How Mama Berthe brightens the days
The last weeks have been sobering. Flea
wars, Mosquito attacks, Crazy-Midnight-Church and a surfeit of
tricks, cheats, lies and threats to get any kind of money, my
eagerness to work in the developing world has tremendously
contracted.
So far ever Congolese that we worked
with more closely has turned out to be money greedy, deceiving, and
ultimately untrustworthy. Of course this a gross generalization, and
of course, like anywhere else there is good people. I hope …
In fact Mama Berthe is my little angel
that brightens up my day. She works at a little shop down the street,
selling all kinds of stuff but most importantly bread and cake (corn
muffin sort of things called “cake”). Every time I come to
purchase her delicious bakery goods, she goes to the house in the
back to get me the fresh and warm ones, instead of the ones that have
been sitting in her shop. This little act of kindness, and good
customer service seems the world to me these days. Matondi Mingi Mama
Berthe (thank you very much Mama Berthe)
The web of lies, collaborations and
tricks guys (male and female, religious and, well religious, because
they all claim to be religious here) have been impressive … and
devastating (fake bills, fake reasons, fake laws, fake resumes, fake
prices, fake talk, fake businesses, fake promises, fake friends....)
Devastating also to my hopes and to
this country. I guess making a couple bucks more of a Mondele is
understandable. But the lengths these guys go to, to make you believe
you can trust them and than try to take HUGE sums from you, is
exhausting (sometimes literally thousands of dollars... which I would
say is like trying to take 10,000s in our countries). I have reached
a point of cynicism that no Colorless can be trust before even
reaching my two months here. Thats sad, but thats reality.
A Lebanese guy that has worked here for
9 years, and runs one of the only good restaurants in town, shared
his frustration about the locals with us last night. “They are
careless, useless and unwilling to learn” he reckons after he has
been burned so many times. I can understand his frustration, being at
a similar point already and fighting against the racist tendencies
that I feel emerging. I know that there is good and bad everywhere
from my experience, but the amount of deception has been astonishing
in the DRC. For now I am still trying to understand what has happened
here. Especially the 4 decades under the cletocracy king Mobuto must
have had an enormous impact.
On another positive note: the owner of
the hotel has in fact talked to the mid-night Church and the volume
has been turned down the last three nights. Bless the lord!
Let's hope that we meet more Mama
Berthe's and more good and trustworthy Congolese … very, very soon!
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