Understanding Difference

In my previous blog I talked about the small and minor difference in the utilization of American and Congolese currencies here in Congo. The standards are clearly different and while I am left wondering why, I also think to myself what is the importance? Could this difference be a good thing and what, perhaps, could it be trying to tell me?

I am reminded of a conversation, which took place this past week, between Kalongo, Scott, Selina, and myself. We were talking about the differences in the way things are done here in Congo compared with how things are done in the US. This came up as we were discussing the development of an adapted volleyball court for persons with disabilities in Bogoro, one of the communities where we are working. We were discussing whether to buy a volleyball net from Kampala, Uganda or to try and have one made locally. Kalongo frequently makes trips to Kampala and so anytime we need an item that can’t be bought here locally he can pick it up in Kampala while there. The idea behind trying to get the net made locally is that it seems like a more sustainable solution to the problem, it could be a way for the community in Bogoro to contribute to the development of the volleyball court, and perhaps this would cost less than buying a net in Kampala. We were then hit with the realities that we don’t actually know how to make a volleyball net ourselves, that the time and effort it would take to try and get this net made locally would be better spent elsewhere, and that the quality of the net would most likely be lower if we tried to make it locally. Kalongo then spoke up, asking us the question, “why do you want to do things differently here than you would in the US?” The answer seems to be an obvious one, we are not in the US and things here in Congo are different from how they are where we call home. However, why do we have a tendency to drop our standard? I took this as a challenge from Kalongo to not cheapen the quality of our work, instead, to bring as much of the advantages we live with in the US to the people in the communities where we are working…a people who need so much.

Just as the American dollar bill is held to a different standard, so to are we and the work that we are doing. This is the reality of living and working as a ‘Muzungu’ or white person in modern-day Congo. We are given all the attention in the world because people expect a difference from us. The American dollar bill with the slightest blemish is not accepted because it is expected to be better than the Congolese Franc with all its rips and tears. What a challenge!