This past week has really made me sympathize with language
translators. Generating accurate
translations is a lot more difficult than it seems. This is perhaps why
electronic translators many times fail to encapsulate and formulate coherent
translations. Some hurdles include translating phrases with heavy cultural
baggage (i.e. Idioms, history), sometimes having to explain ideas outside of
the participant’s knowledge, not knowing vocabulary, trying to explain concepts
for vocabulary that doesn’t exist, and keeping in mind cultural and social cues
while speaking to either person on each end of the discussion, while attempting
to produce sentences with correct grammar and syntax. I was asked by a French graduate student doing
research on black eye beans to help him translate interviews with farmers and
collectors in Ambato-boeny (a city near Mahajanga) in the West. We interviewed union members, independent
farmers, government employees, and middle-men. Each interview was very
different from the next. Depending on
how technical the language they used was I would at times sit perplexed trying
to fill in the linguistic gaps with my own logic. I translated from English to
Malagasy and vice versa. And because
English wasn’t the graduate student’s native tongue there were moments when I
tried to make sense of his meaning too.
I think of all the literature I’ve read in my life that had been
translated from its original language, and wonder to myself how much of the
meaning is lost. Really translation work
seems to be a skill that one can always improve at without ever reaching
perfection. Words themselves are packed
with meaning, and sometimes their true meaning is lost when translated
literally.
Friday, August 10, 2012
Sunscreen
Aging is a natural life process. This is a fact I don’t need to remind us
all. However aging is exacerbated by
exposure to the sun. I remember people
in my stage (training group) ask if the current volunteers were a lot older
than us when we first landed in-country.
Little did we know we would
look like this in a year’s time. I was
shocked when I saw my stage for the first time in almost a year during our last
conference. Many of us had crow’s feet
where none existed before. The impact of
the sun had left blemishes and our skin more leathery. Of course there are other factors that
contribute to our enhanced “ripened” state, such as physical and emotional
stress, but out of all of these the sun is to be the most blamed. DO NOT challenge the Malagasy sun,
particularly on the coasts, because you can be assured that it will win. Our complexion is lighter than that of our
African counterparts, therefore more susceptible to cracking.
Wear sunscreen. I’ve ditched the mascara, the foundation,
the blush and lipstick. My prep work
before exposing myself to the public includes dousing myself with
sunscreen. This has become a necessary
daily regime. I go through a tube every month. Straw hats and sunglasses have become
important accessories to me. More than
cosmetic reasons I’m afraid of skin cancer.
This brings to my mind asinine practices such as membership sun tanning
that we as Americans can’t get enough of.
I understand why people do this, but in the end I ask myself why…really why? Our skin is our largest organ. It is a living part of us that needs to be
cared for just as any other part of our bodies.
And with the encroachment of ozone layer depletion, we need to grow ever
more wary of the sun.
Permission to Speak
In the novel Mating
by Norman Rush the inhabitants of an experimental colony in post-colonial
Botswana are required to first give a signal to one another if they wish to
speak English versus their native tongue.
I wondered what kind of implications this development model would have
in Madagascar. Just imagine, if
foreigners first had to ask permission to speak French to a Malagasy person,
and vice versa how it would shift one’s attitude and mentality. In subtle ways
the legacy of French colonization continues.
There is an unspoken expectation that metropolitan and
educated Malagasy speak French when communicating with foreigners
(vazaha). However, if vazaha were urged
to ask permission before speaking French this could result in a power shift,
bringing to consciousness among foreigners that they are merely guests and
aren’t owed accommodation, but rather must show respect to gain it. I feel
not only would this encourage foreigners to learn more Malagasy but
empower the local population, especially the most oppressed to feel more pride
towards their native tongue. There are
elites in this country who opt to converse mostly if not solely with one
another in French. This creates more
stratification in society and reaffirms French dominance. I’ve been thanked several times and have
shocked many that I can speak Malagasy.
This should not be necessary. Out
of respect one should at minimum learn basic Malagasy, and if they aren’t able
to then signal for permission to speak French, because understandably not
everyone has the time or resources to learn Malagasy.
I was able to visit
and speak to a traditional spirit interlocutor.
It took a year and a half to build up enough Malagasy vocabulary so that
I could have this conversation. However
the French lady who organized the meeting was able to gain as much if not more
information in a mere few weeks of being in-country by using French. What if I could have cheated too and spoke
French from the get-go? I would have
saved so much time and energy, and my work would have been expedited. But so much more is at stake than time.
Before joining Peace Corps one of my main goals was to gain
linguistic skills that could be applied in a future international career. I hoped to learn a language such as Arabic,
Russian, Spanish, etc. But I am proud that I speak Malagasy, and furthermore I
am proud of Peace Corps volunteers. We
can found in some of the most obscure pockets of the globe with the ability to
speak languages such as Zulu, Setswana, Wolof, and Quechua. In some ways we are helping to preserve and
encourage the use of indigenous tongues.
Some of us converse in languages that may only have a few million
speakers worldwide and for the most part we do it well.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
The Living Dead
Cultural sensitivity is a pivotal aspect of any Peace Corps volunteers’
life. But how relativistic does one need
to be before their own personality and morals diminish? Most cultural practices have arisen due to
economic or geographic constraints, normalizing sometimes arbitrary or harmful
practices, just think of the short story The
Lottery and the message behind it.
Now there are pcvs who are unable or unwilling to access HCN’s behavior
with a nuanced point of view, rather judging harshly and therefore unfairly,
creating stereotypes and unwarranted labels. Understandably this is due to frustrations
with integration. Perhaps they are
projecting their own insecurities and homesickness onto HCNS (host country nationals,
some more PC lingo). I am not saying
that I am not guilty of doing this from time to time too.
This is a story that happened over a year ago in my old
village. I had just moved into my site
around a month and was taking an afternoon stroll around my community. The sun was shining brilliantly. Dust clouds would form wherever I stepped on
the baked earth. Everything seemed in place: women braiding and breastfeeding,
children chasing broken bicycle tires, and people standing in line at the pumps
for water, until all of a sudden I ran into an elderly man prostrated on a heap
of hardened sand. Only the whites of
his eyes were visible as his eyeballs rolled back into his head. He was quenching for thirst as his lips hung
half open parched. His body lay limp,
emaciated and without movement. The only
thing he wore were rags, which exposed his ribs and vacant belly. Shocked I asked the people around me why no
one was helping him, in my then very broken Gasy. The villagers told me that he wasn’t their
responsibility and that his son lived down the road and to ask him about the
old man. I quickly ran to the man’s
family’s hut and called for someone to come out. A young man appeared, and when I described what
I saw I expected him to react differently to his father’s sickness. Rather, he seemed apathetic and tried to feign
interest, but really the answer was found in the expression in his eyes. He went with other family members and
children trailing behind him to pick up his father who lay dying only meters
from his home. I’m unsure of what became
of this story. No matter how much I
inquired afterwards the only response would be that they had brought him to a
doctor and a look to mind my own business. But I knew this wasn’t the
truth. The old man was dead and I couldn’t
do anything about it.
A French researcher told me about a time when he went to
a neighboring village and a young man lay dead with a sweater covered over him
in the middle of the busy market. Someone had dropped him off knowing that his
time on this earth was limited and could not handle the burden and or finance
of moving him to a doctor or respectable place. I was surprised that people in the market
weren’t more aghast at the site of a dead body where they shopped and bartered
for food.
Death is a much more accepted in life here than it is among
Americans. This I presumed is due to
socio-economic limitations. Perhaps this
is why funerals often times lack the same air of dread that they do in the West
or why children are born in the dozen with the expectation that many will not
make it to middle school. Like all
humans we all grieve over loved community and family members. However access to proper medical care is a luxury
not many can afford here. Maybe for this
reason people have become more accepting and complacent of death here. Jaded.
Perhaps this is the crux of a lot of the development issues here. We are jaded as PCVS, NGO’s, the outside
spectator who only hears about hunger in Africa, and even the local
population. We all hope that things can
change, but a part of us feel so limited in what we can do and often fall into
despair or apathy. In what ways does
apathy fuel poverty and in what ways does poverty fuel apathy?
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
A Heart Away from Home
I thank Mark Zuckberg for avenues such as Facebook, which I've consistently rely upon to receive updates from friends and family. However, it brings to mind the fact that my
life is drifting farther and farther away from those who I left behind nearly a year
and a half ago. I ponder to myself what
life would have been like if I hadn't made the decision to join Peace
Corps. Sometimes I vacillate between
wanting the salaried figure, the big grand investments (car, home, and sofa
from Ikea), and the rock on my finger, the promotion or to continue on this
wannabe Indiana Jones / Mother Theresa adventure. There is no way I can label my decision to
live abroad in a developing nation as superior to my peers who have chosen a
more traditional avenue to pursue.
Having lived abroad, and for a majority of that time removed from basic
conveniences and technology, has created rifts between once unbreakable
bonds. It’s helped me discern the high
context and low context relationships in my life, and to reevaluate my criteria
for friendship. However, I can’t be
bitter, as I understand it’s natural that time and distance forces change to
occur. In what ways will I be able to
compensate for the lost time? Will I be
able to slide my way back into my old social circles, laugh at the same jokes, and
continue old hobbies? Will children of family members recognize me? Without a
doubt I will become emotional when I hold babies whom I've never met
before. But honestly I still have a year
before these issues become relevant. For
now, I enjoy long bike rides over the plateau, grinding rice in large mortar
and pestles, teaching English and art at the local primary school, and having beers while discussing politics with my Malagasy friends. The rest I’ll worry about when my plane lands
on American soil.
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