More Dowden on African Aid

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....

"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?"

Good Fortune

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.

Famine or Plenty?

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

Africa 2011. The Plan

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 the continent

8.11.10 Julius Nyerere International Airport, Tanzania

What a day, what a trip, what a life...the trouble with traveling, with such a profound plethoria of experience on a daily basis, is parlaying, translating this back into a normal, sedentary life...life on the road, the ability to pick up, pack up, and go, no questions asked, as if this is the most natural act in the world, is profoundly freeing to the soul...the life of a pilgrim is hard, filled with discomfort, fraught with occasional danger, tedium, and struggle, but is a life liberated, nonetheless.

SItting in a local bar across the darkened street from the airport, the only establishment on the street with electricity and not a flickering candle in front for illumination, drinking a warm Safari Beer, watching the locals shoot pool, surrounded by the barely electric buzz of exoticism. Driving the dusty, traffic clogged, street vendor packed roads of Dar Es Salaam, me and my belongings packed into the back of a Tuk Tuk, guarding the contents at every stop from the roving bands of theives that prey upon the weak in this part of the world; watching the scenes of momentary, simplistic brilliance unfold, understanding that this moment is truly unique; the understanding leaves me breathless. The last 6 weeks in Africa leave me breathless. The thought of so much more experience yet to come on this trip, in this life, leaves me breathless.

I sit in the rickety plastic chair, inherited from some unknown place, some undreamed circumstance, writing at thi crooked, wobbly table in the dim humming light of the pool table, waiting for an unknown meal to arrive, Swahili music cruising the periphery, mingling with the tongues of those around in the darkened shadows, and I smile at the grandeur of it all.

8.11 Dar

8.11.10 Dar Es Salaam

An exhausting night spent on the S.S. Flying Horse ferry from Zanzibar to mainland Tanzania...mass crowds and a near-riot at the gates to the pier, pushing past the crowds to board a boat to be sheparded into the dank, dark crew's quarters instead of the paid for "VIP" section with actual places to sleep; making a racket, American style, pushing past the guards stating that the section was "full" to be standing in front of a Colonel and two of his guards, machine guns drawn, eyes blood shot, liquor breath, who had comindeered the VIP section for themselves...this is Africa I think to myself...one cannot argue with a man with a loaded weapon in his face, the ultimate conversation ender, if you will...stumbling off the ferry at the break of dawn into early-morning Dar Es Salaam, slaloming past taxi touts with the skill of a downhill racer, beginning a desperate search for coffee and sustinence...flight doesnt depart the continent until 4am, meaning I have 22 hours to kill, no small task in this place....

zanzibar

watching the sun fade, brilliant orange globe tracking down the horizon,
sailing dhow cutting across the dark turquoise sea, palm fronds swaying as the
day slowly turns to night; i sit amongst others, yet my focus lies within;
the singularity of this moment, of this experience, as the sea air gently buffets my face.
cameras abound, catching the moment amongst electrodes and circuits; but my own stays
holstered.
how can one try to grab a moment consisting of sun, sea, air, earth; to imagine as one simple plane
is to cheat the brilliance;
i sit and smile.

zanzibar.....

the group has departed, seen off at the night market;
i wandered back through the darkened alleyways,
finding my own steps again.
moving forward, facing bravely the unknown with only myself to rely;
two more days wandering Stone town, photographing, admiring,
watching the sun set over the Indian ocean, before i, too, depart, move on again.
i am reminded, once again, that everything changes, everything is impermanent.

zanzibar, tanzania

sitting on a wooden dock, overlooking the turquoise sea, listening to the waves
roll rhythmically onto shore, wooden dhows bobbing on anchors offshore.
what still lies ahead for this will be nothing but passing dream in the days to come.
beauty is nice, yes,
but it takes flavor to stir my soul....

Singida, Tanzania

a great day spent amongst the beautiful granite boulders; possible first ascents of routes were numerous; copious local spectators observed the trials; equatorial sun and lake breeze counterbalancing the extremes of their potential, creating a serene space for being in the outdoors, connecting with surroundings; fingertips worn pink, close in hue to the setting sun, as I sit on a giant boulder watching the local boys play a game of simple soccer on the dry lakebed, and the migratory birds flutter over the shallow, smooth water.

Singida Bush Camp, Tanzania

Camped next to a lakeside boulder field, in a landscape reminiscent of Hampi, India-tons of granite boulders strewn across a dusty landscape.
Yesterday's safari in the Norongoro Crater was majestic-a tiger with two cubs only feet away, rare cheetahs sitting in the sun, an elephant storming out of the early morning, misty brush.
Wonderful experience.
My first month of travel draws to a close and a new month dawns on the horizon;
I feel strong, undaunted, confident in moving forward on my path.

kenya thoughts

"The skin of enlightened self-interest is very delicate, easily eroded, and the human capacity for unspeakable barbarity lies just beneath its surface. Africa's horrors are chilling examples of what people are capable of doing to one another when short-term exploitation has taken over from long-term regulation, when the notion of accountability has been swept aside and the promise of the future is hidden by the trials of surviving in the present."
-John Reader, Africa: A Biography of the Continent

after a long ride into Nairobi from Nakuru, the third largest town and center of the Rift Valley region of Kenya, sick and fatigued from an unknown bug, the final stretch to the outskirts of Karen were being taken on a local bus when we approached mayhem on the road; a burning roadblock filled with some of the multitudes of unemployed young men seen all over Kenya, listlessly gathered on the sides of roads, watching life pass by. the tension was palpable; and as one young man ran up to the bus with a large cement block and threw it at the windshield (of which I was sitting directly behind), I could see hatred burning in his eyes. There is much tension lying directly beneath the surface here; a political machine that thrives as much on divisiveness as it does on corruption. The "skin" Reader mentions so easily pulled back, as occurred in the last elections when over 2000 innocent people were slaughtered because they had the wrong tribal affiliation, with hundreds of thousands displaced. It is painfully ironic that the cradle of civilization has been home to so much dehumanization in the recent past.

lamu 7.15

the barely-cool breeze ripple across the brown thatch, faded pink tin, and moorish-coral stone rooftops. touts shouts from the pier carry past my ears, the swahili tongue rhythmic and foreign.
donkeys laze past in the dusty streets, noses keen for scraps from discarded bins; mysterious black burka clad women reveal only their eyes as they glide past on the narrow paths; a black hawk with sharp white beak swoops down, its midnight black body silhouetted against the calm deep blue waters of the indian ocean, and then, is gone, like everything.

lamu island 7.14

wandering narrow stone streets, catching quick glances down crumbling alleyways festooned with ramshackle wiring, windows opened to the brilliant equatorial sun and wind, boats queued in the busy harbor, all crafted meticulously by hand from trees felled long ago, will all eventually return to the same sea. wandering through an old islamic gravesite at the north end of stonetown, where the alleyways give way to sand, brush, shrubs, simple thatch houses, my eyes were averted to the dates drawn onto simple memorials; imperminence, lives lived and extinguished, dreams, sorrows, happiness.

journey to Lamu 7.13.10

all huge journeys must come to a close, and today's epic closed with an orange sunset
low in the eastern sky, throwing the facades of Stonetown into an otherworldly glow as
the slow local ferry packed with brightly colored kenyans sputtered its way into port.
the timing was perfect after an arduous 9 hour journey from steamy, hectic mombassa....snapshots of a day's journey in east africa....
...young soldiers in crisp, green uniforms straddling machine guns as our armed escorts through the bandit-ridden country, approaching the lawless somali border posts
...brightly clad nomads selling camel milk in jerry cans on the side of the dusty, broken road
...clapboard and cement block towns, too numerous to name, strung out along the lone dirt road traversing this parched land; concrete painted with cell phone ads, children playing with makeshift toys in the dirt, market sellers yelling, jostling for livelihoods
...a bus groaning under the weight of a standing room crowd, cracked windows barely moving the stifling, dusty air; africans laughing and carrying on, unnoticing the discomforts which can so easily fill and control the western mind, for hours on this broken, desolate road
...my pack falling from the overhead rack and directly out the bus's open door as we careened down the early morning Mombassa road, the truck screeching to a halt and conductor dashing madly to retrieve it before it sprouted legs and ran off into the bush, all before i even realized what was happening (luckily, the pack is still with me...)
...and finally, lying in bed, indian ocean breeze filterning in through the broken window slats, fishing boats metallic clanking lulling me to a dreamy end to another day in africa...

camp life 7.6.10

rhythm of camp life established.
my small tent my home, my small oasis.
bucket shower in the evening amongst the scrubby brush, my toes mingling with the brown earth.
nothing electronic, no clock, no phone, no electricity, nothing. simplicity.
simple meals, carrying jerry cans of water from the farmer's tap down the valley; cows, sheep, laundry drying over leaning wooden fences. crickets and birds, brilliant radiant blues and browns,
the cliff faces offering up their splendors from morning till dusk; our small group perched at the top of the cliff watched the eagles soar on thermals and laughed.

Independence Day 7.4.10

Waking up in the bush, the shadows of a towering baobob tree greeting the sunrise,
open savanna revealing itself in the morning rays;
school children in the valley below singing songs in swahili to greet the dawn;
walking dusty paths, stopping to observe the african silences;
riding pillion in a motorbike taxi, clouds of brown dust billowing about;
strangers stopping, turning to see this single, solitary mtuzugu, or white man,
in such a remote setting. I hold onto the bike, trying not to get thrown as it bumps along
the dirt tracks, narrowly missing small boys playing hooky from school, plump ladies carrying
brightly colored market wares.
TIA. This is Africa.

Travel

"The act of discovery is not merely the basis of travel,
but is also the quintessential revolutionary act.
Every long journey overturns the established order of one's own life,
and all revolutionaries must begin by transforming themselves."
-Patrick Symmes,
"Chasing Che"

awake

"A story is told of the Buddha when he was wandering in India shortly after his enlightenment. He was encountered by several men who recognized something quite extraordinary about this handsome prince now robed as a monk. Stopping to inquire, they asked, 'Are you a god?' 'No,' he answered. 'Well, are you a deva or an angel?' 'No' he replied. 'Well, are you some kind of wizard or magician?' 'No.' They were perplexed. Finally they asked, 'Then what are you?' He replied simply, 'I am awake.'
The word Buddha means to awaken. How to awaken is all he taught.
-Jack Kornfield