On What We Leave Behind

The less time I have here, the more I find myself wanting to leave a legacy behind.  Legacy is such a formal word, though.  It’s a word you hear at funerals and monument unveilings.  It is something permanent that shows that all your efforts were not in vain.  I don’t think it’s vanity to want to leave a legacy behind in Swaziland.  If I didn’t, would the blood, sweat, and tears I’ve spent in this country mean nothing? 

Whenever you get two or more volunteers sitting around together, we debate the potential futility of our efforts.  We struggle with different philosophies of development, and we secretly hold our own philosophy as superior to those of other volunteers.  We all find our philosophies superior to those of the big NGOs and missionaries.  By the time two years are up, we want to punch anyone who dares to utter the words “sustainable projects” in our presence without ever having done one on the ground. 

I’m not naïve about the outcome.  Twenty years from now, my village will probably still look the same.  The road leading to it will still be dirt, most parents will still struggle to feed their children and pay their school fees, and electricity and water will only be available to the lucky few.  I haven’t uplifted my entire community.  If someone ever claims to have done this, I would be very skeptical.  So what have I done?  What is my “legacy”? 

·         I will have built a library- the first one in the entire chiefdom. 

 

·         I taught about 20 adults and around 150 teenagers basic computer literacy.

·         I directed Peace Corps Swaziland’s female empowerment initiative and increased our camp size by 1/3.  Check out the video:

http://youtu.be/CLvGt7bOXdY

·         I started a community garden for orphans and vulnerable children.

·         I educated our soccer league (12 teams) on reproductive health. 

·         I kept a previous volunteer’s income generating project alive against all odds and acquired a grant for it.

·         I conducted a business management and fruit tree propagation training for the seedling nursery.

·         I planted two orange groves for two different communities. 

·         I helped many students pass English with nightly tutoring sessions.

·         I introduced worthy people to scholarship opportunities and competitions.

·         I helped with small tasks at the clinic.

·         I provided fun activities for Kindergartners on a daily basis.

·         I started a girls’ club in my community.

….But all of this will be forgotten soon, probably not long after I board the plane home.  So this is not a legacy, because a legacy is something lasting. 

What I admire about Peace Corps is that we live in the communities we work in.  When you mention Peace Corps to rich city-folk, though, they don’t understand how we are different from any of the hundreds of NGOs or (terrible) missionaries which roll into the village in their big white SUVs and roll out again before dark.  We stay.  We learn the language and understand the needs and power structures within our communities.  We strive to be a part of the community- to be (almost) Swazi.  City people cannot know the daily struggle for tiny increments of progress nor can they achieve the accomplishments listed above.  Perhaps they see me as merely a tourist in these peoples’ lives.

So what is my legacy, if only intangible? 

My legacy is simply that I was here.  How many times have I been approached by a man or woman, grinningly asking “Are you a volunteer?”

“Yes,” I would answer nervously, wary of a long conversation about sponsorship. 

“I knew a volunteer once,” that person would say.  “His name was Frank.  I miss him too much…”

Or they would say: “I once had a Peace Corps teacher.  Mr. Johnson cared about us a lot.  He thought I was brilliant at school and even wanted to pay my school fees.”

Or: “My friend Welile was my best friend.  My very best friend.”

Or: “We once had a volunteer stay with us.  Her name was Ashley.  Do you know her?”

Or: “I worked with Bob.  He did HIV testing with me at the clinic.  He really loved it here.”

See, Peace Corps Volunteers have been in the rural areas for generations now.  We’re not centered in the towns and we’re not flashy like MSF or ICAP, so no one has heard of us there.  But in the rural areas, you’d be hard pressed to find someone who at one point wasn’t taught by a Peace Corps Volunteer. 

I love those conversations, as they are the most positive affirmation one could ever get.  It is affirmation that years-decades even- after you leave, someone still thinks of you fondly.  That is what I hope my legacy is.  That one day, 20 years from now or so, my little host brother (by then a grown man of 27) will spot an American walking down by the soccer pitch.

“Hey you!” he’ll call out, running over to some nervous Peace Corps Volunteer with a backpack on. 

“Are you a volunteer? …I knew a volunteer once.  Her name was Zanele and she was my sister.”