Imation to Stranger in the Village by James Baldwin - Essay Example

Imitate James Baldwins essay "Stranger in the village" It was about 10 am when the boat reached this small village in the river bank. Nile has been proved to be a river with a beautiful but wild landscape. It has my first time in the particular region. I have being tried for years to visit Egypt but it was only this humanitarian trip arranged the last minute, which urged me to travel to Africa. In fact I had promised to my colleagues that in case that such a trip would be ever organized I would participate with enthusiasm. Now, I had started to wonder if my decision was right. It was perhaps the long trip (about 5 hours by plane, 2 hours by bus and now approximately 1 ½ hour by boat) that made me a bit nervous regarding this trip. The particular trip aims to the delivery of a significant amount of foods and drugs to the people of Aisupe and Koslu – two small villages in the bank of the river Nile. The trip was an initiative of the University of London and all students and professors were welcome to participate. Finally approximately 85 people (students and professors) decided to travel to Egypt. People participated in this trip have been divided in two teams. I was on the team that would visit Aisupe. From the moment that we reached Egypt we felt that we had to adapt our way of thinking to the local culture in order to reach our destination. Despite that locals were friendly, it was obvious that the ‘fear for the foreigners’ existed. Me and the other colleagues tried to be as friendly as possible stating clear the reasons of our trip; however there were issues, like the choice of the destination and the material carried that had to be analytically explained to local authorities. Of course, because this procedure would be characterized as expected, there was initially no worry by our side regarding the behaviour of locals (civilians and authorities) but we tried to follow exactly the instructions given. Finally, approximately at 4pm we arrived (the first team) at Aisupe. Locals were friendly and arranged to provide us with food and a space for rest. In fact a meal was prepared in which all villagers participated. After the meal, we went to rest but this part of our trip was proved to be one of the most challenging ones. In fact no member of my team managed to rest due to the noise (all night a disturbing noise from animals kept all of us awake) and the humidity. Finally, in the early hours of the morning all members of the team managed to rest for a while. Locals seem not to worry for this situation. In fact they didn’t seem to care for the specific problem. It was an issue that we had to handle by ourselves. The next day, all members of the team tried to communicate with the locals and know their culture and their ethics. All villagers went normally to their work as if we were not there. It seems that there was a program that should be kept on a daily basis despite our presence in the particular place. All our efforts made in order to communicate with locals failed. Men went in fishing and gathering fruits while women prepared food and cleaned the place. All activities started too early in the morning about 6.30am. Approximately at 11.00am men were back and women had finished with cooking. They’ve just informed us that the meal was ready. We ate together and after an hour we went to our tent – we’ve brought with us a series of tents which we installed in the area indicated by the locals. We had a short chat and afterwards we rest for a while. No other communication with the villagers took place apart from a short conversation of our leader with the leader of the village regarding the humanitarian material brought. The leader thanked our leader for the help and suggested that we could stay a few days in order to learn their culture and their lifestyle. Despite the friendly behaviour of their leader, people in the village were too difficult to approach. They seemed a bit ‘scared’ of the Western people – of course the negative behaviour of many Westerns in the greater area of Africa could be considered as a sufficient justification of this behaviour (at least up to a point). Under the prompt of our leader we were divided into three groups and started to study the environment of the area – not too far from the village, the existence of wild animals and hunters in the forest would be a threat for our lives. Indeed, we followed the project suggested and we started to observe the plants existed around the village. Moreover, we approached the bank of the river and had our first experience of fishing in Egypt. However, it was during this activity that the feelings of the villagers revealed. More specifically, during an attempt to catch a fish one of my colleagues felt into the water - which was proved to be extremely deep – which started to jerk him towards the other bank and after far away. There were only a few seconds that the whole event took place and all of us were looking – unable to help. The water has already taken our colleague far from the bank and was leading him to a dangerous waterfall. One of my colleagues started to scream towards the village and asked for help; instead all villagers kept on looking at her without reacting. They seemed that they were tried to understand what happened. After a few more seconds, our colleague (who was in the water) managed to hang on a root (extended in the river) and avoided the waterfall. We all run towards his direction and after a while we reached him by using one of our boats. This was the end of our effort to explore the nature in Aisupe. It should be noticed that during this entire event, locals kept on observing us and did nothing. They seemed that they were trying to understand what is happening but it was obvious that we were not welcome in this place. When we went back to the village with our colleague (who was wet) they didn’t ask a question about the event. In any case, most of them were absent focusing on their daily duties (hunting, fishing, cooking and cleaning). It should also be noticed that in the time of the event 2 villagers were fishing near us but they behaved like they didn’t notice the accident. In the evening when eating, the leader of the village asked our leader about the event and noticed that we should be careful and try to keep close to the village because the river is dangerous (there are numerous crocodiles in its bank). Our leader responded that we are doing our best in order to protect ourselves and that we pay the appropriate attention during all our activities. This conversation – which was too short – stopped there. No particular reference to the health condition of our colleague was made by the leader of the village. We returned to our tents and tried to rest planning the details of our departure. As already stated above our trip involved a 1 ½ hours approximately of traveling in the Nile river. In order to reach our destination we had the help of locals (from Cairo) that know all parts of the river. However, these ‘guides’ had returned to Cairo (with three of our boats, leaving to us just two boats) and they were expected to be back approximately 3 days after. For this reason, we had to keep our sense of humour trying to be adapted to the particular way of life and understand the local culture. The hostility faced by the locals until know has been interpreted as just a sign of fear towards the unknown – probably they were just afraid of us and there was no issue of hostility – at least as the term is used more commonly. Next morning we decided to go on a short walk near the village but not towards the forest but towards the bank of the river – forest as already stated above was a place that it should be avoided. We didn’t attempt to catch a fish, but instead we kept on studying for hours the plants and the insects existed in the whole area. This activity kept us busy until noon when a villager notified us that the meal was ready. We returned in the village tired. After the meal we went to rest. Later we heard some voices and a continuous noise – like a musical instrument. We tried to understand what happened and we approached the centre of the village where all villagers were gathered having something like a traditional feast. In any case, we were not invited in the feast and we decided to return to our tents. The feast finished late in the evening. We were not notified for the meal and we ate canned foods that we have brought with us (tuna and beans). We were really depressed of not being invited in the feast. It was an excellent chance of getting closer with the villagers and learning their culture. However, it was now clear that our presence in the village was not welcomed. Villagers had their own rhythm of life and they would not share it with strangers. We don’t know if it was our colour, our race or our culture that created this barrier. Perhaps it would be the same if we were Asians or Africans. But all these issues are just thoughts. From that day we avoided going to the village. Instead we were staying inside our tents chatting and resting. As for food, the canned food that we have brought with us (in the case of emergency) has been proved to be more than enough for our entire trip. There was just one day left before we leave the place. Guides were already here and it was arranged that we would leave very early in the morning (about 6am) in order to catch the bus of 8am for Cairo (next bus would leave approximately at 12 and there was no enough time for us to reach the airport). In that evening villagers notified us that the leader would like to speak to us. Indeed, during the meal that had been prepared the leader of the village told us that our initiative to bring humanitarian material to his village was of significant importance for all villagers. Especially the drugs brought could help villagers to face appropriately all health problems appeared during the winter – it was fall then. Also, he told us that we had come in a rather inappropriate time in order to learn the cultures and the ethics of local society because all villagers were busy in order to prepare the village for the winter which is usually very strong and there are no sufficient sources for food – fruits also are few during winter in the particular place. Our leader avoided to refer to the behaviour of villagers and just noticed that we should stay for fewer days – in fact one day it would be sufficient for us to rest and that we should have returned earlier home. He thanked villagers for their hospitality (!) and said that we could maybe repeat this trip in the future but under different circumstances – especially in different season. Next morning, we woke up approximately at 5 am and we transported our luggage (in fact there were just bags and tents) in the boats. We left the village approximately in 5.40am after greeting villagers. We all felt disappointed by this trip. We expected to manage to communicate with people of different culture and learn their ethics; however this was proved to be just a dream. In reality, we just transported humanitarian aid and nothing else. No particular communication existed with locals (language should not be considered as a barrier especially under the fact that even basic communication – using signs – could be achieved). In fact it was proved that cultural differences can be stronger that one could think and that in sometimes it is preferable of helping people by a distance (as long as you make sure that your help is going to reach them) instead of trying to combine help with communication – because the latter in some cases is not desirable by the other party. We arrived at Cairo at about 10.30 am and we went immediately to the airport (there was just a short brake of about 30 minutes). There we met the other team (the one went in the Koslu village. Their experiences were similar with ours; although they might have more chances to communicate with locals. We left Egypt feeling that we tried to communicate with the locals but maybe our effort was not welcome or maybe it wasn’t notice by locals who have used to live under different conditions having a different culture. Our trip could be characterized as an indicative example of the failure to communicate with people. It was also an example of social and cultural ‘rejection’. However, as it was noticed above, it wasn’t probably a fault of the locals. It is just the fact that communication with people belonging in different cultures can be problematic and even impossible. Maybe if the above trip was attempted under different conditions – especially in other season – the experiences of the participants were different. However, weak arguments could appear for the support of this view. References http://www.uwm.edu/~gjay/Whiteness/stranger.htm Read More