Lessons from Masi Literacy Workshop -- version 3.0

The first week of December last year, I was supposed to join our team members from Kinshasa to put on a long-awaited literacy teacher training seminar for the communities around Masi-Manimba, a town on the Kinshasa-Kikwit road. Our biggest concern was the state of the road, since it is under repair and we were going to travel from different ends of it to Masi-Manimba. Arrangements were made, food for the seminar was gathering in Masi, and people were getting ready. The day we were supposed to leave, the Masi pastor called everyone and put the seminar off for two months, till the first week in February. There was no money in the denomination’s treasury, all accounts, including the literacy account, had been frozen, and we had no means of traveling.

Women around Lusekele start their peanut harvest in November, continue in January with the corn harvest, and finish up with the squash seeds around the end of January. I figured that the first of February would be an excellent time for our Masi training seminar: women would have finished their harvests and have both leisure time and food to spare.

January 31st I got to the Vanga parking at 5:30 am to meet the taxi jeep and my fellow passengers. The taxi sat there in lonely splendor: no baggage, no people, no driver. I’d rather figured on that, settled myself, had my breakfast, and started work on the paperwork I’d brought with me. The driver showed up and disappeared again. A few passengers started to gather around the roots of a tree.

At 11:30 am we took off, 14 people, not including the 3 small children on people’s laps, for Kikwit, the “Chicago” of Bandundu Province, some 135 km from us. They would drop me off at Petit-Kasai, a settlement where we emerge onto the paved road. I planned to catch a bus from Kikwit for Masi-Manimba the next morning. Rose Mayala and the rest of our training group would meet me there, starting from Kinshasa the next day.

About 2:30 pm, the taxi pulled into Petit-Kasai, dropped me off, and dallied, looking for water for the overheating radiator. A small clump of men found us: one had gotten a phone-call from the head pastor at Masi – “Tell Mama Miriam to go back home; the seminar’s cancelled.” ??? There was a pay phone nearby. I called Pastor Makasi for an explanation, but no one answered. I did call someone in Vanga to tell his brother to e-mail Ed to let him know I’d be back the next day(Lusekele is out of phone service areas).

Well now. There was a taxi due to come back to Vanga the next day, but they would be packed to the gills when they reached Kasai. I would have to catch them in Kikwit to get a ride. So I hopped back on the taxi and we went to Kikwit, arriving before sundown. A man on business from the Vanga hospital offered me a place where he was staying. We met with the other taxi owner, and he agreed to give me a place. We were to start out late afternoon for Vanga.

When we got to the large house where we’d be staying, they had a lively church service in full swing. We waited outside in the dark, talking to the wife until it was over. Then we had supper along with the pastor, baths and bed. The next morning we were awakened by the loud morning prayer service on the front porch. My fellow traveler talked business with several people and we left for the day, thanking our hosts. We walked around the corner to a main road and took a taxi to downtown.

It’s rare that I get to Kikwit, so I checked out the goods and prices in the stores, and bantered with street vendors. I called the pastor in Masi-Manimba. Why did they cancel the seminar? Well, the Masi women were in the middle of their peanut and corn harvest, and wanted to finish first. They were only putting the training off two weeks till the 18th.

The sun crawled across the sky. I met fellow travelers: either Vanga citizens buying stuff for sale in Vanga, or people going to the hospital for treatment or check-ups. We moved from shade to shade. Finally the pickup was loaded and passengers climbed on. Leaving Kikwit there was one last ritual: a shake-down by traffic cops at two roadblocks controlling traffic in and out of the city. Despite the fact that our papers were all in order, we looked like a good target, and they were determined to get something out of us. Finally they let us go. The rest of the trip was uneventful. We pulled in to Vanga a little after 9 pm and I headed for home.

So now it’s two days before we were supposed to start out for Masi again for our literacy training. Monday I got word that Pastor Makasi is stranded at Kikongo far from home, waiting for a delayed Mission Aviation Fellowship flight. Flights have been put off until Friday. “Could we put the literacy workshop off again several days?” he asked. He could get the Friday flight to Bonga Yasa and hitch a motorcycle ride to Masi-Manimba to get things going before we arrive. So I wrote my colleagues in Kinshasa and we will travel the beginning of next week, to start our seminar Wednesday, the 20th. Only two days late. Stay tuned!

My story illustrates several important points for work here:
1. The primary importance of the agricultural calendar for women. Farming in Congo is a woman’s job, and most rural women are farmers. Men will often, as our pastor friend apparently did, schedule things without taking it into account. But you do that at your peril, when you’re dealing with women. They know that their family’s welfare depends on their crops. From November to February is harvest time for the critical crops that take a family through the year, depending on the area and when they planted. In this case, I thought they ran on the same calendar as we do, so accepted the pastor’s dates, when in reality, the rainy (thus, planting) season must start later for them, so they’re still harvesting.

2. The difficulties and uncertainties of communication here. We are in flux. The old system of short-wave radio that linked church centers in rural Congo is fast disappearing. In its place is a patchwork of possibilities, though sometimes nothing at all. We have Internet access, but no telephone coverage here. At Vanga they only have pay phone service. At Kikwit, Kasai, and Masi-Manimba, they have full telephone coverage, so one can use one’s own cell phone or use a pay phone. At Kikongo, where the Masi pastor is right now, they have no phone coverage, and limited e-mail and short-wave radio service. So, when plans changed, I could call a pay phone in Vanga, and ask the guy to have his brother write Ed to let him know to expect me back soon. From Kikongo, the Masi pastor had to ask a missionary to e-mail us to warn us of the change of plans. I don’t know how he is telling the folks back home. While, from Masi, he could call my colleagues in Kinshasa, now he has to rely on me to pass the word along to them by e-mail or a Vanga pay phone. I once was incommunicado 5 weeks on a trip, two weeks later than expected, because the only means of communication – radio – didn’t work for us.

3. Difficulties of travel. For example, we have 4½ miles of poorly maintained dirt road between us and Vanga. It is 4 wheel drive (guzzling fuel), and there are very few places where we can go more than 15 mph. When roads are mostly dirt roads, and mostly in bad shape, travel becomes enormously expensive, opportunities are rare, and you mostly have to take what you can get. Safety becomes a secondary issue. The people who brought Pastor Makasi to Kikongo were willing to pay for air travel, and there’s a strip at Masi, but it is not practically possible, either for him the entire way, or us, so we look for other options.
4. Christianity in Congo, despite serious problems in the church, is alive and well. I may not be comfortable with all the customs of the Pentacostal house church where I was welcomed, but there is a great Christian fellowship to be found with many people you meet here.