Name: Caitlin
It's 'wait' time
While I would prefer to give you only optimistic and uplifting stories, I do want this to be an accurate account of my time here, and therefore there are obstacles that will require some serious patience.
For example, we (three volunteers and myself living in Rikou) are currently working with a women's group to promote healthy practices. After using some techniques that we learned here, we discovered that one of the priority problems of the area is malnutrition. We chose the women's group because they were already well established and organized. We met once to carry out a KAP study, assessing their knowledge, attitudes and practices concerning this problem. We discovered that they believed someone to be malnourished if they are very skinny and weak, but if there stomach is large and round (even bloated maybe) then they were happy and full. They also shared that the main cause of malnourishment was the fact that it doesn't rain often enough, so there isn't enough food to go around. The best meal that they could prepare for someone if there was enough food, would be fish, oil and salt. According to them adults and children need the exact same kinds of food, and that the most important meal of the day is lunch because it gives people energy to work in the fields.
Clearly we could share some information with these people that could potentially be helpful, if nothing else than to set the record straight. We had more training on how to go about giving a sensibilization which basically means a training session to give people accurate and useful information which they can then share with others. We learned that these presentations should be interactive, visual (but not necessarily with words since most of the audience is illiterate), interesting, and concise to keep their attention. With these tools we prepared a short 20 minute presentation where each of the four of us spoke for 5 minutes on the different topics related to malnutrition; definition, signs\symptoms, methods of treatment, and possible ways to prevent. We asked the women's group when the best time to meet would be and they said 8pm by the grain storage which is in the center of the village. We said great! see you then.
Well, we were there at 8pm, outside the grain storage, the women however, did not start showing up until 8:45pm. Even then, only four women came when we needed at least six to begin and the whole group constituted about 20. We didn't know what to do, begin the training even though more women might show up and miss the beginning or wait until the women who did show up got too tired and went to bed. We were exhausted ourselves and didn't feel like hanging around until 10pm. We were in the middle of discussing our options when we noticed that we were now down to two women, apparently the other 2 left to find more women. This was turning into a disaster. Finally at 9:30 we had about 8 women, and decided to begin. Unfortunately since we were meeting in the middle of the village, right next to the "cinema" and the village store we also had an audience of about 30 kids and a few curious adults, no pressure right? So we began, introduced our presentation and got started into the definition of malnutrition, lack of food, lack of the right kinds of food or toxic excess of a certain kind of vitamin from eating the same foods everyday. Then we moved into the different signs and symptoms of malnutrition, swollen belly, thin arms and legs and - ok we have to take a break because some guy just walked up to say hello! how's your evening, how's your family, how's your night going? And to our horror the women started responding, good and yours? Not only had this guy just barged in the middle of our presentation but the women were perfectly willing to start talking to this random about his goats. Argh! So, ok, have a good night, yes, may god hold you in the palm of his hand until we meet again, goodbye! Now we can get back on track. So we go into the importance of a well-balanced meal and eating at least three a day, and quantity vs. quality, yadda yadda yadda, then sit there feeling pretty proud until we see the group's faces and they are looking at us like, "...and? Cello, how do we make it rain?"
So all that for not a whole lot of a response. They said they basically had all of this information at the CSPS (health center) but they just didn't have the means to put it into practice, such as; making enriched porridge, buying fruits and veggies instead of rice, ect. They wanted more quantity, only then could they afford quality. We did not really have a response to this, but instead made a meeting time for next week and suprise suprise the only time they were free was at 8pm. Now of course a level of understanding has to be taken into account because they were most likely late after preparing dinner for the entire family and taking care of their kids and after a long day in the fields it is clear they were tired. But there was no point in our showing up at 8 to wait around for an hour and they should not tell us they will be somewhere when they won't. We should be understanding but that doesn't mean they can walk over us and we should accept that as our fate. In the end our LCF told us that they will never say that they won't show up, but that you have to take 'wait' time into consideration, what's that? we asked, 'western african international time, ' he said. Oooooh, we said. Basically it is better to attempt to be punctual and firm with a meeting time but not to get discouraged when no one shows up for 2 hours, because that will happen and you have no control over it. Some volunteers have devised ways to deal with the frusterations; ie, bring a book, or the constant interuptions; one PCV made it a rule that during his meetings with the CoGes if any member shook hands and started talking to someone outside the group they would have to leave. I guess each volunteer has to find their own balance between cultural sensitivity and efficiency of achieving their goals.
Well thank you for listening to my rant, as always keep the emails coming because just as I might remind you of your own trips abroad I sincerely appreciate being reminded of where I consider home, if for no other reason than the fact that you all live there.
As always take care, love,
Caitlin
For example, we (three volunteers and myself living in Rikou) are currently working with a women's group to promote healthy practices. After using some techniques that we learned here, we discovered that one of the priority problems of the area is malnutrition. We chose the women's group because they were already well established and organized. We met once to carry out a KAP study, assessing their knowledge, attitudes and practices concerning this problem. We discovered that they believed someone to be malnourished if they are very skinny and weak, but if there stomach is large and round (even bloated maybe) then they were happy and full. They also shared that the main cause of malnourishment was the fact that it doesn't rain often enough, so there isn't enough food to go around. The best meal that they could prepare for someone if there was enough food, would be fish, oil and salt. According to them adults and children need the exact same kinds of food, and that the most important meal of the day is lunch because it gives people energy to work in the fields.
Clearly we could share some information with these people that could potentially be helpful, if nothing else than to set the record straight. We had more training on how to go about giving a sensibilization which basically means a training session to give people accurate and useful information which they can then share with others. We learned that these presentations should be interactive, visual (but not necessarily with words since most of the audience is illiterate), interesting, and concise to keep their attention. With these tools we prepared a short 20 minute presentation where each of the four of us spoke for 5 minutes on the different topics related to malnutrition; definition, signs\symptoms, methods of treatment, and possible ways to prevent. We asked the women's group when the best time to meet would be and they said 8pm by the grain storage which is in the center of the village. We said great! see you then.
Well, we were there at 8pm, outside the grain storage, the women however, did not start showing up until 8:45pm. Even then, only four women came when we needed at least six to begin and the whole group constituted about 20. We didn't know what to do, begin the training even though more women might show up and miss the beginning or wait until the women who did show up got too tired and went to bed. We were exhausted ourselves and didn't feel like hanging around until 10pm. We were in the middle of discussing our options when we noticed that we were now down to two women, apparently the other 2 left to find more women. This was turning into a disaster. Finally at 9:30 we had about 8 women, and decided to begin. Unfortunately since we were meeting in the middle of the village, right next to the "cinema" and the village store we also had an audience of about 30 kids and a few curious adults, no pressure right? So we began, introduced our presentation and got started into the definition of malnutrition, lack of food, lack of the right kinds of food or toxic excess of a certain kind of vitamin from eating the same foods everyday. Then we moved into the different signs and symptoms of malnutrition, swollen belly, thin arms and legs and - ok we have to take a break because some guy just walked up to say hello! how's your evening, how's your family, how's your night going? And to our horror the women started responding, good and yours? Not only had this guy just barged in the middle of our presentation but the women were perfectly willing to start talking to this random about his goats. Argh! So, ok, have a good night, yes, may god hold you in the palm of his hand until we meet again, goodbye! Now we can get back on track. So we go into the importance of a well-balanced meal and eating at least three a day, and quantity vs. quality, yadda yadda yadda, then sit there feeling pretty proud until we see the group's faces and they are looking at us like, "...and? Cello, how do we make it rain?"
So all that for not a whole lot of a response. They said they basically had all of this information at the CSPS (health center) but they just didn't have the means to put it into practice, such as; making enriched porridge, buying fruits and veggies instead of rice, ect. They wanted more quantity, only then could they afford quality. We did not really have a response to this, but instead made a meeting time for next week and suprise suprise the only time they were free was at 8pm. Now of course a level of understanding has to be taken into account because they were most likely late after preparing dinner for the entire family and taking care of their kids and after a long day in the fields it is clear they were tired. But there was no point in our showing up at 8 to wait around for an hour and they should not tell us they will be somewhere when they won't. We should be understanding but that doesn't mean they can walk over us and we should accept that as our fate. In the end our LCF told us that they will never say that they won't show up, but that you have to take 'wait' time into consideration, what's that? we asked, 'western african international time, ' he said. Oooooh, we said. Basically it is better to attempt to be punctual and firm with a meeting time but not to get discouraged when no one shows up for 2 hours, because that will happen and you have no control over it. Some volunteers have devised ways to deal with the frusterations; ie, bring a book, or the constant interuptions; one PCV made it a rule that during his meetings with the CoGes if any member shook hands and started talking to someone outside the group they would have to leave. I guess each volunteer has to find their own balance between cultural sensitivity and efficiency of achieving their goals.
Well thank you for listening to my rant, as always keep the emails coming because just as I might remind you of your own trips abroad I sincerely appreciate being reminded of where I consider home, if for no other reason than the fact that you all live there.
As always take care, love,
Caitlin
posted by Caitlin | 5:27 AM
1 Comments:
I'm luvn all these blogs keep em' comin'. Do you miss home? Are you getting homesick yet? That malnutrition must get pretty frustratin' I think you haneling it pretty well. (do you like the user name?)Dads rough housing w/ tessie again. Well I gotta go. (hold on I'll make you a deal every time you write a blog I'll either write you a "comment" or a full on e-mail deal?) Gotta go see ya wouoldn't want to be ya. Bye-bye!
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