I am not your white lottery

I have been in this game long enough to know there are no easy answers when it comes to development and service, and I have had the honor of learning from some of the best: Where There Be Dragons, Daniela, Claire, Christopher and Debra Lion-Tree, and GSL. Taking what I have learned, I have branched out for the first time to serve in a full-on volunteer placement in Kenya, East Africa.

I tried hard to find a good organization that was locally run, sustainable, doing good work, fair, and not choosing foreigners over locals. I am here giving my time and energy to a locally run girls’ crisis center. I am learning what questions I should have asked and some situations that I should have avoided in this placement. What I am able to give and the confidence in which I do it is another blog of self-analysis and awareness, but today I want to consider my white skin in this black country.

I have been here a week and three days. The 28 girls were immediately kind and respectful and that quickly turned to engaged and caring. We sang songs, made art, danced, told stories, had lessons, and sat together doing hair and just being still. I am learning about Kenya as they learn about the USA. The stereotypes they carry do not surprise me, and I am happy to help dispel them.

However, in the last twenty four hours, due to the color of my skin, my phone was stolen, I sat through a meeting with the director that boiled down to, “This is the money we need and how you can help”, one of the workers from the organization approached me point blank and asked me to pay for her daughter’s university fees and the house mom fished for me to pay transport for a young woman going home.

Isolated these events would not have surprised me, but piled on top of one another, and with the vulnerability of being robbed, I feel stressed, victimized, unappreciated, and confused. How can I, from a white developed world, ever come to a developing country and not be adding to the culture of dependency? Cries of "Mzungu" heard as I walk the streets, hands held out for gifts, men making indecent proposals.

Even if I dispel stereotypes, am I not reinforcing them at the very same time? I sit at a table alone, served three meals a day, the food slightly elevated from what the girls eat, the portions definitely as large as I might want them. I use a western bathroom (without running water) and not the outdoor pit toilets. I recognize this as an act of hospitality, and this would be extended to all visitors black and white, but what message does it send for me to have a plate of mendazi, hot tea with sugar, and a coveted egg on my plate as some girls hover around me hoping for left overs?

And while I say, that I don’t have money to help these different requests, I will go to town and replace my phone with ease.

And while I say, I did not come to give every good group and person donations, am I not the best audience for these people to ask?

And it happens, time and again, the “white lottery” pays off: university fees paid, education sponsored, donations given, gifts left, wells built, etc.

The USA has a culture of giving. So we give with our time, talents, resources, and money. The developing world, and we can analyze the reasons why later, has a culture of taking, asking, needing.

I came to this country wanting to make a human investment, not a donation, but I realize once again, that it is not that easy. I have been taught well enough to ask, am I truly serving? And how do I navigate these waters with integrity? But I have yet to find the answers; I am sure, the next three weeks will continue to offer insight and challenge. Thoughts appreciated, and more to come.