What am I doing here?

I have been proofreading Augustin's dissertation for an MA from the University of Wales, via a theological college in Uganda. It's about HIV/AIDS and development with reference to a small Friends church in the west of Rwanda.

The interviews aren't written up yet so all I have to go on is his introductory pages. there seems to be some degree of consensus among the authors he reads - and I've no idea how representative or otherwise they are - that it's more than time to think about and deliver aid differently.

Why do the poor stay poor despite efforts by governments as well as far-reaching aid agencies? Because everybody comes in and delivers packages designed somewhere else and done to the poor instead of asking the intended beneficiaries what would help them, and appreciating the value of their own skills and resources.

The Friends Church in Rwanda has been saying for the years I've been coming here that it's time the church members developed and used their own resources instead of waiting for outside aid to enable any development. Apparently the president himself has adopted the same theme - that Rwanda needs to stand on its own feet now; that the war/genocide is in the past and it's time to outgrow the childish dependence on generosity from other countries.

The mindset is not easily changed, however. A new toilet block at the school here, for which I carried some bricks in 2008, is not built 'because there isn't the money'. I still get caught up in arguments about why I (or AGLI) won't pay bus fares and per diem/sitting allowance.

In the years after the genocide many agencies came in and paid people to attend trainings in the best hotels with food and drink provided. There is still a universal expectation that a training will include a good lunch, even if it's for less than a day. That's understandable when teachers, for example, are very poorly paid, and there are few other ways of eating than a hot (or warm) cooked meal.

Augustin is clear that giving handouts of money or clothes etc is unhelpful. Yet people are desperate, and what seems a little to me can be greatly appreciated by the recipient. I don't propose to stop bringing second-hand flash drives, for example, because they enable study. I will think again about clothes. And personal gifts to people who put me up, invite me to their houses, etc surely can't be too harmful? Perhaps a useful test is 'Would I do it at home?'.

That leaves the central question. Is what I am teaching what people have asked for, or is it yet another package, designed by me and delivered willy nilly? And I don't have an answer. I really hope groups don't come and spend two days merely to humour me and eat good lunches. I'm glad the structure of my visits allows me to work with a group, ask them what they'd like next, go home and work on it, and come back with something tailor-made. I never would have thought of cooking and eating as being requested, but it has been, and it was lovely.

I'd be glad of comments, if blogspot allows you to post them - I'm told perseverance is needed. Now it's time for me to go and eat lunch chez Gaudance (wife of Augustin), including two salads we prepared together yesterday.

[Posting pics is a continuing challenge. I'll do what I can when I can.]