Jeffrey Dow

Is it Time for an African Spring?

2012-01-24T02:46:00.000-08:00

Can the winds of change, perennially seen as superseding political barriers, truly transcend?
Can authoritarianism, cloaked in the thin veil of democracy, continue to deceive both a willing world, and the unwilling, unlucky participants caught in the crossfire?
Can power and vested interests, when so firmly entrenched, ever yield?
Recent history paints a startlingly contrasting answer to this multifaceted question; but we must ask-why does this work for some, and not for others? Why id Mugabe still firmly in control of Zimbabwe, and country he has devastated, while Mubarak is being wheeled into trial in a nation in which he oversaw at least some measure of progress and human development enhancement?

What are the tools that are used to preserve power?
What is the threshold of ruthlessness that must be crossed in some, but not other nations?
And why is this threshold permitted to be crossed with some populations, while violent upheavals and revolutions result in others?
What is the dividing line of humanity, what is the tipping point of collective action?

The BBC's Jimmy Kainja states that, "...an African Spring in the exact fashion of the Arab Spring would signify a step backwards - not a step forward...I previously argued that "the protagonists of the Arab Spring have more to learn from their sub-Saharan Africa counterparts than the other way round. The majority of sub-Saharan African countries peacefully did away with one-party-rule in the 1990s.""

The majority of countries in the region "did away with one party rule in the 1990's." This statement is both true and completely false; truth, a thin veneer painted on top of a reality of lies. The tide towards authoritarianism is increasing with time; the initial movements away from one party rule were in response to Western demands, back by structural adjustment loans and financing; they were not indigenous revolutions, indigenous movements; and thus, they have never been more than thin lip service. The governmental systems in most nations exist to serve the vested interests of a few; democracy and democratic elections acts as a trough for political patronage, not for the distribution of public goods to the majority of citizens. These vested interests are also the ones reaping the fruits of the newly energized economic growth of the continent, not the ordinary citizens, who continue to the blindly neglected and untouched by the hand of the state. And how? Governments have become adept at limiting the coordination goods, the ability of opposition groups to coordinate and scale dissent through strict media and political controls. What we have in nations such as Rwanda, Uganda, and Ethiopia, is not democracy; development and progress, but surely not democracy. What we have in nations such as the DRC, Zimbabwe, and Angola is kleptocracy, not democracy. What we have in nations such as Mozambique and Kenya is limited progress, with vastly entrenched vested interests reaping the fruits of economic growth; democracy, with very limited development.

I agree with Kainja that developing strong democratic institutions is the best way forward to establishing true democracy; however, this is simply not happening, has not happened, and is promising not to happen in many nations (there are certainly exceptions, Ghana and Liberia come quickly to mind). What, then, is the answer to a Mugabe, who shows no sign of relenting?

Kapuscinski

2012-01-22T04:34:00.000-08:00

"The population of Africa was a gigantic, matted, crisscrossing web, spanning the entire continent and in constant motion, endlessly undulating, bunching up in one place and spreading out in another, a rich fabric, a colorful arras."
-Richard Kapucinski

"The Adventurer has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible."
-Conrad

Insecurity Ruminations

2012-01-12T02:26:00.000-08:00

Insecurity is manifest to the human condition, whether this insecurity is found in the external circumstances of ones lives, internally due to psychological stress; this insecurity can be, and is, the combination of these specific factors. When applying a logical, "Western" academic framework to human insecurity in humanitarian/conflict situations, it is important to bear in mind our own psychological conditions, our own mental insecurities, and understand how these translate into our concern and our constructs for others' insecure physical situations. Important parallels can link physical and mental insecurity; these conditions are often thought of as outside our control, as something we must bear witness to, suffer through, however humanely or inhumanely this suffering might be; we, and they, are commonly seen as observants in the grand mechanisms of suffering; however, this is a rather simplistic view, one that takes the impetus away from action, from examination, whether this be self-or-other examination, and change as a result of this critical investigation.

A Long Term Solution

2012-01-03T01:25:00.000-08:00

"Hatred will never cease by hatred."
-Maha Ghosananda

Reading of the continued tribal/ethnic violence that has been wracking the newly independent nation of South Sudan in the last weeks; marauding groups of heavily armed warriors, seeking "retribution" through the barrel of a gun, pillaging, killing, stealing. My immediate intellectual response is to investigate: whose interests are really being served by these actions? Are there greater manipulations occurring at the hands of elites? Who is benefiting and who is losing from these actions? Though this might seem straightforward, there are often hidden and deeply powerful motives being served by violence; I do not believe that this case is an exception.
What these motives are, I am not certain, my only sources of information are Al Jazeera and the BBC; their inherent biases must also be taken into consideration; their lack of contact with villagers, embedding with national army units and UN units who have their own interests in the conflict, whether that be in prolonging it for self-perpetuation, or in ending it in the name of national and international harmonization. Thus, we must analyze the motives, the elite and organizational interests at play in this new struggle, while be careful not to overlook the most obvious explanations, which, in the wise words of the past, are often correct.
What manifests here is multi-faceted; as a result of decades of war and Western/Chinese/Malaysian/Indian involvement (no guns are manufactured, to the best of my knowledge, in South Sudan) there is a proliferation of arms in this nation, where traditional tribal justice and conflict is historically consistent and significant, but has not resulted in the widespread death rates of the modern era due to the modern arms now involved. We have a new nation state, struggling to define its own international borders, facing an increasingly hostile Khartoum. We have widespread poverty, illiteracy, one of the poorest regions on the face of the earth. We have international interest in mineral resources that are found in multitude under the soils of this new nation state. But we also have a deeper ethos that needs to be examined, an ethos of violence, of the acceptance of violence as a legitimate means of conflict resolution, the vicious cycle of this violence, I am sure comprehended, but not heard, not heeded; this circle, this cycle of violence requires a definite end point, a clean break in the wheel, or it will continue to manifest, to perpetuate itself into the future, with devastating results for those who are always affected the most by conflict; the most vulnerable, the citizens caught in the crossfire.
What creates an ethos of violence, of violent, seemingly disproportionate, response? This is cultural, historical, as well as a factor that has been manipulated by outside players for centuries in their own vested interests; where this cycle stops, where visionary, non-violent leadership takes control of a situation and charts a new path into the future, is yet to be determined, obviously complicated by the fact that the national leader was, in fact, the rebel army commander, and that these messages of peace require information infrastructure to be disseminated, which is sorely lacking in this newborn nation.

What lies ahead is unknown.

Levi-Strauss and Mattheissen

2012-01-02T15:17:00.000-08:00

"Perhaps, then, this was what traveling was, an exploration of the deserts of my mind rather than those surrounding me."

-Claude Levi-Strauss

"Between clinging and letting go, I feel a great struggle."
-Peter Mattheissen, The Snow Leopard

Reflections on Retreat

2012-01-01T14:24:00.000-08:00

We sit,
like a mountain,
still,
strong,
closing our eyes,
the thoughts assail.
Pain and pleasure,
gain and loss,
seeking, being, becoming.
We stay seated,
watch the magical display of the mind,
with strength, silence, openness, receptivity,
invite in pain, fear, sit with them, bow to them,
and say, yes, this too.
We watch the fleeting nature,
the transitions that we spend our lives trying to chase,
to hold onto so tightly.
And we stop,
we sit,
like a mountain;
a smile forms on our silent lips,
an opening, a glimpse of silence, freedom, space;
still,
strong.

Blessings

2012-01-01T11:03:00.000-08:00

"May i be a guard for those who need protection,

a guide for those on the path,

a raft, a boat, a bridge, for those to cross the flood;

May i be a lamp in the darkness,

a resting place for the weary,

may I be medicine for all who are sick;

A vase of plenty,

a tree of miracles.

May I bring food to the hungry,

and sustenance and awakening,

enduring like earth and sky,

for countless eons,

until all beings are freed from sorrow,

and all are awakened.

-The Dalai Lama's Boddhistava Vows

Hope

2011-12-30T12:58:00.000-08:00

"Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Either we have hope or we don't; it is a dimension of the soul, and it's not essentially dependent on some particular observation of the world or estimate of the situation. Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, and orientation of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced, and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons ...Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed. The more propitious the situation in which we demonstrate hope, the deeper the hope is. Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. "
-Havel

Reflections on Retreat

2011-12-26T12:13:00.000-08:00

Thoughts from the Shambhala Tibetan Winter Retreat I have been attending here in London...

The way of the warrior; fierce grace. There are few things challenging as sitting for 8 hours every day, no distractions, only a simple cushion, a bell, and your mind. Our society has conditioned us our entire lives for distraction, for multi-tasking, for clouding over our minds with the busyness of the world; what a challenge, then, to simply sit, to uncover, to unwrap, to spend all day looking directly at your own mind. To uncover what we hide from; to sit with pain, to sit with difficult emotions, with nowhere to run, nowhere to distract; simply to sit with what is. Having the dignity, the courage, to stop running. Waking up. Crazy Wisdom. This is the journey.

I thought of a night, recently, caught out in the cold of a trendy part of London, walking to meet friends, marveling at the huge lines of people, waiting to get into clubs, bars;
the effort, the energy; driving, planning, waiting, working,
and I wondered for what;
for what where all these people looking for?
They were chasing something, looking for something in those lines, standing out in the cold December air; looking for happiness, contentment, perhaps? Do we really know what we are seeking?

"We expend a lot of effort to improve the external conditions of our lives, but in the end, it's always the mind that creates our experience of the world, and translates that experience into either well-being or suffering. If we transform our way of perceiving things, we transform the quality of our lives. It is this kind of transformation that is brought about by mind training."

-Matthieu Ricard

Tea

2011-12-26T11:58:00.000-08:00

When asked by his disciple, studying tea ceremony under him for 10 years, what the reason for the practice was, Sen no Rikyu, the great, ancient, master of the art, replied:

"The reason for Chanoyu (tea ceremony) is simple. First you boil the water. Then you prepare the tea. And then you drink it. Thats all.

Sensing his student's disappointment, at learning that this was what he had spent his last 10 years doing, Rikyu replied:

Show me someone who truly understands these things, then I will become that person's disciple."

The challenge in making tea, as in everything in life, is to do it with attention undivided, so we are not running through our day while making tea. Beautiful simplicity in this ancient anecdote.

"Africa's Year of Living Dangerously"

2011-12-25T03:51:00.000-08:00

"Sub-Saharan Africa's economic gains came under threat this year, but public demands for good governance to address the continent's problems holds promise for the future"
-Shanta Devarajan, The Guardian, Dec 25, 2011 http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/dec/21/africa-economic-year-living-dangerously

Yet another insightful article on from the folks at The Guardian's Development Blog.
The crux of the argument here: key progress has been made in macroeconomic policy in many African nations, the case in point being the tightening of monetary policy in response to inflationary pressures across East Africa this year (politically difficult); the ability to make a politically difficult decision amidst global economic downturns can be a sentiment to a number of factors: growing authoritarianism and a lack of concern of popular discontent (as can certainly be the case in Ethiopia) or a general delinking and independent growth cycle (as can certainly be the case both in Ethiopia as well as Kenya and Tanzania); but moreover, a sense of optimism for the future, of a longer-term time horizon being used by the leadership and planners in these nations. Time horizons are the critical element here that will differentiate ruinous, short-sighted policy, with sensible, growth-oriented, progressive policy that will gradually impact the majority of a society over the short term elite vested interest drives (that we have seen in the US, for example). These factors breed optimism in the growth trajectories for many African nations.
A main point made by Devarajan has been the impact of cash transfers to the poor as a key method for weathering the global financial turmoils and domestic economic and agricultural crises. These direct cash transfers, though they necessitate a certain level of technological and bureaucratic infrastructure to enable transmission, as well as the concern for graft and opportunities for graft they might introduce, have been seen as more effective in introducing personal empowerment into these situations. This harkens back to Amartya Sens' entitlements and empowerments arguments; if people have the economic and social ability to obtain entitlements, famine and destitution can be averted (subsequently, most famines are not due to lack of food, they are market failures caused by a lack of these entitlements). Thus, the combination of macroeconomic foresight and long-term stable planning with short term entitlement distribution might be the key recipe for many moving forward.

words

2011-12-24T13:08:00.000-08:00

listening to cries of the geese, their patterns strung out, oblique, obtuse, flying into the frigid early morning sun, their wings ablaze in golden light,
the pale blue sky,
the sound of snow crunching under my boot amplified by the silence, the utter silence.

Ethnocide

2011-12-24T05:48:00.000-08:00

"The problem isn't change. All cultures, through time have constantly been engaged with a dance of new possibilities about life. Its not change or technology that threatens the integrity of the ethnosphere. It is power. The crude face of political domination...Genocide, the physical extinction of a people, is universally condemned, but ethnocide, the destruction of a people's way of life, is not only not condemned, but it is universally, in many quarters, celebrated as part of a development strategy. You cannot understand the pain of Tibet unless you move across it, at ground level...

In the end, it comes down to a choice. Do we want to live in a monochromatic world of monotony, or do we want to embrace a polychromatic world of diversity?"

-Wade Davis

Oil for Life

2011-12-23T03:59:00.000-08:00

The natural resource curse, aka: Dutch Disease, combined with a historical degree of plunder by successive, misdirected, and tainted leaders, both military and civilian, have left the citizens of Nigeria

in worse living conditions than 40 years ago, despite many hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue accruing to the federal state. This looting and mismanagement has been well-documented, and there is no need to reiterate points already made clear on the misuse of natural resource revenue; however, in looking at the increasing environmental damage, the recent Shell oil spill that is now covering 350 square miles and approaching the fragile, mangrove shores filled with subservience fisherman, one can not ruminate on how much better off these people would have been had oil never been discovered within their territorial borders. The press coverage of this newest environmental catastrophe has been minimal; I think back to the Gulf of Mexico spill dominating world press for months and it paints a pale comparison to this newest spill. The story did not register in a roll call of world news on Google. Another environmental catastrophe bestowed upon some of the world's most vulnerable and underserved citizens by large, Western, multinational chemical companies. Certainly not the first time, and with increased drives for energy exploration and globalization, this will not be the last. Are these people's lives and livelihoods somehow worth less than those of the citizens of the Gulf coast of America? Are their lives not worth the same level of regulations and press coverage that lives in the West take for granted? Despite the common multitude of statements to the contrary, this certainly seems to be the case, reinforced, once again.

The Worth of Tradition?

2011-12-22T14:30:00.000-08:00

"What is the worth of family bonds that mitigate poverty and insulate individuals from loneliness? What is the value of diverse intuitions about the cosmos, the realms of the spirit, the meaning and practice of faith? What is the economic measure of a ritual practice that results in the protection of a river or a forest?"

-Wade Davis, The Light at the Edge of the World

The idea of tradition gets trampled like a leaf under the foot of an elephant in the modern discourse of development. China is seen as the model for the rest of the world; the lifting of 600 million out of poverty in 30 years, surely a remarkable feat, deserving of emulation and praise; however, one might ask, what is the price that has been paid by the Chinese people in their drive for economic prosperity? What has been the cost to family bonds, to the traditional culture and languages that have held this most ancient of cultures together over the many centuries? What has been the cost to the thousand year old traditions of the Tibetans, no longer able to practice traditional culture and religion in the land of their birth? What is the cost of the relentless drive for development, for material prosperity? Can we tell a hunter in the highlands of Papua New Guinea, sustained by the land, nourished by family, that he is impoverished? Is he any poorer than a banker working 80 hour weeks for money he cannot every possibly spend?

Language

2011-12-22T14:23:00.000-08:00

"More than a cluster of words or a set of grammatical rules, a language is a flash of the human spirit, the filter through which the soul of each particular culture reaches into the material world. A language is as divine and mysterious as a living creature...each language is, in itself, an entire ecosystem of thought, an old growth forest of the mind. Each is a window into a world, a monument to the culture that gave birth to it, and whose spirit it expresses."

-Wade Davis, The Wonder of the Ethnosphere, The Light at the Edge of the World

Tides and Polarization

2011-10-12T02:18:00.000-07:00

Looking at the two main headlines on the BBC News Africa page this morning:
The First: Uganda MPs suspend all oil deals
The Second: Huge' turnout in Liberian poll

The first headline: the old goad of Africa, of the developing world, of transparency, of a relatively stable government, that has been held up as a model of good governance and lauded in the West (albeit with many personal reservations, but still, an improvement over Amin!) now facing a rapid influx of cash as the result of natural resource discovery. How will these resources be managed in a state with weak democratic institutions? This headline does not bode well for the impact of natural resource revenues on governments (aka the Nigeria Syndrome vis a vis Dutch Disease).

And the Second: The promise of true, peaceful, meaningful democratic transition in a post-conflict society. In what was, only a short decade ago, a war-ravaged derelict state, a chance of following the Ghana model, of pure and peaceful African democratic transition. The real test will yet to be seen: If Sirleaf will accept defeat and pass power peacefully if defeated by Tubman. All hope for African democracy can be boiled down to this particular moment in time.

Shifting Perspectives

2011-09-28T02:28:00.000-07:00

"We need to shift perspectives, leave the large question aside, and focus on the lives and choices of poor people-if we want to have any hope of making progress on this issue."
"Saving behavior crucially depends on what people expect will happen in the future. Poor people who feel that they will have opportunities to realize their aspirations will have strong reasons to cut down on their 'frivolous' consumption and invest in that future...the bigger point is that a little bit of hope and some reassurance and comfort can be a powerful incentive."
-Duflo and Banerjee, Poor Economics

The Dragon's Gift: Deborah Brautigam

2011-09-28T02:22:00.000-07:00

Collecting thoughts and ideas from a recent book, "The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa." Having a discussion about development in the modern age without discussing the impact of China on the Global South is plain ignorance; the role of the world's rising superpower cannot be overstated in the developing world over the last decade, and even, the last 60 years. The decline of the West and the rise of Asia is the great movement of the modern age; what will this enormous shift mean for global poverty alleviation and humanitarian response, moving into the near future?
What path will China walk moving forward in both internal and external development? Will increased global power bring increased global commitments and responsibility? Will the dragon focus within? Will non-intervention, supremacy of sovereignty, and resources-for-infrastructure rule the day? And what are the ramifications for this in the lives of the citizens of the bottom billion?
"If you plan for a year, plant a seed. If for a hundred years, teach the people. When you sow a seed, you will reap a single harvest. When you teach the people, you will reap a hundred harvests."
-Confucius

Haiti's Rise From the Rubble

2011-09-28T02:11:00.000-07:00

Paul Collier recently wrote an excellent review of Paul Farmer's new book on reconstruction in Haiti, entitled, 'Haiti After the Earthquake' with some salient points about Farmer's approach to reconstruction and redevelopment. Farmer, whose work in health has been truly monumental (and will, most certainly, lead to a Nobel Prize at some point in his career), and has been well documented in Tracy Kidder's beautiful tome, "Mountains Beyond Mountains," does not, it seems, play the role of development expert as well as he does health expert. Farmer's recommendations involve the heavy reliance on a national government that was both unable and unwilling to provide services BEFORE the disaster struck; granted, which local ownership of the reconstruction process is a vital component in the medium-to-long term, the immediacy of the impact of the earthquake and the as-of-yet inadequate governmental response to the calamity demands innovative thinking. Thus, the "Interim Haiti Recovery Commission," described by Collier as, "...a potentially far-reaching innovation, one that could serve as a prototype for for aid in fragile states." The biggest challenge since the disaster has been the coordination of the NGO's that have sprung up in its wake; the dissonance caused by too many organizations working in too small of a space has inhibited progress instead of serving to propel reconstruction. Thus, the Commission: "The commission was set up to break the logjam of dysfunction, tell donors what to fund, tell NGOs what to do, and provide the necessary authorizations on behalf of the government. In the longer term, it will need to evolve into something fully Haitian that can supersede those parts of the state that are essential yet, realistically, beyond reform."
Collier had touched on this point in his book, "The Bottom Billion," with his Independent Service Authorities, set up as extra-governmental bodies to, in essence, get the job done on crucial tasks of governance. Thus, there is something to these external-bodies; and in meeting the largest critique, that of the vested interests enjoying the low-hanging pickings of corruption, milking on fickle, external development and humanitarian funds for personal gain, inside the status-quo, Collier answers sagely, "...prickly assertions of soverignty are an inadequate response to reasonable concerns."

Poor Economics

2011-09-26T13:44:00.001-07:00

“Poor Economics”

Reading Notes/Quotes

“Poverty is not just a lack of money. It’s not having the capability to realize one’s full potential as a human being.” -Amartya Sen

“Talking about the problems of the world without talking about some accessible solutions is the way to paralyze rather than progress.” (15)

“The poor often resist the wonderful plans we think up for them because they do not share our faith that those plans work, or work as well as we claim.” (40)

“Generally, its clear that things that make life less boring are a priority for the poor…the basic human need for a pleasant life might explain why food spending has been declining in India (with increased prosperity). Today, television signals reach into remote regions, and there are more things to buy, even in remote villages.” (42)

Childhood nutrition programs, such as deworming and micronutrient fortification will lead to significant lifetime income gains-these should be an integral part of post-conflict/poverty trapped education development programs; both the awareness and distribution should be hubbed out of local educational establishments, using teachers as the front line combatants against malnutrition. “The social returns of directly investing in children and pregnant mother nutrition are tremendous. The rich world is still caught in the wrong thinking that the poor need more cheap grain-this is not the case-they need more nutrients.” (44)

When one has been continually let down, or failed by the state charged with providing for their wellbeing and security and provision of public goods, how do we expect that person to then turn around with open arms when the state suddenly decides to “act” in the public good, often at the pressuring of outside organizations or nations? If this is not intrinsic to governance, it is very hard to turn around. There is an embedded complacency and a sense of low expectation, which spreads like ripples through a society in the converse of ripples of hope, as the result of the non-functioning or vampire state. This will parlay into what Richard Kapuscinski calls “moribound waiting” as the default physical response to many social situations.

Esther Duflo at The European Bank for Reconstruction

2011-09-26T12:50:00.000-07:00

I had the opportunity this evening to hear Esther Duflo, MIT development economics professor and the founder of the Poverty Action Lab, speak tonight in London. It was great to put a face to the words that I have been reading in her recent book, "Poor Economics." Here is a rough transcript of her speech tonite:

Big world events seem to have more to do with politics than with policies; in the West, enough Aid was given to Egypt every year to give every child in Africa $20; the aid in Egypt was not about reducing poverty; in the South, we need to look at questions like what encourages mothers to immunize their children in the DRC? This comes down to politics, to the governments in disarray.

A growing number of academics are saying that we are wasting time in designing policies, as we are missing the elephant in the room, what determines whether policies will be implemented or not, is politics;

Institutionalist View: the main question of development is to figure out how to solve the political process; from a good political process will emerge good policies; without the political process, policy will not be implemented.

INSTITUTIONS are the main driver of success in a country (Acemoglu-Robinson); unfortunately, they are also very hard to change; they have a large shadow of history; in the areas in West Africa where the colonial powers spent more on education, there is still better education today; in India, places where more egalitarian tax collection are still doing better today.

Does this mean that we are stuck where we are? Institutional change cannot be easily engineered or imposed from the outside (see: Collier vs. Easterly-we cannot import freedom by force, this is an impossibility); Thus, can anything be done? Institutions, and hence history, clearly matter and define the broad constraints; To what extent is there slack for better policy? Is there a chance of improving policies can improve politics?

Progress with bad Institutions

One rarely sees wholesale institutional change, and these are very hard to predict or provoke; but incremental democratic changes do happen at the margin, even with fairly autocratic regimes, such as Indonesia, Brazil, China, Mexico; looking at fixing corruption at the margins is also seen as fruitless; however, this is not always the case; in Indonesia, the threat of audits on road construction projects was enough to decrease the theft level from 27 cents to 18 cents on the dollar; this shows that something can be done, that change at the margins is possible in imperfect systems

Even good institutions are not a guarantee for a good functioning of the institutions;

Many people believe that even democracy is bound to fail in many African countries because of the importance of ethnic voting; in Benin, a study was randomized in which the voters were given different messages in different areas of the country, with different degrees of ethnic appeal and clientism vs: messages of nationalism and national peace; the result was that the client/ethnic message won hands down in the nation, by over 20%. In Uttar Pradesh, Banarjee ran a randomized trial where an NGO went village to village and told the villagers to not vote on caste, but on the issues, and ethnic voting went down from 25% to 18%; these trials show that voters may simply not know enough to vote for competence providing that information matters.

Ideology, Ignorance, and Inertia

There can be good politics in even in bad environments; see: education in Suharto’s Indonesia; moreover, there is plenty of bad policies within generally good policy environment; corruption and inefficiencies are more likely to be due to the lack of understanding and attention to details then to a conspiracy against the poor; Ideology, Ignorance, Inertia (the three I problem)

Example of the Three I’s: school committers in Uttar Pradesh (poor should be involved in the public service)-this was a product of World Bank consensus; thus, the Indian government decided that every village would have a village education committee; after surveying, only 8% even knew these existed, 2% knew what they were supposed to do, and 25% of the members didn’t know they were members. Efforts to re-invigorate these has proved fruitless. This defunct scheme is a pure 3i example. Its not that people don’t want to do something , its just that the system was defunct-the implementation was completely disastrous.

From Good Policies to Good Politics

Voters adjust their views based on what they see on the ground; we can look at the attitude towards women in India; there has been a quota system in the village level Panchayat elections-women tend to be at least as good leaders as men. Randomized trials were held, in which respondents listened to speeches by either male or female; the villagers were then asked questions about the same speech; in the villages where there had been quotas for women, they fared much better in the results than in villages where there had been no quotas; the quotas showed to reduce prejudice in these villagers and respondents, and added to the chances of women being elected in the future.

Another example is in Benin; there was an expert conference held in Benin on the problems on the country, and the experts came up with policies and platforms based on it. In some villagers, the traditional method of campaigning was replaced by town meetings based on these concrete policies that had been formulated. In the villagers where there had been the meetings, the experimental candidate got a much higher level percent of the vote than in the control villages. This shows if you want good politics you must have good policies, to give people something to discuss in making their decisions.

Conclusion

Many in the West are pessimistic about the institutions of the developing world. Political constraints exist-and hard to predict political events have important impacts; however, there is a lot of scope for better policies, perhaps particularly in regimes that are not completely locked or at war; there are a lot of very bad politics for no good reason.

Nothing will come out of just one RCT; but at the same time, it is ridiculous to say that these experiments do not matter when used to establish patterns, to trace a story about what is going on in a particular domain. What matters at the end of the day is not the multilateral organizations, but the policies of the countries themselves-this is where most of the money is, not in the aid dollars, which are quite marginal. Once we recognize that aid money is marginal, this can liberate, and create the understanding of leverage for the money in the most effective way. Thus, some of the money should be used to find out what works best, through trials and experimentation. There is room for this with development policies. This will maintain relevance in a way that is more useful than today in the development world. Lack of change is more due to inertia than to resistance. Thus, change is often identifying opportunities.

More Dowden on African Aid

2011-09-24T16:44:00.000-07:00

More from Richard Dowden, from his great work, "Africa: Altered States, Ordinary Miracles" :

"...when the 'right answers' are found by the Africans themselves, moderate amounts of external funding can help speed up the process of development. But when outsiders decree the solution and pour in money, most aid is wasted. In some places it has destroyed local initiative and held Africa back."

Richard Dowden on the role of Aid....

2011-09-24T09:43:00.000-07:00

"Aid can speed up development that people have already decided to carry out for themselves and have the capacity to do...but aid from the outside cannot transform whole societies, who countries. That can only come about through producing things and trading them, or doing something that someone else wants to pay for."

"Real change must come from within. African countries will be better places to live and work in when Africans in positions of power and influence begin to invest their futures, energy, and money in the continent...If Africans move their own wealth out of the continent, how can Africa ask outsiders to invest there?"

Collier, Foreign Exchange, and Pseudo-Democracies

2011-09-08T13:31:00.000-07:00

Watch Paul Collier Foreign Exchange 522 in News | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Paul Collier: Pseudo-Democracies and Solutions: Foreign Exchange 522

Why are elections meaningless for the countries of the bottom billion?

Elections depend on being well conducted; they are only well-conducted when there are institutions already in place that force the politicians to stick by their honest roots; if these institutions are not in place, elections are easy to circumvent by corrupted leaders.

If the first wave of democracy is to hold elections, we will never get to institutions that are needed for effective democracy.

In our own democracies, this mean much more than just elections; there are lots of checks and balances in our systems that prevent cheating; however, we have not translated this to the nations of the bottom billion. These institutions take time to build, and governments resist building them. The only people that cheating elections fool are the west, not the citizens of the nations; ordinary citizens simply get infuriated by the entire process and blame the west for the continued failings.

There are many aspects to accountable government; the first is the amount of money that is raised; conditioning aid to policies does not work; governments need to be accountable to their own citizens, and not to donors. Aid needs to be tied to governance. The alternative to money being well spent is to further empower the crooks stealing it, creating a vicious cycle.

In low income countries, democracy is seen to be linked with an increase in societal violence. Thus, we should not abandon democracy, but we need to make security a strategic priority in addition to democracy. This can be done through security guarantees through coups and western nations guaranteeing true democracies intervention from coups. This is already happening with Australia, as can be seen with East Timor; if the Australians had guaranteed that if there was a coup the Aussies would put it down, they would not of had to actually do it a few years back. In Africa, as long as the elections were well conducted, they could be protected.

Smart power needs to be used; a small amount of hard power combined with more soft power is the necessary combination if used intelligently.

Looking the Other Way

2011-09-06T03:16:00.000-07:00

Looking the Other Way
The Economist recently published a short article entitled "Looking the Other Way," following up on a theme that I had touched on awhile back at the onset of the brutal Somali famine. The biggest question that I raised initially was why is the West and the African public bearing the brunt of the fund-raising and donation efforts being undertaken to help alleviate the suffering in the Horn of Africa, while the most obvious partners, the neighboring countries and the countries of the broader AU, are providing a pittance? Fundamentally, one would expect a country such as Kenya, which shares a long and porous border with Somalia, to be stumping up funds for humanitarian aid, as they are most subject to bearing the brunt of the cross-border ramifications; a nation such as Uganda, which has provided troops for the AU mission in Mogadishu (funded by the UN/West through its peacekeeping initiatives) will provide men, but not food aid (there are no reimbursements from the international community for food aid, I suppose). Thus, the famine continues, as many as 3/4 of a million people at risk of eminent starvation, and 4 heads of state from Africa actually showed up for the pledging conference in Addis Ababa; could Jacob Zuma not spare a day, and could his country, South Africa, which makes up 1/3 of the GDP of the continent, spare more than the measly $1million dollars pledged? Zuma, staunch advocate of "African Solutions to African Problems...." This figure is simply an affront to collective humanity, to the dreams of the Pan-African statesman of the past. Zuma sent $250million to diminutive, autocratic Swaziland to help them fend off default and the subsequent democratic reform demanded by the international community. African solutions to African problems? Is the famine in the Horn not an African problem? Is this not a dangerous game of lethal hypocrisy? Criticism alone cannot provoke action; the action must be collective and intrinsic. If the entire African Union cannot pledge more than the $50 million already committed for the calamity unfolding on the continent, one must question the basic governmental impetuses of the nations of this land, the shared bonds and collective humanity present, or so seemingly deficient. How can true development take place in states that show little interest in actual altruism towards neighbors, and thus, their own citizens? Have the leaders been simply more frugal than the international community because they understand the realities of aid on the ground more than those in the developed world? Is this, in itself, a wake up call? Or is it simply the reinforced understanding that the international community will share the brunt of the burden, as they have done since independence for many of the aid-reliant states on the continent. This entire humanitarian catastrophe has shown down like a magnifying glass on the motivations and predispositions of the governments of the region, and it has not been a pretty sight.

Amartya Sen on "Good Fortune"

2011-09-05T15:52:00.000-07:00

"Human well-being cannot be measured solely by wealth"

Paraphrasing the brilliant Amartya Sen in his behind-the-scenes comments on PBS's "Good Fortune" documentary:

On "Development"
Development is quite simple; it aims to remove the deprivations that plague human life; we need to look at the freedoms that people have in control over their lives to do the things that they wish to do; it is this extension of human freedom that is the central issue of development.

On "The Solution"
We can do an enormous amount to make the lives of each other better; we live in a very interdependent world, and some of us are more fortunate to have more control over our lives compared with others that don't; we have to emphasize the development of human capabilities; not that you bestow development on people, but that you actually make people more enabled. Once one acquires knowledge on how to deal with a deprivation, then they are in a position to help others. This is a unique approach. The way to get things right is to put them under public scrutiny. I am a great believer in public reasoning; this is the most important freedom that human beings have in terms of consequences. Support, sympathy, and communication and more cooperative action are essential to making eachother's lives better.

Good Fortune

2011-09-05T15:16:00.000-07:00

I was fortunate enough to catch a fantastic, thought provoking documentary courtesy of PBS and POV, entitled, "Good Fortune," which traces two examples of "development" in Kenya through the eyes of both the "developers" and the "developees." The film brought to light many of the moral and political issues involved with poverty alleviation; seldom are there black and white, cut and dry issues when dealing with the human condition and human variables; this film shed some brilliant light onto some of these human predicaments.

Symptom of a Larger Problem

2011-08-19T06:38:00.000-07:00

In reading this article this morning, I was struck by the deeper message of this story on Oxfam's work shaming African governments into contributing more to famine relief in Somalia. Why are African governments not leading this charge, why are the governments of the region, the nations with the most at stake, in terms of regional stability and development, not at the vanguard of this push to save fellow African lives? Where is the leadership of the great African democracies, shaming the rest of the world for inaction? How is the current situation, in which governments from the other side of the world, with little actual tangible economic and political interest in what is occurring on the horn of Africa, are leading the charge, plausible? It was reported that South Africa, the superpower of the continent, had recently upped its contribution to $1million. And the African Union, the pillar of the continental, pan-African vision? $500,000. That is a shameful, paltry sum, offensive in its meagerness. This great pan-African congress can surely muster more than half a million dollars. Why is this charge being led by Oxfam and not the African Union? The meaning here is much deeper than simple initial inspection allows. The situation is indicative of a larger mindset, which is at the least troubling, in an age in which the nations of the developing world, and Africa specifically, are to be taking the charge of their own destinies, competing in the global marketplaces through deregulation, and becoming responsible global voices. And where are these voices? Where is the governmental leadership? Where is the responsibility to take charge and act? Where is the great mutual and community regard that has carried through the ages on the continent? It again turns to the West, turns to China, for relief, for aid, for help. The domestic leadership so sorely needed, missing, desperately, sorely, missing.

Oxfam Urges African Governments to Give More to Famine Relief

Michael Onyiego | Nairobi

Photo: AP

Children from southern Somalia, receive food in Mogadishu, Aug 15, 2011

As calls for assistance to fight the famine in Somalia increase, aid group Oxfam says African countries must also do their part to alleviate the suffering.

Following a declaration by the African Union, countries around the continent are observing a day of solidarity and awareness with the victims of the ongoing famine in Somalia. But at the same time, a coalition of civil society and relief organizations gathered to criticize the African response to the food crisis sweeping across the Horn of Africa.

Since bursting into the public eye just over a month ago, response to the drought and subsequent famine has largely been led by humanitarian groups and the United Nations. Western nations, particularly in Europe and North America, have pledged significant funds to relief efforts, but Oxfam International spokesperson Anne Mitaru says African leaders have not played a large enough role in addressing the crisis.
“There is general disappointment that can be felt across the continent. What was missing is the African voice. The bold African voice, the bold African face of leadership on this matter,” said Mitaru.

And beyond leadership, Africans Act 4 Africa, known simply as AA4A, says the continent is not pulling its financial weight. People in countries like Kenya and South Africa have organized donation drives to contribute to famine relief, but with aid efforts facing a $1.3 billion shortfall, AA4A says the governments will need to get involved.

The African Union initially announced a contribution of around $500,000. South Africa also announced an initial contribution of more than $150,000. But Oxfam’s Mitaru says such contributions are unacceptable.

“When you look at the South African economy, one of the largest, actually the leading, biggest economy on the continent, $150,000 is a poor show," said Mitaru. African governments may not have the resources to entirely meet the funding gap, but they cannot not be part of the solution.”

South Africa has since upped its pledge to around $1 million, and Botswana, Sudan and other countries have pledged money. But Africans Act 4 Africa says the continent’s governments can do better. In just more than a week, the Kenyans for Kenya campaign has already generated over $2 million from private and public donations.

Oxfam and the AA4A coalition are calling for African governments to raise at least $50 million towards famine relief in Somalia. The groups released a report that breaks down how much each government can allegedly afford to contribute. The report says South Africa, Nigeria, Libya, Egypt and Algeria should donate more than $5 million each.

Paul Coller and Dambisa Moyo on Aid

2011-08-16T19:14:00.000-07:00

Paul Collier and Dambisa Moyo on Africa
Allan Gregg Conversations

Collier-The Plundered Planet –(notes/quotes)

“Natural resources can transform the developing world or tear it apart. They are potentially a huge opportunity to help, and also a huge possibility to destroy. Natural assets have no natural owners. The contest that can ensue in the scramble for these natural resources can tear a country apart, and it had. Because there are no owners, a contest for these assets controls the very poorest societies. This scramble turns crooked and violent. The normal business of government, to provide public goods, is abandoned for the patronage systems that are needed to maintain power in these countries, such as Nigeria under Sani Abacha. There are two types of plunder-the few stealing what should belong to all citizens, and the present generation burning up assets that should belong to the future. The ethical responsibility is to harness nature to reduce poverty.
There are two huge holes in governance; the first is huge amounts of natural resources facing weak governments, and the second being the natural resources that transcend governments, ie: migratory fish stocks.
What is to be done? First, the natural assets need to be priced, and the value needs to be captured by the government. Now, the typical way that an asset is sold by a government is under the table, or undervalued, or given away on an undervalued basis as a result of the lack of information. Auctions need to be run to combat this problem. The genius of auctions is that the market values the assets. It is vital that governments have geological information to be able to have an idea of the assets under their soils before these auctions, however.
The revenues that come out of natural resource depletion are not sustainable. As you run down these assets, you need to build up other assets, such as schools, roads, ports, etc, or you are cheating the future generations on a rate of return.

Dambisa Moyo
Dead Aid –notes/quotes

The premise: foreign aid has been a disaster for Africa, and must stop.
Why is aid part of the problem? There is a completely different model of growth and development for the industrializing nations such as China and African nations. Africa has become addicted to aid. In some countries, over 70% of the budget is aid sourced. From this, the incentives for alternative economic development are reduced. In addition, there is outright theft and corruption that is accepted. The real source of cash in these governments comes from controlling the state; when you control the state, you control the cash. This creates a destabilizing issue. The image that is perpetuated by the western aid agencies is self-perpetuating and negative. By giving free mosquito nets to the continent, we are breaking local manufacturers of mosquito nets. This is the example of the big problem in today’s aid business. What the Chinese have done in Africa is tremendous, in terms of infrastructure development. Their approach is an equal approach. They are coming to do business, unlike the auspices of pity of the aid industry. African governments need to act on behalf of the interests of the people.

Collier: Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places

2011-08-13T18:45:00.001-07:00

Paul Collier

Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places

LSE Lecture Notes

The Bottom Billion was about poverty, looking at the poverty problem differently; 60 countries, with about a billion people, have diverged from the rest of the world, and we need to, as a result, rethink poverty in addressing these people

Paraphrasing Collier:

Wars, Guns, and Votes is about power. Weaknesses, insecurity, and the abuse of political power in these nations. The book starts with the proposition that the international community is in a phase of denying reality. We then need to face reality, in order to effectively change reality. The purpose of the book is getting realistic strategies for change.

“The countries in the bottom billion are in the paradoxical situation of being too large to be nations, but too small to be states.”

The states that we see in Europe emerged as solutions to problems. The boundaries are not intrinsic, they are solutions to problems, the biggest of these being security. Going back in history, proto-states existed in Europe, were tiny, and ruled by thugs. There was then an arms race by these thugs to get the bigger army, in order to expand against their neighbors. The bigger militarized states swallowed up the smaller, and these states were able to provide internal and external security, as a result. This resolution also solves the problems of nationalism, or forging a common sense of national identity, which has been forged so well in Europe, this myth of common identity, as well as the problem of building accountable states. The ones who can spend most on the military as the ones who won the arms race, and these were the ones who were able to build the best taxation to fund their armies, and thus, a degree of good governance as a result, as their taxation relied on the citizens of their states. Thus, the result of the militaristic conquests by early European states is good governance, accountability, and security.

In the bottom billion, the situation was completely different. They were suddenly colonized and broken up into colonial groupings that were split and split and split again into 54 countries, usually very small. These little countries are too large to be nations because there is no process for building a common sense of identity; there is no equivalent to the warfare in Europe that build nationalism; as a result, there is a weak sense of national identity, but a strong sense of sub-national, normally ethnic, identity. This brings a lack of compliance in providing public goods as a result. National identity brings the delivery of public goods. And yet, too small to be states. Looking at where size matters, economic activity is what needs to be measured, and the typical African nation of the bottom billion is tiny. They cannot reap the scale economies that are intrinsic to effective public goods. Thus, supply is inadequate in the provision of public goods, most especially being security and accountability, is sorely lacking.

Looking at the standard public good of defense, providing against external and internal threats, normally internal threats in Africa, as a result of the geo-political consequences of non-interference and sovereignty. Internal insecurity is the biggest issue with these states; the level of the public good of security is not high enough to maintain internal peace. Rebellion is quite rampant and easy in these nations as a result of low income, low growth, dependence on primary commodities, and small economic size-these are all structural features of the bottom billion. If rebellion is so easy, the dilemma is how to secure the state, as the other challenge to the state is from the coup de etat. So, they need a strong military to defend from rebellion, but a weak military to defend from a coup. See: Mobutu’s Zaire-he emasculated his army completely to lessen the feared risk of a coup; as a result, when a tiny rebel group from Rwanda invaded the country and took power in a rebellion. This is a dilemma that leads to no effective way to provide for security in these nations. The risk of conflict is a major deterrent to private investment, and also spill over, cost-wise, to the neighborhood.

Looking at the public supply of accountability, which is not the textbook public good like security, we face another dilemma. First, we need to look at the false goal of the China Model in this argument, as they lack accountability and have grown dramatically; to address this issue, there is a huge dispersion in the success of this model; China is very big, relatively, but also very cohesive, with a strong sense of national identity; thus, there is not a massive divergence in terms of goals between the elite and the masses-both want a strong China; however, in other fractured bottom billion nations, there is a huge gulf in these interests between the autocratic elite and the masses, which is seen again and again. Thus, democracy and accountability is not necessary for China, but it is for the small, fractured nations of the bottom billion.

Accountability comes from the government providing the institutions, and citizens having the freedom to make these work, and also citizens being provoked to scrutinize accountability. The provocation in Europe was taxation and representation; in the bottom billion, taxation is low because of aid and resource rents; the institution that has been promoted in the last 15 years has been elections. Elections force the government to improve economic policies. But only if the elections are properly conducted. Where elections are not properly held, there is, at best, no effect on economic policy, and usually a worsening of economic conditions, as a result.

Bribery, intimidation, and ballot fraud are the three tactics that boost incumbents in elections. In elections that are not properly conducted, the incumbent is only worrying about how long they can stay in office, and they rely on these three variables to both increase their terms and get them off the hook for providing good economic management. If there is a valid election, good economic performance adds to the chances that you will be re-elected. If you resort to bribery and corruption, good economic governance is actually a hindrance to your power consolidation.

Small states are much more prone to these problems-power is very easily personalized in these small societies; in larger societies, you need to quickly institutionalize power. Personalized power often goes very wrong. Poor, small, and dependent on natural elections are the biggest three features that drive crooked elections. These are all features of the bottom billion.

What is to be done?

Above a certain threshold, democracy makes a society safer (2500$). Below that threshold, it makes the society more dangerous. If nations democratize below this level, they still have security issues.

Regional solutions to public supply deficits: spillover is great to neighborhoods from conflict, so it makes sense to pool resources; however, neighbors have illegitimate interests in this issue, such as with Ethiopia trying to bring security to Somalia. The dilemma for the regional supply is the only countries with a real interest in supplying security are often debarred. In terms of regional accountability solutions, efforts have not been impressive (look at Zimbabwe). The Presidents of the bottom billion are sovereignty-retentive and are not willing to share sovereignty. Look at successful models such as the USA, in which states learned to share sovereignty, or the EU. Bottom billion nations need shared sovereignty much more than developed entities such as Germany and California, but they refuse to budge on this issue. In these nations, power is massively centralized in the Presidency, and they will not share this power.

International Solutions to public supply deficits: Why should there be “African solutions to African problems?” They are living in entities that cannot solve the problem of public good supply, and we are. This is not colonialism, mark two. The international supply means: Security-post conflict peace keeping-this is effective-these environments are very risky (40% chance of recidivism); peacekeepers are needed for the first decade to bring the risks down for relapse. It is expensive, but much more cost effective than the cost of conflict. Peacekeeping is a good use of international resources, and is a good value for the money; however, we do not look at it in this light. Aid is looked at as good value, but not peacekeeping. Peacekeeping expenditures should be included in the envelope of overall development. Accountability should be looked at through the prism of money. However, the accountability of governments to their own citizens is what is the problem. Providing money without questions creates problems with corruption through capture; it is empowering the very people who are driving the bottom billion into the ground. Independent verification of budget systems warranting budget support needs to be implemented; in countries that are not fit for budget support, it is irresponsible to provide this support. There needs to be capacity building support to bring these economies up to speed for budget support.

Illicit conduct in elections: how can we make accountability to citizens effective by discouraging cheating in elections? Aid is not sufficient to make Presidents want to cut short their terms. What are Presidents really scared about? Coups. In Africa there has been over 90 coups. They are condemned by the International Community, but we do nothing. So, what can we do? These militaries are relatively feeble, and these coups can be put down relatively easily. This should be offered to democratically elected governments. Any government that undertakes a democratic election should be given a warranty against coups. This would make the cost too high to the internal militaries. This carrot inadvertently turns into a very large stick; suppose a President cheats in an election; when the international community scrutinizes the election, and the president cheats, the guarantee against coups is repealed; this is an invitation to Presidents not to steal elections out of fear of coups, as an inadvertent result.

Look at Senegal: the President-for-life had huge support in the rural areas, and the opposition in the urban areas. When the results came in, the opposition started to pull ahead; then, the President accepted defeat even before the results were counted in the rural areas. A few months earlier there had been a coup in Ivory Coast that was not put down by the French, and this scared the Senegalese President, as the army came in and told him that if he stole the election, they would hold a coup. The President had the option of stepping down honorably, or being displaced in a coup. This is the power of the threat of a coup and shows the value of this warranty.

MIT Poverty Action Lab/Education Technology

2011-08-10T18:07:00.000-07:00

A great bit of research courtesy of the MIT Poverty Action lab on the effectiveness of technology training on primary school students in India. Students were tested with both after school, additional computing classes, a pull-out model of during-school classes, and no extra computer classes at all; the results were quite interesting....Niranjan Rajadhyaksha reported on the findings in the Wall Street Journal:

Computers or classrooms?
The role of the teacher is restricted to switching on the computers and allocating them to different batches of children
Cafe Economics | Niranjan Rajadhyaksha

Ever since fears erupted about a decade ago that the world could be divided into digital haves and have-nots, policymakers and do-gooders have assumed quite correctly that this digital divide needs to be bridged. The most obvious first step was to give children from poor families access to computers, in school and at home. From that followed ambitious programmes as One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), which is funded by some of the world’s best firms such as Google. Some visionaries even dream of an education system where the teacher is replaced by a computer programme.

Does this plug-and-study idea really work in poor neighbourhoods? Not necessarily, it seems.

True, the initial findings were encouraging. Many studies showed that poor kids improved their exam scores when they had access to computers. But more recent studies cast some doubts on the assumption that the academic performance of children from poor families improves with access to computers. In other words, plonking a computer in front of a kid does not necessarily do the trick.

In one recent study in Gujarat, Leigh Linden, an economist with Columbia University, and the MIT Jameel Poverty Action Lab evaluated how academic performance changed when computers were introduced in classrooms. The data was collected from schools in the slums of Ahmedabad and some other towns and villages in Gujarat that are run by Gyan Shala, an NGO. Children in these schools get one hour of computer time each day. The role of the teacher is restricted to switching on the computers and allocating them to different batches of children.

Linden found that a lot depends on how the computers are used — as complements or substitutes for the teacher and the regular curriculum. The programme of computerized learning does not work too well when it is used to substitute the teacher in the normal school day. Math scores actually dropped in schools that took this path. The “out-of-school” alternative — when students sat at the computers either before or after school — showed better, though modest, improvements in academic performance. Here, the learning software is a complement rather than a substitute for the usual curriculum. Further, Linden says the worst students benefited the most in this case.

The Gujarat study shows that merely providing computers in schools is not much of an answer. A lot depends on how they are used, when they are used, and who uses them.

Another study from across the world has an even more sobering lesson. Economists Ofer Malamud and Cristian Pop-Eleches turned their eyes on what happens when poor children in Romania get computers at home. As part of a programme, called Euro 200, some poor Romanian families were given euro 200 to buy computers for their children. Other families with similar income levels did not get this subsidy because of budget constraints. The two economists compared what happened in the two groups of families which were alike in almost every other respect.

There is much to be learnt: Kids with computers saw less television, but they also had less time for their homework. Grades dropped. “The lesson from Romania’s voucher experiment is not that computers aren’t useful learning tools, but that their usefulness relies on parents being around to assure they don’t simply become a very tempting distraction from the unpleasantness of trigonometry homework. But this is a crucial insight for those tasked with designing policies to bridge the digital divide,” writes Ray Fisman, in a June article for online magazine Slate, where Malamud and Pop-Eleches’ research was cited.

Does this mean that computers have no role in classrooms? Does this mean that the age-old talk and chalk teaching routine is irreplaceable? There is no need to draw such dark conclusions. (And these are dark conclusions, since schools do need reform. Peter Drucker once pointed out that our schools are the only social institutions around us that have not changed at all since the Industrial Revolution. Everything else — from governments to workplaces to families — has been radically transformed.)

The more limited point is that it’s not just an issue of lavish funding and putting computers in classrooms. The OLPC mission statement reflects this belief: “To eliminate poverty and create world peace by providing education to the poorest and most remote children on the planet by making them more active in their own learning, through collaborative and creative activities, connected to the Internet, with their own laptop, as a human right and cost free to them.”

In the Gujarat study, Linden draws attention to several more cost-effective ways to improve the academic performance of children from poor families — cash incentives for teachers, scholarships for girls and access to textbooks. And good libraries, too. Computers are part of the answer — but perhaps not the most important part.

Intelligence Squared: Aid to Africa Debate

2011-08-08T15:31:00.000-07:00

AID TO AFRICA IS DOING MORE HARM THAN GOOD from Intelligence Squared U.S. on Vimeo.

AID TO AFRICA DEBATE NOTES

Intelligence Squared

The Question fro Debate:

“Is aid to Africa doing more harm than good?”

David Reiff: To paraphrase his statements: On balance, aid has done more harm than good…The problem, I think, is that the whole discussion of aid avoids the problem of politics. People are not saved from outside-people rescue themselves. They can be helped at the margins. If aid was less ambitious, I would support it, such as emergency relief. If it does as its meant to do, to offer a bed for a night, but not to hope to transform society, then the value of aid is indisputable. What is not indisputable is the idea that foreign institutions and governments know how to fox other people’s difficulties. The problem with aid is that it sets itself as the be-all and end-all. “The man with the gold makes the rules”…What you have, by definition, is outsiders telling people how to behave satisfactorily, then the aid will be withdrawn. By depriving people of their agents, aid does more harm than good. Moreover, the emphasis on aid is misdirected. We should be talking more about fair trade than about aid. What is impossible is the notion of aid as the centerpiece of development.

Gayle Smith: Aid is a very complex instrument that cannot be categorized together. There have been many successes, especially in health and education. Wireless access in Africa has had a huge impact on the local markets-this has come in part from aid. Microfinance has changed many lives, and a lot has come from aid. There is no question that politics has affected aid and has often been driven by politics. Aid needs to be elevated so it is on par with other institutions and protected from politics, ring-fenced against use for reasons other than development. At the end of the day, development matters. Development is a moral, economic, and security interest. What is the alternative? The military as our primary means to contributing to development?

William Easterly: There are two tragedies in this debate. The first is the unnecessary suffering in Africa-lives can be saved by a 12 cent dose of malaria medicine which is not being done. The second tragedy that we hear a lot less about is that we have already spent 600$ billion in the last 45 years, and children are still not getting those 12cent medicines. Aid would be great if it worked, but the sad tragedy is that money meant for the most desperate people in the world is not reaching them. Over the 45 years of aid, there has basically been a zero rise in living standards in Africa. Every generation calls for an increase in aid to solve the issues of their generation. Everybody calls for the doubling of aid to Africa, but what good does it do to focus on amounts when most of the money is not being used correctly. Most of it goes to corrupt and autocratic rulers. 2/3 of aid today still goes to corrupt rulers (see: Meles in Ethiopia). A lot of aid went into countries that have collapsed into anarchy, such as Rwanda, Congo, Somalia. Thus, aid worsens corruption, blocks democracy, and is an obstacle to getting rid of corrupt rulers. We must condemn the sorry record of aid as simply unacceptable, as making things worse rather than better.

John McArthur: If we think about what aid achieves and doesn’t achieve, we must caution against random correlations. When we look at statistical evidence, Africa grows on average 2% slower than other developing countries in the world, even with lower standards of governance and higher levels of corruption. Why do Ghana and Senegal, with higher Transparency International ratings, grow slower than China and India? This is because of disease, infrastructure, and lack of education that is a legacy of history. It is about much more than bad governance. Aid is about tackling the challenges of health, education, and infrastructure effectively. There has been successes. The eradication of smallpox by the UN. The fight against AIDS has brought retroviral medications to more than a million people which was considered impossible. Primary school enrollment rates are up 20%. Measles has been cut 90% in Africa. This has all been backed by aid. In Malawi aid has supported the national plan to get seed and fertilizer to farmers and the country has doubled its food production. Aid needs to build on success.

George Ayittey: The record of aid has been a disaster. If you want to better help the African people, you need to ask them what they want. Africans are interested in reform, not aid. Economic reform, political reform, and social reform. Corruption costs the continent over 140$billion per year.

MIT Poverty Action Lab-Madagascar Education Development Trials

2011-08-03T19:54:00.000-07:00

I have been reading into the MIT Poverty Action Lab's work since seeing their test results published in the book Economic Gangsters. In looking specifically at their randomized trials in the educational setting, I was drawn to recent work done in Madagascar, which looked at the effects of both a "top down" and a "bottom up" approach to school interventions. Madagascar is filled with the same issues as most of the developing world in terms of lack of truly progressive educational policy and a stagnant public education system riddled with huge systemic problems. The details are as followed for the "intervention:"

Researchers, in collaboration with The Ministry of Education in Madagascar, ran a randomized experiment in 3,774 primary schools in 30 public school districts. These districts represented all geographic areas in the country, but were focused on schools with the higher rates of grade repetition.

All district administrators in treatment districts received operational tools and training that included forms for supervision visits to schools, and procurement sheets for school supplies and grants (district-level intervention). In some of these schools, the subdistrict head was also trained and provided with tools to supervise school visits, as well as information on the performance and resource level at each school (subdistrict-level intervention).

Lastly, several districts also introduced a school level intervention which involved parental monitoring through school meetings. Field workers distributed a ‘report card’ to schools, which included the previous year’s dropout rate, exam pass rate, and repetition rate. Two community meetings were then held, and the first meeting resulted in an action plan based on the report card. One example of the goals specified in the action plans was to increase the school exam pass rate by 5 percentage points by the end of the academic year. Common tasks specified for teachers included lesson planning and student evaluation every few weeks. The parent’s association was expected to monitor the student evaluation reports which the teachers were supposed to communicate to them. These tools allowed parents to coordinate on taking actions to monitor service quality and exercise social pressure on the teachers.

What is so interesting about the results is that the top-down approach, which is the traditional development approach of dealing with school reform, did practically nothing to actually improve the conditions on the ground. What showed large results were the "bottom up" trials, in which parental monitoring, field workers, and community meetings following specific action plans. Here are the details from the MIT site:

Impact from Bottom-Up Approach: The interventions at the school level led to significantly improved teacher behavior. Teachers were on average 0.26 standard deviations more likely to create daily and weekly lesson plans and to have discussed them with their director. Test scores were 0.1 standard deviations higher than those in the comparison group two years after the implementation of the program. Additionally, student attendance increased by 4.3 percentage points compared to the comparison group average of 87%, though teacher attendance and communication with parents did not improve.

Josette Sheeran, Ted Talk, Hunger

2011-08-02T15:34:00.000-07:00

This is a great talk by Sheeran on the realities of hunger in the developing world.
Every day, 1/7th of humanity, about a billion people, wakes up hungry and does not know
how they are going to get their daily meal. This figure (though im sure disputable) is simply staggering.
Every ten second, a child is lost to hunger. There is enough food on the earth to provide nutrition
to every man, woman, and child. The problem is greed. Hoarding. Distribution. Commodity speculation. "80% of the people in the world have no food safety net."
Introducing food into schools is an extremely effective way of both combating hunger and increasing school enrollment, especially amongst girls, as well as supporting local farmers if the food is locally mandated.

"To a hungry man, a piece of bread is the face of god."
-Gandhi

"Famines happen in the presence of food people have no ability to buy it."
-Amartya Sen

Easterly and "The White Man's Burden"

2011-08-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

William Easterly at Google

Critical Commentary-Italics are my own commentary

“Can The West Save the Rest?”

Easterly opens at google addressing the following massive tragedy: 30,000 children die every day from extreme poverty. They die because they are simply too poor to stay alive. This is preventable death, such as diarrhea, which can be prevented by re-hydration packets costing pennies. The other tragedy, according to Easterly, is that the West has already given $2.5 trillion over the last decades, and these deaths are still happening. This is the problem. This is the scandal. That so much money and effort has been spent on this problem, but there is so little evidence of the effectiveness. (This is a scandal. But a lot of the money needs to be seen for what it really has been; simple economic stimulus for western companies, doled out by national agencies, with little regard for outcome; as this money dwarfs other aid money, as it is coming from national sources, it can be seen as the bulk of the issue; but categorizing all aid, all development money as a failure is a gross oversimplification and simply not true).

Too much attention is focused on what is spent, and this creates incentives for spending more money, not for creating effectiveness and results, for actually reaching the poor. This is the second tragedy, according to Easterly. (certainly a problem, but there HAS been results. In many places that have been stagnant, without the input of aid, their growth rate would be, in fact, negative, as per Collier/Oxford Analysis).

According to Easterly, “Nobody is individually responsible for any individual result.” There is, thus, collective responsibility, which leads to unaccountability on the behalf of the aid and donor agencies. The aid plans, thus, give the appearance of action, using publicity, which substitutes for real action, as the money is not actually reaching the people intended, which is another tragedy. There is a lack of customer feedback (the recipients), there are a lack of incentives and accountability for results, and thus, there are a lack of good outcomes as a result. (this is being overly simplistic, though good points are made on the need for more accountability; however, the realities of the international geopolitical platforms in which the world conducts its business needs to be looked at in all fairness; while fraught with problems, the UN has still given the world a net benefit over the years, for instance).

The private market, according to Easterly, would be a good model for what needs to be done in this aspect. Introducing accountability, feedback, incentives for efficiencies. If customers are dissatisfied, they can take their business elsewhere. (However good a point, he fails to note that this is not the case in the developing world with services/government accountability, especially looking at the test case of resource-renting nations).

The markets should be a metaphor for how aid should work, according to Easterly. Donors should be thinking in this mindset to achieve good outcomes.

The poor are stuck with official aid which is caught in complex, top-down planning, which is non-accountable.

Why has this happened? Why have planners taken over foreign aid? If politicians are not to be held accountable for their promises, they might as well make the biggest promises possible. And there is no quick, easy answer to the end of poverty. (agreed).

The countries with the highest aid have had the lowest growth, and the countries with the lowest aid have had the highest growth, according to Easterly. There is no evidence that aid creates growth, according to Easterly's empirical data. (Easterly's data needs to be looked at with external “traps” factored in, such as conflict affecting growth, bad geography, coups, etc, to be seen in all fairness).

Recent UN Reports show that in many countries the Millennium Development Goals are not being met, that they have been a failure. Easterly again points to the need for accountability in the agenda as the answer to a lot of these questions, as a non-traditional answer to the problems. (The question is how to increase the feedback mechanisms with aid, in terms of the target audiences who have had no experience with accountability in their lives, ie: governments, institutions, etc. To many, even the non-effectiveness of the agencies is still much more effective than their own governmental institutions. And again, without the effect of aid, which has been fraught with failure, the realities in many areas would be much worse).

“There is no room for the sort of home grown effort that would get started on its own and attract financing (in Africa).” Easterly proposes a “searcher” model, in which the aid agencies search for people and organizations doing good things on the ground and supporting them. (This is a great idea! Ideally, this would be a fixed percentage of all agencies budgets).

Easterly's Policy Recommendations:

When something doesn't work, discontinue it.
Discontinue structural adjustment loans to poor countries
Get rid of utopian goals and plans (MDG's, etc)
For long-run development, most hope is not from aid, but from homegrown development, social entrepreneurs, and private investors

All good points. However, I will have to personally disagree with #3 and #4. I believe that large plans do have a place in the development of nations; and there has been success in meeting these goals, despite Easterly's critiques. There is simply a lot more to the data than he presents, aka: the “known unknowns” that occur in the least developed countries in the world, normally as a result of poverty, aka, the “traps” as presented by Collier. Only in lifting a country from these traps through massive pushes, which will be a combination of homegrown development, social entrepreneurs, and outside organizations, in addition to other massive country-led initiatives (such as, but not limited to the infrastructure-for-commodities deals arranged with China and India, which, despite serious issues, are a reality that cannot be debated at this point in time). An integrated approach will look at lot like a “massive push” such as the MDG's. And catchy slogans draw attention. And attention is a damn good start. I note that Easterly spends a lot of time slamming Bono and Angelia Jolie for their Sachs relations and globe trotting; while far from being policy experts, the ability to draw attention to an issue, the ability to bring a focus onto an issue from people who otherwise would simply not care, is something that cannot be discounted. Thus, I believe there is a roll for the “concerned actor” and many have done tremendous work in bringing issues to light. While teaching in the Bronx, I showed Hotel Rwanda and Save Darfur as part of a Human Rights curriculum I was teaching, and the impact of Clooney, Cheadle, and others on focusing the attentions of inner-city high school youths was immense. There is a place for this attention, and Easterly would do better by not simply dismissing it as a cheap publicity ploy. In terms of the need for homegrown development, I fully agree with Easterly. However, for this development to flourish, much macroeconomic change needs to occur in many of the poorest nations. In these nations, there is simply not room, due to terrible government policy, for social entrepreneurs to flourish; thus, the macro needs to be shifted through englightened governmental policies (trade, business, mineral extraction) before these “homegrown” initiatives can truly transform. And the macro will simply not change in a vacuum; there needs to be outside influence in many nations where the leaders are simply not looking out for the best interests of their citizens. Thus, both approaches are necessary; aid needs to be much more effective, this is a given; however, this is not a black or white issue; many of Easterly's proposals can only come with external funding (ie: homegrown development attractiing foreign investment and turning into viable social businesses) and a change in the domestic business environment. Capitalism cannot cure all; the platforms for capitalism need to be laid down before it can do so; in the meantime, as Paul Collier notes, much of the roll of aid will be to simply provide a basic decency in the lives of many.

The economic miracles of the East have come in the absence of foreign aid; in fact, China was a donor nations to its many Maoist friends during the worst of its economic debacles of the last decades; however, the reality on the ground is the reality-the Asian tigers have already seized the manufacturing and service based growth that is needed by African nations to grow themselves out of poverty, and there is very little chance of manufacturing becoming agglomerated in many of the countries of the bottom billion in the coming decades, and thus, the problems will persist, unless assistance is given, in the forms of aid, trade barrier resolution, and infrastructure development. A country such as Chad will simply not be able to compete its way out of poverty with a nation such as Vietnam or even Bangladesh. What, then, to do about the Chads of the world? Abandon them? Aid needs to be focused, targeted, and made more accountable for the truly needy of the world, of which there are many. It does not deserve to be abandoned, despite all its failings

Another Tragedy

2011-08-01T22:32:00.000-07:00

The headline, "Somalis Waste Away as Insurgents Block Escape From Famine." fills a space far from the top of the NYTimes webpage; in seeing out the news, tucked into a subheading, far beneath the cries of the budget impass, the daily trends of New York, it seemed strangely fitting. Another forgotten corner of a forgotten land, filled with legions of forgotten people, who are now starving by the thousands, while the world whittles away its attentions on the disfunctional western governments and their self-enabled fiascos, or 65 people killed in one of the richest nations in the world by a lone madman; and yet, what of the thousands dying every day, the nameless, the countless, those who, in their multitude, will be hidden from history, admonished to obscurity, a cruel fate. I am brought back to the words of Kapuschiski who wrote of these very lands decades ago, as timeless as the struggles, the utter fragility, ongoing:

"...in the dry season, most pastures disappear entirely, and pools and wells become shallow or dry up altogether. If the drought persists, hunger ensues, animals perish, many people die. The young Somali starts getting to know his world. He studies it. Those individual acacias, those torn-up clumps of sod, those lonely, elephantine baobabs are signals telling him where he is and which way he should go. Those tall rocks, those steep, stony faultlines, those protruding cliff edges, instruct him, indicate directions, keep him from losing his way...The youngster will then comprehend that the features of the landscape are varied and changeable, and that one must know the order of their permutations, their significance, what they are telling him, what they are warning him...It is here that begins the great Somali game, the game of survival, of life. For these trails lead from well to well, from pasture to pasture...The dry season becomes a time of fever, tension, fury, wars. People's worst traits surface: distrust, deceit, greed, hatred."

Collier, The Bottom Billion, and a Summation on Trade and Aid

2011-08-01T15:54:00.000-07:00

On the role of the aid agencies:

“Aid agencies should become increasingly concentrated in the most difficult environments. That means that they will need to accept more risk, and so a higher rate of failure. They should compensate by increasing their project supervision, which means higher administrative overheads. They should become swift-footed, seizing reform opportunities at an early stage. They should intervene strategically, financing big-push strategies for export diversification. They should introduce governance conditionality. At present, the powerful force of popular opinion is driving agencies in precisely the opposite direction. They cannot afford failure. They have to be lean with low administrative expenses. They have to prioritize long-term social objectives rather than short-term opportunities for reform and growth. They have to give unconditional debt relief.”

On the role of trade policy:

“With trade policy, self-interest meets ignorance and duly manipulates it. Rich-country protectionism masquerades in alliance with antiglobalization romantics and third world crooks. The critical changes in trade policy-temporary protection of the bottom billion from Asia in our markets-are politically difficult not because they threaten any interests, but because they do not fit into any of the current slogans and so don't make it onto the agenda.

Collier, the Bottom Billion, and a Novel Approach to Corruption

2011-08-01T14:32:00.001-07:00

A Novel Approach to Corruption in the Public Sector-The Bottom Billion-Laws and Charters

On the utilization of the press in combatting corruption in the public sector, obviously reliant on a free local press and an open environment free of politically-based intimidation, obviously not the case in many of the bottom billion societies. But nonetheless, certainly noteworthy.

“...only around 20% of the money that the Ministry of Finance released for primary schools, other than for teacher's salaries, actually reached the schools. In some societies the government would have tried to suppress information like this, but in Uganda, far from suppressing it, Tumusiime-Mutebile used it as a springboard for action. Obviously, one way would have been to tighten the top-down system of audit and scrutiny, but they have already been trying that and it evidently wasn't working too well. So Tumusiime-Mutebile decided to try a completely different approach: scrutiny from the bottom up. Each time the Ministry of Finance released money it informed the local media, and it also sent a poster to each school setting out what it should be getting...Now, instead of only 20% getting through to the schools, 90% was getting through....the media had been decisive-in this case reports in the newspaper. So scrutiny turned 20 percent into 90 percent-more effective than doubling aid and doubling it again.”

(150).

Collier, The Bottom Billion, and Independent Service Authorities

2011-08-01T11:59:00.001-07:00

Independent Service Authorities

Collier suggests a solution to the problem of bad governance; the creation of so called “Independent Service Authorities.” “The idea is that in countries where basic public services such as primary education and health clinics are utterly failing, the government, civil society, and donors combined could try to build an alternative system for spending public money...The authority would be a wholesale organization for purchasing basic services, buy some from local governments, some from NGO's such as churches, and some from private firms. It would finance not just the building of schools but also their day-to-day operation., Once such an organization was put into place, managed jointly by governments, donors, and civil society, both donors and the government would channel money through it.” This is an extremely debatable idea, though from first inspection, a novel and wise one; I have visited the government health and education ministry buildings in some of the bottom billion societies, and the sights were terrifying, to say the least, not even to speak of efficiencies. In some of the worst nations in the world in terms of governance, this would be the only viable option-the civil services are so thoroughly disintegrated, that starting over is the only way of actually progressing, however, heartbreaking a thought this might be (simply sidestepping 50 years of post-independence “progress”).

And creating buy-in by the actual nations would be extremely difficult; the interests are intrenched, and bypassing these interests would require large political capital and guts by the top leadership. Collier compares his idea with that of one already implemented in many nations, that of the “Independent Revenue Authorities” which have been created in the last decades. “The function was taken out of the traditional civil service for precisely the reason that I want basic public services to be taken out of the traditional civil service-there was no realistic prospect of the traditional system being made to work. Why did governments go for the radical option on revenue but not on service delivery? The answer is depressingly obvious: governments benefit from revenue, whereas ordinary people benefit from basic services. Governments were not prepared to let the traditional civil service continue to sabotage tax revenues, because governments themselves were the victims. They were prepared to leave basic service delivery unreformed because the governing elite ot its services elsewhere.”

Collier, The Bottom Billion, and "What is Aid's Best Roll?"

2011-08-01T11:44:00.001-07:00

And Thus, What is Aid's Best Role?

In terms of the different areas of poverty traps, (including the Conflict Trap, the Natural Resources Trap, Landlocked Trap, and the Bad Governance Trap), Collier notes that the one that is most promising for change, in relation to the input of foreign aid, is the last, governance (and policies). In terms of the relation between the actual donor agencies and the governments on the receiving end, Collier notes, “...aid agencies have very little incentive to enforce conditions: people get promoted by disbursing money, not by withholding it.” While this has been since adapted and changed to reflect more of the realities on the ground, the problem still persists. Changes in governance must not be simply promised in return for offers of aid; the changes must take place, must take root, and must be well-configured before the aid is distributed. This is the only practical way of dealing with this issue of distribution and conditionality. Collier further notes, “The key objective of governance conditionality is not to shift power from governments to donors, but from governments to their own citizens...why should we give aid to governments that are not willing to let their citizens see how they spend it?” Thus, aid levels should be directly tied to good governance, transparency, and positive changes on the ground for the citizens of these nations. However, a big hurdle in these reforms of governance comes with the lower and middle levels of the government itself, the civil service, which in many nations of the bottom billion, has been hollowed out and stocked with incompetence and corruption as a guiding principal. How, thus, to change the entire culture of a civil service, from the “serve thy self” motivation to actual performance-based efficiency, with little extrinsic motivation present to reward positive change? Can aid bridge this gap? If not, what can? I believe this is one of the biggest hurdles facing the developing world. An entire culture can only be changed from the top-down; getting the right talent in place at the top is extremely difficult in itself in an age of kleptocrats and octogenarian rulers; but even once this change has been made, extending their writ down to the lowest levels takes a huge paradigm shift in the entire culture of the nation, and as a microcosm of the nation, the civil service. In fact, Collier has looked into the effect of bringing in technical assistance, ie: foreign experts, and their effect on a country's turnaround; his research has shown that foreign experts are only going to help with situations in which there is a new leader, which is very specific in the nations of the bottom billion. “Technical assistance during the first four years of an incipient reform, and especially during the first two years, has a big favorable effect on the chances that the momentum of the reforms will be maintained. It also substantially reduces the chance that the reforms will collapse altogether.” These are all the smaller pieces of a vast pie: each needs to be considered and enacted in its own right to sustain a longer-lasting growth and development in these nations. The biggest problem with the current deployment of technical assistance to nations is that, “...technical assistance is supply-driven rather than demand-driven. The same assistance is poured into the same places year after year without much regard to political opportunities.” And thus, the agencies MUST understand that their work is fluid; that the human situations and the human capital that they are dealing with are fluid, changing, and prone to opportunity and downturn. They MUST be responsive to these changes to take advantage of the particular opportunities that present themselves, to make the most of a finite resource.
Collier later critiques the motivations and the change-capacity of the agencies in "Aid to the Rescue?": Agencies operate with two-types of fair-shares rules. One is for countries: it is difficult to privilege one country over another, even temporarily, although if the Krugman-Venables thesis of agglomeration economies is right, then one of its implications is that such temporary concentrations of aid are likely to be efficient...So the present aid system is designed for incrementalism-a bit more budget here, a bit more budget there-and not for structural change. Yet we know that incrementalism is doomed because of diminishing returns to aid. Just doing more of the same is likely to yield a pretty modest payoff. For aid to promote structural change in countries requires structural change in aid agencies."

Collier continues with the next aspect of aid coming under his statistical eye, that of money supplied for project or budget support. He notes, “Money early in reform is actually counterproductive. It makes it less likely that the reform will maintain momentum.” Thus, in the early stages of a post-conflict turnaround, the most effect assistance that can be given is in the form of technical assistance. A few years down the line, however, the tides turn, and budgetary and project support becomes much more viable. In summing this “sequence,” Collier notes, “Aid is not very effective in inducing a turnaround in a failing state; you have to wait for political opportunity. When it arises, pour in the technical assistance as quickly as possible to help implement reform. Then, after a few years, start pouring in money for the government to spend. Aid used in this way to support incipient turnarounds would be pretty high-risk. Even with aid many incipient turnarounds would fail. The payoff is high because the successes, when they happen, are enormously valuable.” And thus, a “turnaround fund” would be seen as the most likely source of funding for these transitions to occur, which the British government has already funded in the last number of years. (It would be interesting to contrast this statistical analysis with analysis of the opposite, or such a situation as what is currently going on in Malawi, where a negative shift in governance has caused a large pull out/suspension in donor funding and budgetary support.)

Collier, The Bottom Billion, and "Aid to the Rescue?"

2011-08-01T10:39:00.001-07:00

“Aid to the Rescue?”

“Aid does tend to speed up the growth process. A reasonable estimate is that over the last thirty years it has added around one percentage point to the annual growth rate of the bottom billion. This does not sound like a whole lot, but then the growth rate of the bottom billion over this period has been much less than 1 percent per year-in fact, it has been zero. So adding 1 percent has made the difference between stagnation and severe cumulative decline. Without aid, cumulatively the countries of the bottom billion would have become much poorer than they are today. Aid has been a holding operation preventing things from falling apart.

Strong words in a nominal, yet forceful, defense of aid. From the viewpoint of the Easterly's of the world, quite radical, I believe; the knowledge that while far from perfect, the situation without the cumulative input of aid dollars would be much worse; which is both encouraging for aid, and discouraging the overall situations of the poorest countries in the world. However, Collier then introduces the concept of “diminishing returns” in regard to increasing the amount of aid to further increase the effectiveness of this growth boost in the developing world. According to Collier, “A recent study by the Center For Global Development, a Washington think tank, came up with an estimate of diminishing returns implying that when aid reaches 16percent of GDP it more or less ceases to be effective.” Thus, this needs to be seen as a strong guideline in the deployment of resources; the ability of a government to intake vast sums of foreign aid is limited in many ways; the absorption of these funds is often near impossible by many small aid garnering nations. In looking at the effectiveness of aid vs. budget support (aka: providing countries with money to use at their discretion in distribution), Collier notes that aid has been much more effective and value-adding, due to the aid agencies themselves. While far from perfect in their bureaucracies and regulations, the agencies do enhance the effectiveness of the financial transfer (102). “Given the bad public image of aid agencies...this is hard to believe, but there it is. The projects, procedures, conditions, and suchlike have been beneficial overall, enhancing the value of the money transferred compared with just sending a check and hoping for the best...Aid has tended to be more effective where governance and policies are already reasonable...(this) is actually pretty controversial...people quite reasonably do not like the harsh-sounding implication that the countries with the worst problems should get the least money” (102). Collier continues, “...the biggest deviation was that far too much aid was going to middle-income countries rather than to the bottom billion. The middle-income countries get aid because they are of much more commercials and political interest than the tiny markets and powerlessness of the bottom billion.”

And thus, the revolutionary statement emerges: Aid should be reserved for the most needy. It should not be used as a carrot in a geopolitical stage set. And yet, of course, when the history of aid is studied, this is exactly what the vast bulk of aid has been earmarked for over the years. Think of the unwitting countries caught in the crossfire during the Cold War. Countries taken over by ideological battles, aid recipients chosen because of simple political proclamations, not based on the theory that the most needy should get first. Is it even a possibility that aid could exist in a non-politicized manner, where the welfare of the poor is the sole determining factor in disbursement?

"Serve People, and Feed People"

2011-07-29T15:35:00.000-07:00

-The Maharaj Ji's answer to the question, "How do I get enlightened?"
I have been trying to figure out what has created the bond in my mind with this video; Ram Das, famous spiritual guru of the 1960's counterculture, the author of "Be Here Now," former Harvard professor, and subject of the bioflick, "Fierce Grace," which details both his growth as a spiritual guide as his trials as a stroke-survivor; a 10 minute clip, describing Ram Das's first meeting with his guru, Maharaj Ji, in the hills if northern India, has stirred by heart, inspired beauty within, as well as renewed vigor towards my own guru, my own practice....

"When Maharaj Ji was near me, I was bathed in love. And because he knew everything about me, it was like I was forgiven. Prior to that I had a lot of things in my past that I didnt want anyone to know; and I always felt that if they knew, they wouldn't love me. He knew, and he loved me. It was so beautiful. It was so beautiful."

"All he wanted was for people to be liberated, to be free."

-Ram Das

"What staggered me is not that he loved everybody; but that when I was standing in front of him, I loved everybody. That was the hardest thing for me to understand. How he could so totally transform the spirit of those who were with him."

"We tried to give him things; you couldnt give him money, you couldnt do anything for him; there was nothing that he needed."

-Larry Brilliant

Collier, The Bottom Billion, and "Private Investment to the Rescue"

2011-07-28T20:11:00.001-07:00

Private Investment to the Rescue

Collier advocates that the answer is private capital investment; private capital investment in Asia has been huge, and has resulted in huge productivity gains for its populace; however, the level of private capital investment in the countries of the bottom billion has been extremely fickle. Thus, another huge challenge; how can we prod private investment in sustainable industry in a place where the lack of transparent governance and rule of law makes this very investment so unlikely? How can we connect these two side of an unanswerable equation?

“Historically, part of the answer (to the lack of investment) has been poor governance and policy. Obviously, this does not impede capital inflows for resource extraction-hence Angola-but it has curtailed the footloose investment in manufacturing, services, and agribusiness...the problem is that even reforming countries are not attracting significant inflows of private capital...the answer is that the perceived risk of investment in the economies of the bottom billion remains high...the problem for the reforming countries of the bottom billion is that the risk ratings take a long time to reflect turnarounds.” And thus, when we monitor global events and consider the recent upheavals in previously “stable” nations such as Malawi, and a bit longer-span-wise in Coite D'Voire, and recently in the United States and Europe, it is no surprise that the lack of serious, long-term, private investment is a problem that will not vanish anytime soon.

“Let me be clear: we cannot rescue them. The societies of the bottom billion can only be rescued from within. In every society of the bottom billion there are people working for change, but are usually defeated by the powerful internal forces stacked against them. We should be helping the heroes...” (96)

The Bottom Billion and Globalization/Economies of Agglomeration

2011-07-28T14:41:00.000-07:00

Globalization and the Bottom Billion

“...the sad reality is that although globalization has powered the majority of developing countries towards prosperity, it is now making things harder for these latecomers.” (80)

Indeed, how can the growth models of South and East Asia be replicated in the sphere of the Bottom Billion, and specifically, in the poor, landlocked, resource-rich, and poorly governed countries of Sub-Saharan Africa?

Collier continues, “...manufacturers and services offer much better prospects of equitable and rapid development (than the production of primary commodities). They use labor rather than the land. The opportunity to export raises the demand for labor. Since the defining characteristic of developing countries is that they have a lot of unproductive labor, these exports are likely to spread the benefits of development more widely. And because the world market in manufactures and services is huge and was initially dominated by the rich countries, the scope for expansion by developing countries is massive.”

“Economies of agglomeration.” (Krugman and Venables): if other firms are producing in the same area, it brings down the overall costs of production and manufacturing, as well as providing a solid pool of labor and other inputs necessary for manufacturing and services. This is what occurred in Asia, with the manufacturing shift from the US; at first, firms who wanted to relocate needed to “jump” the gap of a lack of agglomeration in return for the value added by low wages; once one company made this jump and was followed by others, it opened up a huge competitive advantage for Asian manufacturing, as a result of this “Economies of Agglomeration.”

Collier notes on this point that, “...in order to break into global markets for manufacturers it is necessary to get over a threshold of cost-competitiveness. If only a country can get over the threshold, it enjoys virtually infinite possibilities of expansion; if the first firm is profitable, so are its imitators.”

And thus, because of a lack of these agglomerations, Africa “missed the boat” in the manufacturing boom of the 1980's. (84). However, “...each year of being free of the gross failures of governance and policy added significantly to the success of export diversification. The countries that stopped shooting themselves in the foot were able to break into new export market” (85).

And finally, Collier concludes, “If there really has been a process of missing the boat, it is pretty depressing...The most depressing reaction is for people to see the society as intrinsically flawed. Their prolonged period of economic failure in Africa and the other countries of the bottom billion has deeply eroded the self-confidence of their societies. The expectation of continued failure reinforces the pressures for the brightest people to leave...the same automatic process that drove Asian development will impede the development of the bottom billion”(86). Anyone who has transited from the African continent, via air, to Asia, can feel the difference in the air, can immediately sense the heightened activity, the energy, the industriousness that often overwhelms in South Asia and Southeast Asia; everyone seems to be doing something, movement is certain, lethargy the exception; a vast contrast to the realities on the street in much of Sub-Saharan Africa and a critical area for analysis, (though it would be hard to quantify a sense of societal energy). I think the key term that Collier references here is expectation. The expectation that the next generation will be better off, that the country is indeed progressing, is an extremely powerful motivational and economic tool for a populace, the effects seen both in the developed and developing world.

In this chapter, “On Missing the Boat,” Collier goes on to mention the effects of the drive-up in global commodity markets (as a result of the Asian manufacturing boom) on world commodity prices, and thus, commodity-producing nations in the bottom billion. And the results are not encouraging; though much of the recent “African Economic Renaissance” can be attributed to increased commodity exports (particularly to China, which is described well in “The Dragon's Gift” a great book by Deborah Brautigam), this economic boom benefits few, as the governance needed to ensure proper development from natural resources is sorely lacking in places such as The DRC, Chad, and even Mozambique, ala, “The Natural Resource Trap.”

Collier, The Bottom Billion: The Resource Curse, Aid, and The Road Ahead

2011-07-26T15:59:00.000-07:00

A brief explanation of the resource curse, aka: Dutch Disease that has become a huge challenge for the global south: resource exports, (normally in the form of oil/diamonds or other extractables) cause the country's currency to rise against other global currencies; this, in turn, makes the country's other exports uncompetitive, and thus, cripples the rest of the broader economy of a developing nation. This curse has been seen all over the world, but has been most prominent in the new oil producing states of West Africa, which have seen their standards of living actually contract after decades of enormous oil-based inflows of wealth. The situation also causes the "renter state" mentality, in which a nation's rulers, by the lucky chance of geography, become unaccountable to the people, as they are not depending upon the people for power; they are, in fact, only accountable the the minerals being extracted under the ground for the power and rule. Thus, authoritarianism and corruption become the rule, the norm, ala Chad, E. Guinea, Nigeria, Libya, Saudi Arabia, etc etc.
Collier explains, "Dutch disease can damage the growth process by crowding out export activities that have the potential to grow rapidly. The key activities are labor-intensive manufacturing and services, the sort of exporting now done by China and India." (40). And thus, with the tested means of economic advancement in the modern world, aka: manufacturing and services, which have created the most massive unburdening of poverty in world history in the past decades ruled out (as these nations simply cannot compete with the dynamic economic cohesion, infrastructure, and governmental benevolence of the far east) what do we have left to answer the puzzle of growth? Is it aid? I think not: aid cant actually create the same problems as mineral extraction; ie: they can cause the same artificial imbalance in a country's import/export earnings/currency valuations. Aid becomes a key source of foreign exchange, and for a poor country, especially a nation languishing in the bottom billion, exports lose their value domestically, and the local currency is driven up, making daily life and existence harder and harder for the local populace, which bears the brunt of the macro-economic geopolitical realities.

Civil War and Postconflict: The Bottom Billion

2011-07-26T15:47:00.000-07:00

Some important notes and commentary from the "Civil War and Postconflict" section of Paul Collier's The Bottom Billion:

"Dependence upon primary commodity exports-oil, diamonds, and the like-substantially increases the risk of civil war." (21)

"A typical low-income country faces a risk of civil war of about 14 percent in any five-year period." (20)

"Take the repression of political rights...There is basically no relationship between political repression and the risk of civil war." (23) To which I would love to ask Professor Collier, how has this changed with the Arab Spring, which obviously proved that there is a connection here, ie: Libya, Yemen, and with the greatest example being Syria (and to a lesser extent the events of the failed Iranian uprising of a few years ago and the recent events in Uganda and Malawi).

"The experience of having been through a civil war roughly doubles the chance of another conflict." (27)

"Civil war is development in reverse." (27)

"The risk that a country in the bottom billion falls into civil war in a five year period is nearly one in six, the same risk facing a player of Russian roulette...growth directly helps to reduce risk; cumulatively it raises the level of income, which also reduces risk, and that in turn helps to diversify the country's exports away from primary commodities, which further reduces risk." (32) To which I would add, in order to prevent the stalling of this cycle of development at the raising of the levels of income (ie: stalling at the diversification level of the economy, which is the true state of affairs in most resource-rich countries, ala: Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, etc), a truly benevolent, people-focused government must be in place (either democratic or not, in my mind and experience, there is no bearing or necessary correlation between open democracy and strong development, ala: the Rwandan/Chinese model of growth), and this government must be willing to invest the necessary inputs into freeing the citizens at the lowest level of society from the bonds of historical repression, ie: illiteracy, malnutrition, etc. Growth is important, obviously, as previously stated, however, key to this growth is a systematic, solidified investment in a populace.

"A country such as The Democratic Republic of Congo will need around half a century of peace at its present rate of growth simply to get back to the income level it had in 1960. Its chances of getting 50 years of continuous peace with its low income, slow growth, dependence upon primary commodities, and history of conflict, are unfortunately, not high. This country is likely to be stuck in a conflict trap no matter how many times it rebrands itself, unless we do something about it." (34). The stark realities, the realism of the challenges facing the very poorest in the world, the most unstable; the realities shared with so many other countries on the ground; and even with massive western intervention, vis-a-vis Afghanistan, the realities are uncertain, at best.

Collier, The Bottom Billion

2011-07-26T10:12:00.000-07:00

In completing some of the preliminary suggested reading for my coursework at LSE, I have been rereading Paul Collier's most excellent book, "The Bottom Billion. I had read this a few years back and its message stuck with ever since. I will be quoting and providing dialogue/commentary to some of the key points made by Collier, a true expert in the field of developmental economics. (In fact, I am at the library right now and I have just picked up another of his works, "Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places," which is next on the reading list.

(p11): Collier advocates for an emphasis on the growth rate of countries, to harken back to Kennedy, "A rising tide lifts all boats." While it is obviously hard to disagree with this, I think that a focus on growth alone is fraught with danger. Joseph Steiglitz has agreed in his drive for a measure "other than GDP" to gauge human development, and the cause has been taken up by countries such as Bhutan, which is aiming to expand the breadth of its "Gross National Happiness" measure at the UN. From recent personal experience in East Africa, and the experience of recently reading the Wikileaks pages on Mozambique, GDP growth, even where phenomenal, where not corresponding to the strong rule of law, transparency, and governance, is a shallow indicator of human development. If a country, such as Mozambique, (which has been growing at 6-8% a year for quite some years now), is measured in this light, what is being measured is the rise in living standards of the rich, urbanized elite, whose stranglehold on power and the economy (often in gangster like cartels, such as is seen in Mozambique, despite its "liberalization" and heralding in the west), and not the actual living standards of the populace, which if one ventures to the rural areas of the north of the country, remain as unchanged as they have been for hundreds of years. Try telling a villager on the road from Namialo to Pemba in the north of the country, living on a dirt path, in a mud hut with thatched roofs, no electricity, no plumbing, and possibly only a mobile phone to connect them to the 21st century that their country has experienced one of the highest growth rates in the world going on a decade, and I do believe that would solicit a wide, hearty laugh. Developmental indicators must, thus, focus on the real indicators of progress for the populace, and not simply economic output figures that often mask the realities on the ground. Literacy, infant mortality, caloric intake; these should be the measure of progress for nations in the developing south. There should not be a "discomfort" about growth, it should be an aim for all; nobody wants to regress, nobody wants to stagnate; however, more enlightened thought needs to be focused on this topic.
Collier notes, eloquently, that, "To my mind, development is about giving hope to ordinary people that their children will live in a society that has caught up with the rest of the world. Take away that hope and smart people will use their energy not to develop their society but to escape from it" (12).

Stiglitz on GDP Measure

2011-07-23T18:02:00.000-07:00

"GDP does not tell you what is going on with the average citizen. When you have inequality in a society, you can have GDP going up, as it has been in the United States, but most people...are becoming worse off...Developing countries may be growing by cutting down their forests, but once they cut down their forests, there's nothing there. Its not sustainable. GDP tells you nothing about sustainability"

Abhijit Banerjee on Doing Better Through Randomized Evaluations

2011-07-23T15:21:00.000-07:00

"We are at a starting point, rather than at the end. We are at a point where we can do better...."

The Conflict Trap

2011-07-20T07:48:00.000-07:00

Drawing parallels between the book I am currently reading, (well, re-reading), Paul Collier's wonderful "The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It," and today's news streaming down my computer screen courtesy of the BBC. Collier laments constantly about the "Traps:" those conditions which hold the poorest nations in a cycle of instability and economic malaise; looking at the news today about famine being declared in Somalia, already a failed state, I think of the regional ramifications for this newest humanitarian disaster. Collier states, "Many of the costs are borne by neighboring countries...Since most countries are bordered by several others, the overall cost to neighbors can easily exceed the cost to the country itself." And while it is calloused to think of a newly declared famine in the terms of "costs," the spiraling effects of these regional calamities are hard to understate. Reading further in the news: riots in Malawi, an attempted assasination in Guinea; just when the "bad old days" seemed to be over, the fractures reappear so easily in the poorest nations in the world; the image band-aids are so easily peeled away by the softest of breezes.

Collier on "The Bottom Billion:" The countries at the bottom coexist with the twenty-first century, but their reality is fourteenth century: civil war, plague, ignorance. They are concentrated in Africa and Central Asia, with a scattering elsewhere. Even during the 1990's, in retrospect the golden decade between the end of the Cold War and 9/11, incomes in this group declined by 5 percent. We must learn to turn the familiar numbers upside down: a total of five billion people who are already prosperous, or at least on track to be so, and the one billion who are stuck at the bottom."

Famine or Plenty?

2011-07-19T21:03:00.001-07:00

Reading of the newest round of desperation in the Horn of Africa, the failed rains of Somalia, the floods of refugees pouring into Kenya, threatening to destabilize, once again, an unimaginably fragile region, I am brought to the words of Richard Kapucinski, and others who have preached the same lessons about the way things are. Can we ever learn from the past if the present is so powerfully blinding?

“People are not hungry because there is no food in the world. There is plenty of it; there is a surplus, in fact. But between those who want to eat and te bursting warehouses stands a tall obstacle indeed: politics...Whoever has weapons, has food. Whoever has food, has power. We are here among people who do not contemplate transcendence and the existence of soul, the meaning of life and the nature of being. We are in a world in which man, crawling on the earth, tries to dig a few grains of wheat out of the mud, just to survive another day.” The Shadow of the Sun

Economic Gangsters

2011-07-17T16:33:00.000-07:00

Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel on the fundamental question, the fundamental divide facing development economics, ie: the Sachs Vs Easterly divide:

"Fundamentally, it boils down to whether rich countries have already provided to much money to help Kenya and others out of poverty-or not nearly enough. Leading academic researchers have lined up on both sides. The answer turns out to hinge critically on one's own views of the role that corruption and violence play in the impoverishment of nations. Maybe corruption and violence are mainly just the symptoms of poverty. If this is the case, once rich donor-countries send enough money to Kenya to jump-start economic growth, its citizens will no longer have to fight one another to survive. On the other hand, if most foreign aid is lost to the grabbing hands of corrupt officials or destroyed in civil strife, then how could aid dollars ever lift countries like Kenya out of poverty? More aid would just enrich an already corrupt elite, and could even make the twin problems of corruption and violence worse by giving people even more money to fight over."

LSE 2011-12 and the Poverty of Nations

2011-07-17T15:38:00.000-07:00

As of now, it looks like I will be attending The London School of Economic's Masters in International Development Management program for the 2011-12 academic year. I am very excited for the intellectual and professional challenge of this program, and have begun to read through some of the required reading. Thus, in correlation with my Schools Project website (www.theschoolsproject.org) I will be posting on different readings and findings in my own academic research and others published works. While I have still to iron out the financial and visa issues concerning my attendance at the LSE, I hold an unconditional offer, and thus, have begun the intellectual journey a bit early.

“Understanding the incentives behind economically motivated acts of violence helped us to develop new schemes to break the cycle of violence and poverty by using aid to stop violence before it starts.”

-Fisman and Miguel

I have almost completed reading Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel's book, "Economic Gangsters: Corruption, Violence, and the Poverty of Nations." Fisman and Miguel are Columbia and Berkeley professors and have taken a great approach, ala Freakonomics, to uncovering some of the lingering issues of developmental economics. They attempt to track the trail of global economic gangsters, those who stymie the development of nations in their individual pursuit of gain, through development issues such as life under Suharto in Indonesia, smuggling and the loss of tariffs in Hong Kong and China, post-conflict economic recovery in Vietnam, and also the impact of fragile environmental/agricultural production on developing nations. All in all a very interesting read. In looking at my particular interest of educational development, I want to specifically focus on a few sections of the book. The first concerns the randomized trials that have become the norm in the health field, when conducting field trials for new medicines before they can be approved by the FDA. The implementation of these randomized trials into all realms of development will be a crucial measure of success moving forward:

“There isn’t any conceptual reason why economists cant harness the power of randomization, by picking villagers-or even entire villages-to receive an economic treatment, and compare these changes to control villages. Armed with these ideas, we hope economists can generate similar breakthroughs in tackling the challenges of global poverty...In collaboration with NGO's, and the MIT Poverty Action Lab, the academic researchers working in Busia (Kenya) have already used randomized evaluations to show that providing anti-parasitic drugs for intestinal worms-a major scourge affecting over 90 percent of Busia's kids-can boost children's school attendance and may have longer term effects on students health...Information on failures is just as useful as successes, since it allows policymakers to shift funding away from the projects that don’t work and towards expanding those that do...

In Busia, for every success there has been two or three development projects that didn't have any meaningful impacts. For example, given the scarcity of textbooks in Busia's schools, it seemed natural to expect that providing more books would produce better student test scores. (However, the successes of literacy and book campaigns need to be measured with more metrics than only standardized test scores, which can be a poor indicator, and can themselves be plagued with problems). It turns out though, that students in classrooms randomly assigned to receive extra books didnt do any better on average than their counterparts in control schools. Maybe other educational expenditures like higher teacher salaries would be more effective, or maybe Kenyan school textbooks just arent any good. Paul Glewwe and coauthors find that standard school texts are written at too high a level of difficulty for most rural Kenyan students, probably because they were written to cater to the needs of the high-achieving children of the country's Nairobi elite. Whatever the reason, we've learned that resources need to be redirected away from programs such like these that, however well-intentioned, don't have any impact.”

The Shadow of the Sun

2011-07-13T07:41:00.000-07:00

Reading Richard Kapuscinski's beautiful memoirs on his decades reporting on Africa as a foreign correspondent...some of his striking words....

"The population of Africa was a gigantic, matted, crisscrossing web, spanning the entire continent and in constant motion, endlessly undulating, bunching up in one place and spreading out in another, a rich fabric, a colorful array."

"More than anything, one is struck by the light. Light everywhere. Brightness everywhere. Everywhere, the sun...from the morning's earliest moments, the airport is ablaze with sunlight, all of us in sunlight."

"The continent is too large to describe. It is a veritable ocean, a separate planet, a varied, immensely rich cosmos. Only with the greatest simplification, for the sake of convenience, can we say 'Africa.' In reality, except as a geographical appellation, Africa does not exist."

Tanzania. Leaving.

2011-07-01T05:10:00.000-07:00

"But did nobody realize that an improvement in economic activity would reveal a shortage of power? Didn't anyone believe that Africa's economies would start to grow? Power-or lack of it-is becoming a problem all over the continent. Africa did not plan for success."
-Richard Dowden
A quote made especially relevant in the 12-15 hours a day of power cuts facing Dar Es Salaam, the engine of the Tanzanian economy, and a mirror of the issues I lived through this year in Nepal

Last morning waking up in Sub-Saharan Africa...the bells, the light, the birds, clashing of metal trays.
It certainly has been an experience, another experience in the long chain of them, exhilerating and exhausting,
a time for learning, technical matters and the common themes of this world, the threads that bind, for both
good and for bad.,
Time for rollcall of highlights and lowlights for this trip in full, as all things in my life need to be itemized (all non-schoolsproject.org related stuff, here):

The Good.
1. Africa. In General. In extreme generality. As this continent is no more "African" than any dissonant, vast continents can be defined in a single word. It beats you up, is hard-as-hell to travel, but at the end of the day, there are few places as rewarding and truly different.

"The continent is too large to describe. It is a veritable ocean, a separate planet, a varied, immensely rich cosmos. Only with the greatest simplification, for the sake of convenience, can we say "Africa." In reality, except as a geographical appellation, Africa does not exist."

-Richard Kapucinski

2. Ihla de Mozambique. Hands down amazing. Still entranced. Magic.
3. Rocklands. The scene. The Camping. The climbing.
4. Cape Town Climbers. Some great, accomodating folks. Really made the time spent great.
5. Maputo. My new favorite African city.
6. Bread in Mozambique. (Pao)...one of the positive aspects of the Portuguese Empire....got me through many a day.
7. The Night Market in Ihla: $1 for 2 lbs of fish, taro, bread, rice, and beans. Nuff said.
8. INES Guesthouse, Pemba.. Despite no water and still costing $20 a nite
9. Mozambique Locals: most friendly African country I've visited (Sub-Saharan)
10. Cheap and Easy Sim Cards: a lesson that the US could pick up from the developing world.
11. Richard Dowden's Africa: Altered States, Ordinary Miracles. A fantastic travel companion.

The Bad
1. Malaria-prophalaxis-induced-hair-loss: Flaking Scalp Mess! Praying that the malaria doesnt decide to come on now....
2. Nampula, Moz: an armpit. The place still haunts me.
3. Prices-in-general: sure is not Asia in the get-what-you-pay-for category.
4. Chapas. Insanity.
5. Horribly terrible power in Dar. See above quote. Worse than Kathmandu. Not easy to do that.
6. S. Africa Vibe-in-General: lacking, lackluster, no smiles, too many bars and elecrtrified wires and fences and supermarkets closing at 530pm for my taste.
7. The heat. Even in the "winter" one can never get used to simply being hot all the time. See: Pemba.
8. The Internet: What I would give for 30 minutes of actual broadband.
9. The number of church-based-missionaries encountered: they literally swarm through towns like locusts: for the love of god.
10. Cost of Flying: As I have developed a phobia to days-on-end-local-transport, the state mafia monopolist African airlines have been the only game in town: And they know they have you by the balls come payment time.

House of Peace

2011-06-28T22:19:00.001-07:00

6.28.2011 Dar Es Salaam (“House of Peace”), Tanzania

The days and nights, though tedious and tending towards loneliness, pass relentlessly.
As my time in Africa winds down, the memories flash in mind, which remains cognizant
of this essential truth: now, they are just memories, just quick glimpses of the past, of the ups and down, the tedium tends to dissipate quickly in the mind, and that is all.
Trying to accumulate these glimpses is like building a house on a foundation of sand; it will not hold. It will slowly slip away, recede back into the ocean of life.
Simply move forward, move on; unceasingly, unnervingly, there is no other way.
The housemaid, clad in baby blue, sweeps the dust from the top layer of the dirt courtyard,
her wooden broom rhythmically sweeping, playing a soothing melody for my tired mind.
The generator, big, nasty, in its tin roofed shed like an angry attack dog growling at the moon, finally turned off at 7:15am after a long night of rumbling underneath my pillow.
The morning tables filled; where these folks all come from, always dressed in collared shirts, starched dresses, I haven't a clue, but the tables are always full when I stumble downstairs for my coffee, confident in my early morning prowess, always to be deflated upon entering the open canteen, the golden African dawn creeping in through the hazy courtyard.
The more time I spend here in Dar, the more aware I come of exactly how little there is to do in Dar. Yesterday, Sunday, was the most closed-up I have ever seen a major city on a weekend, weekday, or even major holiday. Other than the incessant ringing of the church bells at 6am, everything was closed, silent, shuttered, gated, people nowhere, a ghost town to behold. Could one imagine New York simply closing up shop one day a week? What is the simple cost to business? 1/7 gross profit, I would assume. I suppose the equation is simply illogical in this place, its veneer of modernity, its new glass and steel buildings being slowly unwrapped from their giant scaffolded bows, often simply a facade for very different underpinnings of life. Different realities. Different priorities. Altered states.

Mozambique Reflections

2011-06-24T03:51:00.000-07:00

Bouldering the old Portuguese lighthouse, Goa Island, Mozambique

Burundian Barber

Sitting in the dust on the side of the road

June 22, 2011: Leaving Mozambique....plane reflections.....

As the LAM flight parts through the low-lying clouds blanketing the east coast of Africa, I am given a quick period for reflections on the last 2.5 weeks of life here in Mozambique, a destination that has been intended for awhile, and finally encountered...the passport stamp said June 4^th, which would make this departure exactly 18 days after arriving, sleep deprived and weary at the great lines of the South Africa-Mozambique border, at 6am with the rest of the overnight bus passengers. What an 18 days is has been; travel, education, research, relaxation, photography, writing, reflection; Maputo, the vibrant capital city that quickly won my affections with its warmth, smiles, and general, flavorful ease; Nampula, the dump of the central, the one night at the pensao expensivo, the $30 hotel room, cheapest in town, with a bathroom that I could not enter for fear of biological contamination and a bed that, even lying on top of my old sleep sheet, still made my skin crawl with imagined bedbugs; Ihla de Mozambique, one of the finest places I have laid my head in my years of travel, a true wonderland; hard chapa travel, hitchhiking from the side of the dusty road junction of Namialo, breaking down after 4 hours of roadside dust and heat imbibing, and finally, Pemba, the provincial capital, the sleepy backwater that brought to mind many reflections of the Pacific, of the sleepy backwater capital cities of my island home.

Only 2 hours ago I was running around with Mr. Nando, my guardian, evangelical spiritual savior, host at INAS, and money changing fixer; frantically going from one bank to another (which are luckily located 5 minutes from each other as the town center is about that large in diameter), getting rejected in pleas to exchange the soon-to-be-worthless Mozambiquan Mecticals for US dollars or Tanzanian Shillings, anything that would be worth something after leaving this place; the amount, about $30 USD worth; the result; a shady drive-by fixer arranging the transaction with the Somali Lady in the market, the only place for such an exchange in this city; and $30 crisp US dollars in my pocket, enough local change to buy a fruit drink in the airport shop and a chocolate Bon Bon to spare, and a smile on my face after being driven to the airport by Nando's secretary at INAS, at 5mph, the trunk swinging open, no door handles on the inside or out of the beat up old sedan...TIA....

Research-wise, a bit of frustration, mainly stemming from the strong language barriers and the lack of anything resembling help from some of the “great NGO's of the area” such as the one that passed me in the dust yesterday while walking in a desert wasteland, emblazoned with the logo that made me laugh, “Helping Africa to Help Itself.” A bit pandering. I did get to spend some time with a local Peace Corps couple doing teacher training work, which was great to hear some stories and struggles, both for my research and for my own experiences, painting them against my own service, sharing the ups and downs, wishing them the best of luck as they wrap up a long, hard, and wonderful period in their lives here in Northern Mozambique. Hanging out at Russel's Place, a refuge for them, an interesting spot for me, the local expat hangout, the South African drinking hole of choice, happy to spend a few hours on their free wireless, but happy also to leave that place....and back to INAS....ah, INAS...where to begin...

Ill never quite figure out what the acronym actually stood for, the first time I heard it muttered from the mouth of Christina, a new friend who took me exploring the night markets in Ihla told me I had to at least try to get in there, gave me the number of Mr. Nando, and told me to make a good story and drop her name....and there I was, standing in the doorway, explaining myself to some FRELIMO (the powerful national political party of Moz) bigwig that I did, indeed, belong staying at their government guesthouse, complete with aircon, stately beds, mini-fridges, huge leather arms chairs, and random FRELIMO party officials staying the night after official jaunts from Maputo....certainly an interesting place to crash, and it made the whole Pemba scene much more bearable, especially when confronted with the other guesthouses in town, either comparable in quality to the digs in Nampula, or of slightly higher quality for $100/night....and sweet Mr. Nando, sending me biblical text messages, constantly trying to get me to come to meet his Brazilian pastor (I was VERY busy), and arranging my Somali black market money deals, in addition to fetching buckets of water, as even though this place had ice cold ac and mini fridges, the water had broken at some point, and being Mozambique, it was just a symptom of the terminal decline of things, and would not be fixed in the forseeable future...water came from a bucket and a well in the courtyard, a nice contrast to the high-life being lived inside...My last evening, sipping a nice, cold 2M local beer in my shorts, reclining on the plush leather chair in the living room, watching a badly pirated copy of The A Team on the national television channel (one of 3 available in the country)....ah, Mozambique....incredibly terrible local travel, expensive and shit hotels, wonderfully friendly locals, and a beautiful 18 days.....onto Tanzania and beyond!!

Mozambique Diary. Ihla to Pemba

2011-06-24T03:50:00.003-07:00

(Im the guy on the left)

Pemba, Mozambiaque...19.June.2011

“Its because this is Africa. We are poor.”

The government telecom manager's explanation for the fact that his office could not give me .60$ change for a dollar (on a .40$ transaction), despite the fact that we were sitting in an air conditioned computer lab inside of a million-dollar building. I was absolutely stunned by this lame-ass rationale employed to excuse bad business practices and a simple laziness (he had change in his pocket the entire time) and was very vocal in my response.

“Life has been very hard here.”

Burundian refugee who cut my hair in Ihla de Mozambique, explaining his plight over the last 14 years, which has led him from Burundi>Rwanda>Congo>Tanzania>Malawi>Mozambique, symbolic of the plight of the victims of Central Africa's multitudes of conflicts and governmental manipulations of refugees for financial and political gain.

The day begins with a restless sleep, usually the case when I am taxed with an early-morning wakeup; and today's, at 4:03am, certainly fit the bill. For some reason here in Mozambique, the public transportation options (chapas, already explained), tend to pick an ungodly hour to depart in the morning for their daily transit runs; usually done so they can get to the destination, shop, relax, and then turn around and come back for the late afternoon run....Accidentally slamming the door to Ruby's behind me, sealing the last 9 days in a cloak of positive memory, setting out, once again, for the utter unknown of Northern Mozambique travel. The dark early hours passed in a sleepy blur; sliding in the mud, covering one knee with muck, cursing the timing, why could this not have happened in the last 9 days instead of on a day where a shower was many many hours distant?? Walking the length of the island, streetlights illuminating the way, the early morning muzzein's call to prayer, witnessing the faithful stepping out for their early-morning ritual. The first attempted extortion, 4:30am, a new personal record: the driver of the truck over the causeway, seizing his monopoly on the route at the hour and the fact that my disheveled, bag loaded self obviously had no other choice other than to walk the 1.5 mile causeway, trying to charge me at the very least 3x the going rate (I settled at 2x and some harsh words); arriving at the ramshackle coastal village, back on the African continent, a renewed taste of the roughness from which Ihla was such a refuge. Children waking up behind a tattered white tarp, on the ground, crowded on the bare concrete slab, in the early morning chill, as I stand, always trying appear non-chalant, obviously a stranger in a strange land, a role played all too often in this life. Yet another attempted extortion, by the same driver, who almost drives off with me half hanging out of the back of the truck after some shady dealing and a wrong destination to which I would have backtracked considerably and paid considerably more; jumping off the back, in the still dark morning, somehow getting my bags to follow along with some choice words for this lovely early morning compadre, and into the passenger seat of another waiting chapa, estatic at my timing, not yet knowing that I would be sitting in this lucky position for 2 hours before finally departing for a 40 minute ride, to be dumped into a pickup for another 45 minute ride, to be left on the side of the road in Nimiala, the stereotypically terrible armpit of African travel, a filthy, dusty, hot road-junction-cum-town. Heat, dust, dirt, frantic coke and banana sellers chasing down trucks and anything else that moved, the vehicles passing all outrageously overpacked with bodies, in this I stood, trying to keep composure, trying not to lose heart and car and truck passed by, not one for hours heading even in the direction that I needed to go, after being promised busses and cars would be coming in “10, maybe 15 minutes, of course!” Trying to hitch, trying to score a badly needed ride, which simply did not happen as the hours rolled past, my legs grew numb, my mind weary from being gang-laughed-at (as one writer said, every country has its assholes). Finally succumbing, sitting down on my dusty pack in the dirt, defeated, deflated, and then the smiles of some strangers, empathy for the plight of a fellow traveler, those who would only know this place, a perspective wedged into my weary mind. A young boy, quite ragged, sat down on the dirt a few feet away just to look at me; at first I looked away, but then over to him, and he gave a simple smile, which opened my heart, made me forget for a minute the hours of hard travel yet to come, the lack of coffee that was making my mind hurt, the dust that had coated every crevice of my being. And finally, right then, an absolute strike of brilliance: not an overloaded, death-trap flatbed; not a packed, cracked-windshield, stereo blaring chapa; but a Mercedes Benz mini bus, 4 passengers total in a 15 seat van, Pemba Dive Lodge logo emblazoned on the side, a vehicle that would not be stopping ever 15 ft to Pemba to drop off and pick up, a complete floating oasis...What luck...4 brilliant, fast, music-filled hours later, and im back in the dust, on the side of the road once again, in the end-of-the-road town of Pemba, Northern Mozambique's answer to Hong Kong, a city in name only, a provincial backwater of the first degree. Trying to smooth-talk my way into the government guesthouse, the governor's friend's pad, reserved for the Frelimo (the ruling party) hotshots who fly in from Maputo for the night. And here I am, ensconced in the finest 4^th rate craftsmanship possible; air-con but no working water; leather armchairs and gaudy headboards but windows that dont shut; a bucket bath and a bathroom door that won't close; a manager trying to convert me to his Evangelical church, and a locked door, a bed, a book, and my pen....another day in Africa....

20.June.2011 Pemba, Mozambique's

A soft breeze breaks through the already searing, sweat inducing breeze; it is 730am, but the sun already feels like mid-day here in Northern Mozambique's provincial capital city, the sleepy backwater of Pemba, town on the sea. It took an hour to find a coffee this morning; walking the broken sidewalks, “Buen Dia” as frequently encountered as the holes in the pavement, the smiling, laid back locals exuding a great warmth, unexpected, but much welcomed. A benefit of being in such a backwater town where only one real intersection exists is that everything of note lies within a 50ft radius; the airline office (check), the pharmacy (next), the internet cafe (still closed), the Frelimo office for some free political posters (ditto, come on), and the Pao Shop (bread in Portuguese), where I just scored my first coffee in 2 days, a taste of heaven. Yesterday I was forced to resort to the only source of caffeine available universally in the world, Coke, for my caffeine kick, a barely suitable substitute that left me cranky until bedtime. The little thing, the details...like the guy who installed the window bar right in front of the window hinge, so the window will have no chance of ever closing, despite that tropical heat and the air conditioner. Two days, and then my time here in Mozambique will be up, onto Dar....

Mozambique Diaries

2011-06-13T03:08:00.000-07:00

Nampula Chapa Stand, Nampula, Northern Mozambique...June 9^th, 2011

(Editors note: a “Chapa” is a minivan; more specifically, an old Chinese white minivan, usually filled with about 34 people and an equal number of children in 14 seats, produce of all makes which is continually purchased and piled upon during very frequent stops, perhaps live animals, a broken windshield, suicidal driver, bald tires, and blaringly loud stereo system...an amazing microcosm of African life on wheels).

How far away this place is from anything in my recent recollection, from home, from the “ordinary”that has, over these years, become quite extraordinary in a strange turning of the tides of life.

The sun slowly rising over the chapa stand, from the east, come come market women,

brightly clad in blazing sarongs, oranges, yellows, reds, the sun projecting its warmth onto the

dirt tracks through delicate footfalls;

plastic green tubs overfilled with bread, produce, water, balanced gracefully on cloth-covered heads;

the lone policeman, an old AK-47 strapped to his young back as he meanders like a lion, a predator in this place looking for vulnerable pray; his predatory eyes lock onto me, asking me after a quick hello to buy him a cold drink, a soda, some breakfast; I hide my eyes and look away, mutter something incomprehensible in response; barefoot children, white eyes, no shoes, roaming around, looking lost, amused at the passing show as myself; what they are doing here I could not guess; the dusty brown soil underfoot, the only solidity in this sea of movement, this show of humanity;

smiles and the faint approaches of strangers; always men, of course, who run this island of mobility, this small dusty chapa stand, in a sea of stagnation; my own cloudy head, screaming for food, for coffee, knowing that neither will come soon....

Ihla de Mocambique, 11 de Junio, 2011

“Wisdom is the clear seeing of the impermanent, conditioned nature of all phenomena, knowing that whatever arises has the nature to cease. When we see this impermanence deeply, we no longer cling; when we no longer cling, we come to the end of suffering. “

-Joseph Goldstein

The rain clouds, the first i've seen since leaving the distant confines of Cape Town, which seems like a lifetime ago, yet only a matter of a week, fill the horizon, the background steel to the forefront of faded whites, sun bleached yellows, and the orange spectrum emblazoned upon the old Portuguese roof tiles which frame the skyline of this peculiar, fascinating place in which I have landed.

Knowing that this, too, will end, only serves to increase my appreciation for this place, this confluence of time, culture, setting, seamlessly blended into a wickedly perfect present moment in time.

A great Buddhist Master, Ajahn Chah, once stated, as he held a beautiful porcelin cup, that the ability to see the cup as already broken only made him love it more, yet without the attachment that clouds the mind, that clouds the experience.

The children's screams come to me from a hundred ruined buildings, the maze of the old city, shells of faded glory and grandeur; the painful task of restoration a mere dream for most, contented to live in the subsistence of the broken present. A Portuguese capital, a massive walled fort which changed the shape of history for the entire continent, and thus, the entire world, at one end, a pointed spear of defense; a maze of historic, mostly dilapidated buildings, their sun bleached facades masking centuries of lives untold, stories echoing; a thatch roofed village, Makute Town, pulsing with the rhythms of tropical African life; and a simple causeway, like a tail, an appendage, a tenuous lifeline to a barren coastline, a harsh, unforgiving interior. At certain moments in history, events collide to produce the enduring stories and edifices that shape the world; and at certain moments in time, life leads you to places which call out, which grab your mind and heart, you eyes, your senses, and all you can do is stay awhile, soak it all in, knowing that this, too, will end.

Maputo, One...

2011-06-06T01:23:00.000-07:00

Cinco de Junio, 2011, Maputo, Mozambique

Sitting in a small Pakistani/Indian restaurant(I love the harmony that results from foreign restaurant-based cultural fusion), green tables covered in plastic, large South Asian families gathered for a Sunday meal, speaking a universal European tongue in this far away land, the feel of cultural blending pervasive. What a wonderful town this is; take your average African city, water it down with wide avenues, few cars, an oceanfront setting, a laid back populace that blends every shade of the cultural paradigm, and take with this the unique feature that this is a walking town, that I can walk unencumbered by safety fears as in South Africa and in so many other large cities, that the local all stop and smile, say hello, an easy grace in this ramshackle African city-town-capital. Embracing my new found Portuguese skills (still milking my high school Spanish classes this late in life....) I awoke from a wonderful siesta an hour ago, and with no power and no water to be had (no worries, a happy tradeoff to the quality of life here), I set out wandering, photographing, observing the tiny streetside fruit stalls, the men in yellow mCell aprons proudly parading past selling cheap mobile air time, and about 95% of the shops shuttered for the Sunday day long siesta. A refreshing fact, this closure; a reflection on quality of life, a focus on spending Sunday with the family, gatherings of friends on corners, sipping rum, laughing, conversing; as I walked past a large family gathered on a covered patio, the children kicking soccer balls down the dirty lanes, and the small group of skateboarders using the steps of the main church, as they do in every town in America, to show off their new moves, I warmed to the rhythm of this place. This place, this last day, has reminded me of why I came to Africa; it has utterly refreshed me with its laid back charms, its rundown, ramshackle, dirty facades, it is everything that was so sorely missing from South Africa's modernity and development. The smiles, food, languidity all embrace me now. I feel safe, welcome, warm, and ready for the next month on the road. I am so glad to have finally made it to this country, only a year later than originally expected, but it feels, just in time.

Maputo, Mozambique

2011-06-05T09:52:00.000-07:00

June 4, 2011, Maputo, Mozambique

It hit has soon as we crossed the border, after the quick and efficient South African immigration (yes, you may leave, we will make this quite easy) and their bizarro-negatives, the Mozambique National Immigration Department (I made that up but it sounds kinda official). I was fortunate enough to skip the line to get into Moz, as I was one of 10, 328 people there in line who had to pay for his visa, courtesy of coming from that great pariah America which just loves to screw all other countries on visa fees, which, in turn, love to turn around and screw ME, but what a line it was....a true Africa border crossing. Pushing, shoving, armed guards barking, ladies with babies strapped to their backs, the whole nine yards. It felt great to be back in the developing world. South Africa, for all its dirt, was way too clean, neat and orderly for me. I breathed in a deep lungfull of the Mozambique air and smiles over the sea of humanity, as the hapless immigration official tried to figure out how to work his fingerprint machine by asking me over and over to rub my thumbs on my forehead. I was fortunate enough to not have exact change, and be faced with a country demanding exact change in their visa payments; all this at 6:30 in the morning, after a night filled in a cramped bus seat with perhaps 2 hours of sleep. Amazingly I survived, was not abandoned at the border post by the bus with all my things packed away into its storage, and was peering out the windows at the marvelously different scope of humanity that soon greeted.

It feels great to be back in Africa. The roughness. The crudeness. The smiles. The Warmth. The cheap street food. The pulsing sidewalks. The arbitrary police. The amazing central market. TIA. This is Africa. This is everything that I so missed in South Africa, a more “developed” nation, but a place without a tenth of the soul of one city block of Maputo, its crumbling buildings, statues, and communist revolution named streets (how about a Lenin Ave and a Mao Street for you right wingers??? Love it.

The slow, tropical, languid pace, the brilliant colors of the setting sun over the harbor, the Portuguese bakeries and their amazing bread loaves. I've found what I came for. And so happy I finally made it to Mozambique.

South Africa, The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

2011-06-05T09:51:00.001-07:00

2/June/2011, Johannesburg Train/Bus Station (Park Station), Downtown JoBurg, South Africa

Sitting here at Nandos, the least offensive of the fine food offerings here at Park Station. The other options: badly overpriced, and just plain bad, fast food at Wimpys, the venerable South African McDonalds that makes the latter look like Peter Lugar's Steakhouse; the fish and chips joint the with mysteriously missing prices, and mysteriously missing line which both look like a sign to keep walking; and good ole South African meat pies and sausages at the Supermarket (which certainly plays into the theme of the particularly large badonkeydonk asses that keep parading past in tight jeans). This is certainly the last country on my culinary list of the world; a Thailand or India, this is not. I have heard stories about the historical reasons for the destruction of indigenous foods here in South Africa and their subsequent replacement with fast food and copious amounts of Coca Cola, but to live it as a traveler is quite depressing, as food says a whole hell of a lot about the culture in which its found. Even in Kenya, another country with a weaker-than-average offering list of local foods at least offered crappy food for a cheap price; here it is crap and extremely expensive crap, at that. (Bad food+expensive=bad placement on list). Only three more hours to kill here now, until I hopefully board a bus for the border and onwards. I do suppose, as my time here in South Africa draws to a close, that its time for a bit of reflection, a bit of the ole list game!! Here we go....lets keep with the Wild West Theme of Nando's and go with The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly....

The Good (in no particular order)

1. Rocklands. Absolutely amazing climbing, incredible scenery, hiking, camping, and awesome fellow climbers. Even the local watering hole in one-horse Clanwilliam was killer (who would have thought, the best pizza I've had in a long time would be in the middle of farmsville S.A.??). definitely the highlight of my time in S.A.

2. Cape Town Climbers: took me in, fed me, clothed me, (well, not really, but I did have a loaned sleeping bag and blanket get me through the cold-as-hell Rocklands nights in my tiny tent), drove me, and were just an awesomely accommodating local crew. Much love to Tristin, Rachel, Josh, and the whole gang. Good people. And killer barbecue masters.

3. Long Street Backpackers: a good spot; nice chill-out areas, a great balcony, good kitchen, not obnoxiously loud (despite my initial fears of the drunken management), clean sheets, and an awesome location. Not as good as the killer apartment I stayed in after Rocklands, but a close second.

4. The Shosholoza Express Train: it was delayed 4 hours, and I froze to everloving shit overnight (see previous) but hell, it was empty, comfortable, the scenery was amazing, and the window didnt shatter when the local kids pelted the train with baseball sized rocks. Bonus.

5. Cape Town: this is a bit more complex a classification; the city is beautiful, the setting unparalleled, a great European feel, but not what I expected whatsoever in an Africa City, and felt a distinct lack of soul as a result. Plus way too much petty crime for my taste, but still a positive place.

The Bad (again, in no particular order)

1. Local People: I'm not sure ive cracked the code of the “Rainbow Nation” but the only rainbow I've witnessed is the complete and utter indifference of the locals; the only true interactions I've had with locals/strangers has been the constant stream of beggars and hangers-on, who bring aggressiveness to the new level. Obviously there is much more to this, but I felt none of the warmth and saw none of the smiles promised in those damn slick South Africa tourism commercials. The only topic that the local whites I met on the train wanted to talk about was the mess the blacks had caused the country; there is still much tension in this land. A complicated issue, no doubt.

2. Expense of Everything: $7 for a shitty burger and soggy fries??? $65 for an overnight train ride with no heat?? $40 for a 3 hour bus ride?? This is certainly not India. I have NO CLUE how the locals survive here. The prices are crazy, way higher than the States, where the average income is at least 10x as much. The quality of services and goods received for the prices charged should be illegal. A real bummer to a budget traveler.

3. The Food: already mentioned and ranted on, but this must be the unhealthiest combination of fast food, meat patties, fried chicken, and Coca Cola ever released upon an unsuspecting populace. Again, the large asses of the women seem to be quite happy with this absurd national diet. And whats up with all the people on the train chain smoking??? People still fucking smoke??? They didnt get that memo or what??? After two weeks of trying, I have not had ONE “local” food here in South Africa. Not one, other than those damn meat pies.

4. Racism: yes, here in the “Rainbow Nation” there are such stark divisions, unbelievable inequalities, and from what I've heard, seen, and experienced, must distrust and animosity between the races. It could certainly be worse, but quite unsettling coming in thinking that the nation was truly a peaceful little cornucopia.

5. Crime: every home has its Armed Rambo Response signs, razor wire, electric fences, dogs, you name it. The fencing people are making a killing in this place!! It reminds me a lot of prison. Crime and theft are completely endemic here, and it makes you constantly have to be on guard, which makes people quite hardened, and is quite exhausting. I had the blueberry muffins stolen out of my shopping bag on the train seat, a friend had her car window broken in at a dinner party we were at the other night, and the lady in the train carriage had her bags stolen in the night. Nobody puts out lawn chairs or patio furniture despite the fact that almost everyone has a patio. Shitty. And one last thing that should go under this category: the damn Pakistani who tried to sell me, in my moment of obvious weakness, a USB cable at the train station for $42. Asshole. You know where you can stick that USB.

6. The Overwhelmingly Ostentatious Displays of Wealth: to go along with the disparities here which are quite unlike anywhere else I've seen, (and I do understand and accept the hypocrisy involved with an American pointing this out), but the wealth displays seen here and heard about are truly horrific; its as if its not enough to have 4 Lamborghinis parked at your mansion a half mile away from cardboard shacks. Come on people. Class up.

And The Ugly....

Yeah, well, not quite anything to talk about here, other than the guy who pissed all over floor of the train bathroom into which my sock-wearing compartment mate walked into in the middle of the night. Frozen pee foot popsicles?

Cape To JoBurg Journal

2011-06-05T09:50:00.001-07:00

June 2, 2010. Shosholoza Moyl Train, Cape Town to Johannesburg

My fingers and toes continue to slowly thaw out after a frigid night aboard the train; I am guessing that the mechanic in charge of operating and/or fixing the heating system might have taken an early retirement package*. Awoke to my breath crystallizing in the shuttered, rocking, black cabin, metal shades drawn as lovely curtains over the rock-scarred windows, the scrubby plains of the Karoo that now greet my eyes soon to be beheld once I thawed out enough to move from under the 4 blanket cocoon. Signs of progress dot the view; a power substation, a graveled road, an old pickup truck (or buckie, as they are called around here) plodding down the path to the unknown; the pale tan colors of a water-starved land, the lushness must have occurred long ago, or simply never; and a perfectly blue sky, the huge horizon, naked expanse. I reckon I am about half way through this journey to Maputo, and this far done is the easy part....big, bad Johannesburg is looming in the forefront of my mind, as we hurtle through the African plains...

*-I was later told that the train carriages, ancient models, were perfecly partnered with the steam engines of a bygone era; since the steam engines were all retired many years ago, the trains are now being pulled by diesel engines, which cannot work the heating systems; thus, we freeze our asses of in the cold South African nights aboard the “Luxury Express.” Ah, TIA...(this is Africa!)

Cape Town, Reflections

2011-06-05T09:49:00.001-07:00

Cape Town, South Africa June 1^st, 2011. Final Thoughts from the Cape

After a long, exhausting night, which started off like any other amongst new friends, a warm fire, and a great meal here in Cape Town, things took a drastic turn, a turn unforeseen, as a new, close friend received some terrible family news. All we could do was be here for her, to fill the space of unfamiliar openness so quickly opened by familiarity, with hugs, comfort; again and again, the universal theme of the Dharma comes into mind when these life situations inevitably arise; the themes I have studied in texts, the themes philosophically analyzed in the abstract, running into the reality of existence; the theme of the truth of suffering, of birth, of old age, of sickness, and of death; the theme of the impermanence of all things, the illusions of stability and solidity in a universe where there is simply nothing to hold on to that will not change, that is not changing, that is not decaying and hurtling towards eventual demise; and this is not meant in a macabre context, but rather as an inspiration to act, an inspiration to learn, an inspire to understand the truth of this human life. Wise Zen masters ask, “The days and nights are relentlessly passing, how well are you spending your time?” How well are we spending our time, understanding both the preciousness and frailty of this human condition, the truth of cause and effect, and the opportunity for freedom? Are we working to benefit others, to open our hearts, to seek truth and progress? Every experience is meant to gain knowledge, to gain understanding, to progress, to contemplate, to discover these truths in the context of our own lives.

And thus, my time here in Cape Town winds down to an end; and yet, also a beginning; the winding path of life, of connections and of disappearances; of great new friends made who will be seen again down the line, when , I do not know, but this is not important; the reality of connection is what matters.

Cape Town, the beautiful city by the sea, framed by the mist-shrouded majestic crags of Table Mountain, a city of color and of brutality, of starkly contrasting manners of life, of gates and security warnings and warmth and vibrancy; a city that was not expected but that opened its arms for me over the last two weeks; and as I prepare to depart, to board the train tomorrow morning for a long journey through the South African heartland to Johannesburg, and on to Maputo, Mozambique, a journey that will be both long and hard and eye-opening and rich and rewarding, a microcosm of the realities of this beautiful life of travel, I thank the good grace that brought me to this edge, this tip of a vast continent. And I look forward to this upcoming journey, its challenge, the time for reflection, the boredom, the discomfort, the realities of life in the developing world, the strangeness, the dust and dirt, all of it, all of this life, here, now.

Cape Town Reflections

2011-06-01T02:48:00.000-07:00

Cape Town, South Africa June 1^st, 2011. Final Thoughts from the Cape

South Africa Journal, Take Three: Rocklands and Pics!

2011-05-31T01:01:00.000-07:00

May 26, 2011. DeParkuys Camp, Rocklands, South Africa

Sitting on the concrete edge of an unfinished structure in the middle of the bush camp,

the sun's rays rose over the eastern, rocky hillside about an hour ago to greet my chilled, down-clad body. Closing my eyes and listening to the delicate birdsong, the beautiful dance of nature, play out for my silenced ears. The quiet and calmness of this place is stunning. The complete peace, utterly unsoiled, constantly awaits if one can take the time to stop, to put down the mental mechanizations and gymnastics, and simply listen. It does not need to be sought out; rather, its pervasiveness surmounts the small echoes of noise. Sitting here in the sun, assessing the damage to my body from yesterday's climbing session; a stiff neck, also the result of my tent's cramped interior, two ripped knuckles, and a hole through the armpit of two shirts, the result of falling from an 18foot highball bouldering problem, nearly missing the pads, and almost being impaled on a sharp, 2 inch thick tree branch which almost sent me straight to the emergency room of the Clanwilliam Regional Hospital, not a relished thought by a long-shot. The perils of a perilous sport; I did manage to climb two beautiful lines that called to me in their beauty, their sculpted holds requiring both balance and strength, a true test of both the physical and mental barriers. A gorgeous day spent in the vast boulderfields of the Rocklands, a magnificent landscape whose beauty ranks quite high in my personal story; the light and shadows writing beautiful scripts at each moment on the streaked black and orange boulders and cliff bands; a remarkable area to be cherished and remembered. And today, more of the same, a solo pilgrimage to hunt out beautiful climbing lines, the calm, the stillness when you stop walking on the dusty trail, quiet the mind, and just listen.

South Africa Journal, Take Two: Rocklands!!

2011-05-31T00:57:00.001-07:00

May 19^th, 2011, Rocklands, South Africa

What a day....reflecting as I lie here, cocooned in my tiny tent, robed in longjohns and down jacket against the frigid night sky; Driving well over the speed limit in Tristin's small Audi, blazing through the South African countryside, the golden hues blazing on the peaks of the Cedarbergs; stopping for groceries in the small rural town of Clanwilliam, the day laborers all laboriously spending their wages on drink, crowded around the front of the local SPAR Market; arriving in the dark of night, stories having been told over the blur of the traffic lines, the glare of the semi-trucks heading north to Namibia and south back to the Cape; setting up tents in the sand by headtorch, happily cocooned after an epic day in South Africa, a stranger alone in the company of strangers, now friends, a lone traveler on this far out road of life....

May 20^th, Rocklands, South Africa

Just in from an evening spent around the campfire, good people, stories, laughs, the stars thundering from overhead in all their singular brilliance, this magical place perched on the edge of the world, balanced, as we all are, so perilously. Walking back into camp today after a great climbing session with some new South African friends, I was enveloped by the absolute peace of this place, the silence startled me; the best day yet in this new country...and many more to come...

South Africa Journals Take One: Cape Town

2011-05-31T00:56:00.000-07:00

Cape Town 17^th May

The sounds of pop music blares from the bar's speakers downstairs, yet my small dorm room remains still, with only the bed I lie upon and a crazy old American (who would have thought??) from Louisiana the humble inhabitants on another night on the tip of the vast African continent. I dont think that the size really got to me until after arriving here on African soil; from far away, everything shrinks in size, becomes more accessible when being accessed through the fingertips on a foreign keyboard; sitting here now, pondering life, the journey has suddenly grown huge, daunting even; I try to keep my wits about me, to stick to my guns, to not be afraid of the unknown, despite my senses screaming “you're fucking insane!!” Its been a long day of walking, of adjusting, of pondering; up and down the hills of color, the labrynth of the City Bowl, downtown, the waterfront, peering back at Table Mountain, its rugged splendor, jagged rocks calling me to climb. I hitched a ride this morning with Jeff, who tracked me as I came through customs at the airport; normally on guard, I was disarmed by his easy candor and lack of bullshit; his client who was to be on the same flight pulled a no-show, and I gave him little more than gas money to take me back into town in his tiny red hatchback, telling him how I managed to get through immigration with no return ticket (make up a believable story and deadpan it to the immigration manager who pulls you out of line and grills you for 10 minutes, and ALWAYS be polite...sir goes a long way, all over the world; though for a few minutes I didnt think id be seeing more than the immigration lounge of South Africa's nicest airport-mental note-check immigration requirements MORE CLOSELY next time!). Jeff also informed me that tomorrow is the national election, of which I had no idea; it is almost certain that Jacob Zuma and the ruling ANC will be reelected, but there is growing discontent with his rule and his lack of delivery on so many promises in this “Rainbow Nation.” Of the rainbow, Jeff informed me that Cape Town is very much a “white run city” and thus, not subject to the copious issues of the other major cities if South Africa; even in its innocence, this comment did open my jet-lagged eyes to the truth of life here. Tomorrow, to figure out how to get to the Rocklands, do a bit of gym climbing at City Rock and try to meet some people to hitch up to the mountains with, or arrange a rental car to go it alone (though the costs of everything here are very high, completely even with NYC prices, the food is quite shit and the public transit is sorely lacking, three huge caveats for a poor traveler such as myself which will surely limit my ultimate amount of time here in South Africa). It amazes me how poorer South Africans can survive with the prices as high as they are-I am finding it a very tough adjustment coming from New York City, not the cheapest of places....

Dubai 17.May.2011. Perpetual Motion

2011-05-16T11:28:00.000-07:00

Dubai 17-May-2011: Perpetual Motion

The bright fluorescent lights framing brighter display cases, emblazoned with the wares of the West, sparkling marble floors and enormous canopied windows; none of this has changed since my last visit to this Mecca of Consumption, this Medina of Capitalism, a brush stroke of Western corporate imperialism painted across the bleak desert sands of the Persian Gulf. The mini-constellation that is Dubai, this strange place that I seem to be passing through more and more as the years progress. And, entwined into the perpetual motion that has been my crazed life, this strange place has become a strange bedrock, a strange bedfellow on routes to and from the developing world; a final outpost of home, its familiarity bred through the slogans of our Starbucks and Costa Coffee bars, our Burger Kings and Givenchy and Christian Dior and Rolex; a weigh-station, transiting through this very terminal on my last birthday from Africa to Asia, a chance to binge for a few hours on the comforts of home without having to actually be home. Maybe this is why so many come here to live, work, and settle. For me, this harsh land with its cursory smattering of modernity, this brash bastion of the West, this temple of money would never faintly considered as a final resting point; however, right now, the warm cup of Starbucks sitting in front of me holds my hand as I journey back to Africa, back to the unknown, back to the unfamiliar, once again.

I have promised myself that I would keep better track of this trip I am embarking on; this efforts have trailed off in my travels to date, but I will be making a more honest effort this time, as a personal record, as a reflection that I realized has been missing after so many long journeys home. Gate number 121, Emirates Dubai to Cape Town will open in a few hours, just enough time to catch up on some correspondence and to wander the gilded hallways a few more times, to soak in this strange atmosphere that is most certainly ephemeral in these circumstances of my life. Now, the calling of gate numbers in Arabic, the language that practically nobody here speaks (as all of the workers are Asian in Dubai, almost 90%) continues and I sit and watch life pass by from over my glowing screen...

Next stop: Cape Town, South Africa, and the beginning of a grand new adventure.

Cancer and Capricorn

2011-04-25T09:35:00.000-07:00

As I prepare to reenter the cacophonous riot that is Africa, I find myself scouring the resources available, the words that have been written describing these indescribable lands, the words of Rimbaud, Greene, Naipaul, Meredith, and so many others who have had the courage to journey, to describe, to entreat all others to their inner madnesses. And one of the best of modern times is Paul Salopek, the Pullitzer Prize winning journalist for the Chicago Tribune, master of prose, dancer of words and worlds....

From writer and journalist Paul Salopek's collection, entitled The Twenty-third Parallel

The twenty-third parallels north and south—what map makers call the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn—girdle the Earth roughly three thousand miles apart, bracketing the warm belly of the planet. They hold between them some of the poorest, least stable and most culturally diverse nations in the world.

The bulk of humanity lives in or near this immense subtropical belt—about two-thirds of the world’s six billion people. It is a place of numberless villages and exploding mega-cities. It is the source of the greatest human migrations in history. Its face is younger. Its colors are brighter. Its sky is a paler blue. By sheer weight of numbers alone, it is where our common future is being scripted.

Africa 2011. The Plan

2011-04-24T18:24:00.000-07:00

Ticket to Cape Town, May 15th, via Dubai, purchased. Its only been 3 weeks since I last passed through the United Arab Emirates on my way to the States from Nepal, and yet, it beckons once again. This time as a quick stopover for another 9 hour flight south, way south, to the southern tip of the African continent. I was in Africa last summer, when I visited Kenya and Tanzania; I remember the late night departure from Dar Es Salaam International Airport, eating a last African meal at the small roadside grill across the darkened road from the airport, drinking a final cold Tusker beer, assured that I would return. And return I will...for yet another "trip of a lifetime." How I've managed so many of these in my years I cannot understand, yet they continue to unfold, and I continue to unfold with them.
My goal: To be way more active updating this site during my travels, as I have always tended to trail off during my various adventures around the world. I want this site to be a true travel blog for the next 4 months of adventure.

The Plan: Cape Town to Cairo, or as far north as I can feasibly get in three months of overland, local transport travel through East/Central Africa. South Africa>Mozambique>Tanzania>Rwanda>Uganda>Kenya>South Sudan>Sudan>Egypt.....visiting some great local Educational NGO's to do field work for my next masters degree starting in September at The London School of Economics. Anything NGO/Education Development will be written about and posted at my sister site, www.theschoolsproject.org. This blog will be just for the nuts and bolts of travel, the hardships, the glories, and everything in between as I take on the mother of all overland adventures.....
Now: wrapping up loose ends, planning, scouring the internet for information, reading as many African books as I can get my hands on (which means re-reading many, as I've already devoured most of them over the years), buying some gear, mainly for camping along the way, and dropping in and visiting some friends here in my hometown of NYC.

leaving nepal.

2011-04-12T19:09:00.000-07:00

isn't it all just as a dream?
nothing starts, nothing finishes, just a continual journey, a continual flow of experience, arising and passing, the screen of consciousness.
I have grown non-sentimental over these years; walking out of Boudha, my back to the giant stupa whose gaze has accompanied me for so many months, for so many nights, its eyes welcoming me home after so many journeys, a simple smile, a simple acknowledgment of time spent, of moving forward on this perpetual journey that life has been, the cumulative experience, the perspectives gained, the whole greater than the sum, lost, seized upon, abandoned.
as the plane lifted off the tarmac in Kathmandu, the haze parted with the recent unseasonable rains, and the ancient city shone below the tips of the white wings, its decrepit and ramshackle glory, the huge village sprawl, the dusty brown facades, life continuing apace from this downward gaze, i recognize this fascinating home now from space, and smile, the perpetual journey swallowing the moment, and pushing further forward, into the unknown, the future.

perspectives

2011-04-12T14:56:00.000-07:00

"The cumulative experience of seeing the world from many vantage points has helped me to appreciate the real circumstances of our planet-the causes of poverty, the role of rich-country policies, and the possibilities for the future. Gaining a proper perspective on these issues has been my struggle and challenge for the decades. Nothing else in my intellectual life and political engagement has been as rewarding."

-Jeffrey Sachs, The End of Poverty

Kinshasa Symphony

2011-04-10T18:27:00.000-07:00

This looks to be a wonderful film coming from the Democratic Republic of Congo, a rare bright shining light in a place so often portrayed by darkness, both real and imagined, but the foreign press....

double standard

2011-03-28T08:08:00.000-07:00

A great op-ed in Foreign Policy written by Yoweri Museveni of Uganda on the situation in Libya. The point that really struck me was this:

Western countries always use double standards. In Libya, they are very eager to impose a no-fly zone. In Bahrain and other areas where there are pro-Western regimes, they turn a blind eye to the very same or even worse conditions. We have been appealing to the United Nations to impose a no-fly zone over Somalia -- so as to impede the free movement of terrorists linked to al Qaeda, which killed Americans on September 11th, killed Ugandans last July, and have caused so much damage to the Somalis -- without success. Why? Are there no human beings in Somalia, as there are in Benghazi? Or is it because Somalia does not have oil that is not fully controlled by the Western oil companies, as in Libya on account of Qaddafi's nationalist posture?

The comparison to the inaction of the Western powers to use the same level of humanitarian intervention in Somalia, where there has been countless human suffering over the years (as well as in Ivory Coast, which has slipped back into civil war, and does not even come up on Google News anymore). I am not defending the actions of Gadaffi; killing innocent civilians is wrong, there is no defense to this; however, what has been wrong has been the action of the West, its hypocrisy and double standards becoming increasingly transparent when seen through the light of the current display of strength in the Mediterranean.

Bed Nets and Bombs

2011-03-28T06:48:00.000-07:00

“Why is it that the choice to express our humanitarian benevolence through the use of missiles and jets gets on the table—to the top of the agenda, even—again and again, but the choice to express it less truculently so rarely does? If our humanitarian values really set the agenda, how likely is it that the prospect of urgent military intervention would come up so often?”

-A highly interesting and thought provoking statement from an Economist article entitled, “Foreign Aid: Anti-Malarial Bed Nets Vs. F-35's.”

This statement begs the question, what are our humanitarian values, both as a nation, and as a collective group of nations that has, through historical, colonial, economical, and military means, controlled the levers of power in the world for centuries? Are there a core set of beliefs that can truly be seen, through both words and actions, as supported by the international community? And with this, is the true test of a set of beliefs and values their even implementation across a blank canvas of internationalism? Some of these questions are obviously rhetorical, but yet, the hypocrisy seen in the actions of the powerful nations of the world is startling in its bluntness and brutality. The nation of France, who just 16 short years ago shielded and armed the perpetrators of one of most vicious and bloody genocides of the 20th century (yes, I'm talking of Rwanda), is now leading the charge for the protection of civilians in Libya? The British, still reeling from the loss of their own empire, aiding another failing power in its middle east conquests (yes, im talking of Iraq), and now blasting over the skies of the Mediterranean in its Hornet fighter jets in defense of a nascent rebel army whose aims, goals, and leadership are as ambiguous as the air strikes that have defended it. I am not defending the actions of a madman, or madmen, in any way; I am a staunch defender of human rights and humanitarian intervention, but also a humanist first, a believer in bednets, not F-35's, and ethical historical action playing a larger role in our historically collective humanitarian amnesia. Granted, civil wars, bloody uprisings, and rebel armies cannot be contained by wrapping them up in bednets; however, the smallest actors on the world stage, the peons whose lives are actually held in the balance by the actions of these globalist powers, deserve a voice, and if not, deserve at the very least to live lives free of Malaria and Dengue Fever due to the employment of a $3 bed net, even as the world powers fly overhead in $2 billion fighter jets dropping $20 million guided smart bombs on $10 million tanks.

The author continues, strikingly, that, “...the 2011 budget submitted by the House slashes the State Department's budget for aid to fight malaria (and AIDS, and tuberculosis) in the developing world by billions of dollars, while leaving the budget for bombing Libya (and everything else the Defence Department does) untouched.” I won't touch this statement, its words are menacing enough on their own.

lumbini journal

2011-03-26T20:17:00.000-07:00

3.22.11 Lumbini, Nepal

Back in Lumbini. Back in the shadow of the towering gray pagoda, the setting plains sun casting off its cool, unfinished cement facade, the dusty paths where the Buddha walked, over 2600 years ago. Yet the dust, the trees, the grass, these are all the same; evolution does not work so fast as the human mind; the solidity of the natural world, its radiance, comforts the tumbling consciousness.
Back with the birdsong, the gray clad Korean monks riding bright red Chinese bicycles, the golden Tibetan stupa, with its Buddha eyes and their knowing stare, poking through the horizon. A landscape literally littered with the Dharma. The end of a long day on the road, of 8 hours of hard bus travel, of crammed legs in tiny metal framed seats, overheated engines and frantic bus conductors pouring litre after litre of spring water in a vain attempt to cool; they should know, only time will do this, the futility of their actions blinded by repetition on the side of the dusty mountain road. I sit in the sun and watch the scene unfold, watch the passing trucks and buses, careening down the same mountain road, no guardrails and horrific drops, the unimaginable a constant companion, the mind learns to accept the inevitable over the hours of travel. Dusty bus transfers in dusty intersections where dust is the only reality; how people can spend time, can spend their lives in these spots I cannot imagine; my 15 minutes spent waiting for the new bus to depart begins to drive me mad, as I sit and choke in the afternoon heat. The Indian ladies, laden with children, golden bangles, golden earrings and nose rings, sit down on the half seat in front of me, literally dripping with colors, with hardship, with dreams I will never know. I offer their young children some dusty peanuts which they eat with the shell intact, staring at this strange white man with long legs crammed into the tiny tattered seat. I looked into the dark eyes of the young mother, holding her child casually, who was busily dismantling the peanut with its tiny brown hands; her ornamental nose ring dangling past her nostril, sari bright with color and kitsch, so young, so obviously young and burdened, despite all the beautiful ornament, I cannot stop wondering of her life in this harsh agrarian land. And then the bus stopped, as it did ever 20 feet or so, a slowly moving Nepali Thanksgiving Day Parade Float, and she, along with her young sister with her own children dangling, was simply gone, another memory, another story unknown, dreams, shadows. I am ecstatic for the simplicity and wonder of this place.

March 11, Jomsom, Nepal

2011-03-12T06:38:00.000-08:00

Drinking a few cups of warm, milky chayng, the local millet brew, at a table filled with red cheeked, robe-clad young Mustangi monks, who have just piled out of a tractor outside the ramshackle old building and join me for their evening meal of Dhal Bhat (rice and lentils). They are returning from the winter spent in Kathmandu, away from the bone-searing artic winds that blast the Mustang region all winter and drive most of its hardy inhabitants to warmer climes. I wonder if I have passed some of these young monks before, walking the cobbled alleyways of my adopted home of Boudha, Kathmandu. The local men, huddled around the old wood fed iron stove, seeking warmth from the high-altitude cold, smile as the strange foreigner walks in, surveys the ancient room, old hand-beaten pots and pans lined up on the soot-covered walls, a low ceiling causing me to crouch and deliver my "namaste" greetings. Its just a simple day in March, the 11th, to be precise. I sit at the table, the monks simple english exhausted as they dig into their meals, and wonder, how many of these experiences, these unique, memory-piercing moments, have been crossed in my years...I ponder the moments of this life, a strange path indeed, a wonderful series of moments, stacked into the deck of life; how many are still yet to be uncovered, I ask. The wonderful mystery brings a grin to my windblown face.
It has been a wonderful 10 days back in the Himalaya, a short trip, but with enduring images; the harsh landscapes masking the cradle of such intricate culture; the ochres and reds superimposed against the barren high altitude desert peaks; the howling winds, the dusty trails, the brilliant blue skies carved against pillow white peaks, truly the abode of the snows. Without the distraction of the world, the mind is free to open, plans unfold out of the crisp mountain air, propelling my onwards. Six months in this strange land; a warm comfort in my soul.

heavy load

2011-02-20T06:20:00.000-08:00

2.19.11 Boudha, Nepal

“Our life is frittered away by detail...simplify, simplify.”
-Thoreau

When you have to carry all your possessions, when one is nomadic,
it becomes much more attractive to let go of the unnecessary;
when all must fit into one bag, the surplus becomes burden, not luxury.
A forced lightening of the load, of the soul.
And yet still, I lay eyes on the old vagabond monk in the monastery courtyard,
see him in the morning laying out his simple maroon robe, his old, worn cloak,
his bowl, to dry after a wash, and I grow envious of his own lack of attachment, his lack of need, ; his lightness of load makes my own seem cumbersome and redundant.

Night Air

2011-02-17T17:01:00.000-08:00

In my small room, more books than clothes; noticing this

put a smile to my face, chilled from the clear night air,

filled with moon, stars.

I walked home on the smooth stone path, chasing the sounds

of bells, of drums, of prayers from distant windows; my eyes

given only the distant glow of candles in the darkened streets.

The guard at the monestary gate was not at his post; I walked past

his empty old chair, my evening greeting met only by the empty earth,

the simple acts, the rituals, a goodnight to a stranger encountered so many

times.

india journals, rambles...

2011-02-15T03:01:00.000-08:00

India Journal

Benares, India 6.2.11

Kites twisted in the dusk air,

their motions jerking, spiraling, diving, climbing, reds, purples,

superimposed against the pale blue sky, the late afternoon stillness,

filled with the sound of muezzins calling their faithful to prayer,

the sounds wailing from countless minarets dotting the ancient skyline,

beginning, sparking, like brushfire;

I pondered both the kites and the calls,

the former so simple, ingenious, ancient, relavent; to hoist into the sky, to send

prayers up to the heavens, such a simple pleasure in this manic, distracting age;

the mosques, their faithful, in this most holy of Hindu cities, a badge of tolerance

in this patchwork land.

Some randomesque quotations from personal inspirations...words worth a ponder, a dance in the mind...Theroux speaks of Rimbaud, as in Arthur Rimbaud, the 19th Century French poet, who, at a young age, in the prime of his career, left the ease and pomposity of Paris literary life for an existence of hard travel, settling and becoming a simple trader, nobody aware of his fame, his past, in northern Ethiopia, in the ancient town of Harar, where several crumbling buildings still mark his transitory presence....Rimbaud's words haunt the mind...a man so far from home, denying his past existence , living amongst strangers in a strange land, finding ease amongst hardship, contentment amongst the unknown...Rimbaud said, “I am used to everything. I fear nothing.”

“Other cultures are not failed attempts at being us, but they're unique answers to

a fundamental question -what does it mean to be a human and to be alive?”

-Wade Davis

“You go away for a long time and return a different person-you never come all

the way back. You think, 'I is someone else,' like Rimbaud.”

-Paul Theroux

“Hindu civilization is the only great classical culture to survive intact from the ancient world, and at temples such as Madurai, one can still catch glimpses of festivals and practices that were seen by Greek visitors to India long before the rise of Ancient Rome. Indeed, it is only when you grasp the astonishing antiquity, and continuity, of Hinduism, that you realize quite how miraculous its survival has been.”

-William Dalrymple

“A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

-Albert Einstein

11.

Calcutta, India

Walking the old lanes of Calcutta, life is lived, laid out bare, in front of one's eyes. There is no shame in this act; it is simply life, simply survival, but something more resonates; laughter and joy echoing from the men sharing their morning bath at the community pump, this scene played out on every street, on every block; there is nothing self conscious in this act; simply life, dancing its dance; the denizens of the streets, sleeping in their makeshift lean-tos, sidewalk camping, if you will; they sleep, curled up in nuclear and extended families, which people pass, the busyness of life not seeming to notice, their ears calloused to the outside world; again, nothing self-conscious, no shame, simple life; the workers from the tall towers, names emblazoned, the corporate titans of the next century, crowded on the street outside, eating simple lunches with their hands on tin trays, jostling, crowded, never solitary in this city of so many souls.

French Africa.

2011-02-15T02:58:00.000-08:00

“As soon as we have problems, we ask someone else to take care of them for us,” Isaac continued. “We ask the Europeans. We ask the Americans. We ask the Chinese. We will run this train into the ground, and then we will tell the Chinese we need another one. This is not development.” I thought of the wreckage by the tracks. In China, there is no such thing as metallic waste. Armies of migrant workers scour the countryside with hammers and chisels, collecting and selling every scrap to the insatiable smelters that feed the country’s industries. Here, by contrast, was a land without industry.”

-Howard French, in his fascinating Atlantic article called “The Next Empire”....in conversation with a young Tanzanian riding the Chinese-built Tazara Express from Dar Es Salaam to Zambia's copper belt, a relic of the idealistic imperialist presence of the Cold War in the 1970's, and a symptom, in this instance, of all that divides the booming economies of the East with the stagnation of the African continent, even with the current commodity boom fueled by Chinese demand.

French introduces the key questions facing 21^st century development: “China’s burgeoning partnership with Africa raises several momentous questions: Is a hands-off approach to governmental affairs the right one? Can Chinese money and ambition succeed where Western engagement has manifestly failed? Or will China become the latest in a series of colonial and neocolonial powers in Africa, destined like the others to leave its own legacy of bitterness and disappointment?”

India Journal, pieces

2011-02-05T22:45:00.000-08:00

“In Africa, for the first time, I got a glimpse of the sort of pattern my life would take...that it would be dominated by writing and solitariness and risk...I learned what many others have discovered before me, that Africa for all its perils represented wilderness and possibility...School teaching was perfect for understanding how people lived and what they wanted for themselves. I never wanted to be a tourist. I wished to be far away, as remote as possible, among people I could talk to.”
-Paul Theroux

The patterns of life; even spontaneity can be habit forming; the thrill of stepping into the unfamiliar, of walking down a simple street never before seen, of turning a bend in a small alley and allowing the world to unfold before your eyes; to become a 'beginner' again, to see with this 'beginner's mind;' lifes many paths, many divergent trails, alleys leading into this great unknown...a great, mysterious dance we dance on these footpaths...to step back, to see things as they really are, experiences, memories, that vanish into light and shadow; experiences yet to happen, that will succumb to the same fate.
Understanding that aloneness is not aloofness; a sense of solitude is more than alright; it is to be embraced, celebrated, seized upon, utilized, honored; possibility can whither like a dying leaf in the small sense of mind, the small mind that has forgotten wonder, that refuses to see the mysterious dance, to sit back and smile at it all, to not take it too seriously.
The wish of remoteness; being away, truly away; observing, witnessing both the beautiful and the terrible, the lights and the shadows, for the first time; a silent witness to the world, watching the dance unfold.

2.1.11 Bombay to Benares, India Railways

Swaying rhythmically, the sound of the tracks groaning and a distant diesel locomotive, a beast of man, groaning like an overloaded ox cart, riding into the Indian night. The oranges flashed through the opaque window, my little porthole into a strange world, a new world, though I have seen it many times already. Riding into the night; on a train filled with colors;
the car is half empty, yet I know this is a mirage.
I know upon waking and drawing back the small maroon curtain, which provides me a small, fleeting sense of privacy, illusory perhaps, that there will be bodies to fill every space, for this is always the case, in a land so small, with so many souls.
The swaying pulls me to slumber, but the journey has just begun.

2.4.11 Benares, The Ancient City of Kali, India

“I had the Rimbaudesque thrill that noone on earth knew where I was.”
-Paul Theroux, Dark Star Safari

The thrill of solitude. The thrill of seeking, of journey, of pilgrimage, of wandering.

The big boat, crammed with pilgrims in this holy city, the holiest of Hinduism, the place of Moksha, of liberation from the cyclical wheel of birth and death true to this faith, and others, its engine like a distant jackhammer pounding its way through the morning mist, its pistons methodically misfiring, a split second of complete silence, then continuing, makes its way up the most sacred of rivers, the Ganga, Mother Ganges. Its long, dark, backlit shadow casts over the glasslike surface of the water. Where these pilgrims are coming from, where they are going, I could not guess...the loud sounds of chanting, of what sounds like drums, a cacophony of human emotion, comes into range as the boat turns towards the muddy shoreline, towards home, or away, I do not know.

Tharoor on The Mahatma

2011-01-27T21:08:00.000-08:00

“Gandhi's life was, of course, his lesson. He was unique among the statesmen of the 20th century in his determination not just to live his beliefs, but to reject any separation between beliefs and actions. In his life, religion flowed into politics; his public persona meshed seamlessly with his private conduct...No dictionary imbues 'truth' with the depth of meaning Gandhi gave it. His truth emerged from his convictions; it meant not only what was accurate, but what was just and therefor right. Truth could not be obtained by 'untruthful' or unjust means, which included inflicting violence on one's opponent. For Gandhi, the way to truth was not by the inflicting of suffering on one's opponent, but on one's self. It was essential to willingly accept punishment in order to demonstrate the strength of one's convisions.”

-Shashi Tharoor

Tharoor describes Gandhism as “physical self-denial and discipline, spiritual faith, a belief in humanity and in the human capacity for selfless love, the self-reliance symbolized by the spinning wheel, religious ecumenism, idealistic internationalism, and a passionate commitment to human equality and social justice.....

truth alone triumphs

2011-01-27T21:01:00.000-08:00

“How does one come to grips with a land of such bewildering contrasts? The world's largest democracy that is also home of the ageless caste system; a land steeped in superstition ad spirituality that is a world leader in information technology; the nation of Mahatma Gandhi, the apostle of non-violence, that is convulsed by periodic bloodletting. The Paradoxes abound. The country's national motto, emblazoned on its government crest, is “Satyameva Jayate:” Truth Alone Triumphs. The question remains, however: whose truth?”

-Shashi Tharoor

india

2011-01-09T05:03:00.000-08:00

walking down a dusty road, its initial curves masking any sense of ultimate destination.

i came across a simple stone carving; it read:

Hello Wanderer,

Don't Forget

Inner Stillness.

I walked on; down the same dusty road,

the peace palpable. A distant chatter of unknown tongues

in the green fields shadowing the shallow river,

four brilliant yellow and black butterflies,

dancing a mid-air dance,

hovering over the most supple pink of pinks,

illuminated in the afternoon sun, effervescent,

fleeting, staggering.

LRA

2011-01-02T03:42:00.000-08:00

I have written extensively in the past about the human-rights catastrophe that the failure to apprehend Joseph Kony, terror of Central Africa, has been in the last decade. Kony, following his self-proclaimed divine mission to implement a magical kingdom based on the Ten Commandments, has ravaged, raped, pillared, and killed his way through vast swaths of the continent, at times aided in a defacto struggle by the Islamic-fundamentalist Khartoum government in its own human rights abuses against its Christian South and Christian neighbors in Uganda. The U.S. Government, which has lent logistical support to the Ugandan military in the past, seems to be stepping up its action plan against Kony, long a scourge of terrified rural populations (well documented in the media through such brilliant films as PBS's The Lords Children, which documented the large numbers of children abducted and forced into a life of butchery and bondage by Kony and his senior commanders). This man, and his “Lords Resistance Army” has been one of the worst non-state violators of human rights in the last decades; the word atrocity does not do justice to his particularly vehement brand of terror. According to a recent report by Human Rights Watch, “Since 2008, Kony's men have massacred some 2,300 civilians and abducted over 3,000 more in a remote area straddling the borders of the Congo, southern Sudan, and CAR. More than 400,000 villagers have fled their homes there. In 2010 alone, Kony's fighters have so far led more than 240 deadly attacks.”
According to an excellent new report by the Pulitzer Center Crisis Group, Obama's new strategy seeks to, “'apprehend or remove from the battlefield Joseph Kony and senior commanders' and to promote the defection of his remaining fighters, bolster civilian protection, and increase humanitarian support.” While commendable, this action has come much too late for the millions already displaced, and the tens of thousands already killed or directly affected by this maniacal warlord. Let us hope that this new hardened stance of the administration (no doubt influenced by the work of Samantha Power in her role as special adviser) pays dividends, quickly and efficiently, to the long-neglected people of Central Africa; let us also hope that the new Republican Congress does not continue the neglect of the past in its rush towards fiscal “austerity” and isolationism.

crisis.

2011-01-02T03:40:00.001-08:00

“The way this crisis will be solved will effect the future of democratic elections in Africa.”

-Ivorian Official (unnamed, Time Magazine)

Africa's hope for a democratic future lies on the tightrope of West Africa, a region so fragile, that something so innocuous as a stolen election (innocious as a well-trodden path to the village well, in this part of the world) could shatter the fragile illusion, the delicate veneer, of stability that has quietly blanketed the most volatile of political regions for the last 5 years. The list of regional tragedies is long; Sierra Leone; Liberia; Guinea; the lives disrupted, the countless flows of refugees across the man made borders, the collectively tortured consciousness of waves upon waves of landless refugee, forcibly migrating at the whims of brutal military dictatorships and even more brutal rebel armies.

While democracy and democratic elections are certainly not a collective fix all for the regions ills, the freedom of democratic voice, the pluralistic opening of societies so long under the strong arm of repressive governments, represents a strong, positive current in the struggle for human rights and the struggle for human decency that must be guaranteed to all citizens of this world. And while democratic elections are focused on the bloodless transfer of power, they have often simply rolled out the red carpet for brutal military uprisings and prolonged power struggles.

The troubling aspects of the current scenario playing out in Cote D'Voire are two-fold; the first being the fact that this was once the crown jewel in the Francophone West African Empire; a shining example of post-colonial development, now reduced to ashes by ethnic and tribal divisions and a protracted civil war, due to be settled by this very democratic process, which has instead exacerbated the widening rifts. The second aspect is that in a region so fragile, the struggle threatens to draw in fighters and ethnic sympathies of neighbors, threatening a regional-destabilization in the process. Rampant unemployment and slow reconstructions in previously war-ravaged Liberia and Sierra Leone will not help this process.

African political leaders have not shied away from heavy reliance on ethnic sympathies when fanning the flames of conflict. The case of Cote D'Voire is no different. The leadership curse of Africa must be vanquished once and for all.

Ivory Coast

2010-12-19T19:19:00.000-08:00

I have been glued to the press reports from the West African nation of the Ivory Coast,
or Cote d'Viore; it seems the bad old days of African strongmen, belligerent of world opinion
and democratic freedoms, using the gun to project their power and secure their graft, has
returned to this once shining pearl of West Africa. Reports of mass abductions, of the military
firing indiscriminately on unarmed protesters, of an entrenched leader, still claiming to represent the people, but increasingly representing only the dying vestiges of strongman rule. Streams of refugees, unbelievably, fleeing to Liberia, which only a few years back was embroiled in its own terrible civil war. World opinion and condemnation has been strong; however, an example needs to be made of Laurent Gbagbo and his military; a multinational force, under the guises of the UN, but with strong western (read: French and American) backing needs to be given the mandate to disarm Gbangbo and his loyal militia, prepare war crimes trials against them in The Hague, and protect and implement the rule of the winner of this month's elections, Mr. Alassane Quattara.
An example needs to be made for both the recent past, and the near future; these acts of aggression towards human rights and democratic principals of freedom will not be tolerated in West Africa, or elsewhere. The jewel of West Africa can soon ride up and shine again. Once again, a stark reminder; how much easier it is to destroy than to build, in the most fragile of regions.

Izumi Shikibu

2010-12-19T05:42:00.000-08:00

"Although the wind blows fiercely here,
the moonlight also shines
through the roof planks
of this ruined house."

"Watching the moon,
at dawn,
solitary,
midsky,
i knew myself completely,
no part left out."

A Master's Words on the Nature of Mind.

2010-12-11T04:49:00.000-08:00

“These trains of thoughts and states of mind are constantly changing, like the shapes of clouds in the wind, but we attach great importance to them. An old man watching children at play knows very well that their games are of little consequence. He feels neither elated nor upset at what happens in their game, while the children take it all very seriously. We are just exactly them.”

“Maintain a state of simplicity. If you encounter happiness, success, prosperity, or other favorable conditions, consider them as dreams or illusions, and do not get attached to them. If you are stricken by illness, calamity, deprivation, or other physical or mental trials, do not let yourself get discouraged, but rekindle your compassion and generate the wish that through your suffering all beings' sufferings may be exhausted. Whatever circumstances arise, do not plunge into either elation or misery, but stay free and comfortable, in unshakable serenity.”

“However deluded your thoughts may be, they are but products of your own intellect.

If you set your thoughts free, where nothing arises, remains, or ends,

they will vanish into emptiness.”

Dilgo Khyentse Rimpoche

Everest Journal. Thame

2010-12-08T22:34:00.000-08:00

Thame Village, December 1st.

A flock of white birds, sun catching their feathers and lighting them on fire, against the dark granite spires and pale cloudless sky, streaking past my view.
The old stone walls, ancient corrals, allow only abstract shapes of light to pass with the sounds of the flowing stream hidden from view.
Life comes quickly and brilliantly, complete silence framed by rocks, earth, sky;
the laughter of a band of brightly colored school children running down a mountain trail from an unknown village above, countless stories, dreams, sorrows, happiness, reflected in the crystal air;
a flutter of worn prayer flags in the bitter wind;
the sun warms my face as I sit, admiring the simple, beautiful, rugged perseverance of this high land.
It is now December; another fascinating month has passed all too quickly; all is fleeting.

"To become one with whatever one does is a true realization of The Way."
-Peter Mattheisson

Everest Journal Outtakes

2010-12-08T22:27:00.001-08:00

Khumjung, Nepal. Thanksgiving Day.

The dirty Tibetan trader, sack filled with market wares slung over his shoulder,
red braid weaved into beautiful long black hair, makes his way up the ancient
stone pathway. Both his origin and his destination are unknown to me as i stand in
the frigid early morning air, observing the high peaks surrounding this narrow valley
illuminated in the low morning sun. The brilliant whites of the towering snowfields;
the jagged, angular manifestations of this earth's crust, thrusting to the heavens, surround
my simple presence.
Last evening, watching the same sun make its way into the high horizons, it was flaming oranges that rang the day into night.
The Tibetan smiles a wide, white smile; and i return my own, no words, he is gone.

basho

2010-12-06T06:02:00.000-08:00

Days and months are the travelers of eternity.
So are the years that pass by.
I myself have been tempted for a long time by the cloud moving wind-
filled with a strong desire to wander...I walked through mists and clouds,
breathing the thin air of high altitudes and stepping on slippery ice snow,
till at last through a gateway of clouds,
as it seemed,
to the very paths of the sun and the moon,
I reached the summit, completely out of breath and nearly frozen to death.
Presently the sun went down and the moon rose glistening in the sky.
-Basho, The Narrow Road to the Deep North

borges

2010-11-20T06:24:00.000-08:00

Boast of Quietness

by Jorge Luis Borges

Writings of light assault the darkness, more prodigious than meteors.

The tall unknowable city takes over the countryside.

Sure of my life and death, I observe the ambitious and would like to

understand them.

Their day is greedy as a lariat in the air.

Their night is a rest from the rage within steel, quick to attack.

They speak of humanity.

My humanity is in feeling we are all voices of that same poverty.

They speak of homeland.

My homeland is the rhythm of a guitar, a few portraits, an old sword,

the willow grove's visible prayer as evening falls.

Time is living me.

More silent than my shadow, I pass through the loftily covetous multitude.

They are indispensable, singular, worthy of tomorrow.

My name is someone and anyone.

I walk slowly, like one who comes from so far away he doesn't expect to arrive

Lumbini. Pilgrimage

2010-11-18T04:28:00.000-08:00

Walking the dusty paths, the same strides taken by pilgrims from all Buddhist faiths, the countriesas diverse as the skin tones, as scattered as the tongues, as varied as the hues of the clothes that drape; Cambodians and Thais in bright orange temple robes; Sri Lankans and Vietnamese in the deep browns of the monsoon season earth; Tibetans in maroon and crimson.

Millenia ago, on these same dusty paths, the same ancient rice paddies dotting the fading horizon, the same crickets greeting the flaming orange horizon, the same primal screams of roving bands of jackals under the starry sky, walked the Buddha himself, a simple man, a simple message.

The chanting of the Korean monks reverberated off the cavernous confines of the unfinished, concrete gray temple; the sound waves collided with my silent mind and stirred my soul.

I smiled deeply and bowed to the moment. What an astonishing adventure this has been, all these years.

“The Tibetans liken the mind to a great clear sky, a cloudless sky. All the phenomena of the mind and body are happenings in this clear sky. They are not the sky itself. The sky is clear and unaffected by what is happening. The clouds come and go, the winds come and go, the rain and sunlight all come and go, but the sky remains clear. Make the mind like a big clear sky and let everything arise and vanish on its own.”

-Joseph Goldstein

words.

2010-11-01T21:34:00.000-07:00

"Many people pass through life driven by greed, fear, aggression, or endless grasping after
security, affection, power, sex wealth, pleasure and fame. This endless cycle of seeking is what Buddhism calls Samsara. Its rare that we take the time to understand this life that we are given to work with. We're born, we grow older, and eventually we die; we enjoy, we suffer, we wake, we sleep-how quickly it all slips away. Awareness of the suffering involved in this process of life-of being born, growing old, and dying, led the Buddha to question deeply how it comes about and how we can find freedom. That was the Buddha's question. That was where he began his practice. To understand ourselves and our lives is the point of meditation; to understand and to be free."
-Jack Kornfield

Helambu Notes

2010-10-30T21:28:00.001-07:00

10.22 Kutumsang

The fog came quickly to the small stone town, as i sat watching the green hills bathed in the late day light; as i sat, watching my breath, my mind, the fog a fitting metaphor for the defilements that come to visit consciousness. How this journey came to this time in space, to this small teahouse nestled on a high Himalayan ridge, huddled in the kitchen around the hearth, the cold mountain air creeping in through the roughly hewn wooden door;
the young Sherpa boy, clad in an old blue blazer several sizes too large, blows at the waning fire through a large wooden straw, as his mother prepares a simple meal over open flame.
In 2 days of walking, the modern world feels centuries away.

10.23 Magangoth

The early morning air at 14,500ft numbs my hands; the proof seen in the layer of frost covering the rough wood planks that constitutes a bench in this remote land; the sun will warm, but it is still far away, illuminating only the golden brown peaks lining the horizon with the pale blue sky.
The young girl fetches freezing water for tea; juniper offerings waft in the silent air.

10.24 Phedi

"all thoughts in their infinite variety are utterly without substance. this is the mind of a Buddha."
-Dilgo Khyentse Rimpoche

I sit on a flat stone, overlooking the awesome green valley below, the suns rays illuminated across, slowly receding; thundering waterfalls reverberate their energies in my humble ears, the peaks of jagged stone cathedrals bath in the orange glow of dusk.
The landscape here is hallucinatory;
my mind, clear, yet overcome by the beauty of this place, in this time.
I am profoundly at peace.

10.26. Gokainsund

We crossed the high pass in the midday sun, prayer chortons festooned with prayer flags sending their messages to the gods from this holy place, asking for protection from the evil spirits that lurk in these dangerous high places. We sat in the sun at the base of a simple stone wall and watched the afternoon fog creep through the break in the massive, crumbling stone hills; over 15,000ft; my third high crossing in these mountains, and the one that instilled the most tranquility as i sat, watching the crows and hawks, flags and peaks.
A rest day now at 14,000ft; impromptu english lesson with the morning sun warming my chilled back; talking of life and its myriad struggles with the old, bent lodge owner; hiking amidst high alpine boulder fields, ringed by complete solitude, complete peace, many miles from any vestige of the 21st, let alone 20th or 19th centuries. Beautiful, fleeting moments true serenity.

"to become one with whatever one does is a true realization of The Way."
-Peter Mattheissen

Boudhanath.

2010-10-13T22:32:00.000-07:00

the days pass with such simple ease in this place.
up with the sun, the offerings, temple bells, laughter of neighbors pounding chilies with mortar and pestle for the day's meals;
life beings early here.
simple reflections;
being blessed with the luxury of time, to walk slowly down the narrow, crumbling pathways,
bowing and extending a simple "namaste" ("I honor the spirit that is within you) to those passing on their own way;
time is treasured in its abundance.
I try to work with the wandering, planning mind;
focus here, on this precious moment;
inspired by the great Tibetan teachers who have walked these same narrow pathways,
I work to control the mind; to see what is true.
Unknown chatter wafts from an open window above the green courtyard;
distant laughter;
then it is gone.

"The great inspiration of the Buddha's teachings is that we must each take ultimate responsibility for the quality of our lives. When we understand that our lives are the unfolding of karmic law, that we are the heirs to our own deeds, then there grows in us a deepening sense of responsibility for how we live, the choices we make, and the actions we undertake."
-Joseph Goldstein