Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Everything goes right 'round?

July 26th, 2009
Yesterday was umuganda- I’m not entirely sure how to translate it accurately into English (now I sound like I am fluent in Kinyarwanda or something, but actually I have absolutely no clue what’s going on beyond “how are you” “I’m fine”. So even if I am NOT fine, I’m doomed to this single answer), but in any case it is something like a community service day. Last Saturdays of each month, everyone has to contribute to some community project, like cleaning the roads, weeding public grounds, etc. By everyone I mean everyone who is Rwandan. Or, if this was 2008, everyone who is doing research in local communities with a professor who wanted everyone on his team to show respect to community by participating in umuganda would also be included. (This is how there are multiple photos of me wielding a large hoe and sometimes a machete on facebook. Yeah, I know, WTF).


I had never experienced umuganda in a city before, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect – are there going to be hoards of people cleaning up the streets downtown? Perhaps that was the case in the morning, which I pretty much conveniently missed by sleeping in. But in any case, when I finally got out of my room around 11, the city was a ghost town. No one was moving along the streets, and most of the stores were closed. No buses, no taxis, just a few motos in the streets.


Technically, everyone is supposed to participate in umuganda, so until a few years ago, I believe you would get in trouble if you were meandering around, ie, not where you were supposed be working, that is of course, if you were Rwandan. I don’t think the law changed recently, but I have heard the regulations were getting a bit more lax, hence the few brave motos driving around. But in general, when I arrived at Bourbon café to get breakfast and internet, the café was ENTIRELY muzungu. In fact, anyone moving in the city was muzungu (or the occasional Rwandan-looking person I would stare with suspicion. Are you just ballsy, or are there loopholes in the system?)


Even if I try to avoid generalization, or the instinctive tendency to draw parallels with one’s own experience, it is hard to miss the correlation between Korea’s past and Rwanda’s present. During the 60’s and 70’s, as we were experiencing the height of both economic development and military dictatorship, Korea had a similar project called the ‘new village movement’ (and it sounds as silly as it does in Korean as it does in translation). I used to hear stories from school, from older relatives, about how people used to participate in this from time to time, doing their bit to help the country ‘modernize.’ (and modernize we did from rubble to one of the most wired countries in the world.) I’m not sure if I heard this from my mother or just from school, but I distinctly remember hearing about how the government encouraged/forced all households to switch from the thatched roofs to tin roofs for the sake of sanitation and fire safety. This all happened within the framework of the ‘new village movement’ (although I’m not sure if the actual villagers were asked to do the work themselves). And last year, when I was roaming the countryside in a 4x4, I remember seeing mud huts, which should have thatched roofs with shiny tin roofs. Government decree, someone told me. Coupled with the umuganda-imposed silence of the city, I felt like I was walking back into the past, reliving my parent’s childhood bit by bit.



History, perhaps, repeats itself. Or, whatever your tradition, culture, or skin color, options given to humanity are limited – there are more similarities to be found than differences. But if history does repeat itself, the trajectory of development here is troubling – South Korea, for a long time, suffered from the inadequacies of rapid development, and is still suffering from the lack of maturity in the political system. Will Rwanda end up in the same place if it chooses the same past? Even if it does, should we tell it to stop, think, and reconsider? Because in the end of the day, how does one explain to a person who is barely avoiding starvation and generally swamped in abject poverty that despite the glittering sky scrapers, mind boggling speed of fiber optic technology and the 11th largest economy in the world (all contained in a tiny country the size of a New England state, if lucky a little bigger), life isn’t so good after all?


Maybe we all worry too much. Maybe we are just indulging in the privilege of self criticism without even knowing it. Or, maybe, I should just focus on my research and stop day dreaming. But that is waaaay too difficult ☺

3 comments:

souvik said...

parallels with your own experiences in the 60s and 70s? damn how old are you exactly?? -.o

Yuna said...

my own as in my own country silly. god, when will you grow up?

Unknown said...

When we were growing up our parents who left Rwanda as juniors(10-15 yrs) told us what the essence of Umuganda was a goodwill gesture or some sort of support given to a person, thereafter this person would buy for the helpers some beer(local)in appreciation for the help