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(1) Cote d’Ivoire
I spent last week in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), helping the local Family Health International office plan their work with orphans and other vulnerable children. Between the extreme poverty, recent history of civil war, and ravages of HIV, this is really tough place. But like the hardy bougainvillea vines or the colorful wax-print fabric favored by the local women, I also witnessed hints of brightness that periodically burst forth and provide hope for a better tomorrow.
Here is a good Sergio-story: On my first day in Abidjan I hadn’t realized that my hosts scheduled lunch at the US embassy. Earlier that morning I had dutifully locked my passport and personal valuables in the hotel-safe, so I arrived at the embassy gates without any picture-ID. Under the circumstances, the US Marine on duty couldn’t let me inside. As I waited, I remembered the date was April 21st. “This may not help my situation, sir,” I said to officer, “But as it happens, today my son starts basic training as a Marine in Parris Island, South Carolina.” The young marine looked at me again and drawled. “Parris Island? I remember it well… Wish your son the best of luck from me.” Then he hesitated and added, “Now, let’s see if we can get the person you are supposed to meet from the embassy to come outside and vouch for you, and then you can proceed with your lunch.”
I worked hard during the week, so by the time Friday came around, I was ready for a break. A local University professor invited a colleague and me to his home for a traditional Ivorian meal (ground cassava, fish-soup and fried plantains), and afterwards we invited the professor and his wife to a concert by the singer Oumou Sangaré – “la diva de la musique malienne” – at the country’s largest outdoor performance arena. Sangaré is known for her songs against polygamy and female genital mutilation – and sure enough, the audience was mostly made of women: clearly, the well-to-do and professional elite of local society.
I spent last week in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), helping the local Family Health International office plan their work with orphans and other vulnerable children. Between the extreme poverty, recent history of civil war, and ravages of HIV, this is really tough place. But like the hardy bougainvillea vines or the colorful wax-print fabric favored by the local women, I also witnessed hints of brightness that periodically burst forth and provide hope for a better tomorrow.
Here is a good Sergio-story: On my first day in Abidjan I hadn’t realized that my hosts scheduled lunch at the US embassy. Earlier that morning I had dutifully locked my passport and personal valuables in the hotel-safe, so I arrived at the embassy gates without any picture-ID. Under the circumstances, the US Marine on duty couldn’t let me inside. As I waited, I remembered the date was April 21st. “This may not help my situation, sir,” I said to officer, “But as it happens, today my son starts basic training as a Marine in Parris Island, South Carolina.” The young marine looked at me again and drawled. “Parris Island? I remember it well… Wish your son the best of luck from me.” Then he hesitated and added, “Now, let’s see if we can get the person you are supposed to meet from the embassy to come outside and vouch for you, and then you can proceed with your lunch.”
I worked hard during the week, so by the time Friday came around, I was ready for a break. A local University professor invited a colleague and me to his home for a traditional Ivorian meal (ground cassava, fish-soup and fried plantains), and afterwards we invited the professor and his wife to a concert by the singer Oumou Sangaré – “la diva de la musique malienne” – at the country’s largest outdoor performance arena. Sangaré is known for her songs against polygamy and female genital mutilation – and sure enough, the audience was mostly made of women: clearly, the well-to-do and professional elite of local society.
My colleague bought VIP tickets in order to ensure good seats. To enter the arena, we had to pass through 10 layers of security, but each time we passed by one guard, someone escorted us to the next, and so on. Although it was almost 10pm by the time we arrived, the music was just getting started. As I looked around, I could scarcely believe the display of gorgeous West African fashion: each woman looking more decked-out than the next, in tight-hipped dresses, huge cloth-headscarves, and flowing shawls. For the next two hours, my eyes feasted on the glittering sequins, satin appliqué, colorful lace, and mounds of bright colors. People stood on their seats, rocked with the music, and danced in the aisles. At times, there was more “show” going on in the audience than on stage. The music pulsated – I found myself clapping and swinging as well – and was interspersed with traditional African praise-singing, line-dancing, and hooplas of joy.
Throughout the performance, people from the audience flocked on stage and fawned adoration at the singer’s feet. Large-muscled lackeys had to literally carry off about half the divining women in order to keep a mild sense of order. But this was also a lucrative business: every woman who came on stage had to pay for the privilege, and the rest of us got to see the money flowing – literally hundreds of thousands of Ivorian-francs by the time the evening was through. The men were the most ostentatious, however. Although a minority, they would come on stage to impress their women-folk: each would take out a wallet of money, kiss the singer, and then lavishly throw out bills one by one – all of which the lackeys gathered as they fell on stage. Part of the display was that Sangaré was supposed ignore all the distractions – that is to say, the songs must go on – uninterrupted, undistracted, like the sun that rises above the storm. It was exhausting to watch – but also an experience I will never forget.
(2/3) Ghana and Nigeria
After leaving Cote d’Ivoire I flew to Ghana. Whereas I had spent the past week struggling in French, suddenly everyone now spoke in American-English: Downtown Accra is modern, glitzy and eager for the tourist-dollar. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay long – my next stop was Nigeria: the country I said three years ago would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I guess that just goes to show you can’t believe everything I write. Work forced me to come here again, not that I liked it any better the second time around. Nigeria is simply too intense and chaotic, worse than New York at rush hour 24 hours a day…
(4) Namibia’s South
What a contrast this was with two other recent trips: Four weeks ago, I traveled to the provincial capital of Keetmanshoop in the south of Namibia. I visit there about once a year and whenever I do, I make it my business to stop at the Keetmanshoop Jewish cemetery. Here it always feels like I am in the middle of nowhere -- the next town of any significance is three hours away by car. The cemetery contains just twenty gravestones, lined up in two rows. Although there aren’t any shade trees or decorative plants, it is fairly clean: Amazingly, the municipality still sends someone to sweep the place regularly and make sure that no damage is done.
Throughout the performance, people from the audience flocked on stage and fawned adoration at the singer’s feet. Large-muscled lackeys had to literally carry off about half the divining women in order to keep a mild sense of order. But this was also a lucrative business: every woman who came on stage had to pay for the privilege, and the rest of us got to see the money flowing – literally hundreds of thousands of Ivorian-francs by the time the evening was through. The men were the most ostentatious, however. Although a minority, they would come on stage to impress their women-folk: each would take out a wallet of money, kiss the singer, and then lavishly throw out bills one by one – all of which the lackeys gathered as they fell on stage. Part of the display was that Sangaré was supposed ignore all the distractions – that is to say, the songs must go on – uninterrupted, undistracted, like the sun that rises above the storm. It was exhausting to watch – but also an experience I will never forget.
(2/3) Ghana and Nigeria
After leaving Cote d’Ivoire I flew to Ghana. Whereas I had spent the past week struggling in French, suddenly everyone now spoke in American-English: Downtown Accra is modern, glitzy and eager for the tourist-dollar. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay long – my next stop was Nigeria: the country I said three years ago would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I guess that just goes to show you can’t believe everything I write. Work forced me to come here again, not that I liked it any better the second time around. Nigeria is simply too intense and chaotic, worse than New York at rush hour 24 hours a day…
(4) Namibia’s South
What a contrast this was with two other recent trips: Four weeks ago, I traveled to the provincial capital of Keetmanshoop in the south of Namibia. I visit there about once a year and whenever I do, I make it my business to stop at the Keetmanshoop Jewish cemetery. Here it always feels like I am in the middle of nowhere -- the next town of any significance is three hours away by car. The cemetery contains just twenty gravestones, lined up in two rows. Although there aren’t any shade trees or decorative plants, it is fairly clean: Amazingly, the municipality still sends someone to sweep the place regularly and make sure that no damage is done.
No Jews have lived in Keetmanshoop for decades. The town’s most recent Jewish burial took place almost fifty years ago, and the majority of gravestones date back to the 1920s and 30s. With a single exception, all the gravestones contain different last-names. I always wonder at the transitory nature of this community, that almost no one stuck around long enough for there to be more than a single death in the family. The one exception consists of two siblings, a boy and a girl, each dying in infancy less than two years apart from the other. Their headstones remain upright, but are now pocked-marked and dull after eight decades’ exposure to the relentless sun and blowing sand.
Following the tradition, I always place three stones on each grave. As I do, I imagine the children’s poor mother, losing first one child and then another, and then seemingly moving on herself. Who was around to provide comfort her darkest hours? Was she more fortunate with child-rearing in the next place she lived? No one with this surname lives in Namibia any more, so I can’t trace how the story progressed. But I hope there is more to this family than what lies in this lonely and forsaken place. 
(5) UgandaI spent my next weekend in Eastern Uganda – a week before Passover – celebrating the Sabbath with the Abayudaya Jewish community (See
During my visit, the main buzz was about community development and expansion. The Abayudaya community has grown to 800 members and now boasts a guest-house, health-clinic, internet café, a fully-established secondary school, and a burgeoning primary school (still in need of assistance). Most recently, a former Seventh Day Adventist congregation about 20 kilometers down the road has given up its Christian practice and wants to become Abayudaya (i.e. Jewish). I was asked for my opinion: What should the Abayudaya do? Jews don’t proselytize, but this group approached the Abayudaya – not the other way around. Eventually, the Abayudaya leadership agreed that they must investigate more fully: Is this group attracted by the fact that the Abayudaya now have electricity, running water, and facilities that are unheard-of in most nearby villages? Or are they truly attracted by the faith-component: willing to be Jewish in the hard times, as well as they easy ones? At a minimum, they would recommend a two-year period of study and then the group could convert to Judaism, if they still want..
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