Have you ever returned to something after many years of being away- an alma mater or your hometown… As we go back to the people and places from our past we forget that time has moved forward without us being there to see it happen. We see the world through our own eyes, but many people fail to realize that there are billions of other eyes also watching the passing of time. We return and expect to see it as it once was, and often fail to reconnect with the new identity it has taken on. I returned to Elon once, walked around the campus and failed to recognize anyone around me- the familiar faces of classmates were gone. There were new people playing rugby on my pitch and unfamiliar students listening to my professors in class. I instantly felt as if they stole something from me- they took my position in that space and there is nothing I could do to get it back. In places such as this time passes quickly, the old campus only remains in the past and in my memories while the new one takes one the personality of its new student and political times. Where I once protested ‘stop Sudan’, a new group had signs against anti-immigration policy. This week I have the chance to return to Ghana – the first place I ever went outside of the US, my first African Adventure. The difference in returning to places like this is that time does not appear to have passed in my absence. The same taxi drivers stand outside the arrival gate hoping for you to be their passenger, the same buildings fill the skyline and symbolize the times of boom- a time much further in the past than my last visit. The driver on the way to the hotel points out the ‘new’ parliament building with great pride, but it is only new because there has been no other structure built to replace it since the 60s. Time does pass in these places, it is the signs of development and change are absent. This is how I feel every time I return to Africa. There was a time when ‘new’ was built every day, back when the first presidents –Kwame Nkruma, Kamuzu Banda, Jomo Kenyatta- came with an appetite for development. They built those ‘new’ parliament buildings, paved road, and spoke about the progress their people would see. Those people who stood at their speeches are now grandparents, hoping that maybe their grandchildren will see what the speeches preached about in their youth. Now the paint is peeling from the buildings, the homes continue to be made with thatch and mud, and the town centers look like they have gone back in time rather than forward. This leaves me wondering – why? Why do places like Accra stop moving forward while development happens elsewhere? In short, I do not know… but I do have a few theories One, there is complacency in stagnation. Movement takes effort while standing in place is easy. There are people who do not have a drive to help development. They are fine getting by but do not see their personal roles in helping the cause. That drive to help your community is not common in the world, but in underdeveloped countries, there must be a greater push from the mases. In the US it is okay to be the status quo because there are people pushing forward who have the resources needed to pull everyone up with them. Elon has new buildings because singular families have money to fund them. America is not full of change leaders, and Africa is not devoid of them. This bring me to my second point - the resources are not available in most of Africa to create development. It takes money to build and the average African does not have it at their disposal. When you are poor – life is a lot harder when trying to meet basic needs. I learned this in college while studying poverty in America. We had to navigate the daily life of a person of poverty – run the necessary daily errands without a car, without computers, without privilege. My group spent our entire day navigating bus systems, standing in social services lines, and being ignored. This is the fate of people in America without money, and in Africa this is the daily practice of the majority. There are no loans to buy your first car or to go to college and there are few jobs available that pay above the living wage. The social service and resources are harder to reach for those in Africa who want to be catalysts for change. Thus, it requires a lot more from an individual to pull not only themselves but the whole country out of poverty. Lastly, there is a need to look for the diamonds in the rough. We need to highlight the fighters, the changers, the successes. Look at the little progresses that have occurred and see what catalyzed it. The question I pose to Africa is - What is moving you forward and what is holding you back? Successes have been made in Immunization – why? A new house for the president was completed – who built it? Students are graduating from college – What next? We need only to ask the questions, provide the resources where needed, and empower the people to change. So, as we return to people and places – do not assume you know them. As I return to Ghana I have been asking questions on progress and politics to understand the current state of the country. Because I do not see change on the surface it does not mean that great leaps and bounds have not happened in my absence. We must learn the identities of the ‘new’ , understand what happened there while away, and find your new identity within the space. I am not longer a student studying the past- My new identity in Ghana is a evaluator trying to understand what is happening and how I can provide guidance for it to better.
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Bonnie HarveyCurrently working in northern Malawi as Programs and Evaluations Coordinator for Temwa Archives
June 2019
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