Waiting for Kenyans
on It began in Africa (Kenya), 23/Aug/2011 05:14, 34 days ago
One of the qualities you are selected on as a VSO volunteer is flexibility, andAllys and I can both attest that ours has beensorelytested by our volunteering experience.If we're honest, we haven't helped ourselves by persisting in our Northern European addiction to promptness and punctuality, wherever possible. These are not qualities that are valued in Kenya. Arrangements, social and business, begin at the whim of the tardiest attendee, much to the chagrin of the wazungu and the attendant bemusement of the Kenyans.There is aGroundhog Dayquality to Kenya testing our patience, the script feels so well worn by now. The ritual goes like this...At a pre-arranged time and place, the stage is set and I make the first fateful call:"Where are you?" I ask tentatively.The respondent usually returns with surprise, "Oh, you are there? Already?"(Like somehow it’s your fault because you turned up; that is, if he or she has even remembered the meeting)."Yes, yes, I am at the pre-arranged place at the appointed time, which we both confirmed in writing and verbally."At this point the excuses are either not-forthcoming or kept as vague as possible because really, at this stage of the game, you should know the lines by now.Here I make my second mistake, and what surprises me is that I can’t stop myself saying it:"How long will you be?"It must be that I am a willing slave to time and acknowledge its hold and power over me. Not so, for the mighty Kenyan! He or she laughs in the face of chronological and geographic inconvenience as we will see in the following:"30 minutes."It is the answer I have learned to expect and for which I have grown a deep, passionate hatred. The world is a small place, and I understand that we all live in a global village but based on the conversations I have had, it sometimes seems that Kenyans believe no two points on this planet are more than 30 minutes apart.Clearly, they don't believe this: they just know that 30 minutes is the maximum amount of lateness a person can withstand without them getting angry.The allotted 30 minutes pass and, succumbing to my role in the comedy of errors, I call again. Usually I don't get an answer or if I do it is the noise of a matatu which makes conversation unintelligible.It is at this point that I begin to suspect that I have inadvertently been taking part in a production ofWaiting for Godot.My thoughts turn to the existential: If a mzungu is not waiting, can a Kenyan travel?I may have becomeSchrodinger's cat stuck in aKoan.If, by some fluke of matatu-nature, I can manage to sustain a conversation of sorts with my tardy compadre, it will probably go something like this:"Sema." (Means "speak")."Hi. You said you would be here in thirty minutes, but you are not here.""What?""Where are you? Uko wapi? Thirty minutes has passed.""I am coming, but the jam is very bad." (Kenyan hangs up - Kenyan phone etiquette has no place for the goodbyes we spend so much time on).What was that? The traffic is bad? In Nairobi? I lived here a matter of weeks before realising that the traffic is always bad in Nairobi (except possibly on Sunday mornings when everyone is in Church). Yet still it is OK to blame the traffic here and sound surprised that there are traffic jams, as if they are some wanton and incomprehensible act of god, rather than the same crazy standstills that happen every day.After a certain point, I begin to realise that it does not matter how long I am kept waiting, only that I continue to do so.A psychiatrist might say I'm addicted to waiting. Well, my British passport may suggest a propensity for queuing but queuing implies order and progress.A queue of one is not a queue, I say to myself. I have begun talking to myself; no good will come of this.And now the suggestion becomes that I must break the cycle to stop thisSisypheannightmare. But if I stop waiting now, I am only acknowledging the prolonged nature of my wait; I will still be waiting even if I am doing other things.But, you tell me, you must develop coping strategies to minimise the waiting period. Schedule the meeting for an hour earlier than you expect it to start, make sure you have things to do, carry a book, meet somewhere you can have a sit down and a coffee.My dear reader, I sit here writing this in a coffee shop, have finished my book and my second cup of coffee and I cannot remember a time when I was not waiting.It becomes clear that no matter what I do, the waiting is always waiting for me. It is my shadow, it stalks around every event, it knows my diary, it doesn’t even need me to slip up because it knows someone else will. And soon, I begin to think that I am always waiting.“This must be what purgatory is like, the great waiting room in the sky”... ...I'm not sure if I said that out loud; anxious I look around, “I must try to look normal,” says the only white guy in the coffee shop.Ultimately, I am vindicated as all meetings eventually begin, and all I have lost is some small portion of my sanity and some hours of my life. However, I find that, at the end, we have scheduled in another meeting. It will be different this time, I tell myself: I have to believe.As a further example, last Saturday (yes, Saturday!), Allys held a workshop in a small town called Kiambu. Knowing everyone would be late she told her colleague three or four times that it would be very important for everyone to arrive at 9am so that they could finish by 3pm. Having really emphasised the importance of timeliness she arrived at 9.30am, thinking people might arrive around 10am so she would have time to set up. At 10.30am only five of 12 people had arrived and three of them disappeared to run errands. At 11am the meeting started.All you can do at that point is shrug with resignation and re-schedule your afternoon's plans. Except, wait for the punchline, come 3pm everyone begins fidgeting and looking annoyed. At 3.30pm one lady pipes up: "Will we be much longer only, you see, the time." So it is OK to be kept waiting for two hours, but not to over-run. All the feedback Allys received said she should have allowed more time for the training as it over-ran. No mention of the two hour wait to get started! Lesson learned: the training will last from 9am-5.30pm. Or some hours within that time frame.But why the wait at all? Is it an organizationally poor culture? As Mediterraneans are perhaps quick to anger and Anglo-Saxons quick to drink?Firstly, it is important to recognise that with a poor transport infrastructure, and we've mentioned matatus, it can take people a long time to travel, particularly from rural locations. At Allys' meeting on Saturday she was waiting for a group of women, most of whom will have had to do the washing (by hand of course), organise childcare, feed the goats, get breakfast for the kids and palm off a grumpy husband before being able to even board a matatu on a Saturday morning. Sometimes they skip the matatu and just walk to save money. Many people work two jobs and women bear the full weight of household chores, which are far more time-consuming than at home - not only without dishwashers, microwaves and washing machines, but often without running water and with only sporadic electricity.That said, things do seem to just happen here: no plan, no briefing. Often we are told 'just come, just come' as if the locals are speaking to small children who don't understand the implicit nature of Kenyan society (and let's face it, they're right about that). Prayers will start proceedings, everybody will speak, no-one's word will be questioned, tea will be taken and definitive action will be vague. As Kenyan's go about their days, they cannot pass anybody they know without stopping to greet them and enquire about their well-being and the well-being of their family, and their cattle, and their work, and their home. It is no wonder punctuality is not on anyone's radar.To follow, culturally it is very difficult to tell people no or to communicate anything which may disappoint them (hence the recurrent "I'll be there in 30 minutes" nightmare). To somebody used to being communicated with in a very direct and unemotional manner this can take some getting used to. Our culture says "deliver bad news swiftly and apologise - do not bullshit"; Kenyan culture says "let us all gloss over this small inconvenience, particularly if it has been caused by someone important, and move on".Most volunteers will at some point during their stay be silently screaming for somebody to say what they mean or tell them a direct "no". We will all be waiting a long time.Things I could have done while Kenya kept me waiting:Read War and Peace about five timesWatched all of Das BoatMastered chessBecome a ninjaVisited the moonClimbed EverestTamed an OrcaSwum to Cuba with and without a shark cage