My Story: Travelling to Burundi (EN)

Hi guys, I am back.
Many of you have asked me how Marcos is doing, what exactly is he doing, how is everything there, etc, so here are just some words, which are to be seen as complementary to the ones himself regularly writes, after arriving from Burundi.
Marcos is all right, working hard, with his usual diligence, optimistic, and carrying out excellent work to help all those people who really need it. You can see him in a couple of pictures I am sending. He repeated to me several times to give to all of you greetings, and although that I will do it personally, I already write it here just in case my bad memory...
I came along with him every day to the cooperative "Umubango" (meaning "together" in swahili). It is a project from JRS (Jesuit Refugee Service). Like most of you already know, Marcos is trying to make this cooperative, in which around 50 people work, profitable, and self-sufficient, in order to avoid the need of an extra amount of money every month to survive. The term Self-sufficient should be understood not only from an economical point of view but from a human point of view (i.e. teaching, changing mentalities and ways to see things) this second being as much important as the first one. The task is very hard, because the means are really short. It is enough to mention that the village (the refuge camp) is furnished neither with electricity nor with running water, and for example the mill has to be a diesel-engine mill.
The basic needs of the people are not covered, at least as they are understood in Europe. Though we did not see malnutrition (people not eating enough), the nutrition itself is clearly not good, especially in the case of children.
The village of the refugee camp (they are from Burundi and ran away form the insecurity of the mountains during the civil war and came to settle down in the outskirts of the city) was always swarming with children who run and play and never stop repeating "musungo" (White in Swahili) as soon as they see you.
"musungo, musungo, musungo", you never stop hearing the children saying that wherever you go. I ended up with a lot of affection for that word. They love touching you, shaking your hand, or playing with the hair of your arm, because they don't have any, and they find it funny. Once they feel a bit confident with you -and that's a question of some minutes, they just hang literally on your arms, as long as you don't stop smiling to them. The "musungos", strange animals, they seem to think.
After some days I was able to talk quite confidently with some people, like Zuberi, the man responsible for the mill.
He shakes your hand, and uses the left hand to support the forearm of the right hand while shaking your hand; it is a sign of respect. Afterwards, while he is speaking with you, he does not release your hand. The first time it is a strange feeling, then you get used to it, and you are happy having the conversation at the same time you hold hands, because you have the feeling that despite of being a "musungo", you begin to be a bit more like them. You realise then that there are a lot of couples, always men, holding hands while talking or just walking side by side. It is not strange to see a couple of policeman, with the frightening kalashnikovs on their shoulders, walking side by side holding hands. Again, this only happens between men; there are no men holding hands with women, as if showing feelings between men and women were a taboo and they should be hidden.
Zuberi lived in Tanzania, after that he came to Burundi, and like the rest, he ran away from the insecurity and misery of the mountains, coming down to settle down by the city looking for better luck. He speaks fluently five languages, between them Swahili, Kirundi, and French. He told me in a sad way that in Europe we can put some money aside every month in a bank, and when we are older, we have something saved. Perhaps he does not have enough to buy the children every month the food, or pay for the school. He lives in a little house made of dried mud, not bigger than 4 by 4 meters, and where probably there is nothing else than a couple of mattresses and some things in a corner to cook.
There are women everywhere working and at the same time taking care of their children. The children being carried on the back, and sticking out their small heads, sleeping some times and sweating most of the time, wrapped around with a big brightly coloured cloth which keeps them on back of their mothers. Sometimes you wonder if only the women take care of the children, the land, the house, everything,...
The sun hits you hard every day, always on the very top; your head boils, and of course you end up burned. It is almost impossible to work under the midday sun. The first was my right arm, after going all the time in the car with the window down and the arm lying on the door. It didn't take long till my skin disappeared on my forearm. I said to the children that that was a musungo-maladie (a sickness of the white people) just getting red like a tomato and afterwards loosing your skin.
We went all the time from one place to the other in Marcos Car, a pick-up in which we were always quite a lot. Later on, when night was approachig, the pick-up was essential for security reasons. Only a few walked in the darkness, and no "musungo". The risk would be too high.
The situation in the country is apparently quiet, the war ended two years ago, but like some volunteers used to say:
"Here we have to be prepared for everything, any spark can make a row now, and tomorrow we have a fight". Indeed there no shortage of kalashnikovs. All the millitary and policemen have one, and there are plenty of them. At the very beginning you can not stand the kalashnikovs, but after a while you get used to them. On top of that they all carry several bullet-loaders tied to the guns, as if one of them wouldn't be enough in some situations. Later on I found out that the kalashnikov is a very simple weapon, very easy to use, it lasts a long time, and is adequate for many kind of fighting. That's why it has so much success in poor countries. Cheap, simple and easy. Just thinking about how any of those guns got into the hands of their owner, made me think about the most bloodthirsty stories, which for sure, did not even reach the true reality.
We had time enough to think about things which you would probably never think about if it you weren't surrounded by them. I would like to mention just a couple of them.
It is clear that the UN role is necessary to bring peace, but the way some missions are carried out is not often the most appropriate. The UN forces destabilize the country somehow. It is perhaps something inevitable, but it is a fact.
But the story which surprised me the most, the story of the coltan (cobalt-tantalum). All our handy and laptops has coltan inside their semiconductors. Let's say that it is like a new material. This coltan is -amongst others- the reason why every month between 10 and 30 thousand people are killed. Me and many others like me are, did not have absolutely any idea about that. The people go for about 1000 km walking or cycling to sell one kilo of this material, so well appreciated. On top of that the forest is devastated.
Stories of ethnic fighting, where Tutsis and Hutus don't get on well with one another, and which provoke tensions which can lead to the worst. That makes me think once again that the truly pandemic sickness in the world is the chauvinism and being jingoistic, establishing differences between the people based on cultural reasons, very often artificial ones, and which leads always to promote elites in the communities which want the best for themselves, thinking that they deserve it. And in this way we find wars -like the big ones that there was here in Europe not long ago-, fighting, colonialism, and nationalism.
The Afrikans are the ones who have to make a better world for themselves, but colonialism makes many countries in Europe responsible of many things that are now going on there.
Last but not least, I met of course another Galician, -it is said we are everywhere-, from Santiago, he was called also Jose. Finishing off a couple of cuba libres in the house of another volunteer from the Vasque Land, he told me he how travels the Africa's Great Lakes region in his Trial motorcycle, through deserts and Jungles, taking pictures here and there for France Press, pictures which for sure show misery, war, corrupt elections, but also, the big smiles of the people, the full brightly coloured clothes, and all the beauty of that country in the centre of Africa, with a Heart shape which is Burundi, which seduced me for some days, and in which despite of everything there is hope, and a lot of it, hope of better living conditions for the people, which does not mean conditions like ours, because actually it is the life of the people of a completely different world, which is not ours.
Landing some days ago in Amsterdam I was sad of not being a "musungo" anymore.
Kwa heri (bye in suahili)
Jose
Final notes:
If you want to know a bit more about whats going on in Africa, "Hotel Ruanda", "Darwin's nightmare", "The constant gardener" and "Nowhere in Africa" (NIrgendwo in Afrika) are good films to watch.
"Ebony" from Ryszard Kapuscinski and "El sueno de África" de Javier Reverte (I dont know the title in English) are very nice and good books.
About the social, economics, and politics, "Human rights watch", or "Amnesty International" are good sources.