At the end of July, I went for a well deserved 14-day
vacation. I left Boguila, traveled by vehicle to Bangui and took a flight for Paris, France. I met with my husband and we spent the
next two weeks visiting Normandy. I was fortunate to discover my French
ancestors, the Gagnons, who left their homes in the hopes of a better life to
go to the Nouvelle-France in 1640, and my fellow Canadians, who left their
country to liberate France from the horror of German occupation when they
participated in the Allies D-Day on 6 June 1944.
The Circle of Life.
Long-awaited homecoming to my French roots. Respectful thoughts for the Canadian
sacrifice.
Two separate events linked together by one goal: the
hope for a peaceful and happy future.
This hope for happiness also exists here, in Central
African Republic. It has lived here for many decades. It is unable, however, to
set its roots – the living conditions here will not allow it. Many have tried to force contentment by
imposing their ideas, their culture, their way of life. Despite the benefits brought by
modernity in their mother land, here, they do not have their place as they are
not well understood. I could
compare this statement with an infant that does not know how to walk and to
whom we suddenly enforce running.
He is not ready – physically and intellectually. We could try again and again to teach
this child to run but he must first learn to walk. And this takes time, patience, determination.
Western countries, the modern world, went through this
learning phase: they know how to walk and now they are uncovering how to
run. They learned
to walk over many long years, even centuries. They fell many times, getting up and learning from each of
their falls. Then they
realized that they would go faster and be more efficient if they ran. At the same time, they want to
teach the rest of the world how great it is to walk. But in certain places, they are still crawling. They need time to learn at their own
rhythm and we need to respect their learning path.
I realized in Boguila that even if we come with great purpose,
the African world needs time. Time
to learn, time to assimilate, time to integrate. It has to grasp and digest in order to understand what
we are trying to explain. As long
as this does not take place, our efforts will be unsuccessful. In fact, they will not be well perceived
and will cause conflict amongst the less educated populations.
I can arrive in Boguila, filled with dreams of
changing their world and intent on teaching all I know to the nurses and
secourists so that we improve a non-existent health system but if these notions
are not understood by the population living in the bush, my efforts will be
useless. . I understood that I have to take baby
steps. A specific concept, which
might appear insignificant to us but means a huge change for the people of
Boguila, will go much further if it is accepted and integrated slowly than if
brought upon abruptly. I am
starting to appreciate that here, patience is important. And even more
significant is respect.
MSF Holland took over the Boguila project over seven
years ago. The people of Boguila
have made giant leaps, thanks to the various teams that came here. But now, the population requires more
than a group of expatriates to help them.
If we want the changes that we brought to take hold and become the
standard, the country needs to take charge. The international community must become involved and show
some patience. We went from being
barbarians to becoming civilized over a period of a thousand years. How can we ask the same growth from the
African people in less than fifty years?
« Rome was not built in one day… »
Don’t you think that we should give them some time to find themselves
instead of insisting on a instant assimilation of our views and ideas?
Janique
