Uh oh. There’s a problem, and it’s got me quite worried. I
might have developed lactose intolerance. Ahhhh!!!
For those who know me, they are aware that two of the things
that I most looked forward to from my recent trip to the states were ice cream
and cheese. I love them both. But I’ve had an upset stomach for the last 3
weeks straight, and I took meds and it doesn’t seem to be working… I’m going to
go no-dairy for the next week, starting tomorrow. We’ll see. I certainly hope
my stomach gets better, but man, I also hope that I can eat my beloved dairy
products too!!
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This last week was overall sad for me. Monday and Tuesday I certainly
felt depressed, especially first thing in the morning and in the evenings. My
situation here has a number of challenges that don’t feel like they’re getting
better, and I feel like I’m not really able to be of much help either. My stomach made sleeping not so good, and I was just uncomfortable most of the time. I also didn't feel like exercising, which in turn brings my mood down in a vicious cycle...
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When I got back from the states I was pretty jazzed about doing a series of lectures on human rights at local universities. It hasn’t gone as well as I’d hoped. The second school I was in discussions with just never called me back to set it up, even after I went there again in person to remind them. In that conversation they said like 5 times “no, no, in June we’ll call you.” That was 6 weeks ago. I get it.
When I got back from the states I was pretty jazzed about doing a series of lectures on human rights at local universities. It hasn’t gone as well as I’d hoped. The second school I was in discussions with just never called me back to set it up, even after I went there again in person to remind them. In that conversation they said like 5 times “no, no, in June we’ll call you.” That was 6 weeks ago. I get it.
The school that did officially let me lecture ended up
giving off a similar vibe. I wanted to do 5 lectures there, and I had detailed
conversations with them in early May planning exactly which days I would do
them. Unfortunately, I only got through 3 lectures.
I did my second just after getting back from the states and
it went fine (about 30+ students in attendance). I then waited 2 weeks (as was
planned) to do the 3rd. The day before the 3rd was
planned they emailed me to say that there was a conflict and they had to
reschedule for the next week. So I showed up the next week and there was no one
there. Office locked, my contacts all gone, and the room where I give the
lecture occupied and being used for something else. They assured me that the
next week it would happen, so I showed up then. But again my contact wasn’t
there, and it didn’t appear that they had reserved the room. They kind of
cleared out whoever had been in it, and a different person was “hosting” me for
the talk. Again, about 30+ students were there. After 10 minutes he told me
that actually the room was scheduled to be used for an exam, so I needed to
wrap it up. I had planned a talk for 40 minutes, with 20 minutes of questions
afterward, but only got through 2.5 of 11 pages of material I’d prepared. And
this is still 3rd talk (on the date we had planned for the 4th).
Since I did only about ¼ of what I had planned, and because it wouldn’t really
work to just skip everything in terms of the flow of the lectures, I decided
that next time I would just complete the 3rd lecture. That is, on
the date we’d planned for the 5th lecture, I would actually be
finishing the 3rd.
That day was last Tuesday, and with all my adventures I
called ahead on Monday to find out if we were still on. Turns out that Tuesday,
in fact, didn’t work anymore, and they suggested Friday. I reminded them that Friday
was DRC’s independence day, and so they countered with Thursday. So yesterday I
showed up, and again found that my contact was not around (in a meeting). His
colleagues were, however, around, and were surprised to see me. They asked me “oh,
are you lecturing today?” The room also wasn’t reserved, and no one had told
the students about it. So we started at 1:25, even though I still had to be
done at 2:00, and there were only 6 students there.
Despite all of this, I actually quite enjoyed delivering the
lecture itself yesterday. I don’t want to get too down, because I felt like it
went the best out of any of them so far. Having a small group meant people were
more engaged. Also, because I had prepared to give this same talk on 4
different occasions (having read through it orally about 15 times by now), I
was now very familiar with it, and so my French was the best it’s been! I was
even able to insert small comments here and there where they felt appropriate,
or to clarify something when I felt I was losing the students. Also, the
questions they asked were ones that I actually understood and knew the answers
too! As we were leaving the room, a student I recognized from earlier lectures
came in and asked my host “why didn’t you tell us you were doing the lecture
today?” Both encouraging (apparently he wanted to attend) and discouraging
(feels like the administration doesn’t really care).
I talked with some of the staff there afterward, remarking
that the fact things had been cancelled so often, or not planned, left me with
the feeling that perhaps they weren’t really interested in me giving these
lectures there. They said that this was not the case, and that they were just
all so busy that it was forgotten…
We’ll see what happens going forward. I really do enjoy
delivering the lectures, and I’d like to do it more. But it’s hard emotionally
for me to get myself all ready to do them and show up and have it be cancelled.
I can start to just feel like they don’t really care if I do these lectures,
that they don’t see any value in them. Or that they’re just saying “yeah, you
can do it, whatever day or time you want” because they feel it’s rude to say no
to the white guy’s face and they’re just trying to be indirect and polite about
it. Hard to know.
But they said they wanted me to do them again, and I don’t
have anything else to do. So I’ll go back in two weeks to talk with them about
perhaps setting up plans for me to do something similar next school term (which
is in September? Or October?).
---
As for next week, I’m going to be playing a support role for
the 4 day training that Karen and Serge will be leading for the Seed program.
It’ll be outside of Congo, and I’m looking forward to a bit of a sense of
break. Karen will likely feel like she’s working all the time, on the other
hand. But it should be in a pretty and quiet spot, and that will be nice in any
case.
