conversation in a village church: fishers of (wo)men?!

Waiting for lunch one afternoon in Bulyahelu village, I was sitting with a group of men in their shack of a church building.  Somehow the conversation turned to fishing (Lake Victoria is nearby), and I was privy to a disagreement concerning the different species of fish in the lake.  After some discussion, one of the church elders said, “Let’s ask Brett; he probably knows.”

All eyes turned to me, as I was expected to settle their dispute.  Each man leaned in, eyebrows furled — not in anger, but in eager anticipation — as the elder asked, “Brett, are there 17 kinds of fish?  Or 18?”

At first I was confused.  I quickly considered the possible options:  In Lake Victoria?  In Tanzania?  In the world?  None of the possibilities allowed for such a small number, so I asked, “In the world?”

“Yes, in all the world.  We know there are tilapia, Nile perch, catfish…” – they began to name the 17 they’d apparently agreed on.

Now… I didn’t know how many types of fish there are in the world; I hated to even venture a guess.  Though I knew it was surely in the thousands (I’ve since looked it up: 31,900 species*).  I decided that, to these Sukuma men, thousands were not much different than hundreds — and I might seem more believable if I used a smaller number.  [Is it ever right to lie?]  So I responded with, “I think there are more than 500 kinds of fish.”

Eyes grew wide and bodies leaned backwards in unison, as if there’d been an explosion in the center of our little circle.  I felt I should justify my answer… and give them a good excuse for not knowing so many fish existed in the world.  So I began explaining that usually ponds have the least number of fish species.  And that lakes and rivers have more. But in the ocean — something none of them have ever seen – “In the ocean there are more kinds of fish than you could ever imagine,” I stated in my best exaggerated children’s storybook voice.

church building at bulyahelu -- not the exact group of people in this story, but the location and day

That’s when talk turned to Dar es Salaam and how the Tanzanians on the coast probably see lots of fish not in Lake Victoria. “And they’ll eat any kind of fish they catch.  They don’t care; they eat anything!” one of the men cried out, almost in disgust.

Another older man was deep in thought.  He wanted to know if people in Dar ate this one particular kind of fish that he’d seen only in pictures.  He began to describe it:

“Well, these fish are really big — the size of a person!  And they look like any other fish on the bottom half… with tails and scales and everything else.  But at the top — up top they’ve got a woman’s head and lady boobies!”

I didn’t say a word.  And fortunately no one asked me for clarification on that one.

the church building at bulyahelu and one of the elders. i'm taller than him. boo-yah!

* Or so says Wikipedia.

fishy ideas on the incarnation

Christmas is fast approaching — though it doesn’t feel like it here in Tanzania.  The forecast for today is 92 degrees.  Maybe I’ll go to the beach and make sand angels.  You laugh, but you should have seen my attempts at erecting a sandman last week, with a corn cob pipe and a button nose, and two eyes made out of coal.  Next week we’re organizing sandball fights, with teams and everything.  I also intend to try and give someone a yellow sandcone, just to see if they’ll eat it…

In keeping with the season, I’ve been thinking a bit lately on the incarnation, and why Jesus came to earth.  I don’t really have in mind a series of posts or anything, but may be writing a little on incarnation between now and Christmas.  But for today, I thought I’d post someone else’s thoughts — well worth reading (again, for many of us):

I learned about incarnation when I kept a salt-water aquarium. Management of a marine aquarium, I discovered, is no easy task. I had to run a portable chemical laboratory to monitor the nitrate levels and the ammonia content. I pumped in vitamins and antibiotics and sulfa drugs and enough enzymes to make a rock grow. I filtered the water through glass fibers and charcoal, and exposed it to ultraviolet light. You would think, in view of all the energy expended on their behalf, that my fish would at least be grateful. Not so. Every time my shadow loomed above the tank they dove for cover into the nearest shell. They showed me one ‘emotion’ only: fear. Although I opened the lid and dropped in food on a regular schedule, three times a day, they responded to each visit as a sure sign of my designs to torture them. I could not convince them of my true concern.

To my fish I was deity. I was too large for them, my actions too incomprehensible. My acts of mercy they saw as cruelty; my attempts at healing they viewed as destruction. To change their perceptions, I began to see, would require a form of incarnation. I would have to become a fish and “speak” to them in a language they could understand.

A human being becoming a fish is nothing compared to God becoming a baby. And yet according to the Gospels that is what happened at Bethlehem. The God who created matter took shape within it, as an artist might become a spot on a painting or a playwright a character within his own play. God wrote a story, only using real characters, on the pages of real history. The Word became flesh.”       —The Jesus I Never Knew, Philip Yancey

two ears of corn and too many fish

While in Dar waiting for Baylor’s arrival, I’ve gotten the chance to do quite a bit of reading.  I’m especially enjoying a book on agricultural development called Two Ears of Corn by Roland Bunch.  Because I feel our team’s strategy for mission is often misunderstood, and the term development exchanged for, or used synonymously with, words like aid and relief, I thought I would give Bunch’s definition.  While not flashy, it says a lot:

Development is basically a process whereby people learn to participate constructively in the solving of their own problems. The driving force behind this participation is enthusiasm; the direction in which the people must move is toward gradually increasing participation;  and the goal is that the program itself gradually be lost in, and replaced by, a totally participatory movement of the people, by the people, and eminently for the people.

Also from Two Ears, development is not to be confused with handouts, giveaways, and accomplishing tasks for the locals.  These strategies often…

• convince locals they are incapable of making progress themselves, creating a sense of dependency and inadequacy
• bring the residents to a point where they expect to be given anything they need — or have it done for them
  
• create bitter divisions when one village is assisted to the exclusion of their neighbors
  
• blind locals to the importance of learning to solve problems themselves
• destroy the possibility of there ever existing a multiplier effect
• do not allow locals to learn by doing, or to learn at all
• fail to achieve permanence
  
• are extremely expensive                                              
  

 

“You can give people so many fish that they lose all interest in learning to fish.”

In essence, when we seek to give things away or accomplish tasks ourselves, because we think it’s faster or easier or believe the locals are incapable of helping themselves, we handicap them.  In my short time in East Africa, I have already witnessed this dozens of times — well-intentioned groups from the West crippling small communities of people while attempting to assist them.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be writing a more complete description of our strategy for ministry.  But I just thought Roland said this so well…