Sunday, August 19, 2012

Dedicated To All Those Who Supported My Village's Library Project

Last week, I met with my counterpart for our village's library project. We went up to the high school to see how the work was going and was happy to see it advancing. I am not going to lie, its hasn't been as quick or efficient of a process as one might think it should be able to be, but this is Africa after all. Some steps have taken longer and some we have redone to make sure the building is as perfect as possible. But the walls are up, they're lined with cement, the roof is on, and hopefully the door and windows will be attached this week. From its origins of a pile of mud, literally, its starting to actually resemble something!

When we were about to leave the school campus, my counterpart and I had one of those conversations that Peace Corps Volunteers hope they'll get to have at least once during their service. A conversation that makes us feel that yes, we really did do something here and yes, our time was worthwhile. There are times we doubt this or lose sight of it. This is just the nature of development work, many projects will fail and the ones that don't, their impact and benefits aren't often seen until years to come. So, this was my conversation:

Counterpart: You know, people in the community see this and say that the white lady really helped.
Me: Its is their project more than mine. They contributed so much to it as well.
Counterpart: Yes, but they really weren't confident that it was going to work. Now they actually see a building and they're confident. A few years ago, the community raised around $3000 to build that school building over there. But then the money disappeared and, as you see, the building has crumbled out of neglect. They were reluctant to donate to the library project because they thought the same thing would happen. But now they see that it is working and they have confidence again that we can do this. It means that in the future, we can do this by ourselves.

I had never realized that building this library would be building so much more than that. We as volunteers always hope that our communities will take ownership over the projects we puruse together, and we hope that they will learn how to work within their resources to develop their communities on their own. My community raised money for a project that they, rightfully so, weren't completely confident about. But they still donated and gave the little they had at the possibility it would work. Now that it is working, they have regained their confidence in their abilities to build their community on their own.

I'm happy that as I am nearing the end of my service, I can look back already and say, "yes, I really did something here and yes, my time was worth it." I have all of my generous family and friends back home to thank for helping me accomplish this, because neither I nor my community could have done it on our own.

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