I attained the rank of Eagle Scout in America, without being very good at marching, so I am inclined to think that the scouts will benefit from a little re-direction, which I am trying to provide them by organizing more activities for them to participate in
This last weekend the principal, who was also a scout, and I organized a 3 day hike and camping trip to the Nyambene forest.
In Kenya, the forest is a place that people usually do not go unless they have some shady businesses, such as cutting down trees illegally or poaching animals. Therefore, most of our students had never been to the forest even though it is only 12km from our school. It was great to see how excited they were to be out in nature. While we were there we went on a hike, I taught them about first aid, we talked with them about environmental conservation, and yes, they even practiced marching a little bit.
Additionally, they had never been organized into patrols and had never elected leaders, so we took advantage of this time together to explain the organization to them and help them elect their first set of leaders.
Another difference between American scouts and Kenyan ones is the gear. In America, we are used to having rain jackets, pre-fabricated tents, gas stoves, thermarests, sleeping bags, etc. In Kenya, they use whatever clothes they can kind to keep warm, they usually make their own tents (often out of tarps or left over grain storage sacks), they cook everything over a wood fire, they carry their mattresses and blankets from school, and often times they only carry one set for each pair of students.
Another difference is that they have rotating watchmen throughout the night, so that at every hour of the night there are 3-4 scouts huddled around the camp fire watching the darkness.
Camping alongside of their plastic tarp tent I felt over-privileged in my REI 2-person backpacking tent. All of them love seeing my camping gear, and I know that they envy it. Even though I have been here for over a year and a half, living with this group of people, I cannot really reconcile the feelings that these thoughts evoke. On the one hand, this is the life that I am used to, so it seems kind of natural, but on the other hand, I see that it is not natural or accessible for very many of the worlds people. I do not ever want to become comfortable with this discrepancy. When we are comfortable or not cognizant of this discrepancy we live like we are the only people on this earth, which is not true. The answer is not just to throw money at the problem either though. Foreign countries are doing that currently, and the result is that the Kenyan MPs can free up money from other places to give themselves a 50% pay increase, or just outright steal the money without being prosecuted by the attorney general.
All of that is a digression, but the corruption aspect of it is relative to scouting, because the first point of the Scout's Law is to be trustworthy, and how do you really teach the youth to be trustworthy and honest when they are bombarded daily with examples of extremely rich Kenyans lying and stealing their money. They see my tent, they know that I am rich, they probably think that I must also be corrupt by virtue of our status. The only way that I know how to combat this is to try to be as forthcoming, honest, and transparent as I can be, and also to have discussions with them about the scout oath and laws, which we did.
On a completely different note, check out this cool grass. The principal said that it is actually part of the moss family.
No comments:
Post a Comment