An exceptional group of young men and women

Nearly a week has passed since they departed for home, and before any more time passes I want to post some pics and some words about the fine group of young men and women with whom Susan and I had the privilege of spending the month of January: the students enrolled in my Calvin Interim course, IDIS W-41: “Building Communities in Kenya.”

This course arose from happenstance more than planning. Originally—in late 2008—I simply agreed to help a Calvin colleague plan an effective Interim, in cooperation with CRWRC staff,that would highlight effective church-based development work in Africa. We wanted to make certain that the students’ experience abroad would motivate them to share what they had learned in the short term—with their home churches, dorm floors, youth groups—and plant some thoughts about pursuing such work in the longer term. After discussing whether Kenya or Zambia would be the better site we decided on Zambia, and my colleague expected to be the instructor. But then she decided the timing was not right, and I received the Fulbright appointment—so both the instructor and the country had to be changed in early 2009. I revised the description to focus on a topic that especially interests me: how communities in Africa build a stronger sense of accountability and participation when they work together to meet their most urgent needs, and how differently this works when identity has less to do with autonomy and more to do with relationships.

Several complications ensued, however. The CRWRC Kenya staff position of “bridger” was open, and planning went slowly until Chikka Yambo was hired and got right to work on all the details. Kenya then proved to be far more expensive than Zambia, and the course budget was already approved and published; so there were endless emails back and forth looking for affordable but safe and clean lodging options. (Susan just finished our financial report, which shows that we had $34,500 available and spent $34,497!) State Department travel warnings in effect for Kenya necessitated several additional layers of review and approval at the college, in response to all the details of our travel plans and an elaborate program for security precautions and emergency procedures. I did not receive final approval to offer the course until a couple of days before we had to pay for our nonrefundable airfares in early December! But everything you undertake in Africa, after all, requires a degree of trust that, to use the Quakers’ language, “way will open.” And open it did.

The twelve students who departed from Grand Rapids with us on January 8 (two fewer than planned owing to a couple of late withdrawals for weighty personal reasons) didn’t know each other at all, and I knew only two of them as former students in my introductory classes. Ten were female, two male; ten were US citizens, one Canadian, and one Korean. We had met each other at fall semester planning meetings and in two days of on-campus classes in January, where we reviewed some readings on Christian approaches to development and on the role of the churches in Africa (David Myers, Walking With the Poor, and Samuel Kobia, The Courage to Hope) and acted out simulation exercises led by Mary Dykstra from CRWRC. There was still a certain wariness in the group, I think, as we spent endless hours on the plane and in Heathrow airport. But once we hit the ground in Nairobi that quickly yielded to a wonderful spirit of mutual care and support, in which no one was excluded and everyone’s observations and feelings were heard by others.

The students were curious, venturesome, and eager to learn. They were respectful of local mores—the short shorts and tank tops appeared only for relaxing at the YMCA, and the women probably wore dresses more often in three weeks than in the previous three years. And they were cautious without being fearful. Nobody set out to explore Nairobi at night, for example, which is very dangerous; but after we learned more about safety in the downtown area they were happy to venture out in larger or smaller groups, never solo, to shop for food, attend church, and visit the craft market.

Most important, the students showed and expressed their appreciation for the warm hospitality we received everywhere, and they accepted the inevitable delays and changes of plan cheerfully. Perhaps the most dramatic demonstration of their resilience came on our third day, when a washed-out road delayed our arrival in a Maasai village. Lunch did not arrive until 4 pm—in the form of roasted goat, little chunks of meat and gristle and bone all chopped up together. The students smiled, gnawed away enthusiastically, and thanked our hosts graciously. It made me proud of Calvin’s students—and grateful to the parents who have raised them so well. We were truly sad to see them all off at the airport Monday evening.

I don’t fault the college for its precautions about safety, I might add—though I do fault the State Department, whose warning is too general and too ominous. Staying safe in Nairobi requires the same sort of attentiveness and savvy as staying safe in Washington DC or Chicago, after all. In our pre-departure classes I repeated (with his permission) an extremely pointed and helpful security briefing given to departing Fulbrighters last June by the head of security for Save the Children, which stressed that personal safety has everything to do with alertness and cultural awareness, very little to do with physical defense. And, thankfully, our group had no untoward incidents.

Well, hardly any. They were the victims of a brazen daytime robbery while they were eating a picnic lunch in Hell’s Gate National Park. But the perpetrator was a baboon, and all he got was a large bag of potato crisps. He is believed to be still at large.


(Last photo is a class meeting in our living room with Fritz and Carol Rottman.)