What's in a Legacy?

Flipping through my Willamette U planner, I recently discovered a Greek proverb that seems to constantly hold weight with my thoughts this past month. It reads, “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.” Having recently sprouted three Acacia trees from mere seeds, and avidly watching the dainty green fronds pop from their pods, stretch and unfurl themselves to the sky, I can’t but help have a better appreciation of the wonder and plain luck that’s involved in new beginnings and the eventual evolution of a legacy (after all, even the smallest seed becomes the grandest tree!). So often it’s incredibly daunting to have a vision of the future, especially when that dream starts out so fragile and vulnerable to the everyday barrage of elements. Yet, I’ve also realized every vision needs a champion. As such, I’ve been hawking over my little trees, defending them from snuffling dogs, pesky insects, and happily shrieking criancas with wildly ricocheting soccer balls that, while tragically destroying my melon plants one-by-one, will NOT be coming close to my little trees.  Mana Karina doesn’t mess around!

So why am I acting like an overprotective mother bear over three measly sprouts? Frankly, that’s an excellent question for someone who – much to her mother’s chagrin – has never held a trace of a green thumb in her life. If anything, things I’ve tried to grow in the past have wilted under my devotion and flourished with my negligence. Just ask my three cactus plants that I was given in fourth grade. They’d rather be left alone thank you very much! (Or at the very least handed over to the nice silver haired lady who talks to them while she waters them – lol, love you mom!)

In any case, even though I’m in Mapinhane for two years, my three little trees will maybe only stand four feet tall and be unable to offer me much reprieve from the scorching Mapinhane sun. Thus, I’m looking down the road 15 years to when some lucky Peace Corps volunteer or Mozambican teacher inherits my little nirvana. So, when they’re lounging in their hammock, writing lessons plans, or maybe even making big sweeping plans for women’s empowerment and educational reform, they’ll be looking out at the world from underneath the comfortable shade of the big canopy of Acacia trees that I planted.  And thus, my little trees are also making me come to terms with the competing tensions of time’s velocity and the weight of a legacy. Some days, two years of service can feel like eternity. But really, to a tree (and ultimately to a PCV) it’s just a blink of an eye, a rustle of delicate little green branches.  A wink and a nod. 

And so, I very appropriately celebrated the six month anniversary of leaving home and beginning my new life in Mozambique by completely forgetting about it. Yep. Completely. Moreover, I didn’t make the realization until two weeks later. Oops. (Future significant others out there, you’ve been duly warned, haha!)

I guess the secret to losing time is involvement. This past month, as I’ve become increasingly busy with teaching and school/community groups and activities, I’ve finally started to comprehend just how short two years of service truly is. Just think! The steps you go through to do your job as a volunteer as responsibly and respectfully as possible can require much more than a mere 27 months.  First, you have to be in a place long enough to adapt to cultural and linguistic differences and simultaneously form relationships within your community to become integrated. Then you need to collaborate with your friends, neighbors, and colleagues to assess community needs. After that, you have to weigh and organize your priorities. Finally, you can then organize a group of interested people and begin working toward one maybe two goals. THIS PROCESS IS SOMETHING MANY ACTIVISTS SPEND THEIR WHOLE LIVES PURSUING, let alone 27 months!! And while Peace Corps Volunteers often idealistically set out to “change the world” at the microcosmic level, even the most motivated “super-volunteer” can begin to feel the pang of self-doubt when faced with the reality of not being given any resources (aka money!) to actually jump-start community development projects . AND of course, it assumes that you actually have learned enough about your community to be in a position to accurately evaluate the needs of your host-community. Now that being said, it’s not like as a PCV you have to tackle the biggest community issues. You can absolutely (and should) start small. But again, mobilization is tricky! For example, it’s great if you want to build a community well or start a school music group, but good luck trying to find the money to sponsor the idea you and a few colleagues came up with. I’m thinking increasingly that being a PCV essentially means door-to-door grassroots organizing in a community that you’re still “new” to! For me, this dilemma kinda calls into question the real aim and effectiveness of Peace Corps. Is it really meant to be a development organization? Or, does it function solely to promote cultural exchange?  Who benefits more from the experience – the community or the volunteer? What dissonance exists between how PC markets its agenda of fostering peace and development, and how it actually enables volunteers to serve their host-communities? Are there organizational reforms that would help volunteers help their communities more effectively?

All these questions I’m only beginning to ask and am lacking any coherent response. But you can bet as I attempt to navigate these challenges over my term of service that after evaluating and continuously re-evaluating, I'll begin to understand just how I can best use my role as a volunteer to serve Mapinhane and help my neighbors help themselves.