last American vista for a year. I’ll pass through there again in less than a month on my home visit. I don’t imagine the places I’m going will have changed much in 12 months. I feel worlds of change inside of me.
Yesterday a tire went completely flat on the car and when Stanis put the spare on to go get it fixed, the spare also went flat. He drove on it as best he could and got them both fixed. This fine Saturday morning I got up early to go pick someone up for a hospital visit only to find that the tire was again flat. I put the spare on and headed out. So far so good, late but still on the road. Then I found the road to where I was going was closed by riot police. Near the university, students were protesting and there was some kind of clash expected. Without any options, I turned around and went home.
Often things go wrong and then other things go wrong on top of the first things, and so on. This is sometimes compounded by cross-cultural miscommunication or Murphy’s Law. I can’t get too upset about such things as they are, if I want to remain sane. Sometimes things can be fixed and made to work, sometimes the road is just plain blocked. At least I haven’t any illusions that I am in control of the show.
This morning I arrived at the office and soon realized the cat was nowhere to be seen. The guards had previously informed me that she’d been receiving regular nighttime visits from a burly tomcat and it usually didn’t go well. They always seemed to get into a brouhaha. Well lately, the visits have been more cordial and apparently he convinced her to leave the office with him (something she’s practically never done before) on a flight of fancy. I knew she’d venture out of the nest someday, but it was still a shocker. She came ambling back around 1PM looking much worse for the wear. She was quite shell-shocked and frazzled from head to tail. She kept shaking her paws and seemed to move with difficulty, but there was no bleeding. She seemed to drool some. I made a little bed for her behind the open office door and she rested there all afternoon. Poor thing. Love hurts.
I’m surprised to see that the US is releasing new dollar coins. There’s a New York Times article about it today. Currency is funny in the DR Congo. Congo’s economy has been linked to the dollar for awhile now in an attempt to curb wartime inflation. I’m not sure when it will lose dependency on the USD. We might be the only microfinance institution that loans in Congolese Francs, and it’s not always easy with value fluctuations.
Awhile back I mentioned how dollar bills are not taken in Kinshasa but they are here in Kisangani. Bills generally need to be without the slightest tear and must be series 2000 or newer. These rules are in response to likely rampant counterfeiting. Bills that don’t meet these tests will not be bought back by banks that ship them to the USA. The tradition of stamping money with initials is strong in Congo. Some say it’s just so that wealthy people can see their money coming back to them. Others say that it’s a way to show others that you’ve touched a lot of money. It’s only done with the US dollars.
The article talks about how the $1 bill is the among the smallest valued paper money in the world. They obviously refer only to wealthy nations. They cite Japan’s smallest Yen bill at a value of about $8 and the smallest Euro note around $6. Here in Congo our largest Franc bill is 500, which is about $0.92 right now. That’s right, our LARGEST bill is SMALLER than $1!! It doesn’t circulate nearly as much as the 200, 100, 50, 20, and 10. The 10 Franc bill is worth 1.8 cents! They are not remade often enough and so widely circulated that they are often shades of brown and absolutely falling apart. There is no way that the government can afford to make the tiny currency that we have. We use no coins at all in DRC. I don’t know how we make decisions without coins to flip!
This makes for all kinds of challenges in microfinance. There are rumors of a new larger bill coming out, but this causes inflation fears based on what has happened in the past.
Allow me to introduce you to Papa François. Along with Papa Leopold, he guards the subterranean garage in my building. The garage is something straight out of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It’s dark, damp, gloomy, and creepy. There are strands of spider web and moss hanging from the ceiling- they may as well have put them there for effect. But then there’s a bright spot: Papa François. I’m alone in my apartment most every weeknight but when I get out of the car I’ll often have a brief but interesting conversation with Papa François. Tonight he remarked that I’d really worked late and then we talked about the crazy dry-season gully-washer rainstorm yesterday that had water pouring into the garage. Then he told me to get on upstairs and get some good rest. I noticed he was cooking up some dinner for himself. Sometimes we talk about the corrupt building manager and just shake our heads at the injustice that man does to both of us. Sometimes we chat about the way things are and he tells me the way they once were. Occasionally our chatter buds into a longer talk. But most nights it’s a regular ten minute camaraderie of an unlikely and quite precious kind.
There have been crusades going on every evening this week on the steps of the (defunct) central post office across the street from my building. I hear the lively music, energetic call and response cheering and high octane preaching complete with frequent loud roars from the crowd.
After a film I watched over the weekend, I’m having a hard time not being skeptical about the state of the church in Congo. I’d heard that the “prosperity gospel” had made its mark here, but until I saw it on film it still seemed to be too fantastical and absurd to be real. If you don’t know what I am talking about, tune into the Trinity Broadcasting Network or TBN on your TV. They showcase, and may partly be responsible for the proliferation of, this theology in most nations around the globe. Some of these American pastors have decided that physical health and wealth are the primary evidences of God’s blessing. They live large and this shows that God loves them and gives them power. They preach that the faithful will reap tenfold blessings for every ‘seed’ of offering money that they ‘sow’. Many of them are lacking proper theological training, but again, genuinely tested wisdom is not the measure that matters, it’s only the bling. You’ve got pastors sitting in golden thrones, passing the plate to fund private jets, wearing custom tailored suits with diamond cufflinks, having their cake and eating it too. Somehow they reconcile all of this with the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth and still manage to sleep at night. (They probably have expensive drugs for that.)
So imagine what happens when the “prosperity gospel” is beamed into a nation like Congo where many pastors are political “big men” in training. Poor people are desperate for a line out of poverty and they follow these teachings of economic power. They put champagne into the pastor’s crystal goblet while their babies lack milk because they believe that this produces miracles. This isn’t the only problem in the church here and it’s not every church, but it is here and it’s big.
On the rough road to work this morning a bicycle taxi-man riding along side the jeep called out my name and we exchanged big smiles and thumbs-up. Later in the morning I attended a UN humanitarian meeting. Afterward I had a nice conversation with a French NGO volunteer who seems like a very good guy. I might even hang out with him and his wife sometime soon.
For lunch I tried a brand new restaurant with a friend. It’s owned by Lebanese folks and I had a delicious falafel sandwich. FALAFEL! Don’t tell the guys in Kinshasa but this place might be better than their best Lebanese restaurant. At lunch my friend surprised me with a generous donation for HOPE. I’m so thankful for her support; it helps us to help more people.
In the afternoon I had a good conversation at the bank with the new World Food Program director for the north part of Congo. He’s from Burkina Faso and has worked all over West Africa and went to the University of Michigan. Nice man.
I saw some great hats today. In the States you can’t get away wearing a bright red Santa hat or a poofy orange witch’s hat with jack-o-lantern face on the front. Bike taxi-men wear such things here at-will. I saw those two hats today. I dig the hats in Congo!
After work I decided to do some grocery shopping. Groceries are insanely expensive here. Kinshasa was recently ranked as the 5th most expensive city in the world, above New York, London, and Tokyo. And Kisangani is more expensive than Kinshasa! But I’m finding good prices by tracking down the right street vendors. I got for $20 what would have easily cost me $70 in the store and the profit is going to a smalltime merchant, just like the kind our loans help. I even got a UN meal ready-to-eat. I’m going to open it up and have whatever five course meal is inside.
It must be six o’clock PM. The sun is sinking swiftly into the raging deep waters of the Congo River. In the span of ten minutes the room goes dark. Good evening to all my friends in Congo and around the world.
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