Africa Vision 22

Africa Vision 22

Bebedja, December 16, 2007

I am dreaming of a white X-mas.

Heather has been in Chad for 10 years as a teacher of English. Every year she and her husband Michel organize a X-mas party. In the relative heat of N’Djamena. Bing Crosby belts his Christmas carols. A gathering of about 30 people of all walks of life coming together to celebrate the Christmas festive season. I met some new people again tonight. Debby a Canadian English teacher who wants to construct water well and has been walking around with a bundle of money to do it for the last 4 months. Talk about synchronicity when I was just telling about my friend Elizabeth, a psychiatrist who does mission work in Africa, Asia, South, North and Central America who is also involved in organizing a water conference in July in Uganda when Liz just happened to call.

There was a chief medical officer and professor from the American military who was very interested in the public health aspect of the program I am working on to establish. He is a specialist in emergency medicine and landmines. Unfortunately many of the warring partners in Chad use this horrendous weapon of war to wound and cripple mostly innocent civilians. The typical story is of a goat’s herd’s man who finds a metal object. Picks it up, examines it uses a stone to see if he can open it and kaboom. Gone is the leg, arm, eyesight and in cases the life of someone. It renders large swaths of land into destitution; as one cannot work the fields, pass with the animals. Amongst weapons of war this is one of the cruelest forms. Yet what was very interesting to hear was that he found it important to emphasize in his interactions with colleagues back in the USA the need for preventive medical interventions. Covering the sewers, making good drainage systems of water, protecting water puts will safe many more lives than the work on landmines. All are important clearly. I will hope to meet him again before he leaves for further discussions and he will be back in and out of Chad.

The food was a traditional X-mas dinner with turkey, the potatoes, the pies, salads, cakes and all you get to yearn for after a while in Chad. The cook did an excellent job. And chocolate, chocolate is what I love and piece of it makes me smile for more than a while and there were mountains of them. Believe it or not I had to pass on desert, despite knowing it was a great variety of cakes. The food was succulent.

And the second highlight of the night. A game involving gifts, thefts thereof, and chits of paper with a number. In short when your number shows up you are allowed to either take a gift from the table, or steal a gift of anyone who took a gift before you. After an item is stolen three times it remains with the fourth owner. Several items like two paintings, a bathing set, Italian coffee changed hands until they finally remained in their final owners hands. One lady had her gift stolen 6 times and finally ended up with her first object. Myself I was the lucky winner of three manly cotton leopard print hankies made in India.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year
Ashis