A flash in the development pan

This afternoon, [insert nongovernmental organization] graced Sabualla with:

1. a brief nutrition seminar,
2. a cloud of dust behind a speeding (and incidentally Peace Corps-white) 4-wheel vehicle,
3. and a good dose of small town drama.

Details are unclear, but apparently only half the village was invited, leaving the other half (my family included) less than pleased. Really, details are unnecessary; the take home point has less to do with specific Sabuallan politics and more to do with development in general.

I wonder how many hours and dollars were spent on this nutrition campaign, only to end up with more hostility than information conveyed. Seeing [insert nongovernmental organization] storm in with their safari clothes, loud cars and fancy notebooks (read: logo-ridden propaganda, distributed like so many cadeaus) gave me a guilty sense of superiority. After all, I am Peace Corps, an organization focused on sustainable development and community-driven, grass-roots initiatives. Until I remembered I too had arrived in a noisy vehicle, decked out in a skirt bought in Philadelphia.

Perhaps Peace Corps sets itself apart and redeems itself through the unique goal of cultural integration. In a way, we aim for reciprocated development, that of the village and that of the volunteer. My greatest wish is to effect change on both fronts, in myself and Sabualla (and eventually Atar). My greatest fear is to be little more than a flash in the development pan, an unwelcome and uninformative distraction from what would otherwise be normal Mauritanian life. True, I’ll not change the world, or even the Gorgol, but if I could proudly serve as a link in a long chain of semi-effective volunteers, that would be enough.

So, how can I play my little part in successful development? A weighty inquiry to tackle just days before our CBT animations.^1,2 Nothing like adding manufactured pressure to already frayed nerves right? But this stress is relevant to our animations. Even if it is just a training exercise, I don’t want our presentations to have a [insert nongovernmental organization] effect. After I leave Sabualla, I pray that more than half the town remembers me fondly and no one uses my fancy notebooks as flyswatters.

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1: CBT is Community Based Training, or the ten weeks prior to the two years of service in our permanent sites.

2: Animation is one of many Peace Corps-isms. This term – not English, not French – means presentation, usually one given in front of dozens of foreigners who do not speak English and cannot understand your garbled [insert local language]. Often, you do an animation with the help of a translator, i.e. a local who does not speak English and cannot understand your garbled [insert local language]. Successful animations are those that are either short or include a break (or three) for mint tea. More importantly, successful animations are required of trainees before we are sworn in as volunteers.

If you’ve been paying attention, you might also remember the terms stagaire (trainee), stage (training), refectoire (cafeteria) and affectation (placement of a volunteer to his or her permanent site). All stolen from French, all ubiquitous in PCV speech. We like our acronyms and made up frenchie words. I should really make a glossary for my constant reader.