Thus it is with Alan and Mary Brody. We met in 1973 in Ghana, West Africa when we were all young. The Brody's went on to travel the globe working with UNICEF to improve the lives of children, women, and communities. If Alan's name sounds familiar, it's because you've read Alan Brody's words on Riehlife.

Recently I visited the Brody's in Iowa City where they invited me to stay for a week while I took a week long workshop in memoir writing. Mary and Alan are a "Salt & Pepper" couple who have been married for decades with a brood of children and grandchildren to revel in. They are "very married" in the affection they show even in the midst of occasional aggravation.

In 1970s America mixed marriage was still a tricky business. I knew Alan's side of the story. My father often says that the best decision he made was to marry my mother. Alan says that his decision to ask Mary to marry him was his last decision. The rest of his life unfolded from there.

As we stood in the yard taking down the badminton net, I asked Alan what it had been like for Mary to decide to marry him. "Ask her," he smiled.

Mary loves her garden. Each morning she comes out to greet her flowers blooming in a riot of colors and shapes. She knows each one as if they were her children. I knew I'd get her most eloquent answer while she watered her flowers.

Janet: "Mary, when Alan asked you to marry him, was it hard to say 'yes'?"

Mary: "No," she said simply, and then with great eloquence connected 1 + 1 + 1 +1 = (at least) 4 to share with me the secret to a happy life. Here it is, folks!

1) Just say "yes."

No, it wasn't hard to say "yes." There were other successful intermarriages in her family, so that wasn't a big deal.

2) Go where life leads you.

In her culture the woman follows the man, so she wasn't concerned where they lived--Ghana or the United States. What she didn't know then was that they'd travel to Nigeria, Afghanistan, Turkey, China, and Swaziland during their long distinguished diplomatic career.

3) Life is vast and mysterious. "When you look out at the sea, there is no end to it. When you look up in the sky, you cannot count the stars. People think they are powerful, but when you feel the wind blow, then you know what true power is."

4) Thank the Man Upstairs.

"Every day I wake up and my feet touch the floor, I'm happy I have another day. The Man Upstairs decides when and what. I just go along with the plan."

Meanwhile the flowers had finished drinking the water and listening to Mary's endearments. We eased inside to finish drinking our milk tea. In the kitchen I shared her answer with Alan. He said, "Oh, this sounds like a good story for Riehlife." And so it is.

Come on out to the Africa World Documentary Film Festival!

Do you live in St. Louis? Care about film? Want to know more about what remains "the Dark Continent" in American media? Involved in community and international development? Love children? Committed to peace?

If so, before I get all "het up" (as we say in the country), let me urge you to dash over to the Missouri History Museum to see the last three days of the 4th annual Africa World Documentary Film Festival . Niyi Coker, Jr., the E. Desmond Lee Professor at University of Missouri at St. Louis directs the festival with arms in Barbados and Cameroon.

____________________
"Helpers are con men, interfering."
--Fritz Perls,
founder of Gestalt Psychology

During the mid-1970s I lived and worked in Africa (Botswana and Ghana) for five years. I saw a lot, thought a lot, learned a lot about culture and development work. Through the lens of that on the ground education I viewed the film "Tunahaki".

"Tunahaki" is a case study in 200 things to do wrong in international development and cross-cultural understanding. Yet, it's billed as "The extraordinary story of nine gifted orphans and their journey from Africa to America."

There are three major things wrong with the world this picture shows us. 1) The film itself; 2) The conceptual framework (or lack); 3) What actually happens as a result of #2. There are maybe 5 things right.

So, what happens?
TUNAHAKI begins at an orphanage in Tanzania. We meet the children who are acrobats, a skill they learned from “Teacher-David”, a poor man who runs Tunahaki. Scott Fifer, an American, takes a volunteer vacation and ends up there. He makes a bold commitment: “I’m going to bring the kids to America, raise money and build them a permanent home.” The whirlwind tour raises hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"After I saw 'Hotel Rwanda' I felt ashamed to be human," Scott Fifer says as "Tunahaki" begins. From this promising beginning, Scott's good intentions quickly start a downward spiral. He doesn't know. But, within the first five minutes I knew, as many others in America must, that this formula was a no-brainer for tragic consequences. The audience in Barbados and Cameroon knew. To sit in the audience of "Tunahaki" made me feel, once again, ashamed to be an American. Ashamed to be white.

What's wrong with this picture?

For starters:

1) Mason Bendewald embarks on a documentary tracing the philanthropic journey of Scott Fifer in Tanzania. Although his director's statement is thoughtful and aware, the point of view of the film isn't clear until the the last five minutes.

2) The hero throughout most of the film is American Scott Fifer who becomes the sponsor of the project to bring these talented, well-behaved Tanzanian children for a week in southern California and Las Vegas.

The hero of this piece should be "Teacher-David", who founded the orphanage that becomes a home for homeless children. While his full name is mentioned in the film, I cannot find it in any of "Tunahaki's" on-line promotion.

What's wrong with the conceptual development model? Why is it the anti-model for sane and sustainable development?

1) Rescue Model. People in developing countries need to be rescued by people in developed countries. (Previously called "Third World," and "First World"). This is a model that has proved not to work for centuries. Didn't Scott Fifer get the memo?

The rescue here becomes quite literal as the children are "air-lifted" out of their village into the flashiest, most superficial parts of the United States.

2) Bigger is Better. Dramatic is Better.
3) Good intentions are enough.

What's wrong with what happens and how it happens?

1) The children's expectations are raised to impossible levels.
2) There's a huge disconnect between the world they come from and the world they go to.
3) There's an egregiously false and contorted picture of America in the places they are taken.
4) I'll get back to you later in the day...

Scott Fifer seems to have learned a lot, too. After his Tunahaki experiment went south, he set up Go Campaign, which, we hope, is doing the good it says it is.

Find more videos like this on Kwanda

Damaria has been a blogging buddy for several years. We met Last year in South Africa. She took me to Phokeng, her family's village (a kingdom, really!) last August.--JGR

___________________

Imagine if hundreds of volunteers across a country began working together.

When I was growing up in Phokeng, the need for community members to work hard to improve their living conditions and their fellow-man was taught to us at a very early age. I also saw this commitment to community in action.

For example, in the early 70s, families from my side of the village each contributed a couple of Rands [SA currency] to buy building materials to build Kgale Primary School, where I started my elementary school education.

This meant that children would no longer have to travel about 10 kilometers by foot from where I lived, to attend school in the central village. I also saw this commitment to doing for oneself demonstrated by my neighbors, who sometimes had to cart water and sand from a nearby dam to build their homes themselves.

So I was very excited when I was asked to develop web content for KWANDA, a South African community makeover TV show.

So what is Kwanda?

Kwanda means ‘wealth’ and ‘growth’ and the show bills itself as the first community make-over show in the world.

Reality TV Show in South Africa: Re-making of a Community

A few months ago, volunteer teams were recruited across South Africa. They were trained to organize themselves and subsequently filmed as they work together addressing some of the biggest challenges their communities face.

The volunteers have been helping orphans, reducing alcohol abuse and alcohol-related violence, generating income, creating jobs and reducing new HIV infections in their communities. KWANDA shows their journey.

During the series, audiences will follow the drama, tensions, successes and challenges of these ordinary people. And, at the end of the series, in a live finale, the television audience will reward the team they believe has made the biggest difference with a major prize.

To help communities make ends meet, an innovative fashion project called Kwanda Klothing will be launched during the TV series.

A team of designers have put together an urban street wear collection, the production of which was undertaken by a collective production facility in each community, creating jobs and teaching valuable entrepreneurial skills at the same time.

To counter the seasonal lull that is characteristic of the fashion industry, a number of unique corporate promotional products are already being produced.

So, other than the history of how I grew up, why does this project resonate with me so much?

On a broader level, I love the concept of ordinary people working hard to improve their lives and helping their fellow-men. I’m sure Janet has lost count of the number of times I’ve said that the answer to Africa’s development lies inside of us, not from the outside.

Not that help is not appreciated! But doing for yourself not only yields results, it also empowers people and gives them confidence in their abilities to take care of themselves.

I also like the fact that volunteering is being popularised in South Africa, and people who want to get more involved in their communities will learn from the experiences of the communities they watch.

And as a writer and blogger, I am happy that I am getting a chance to use my writing to make a difference to society.

I would also like to encourage more writers and bloggers to use their talents to make a difference: tell the inspiring stories of the people in your community who make a difference to society; help a non-profit develop an online presence that communicates their cause more effectively and mobilises supporters; encourage your readers to do something to help their communities; tell the next person who reads your blog that they matter and every little bit of help they can give also matters.

Kwanda premiers on the 2 September and will play Wednesdays on SABC 1, one of the stations of the national broadcaster in South Africa.
You can join to be a fan of Kwanda on Facebook.

"Taking Root" tells the dramatic story of Kenyan Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Wangari Naathai, whose simple act of planting trees grew into a nationwide movement to safeguard the environment, protect human rights and defend democracy--a movement for which this woman became an iconic inspiration.

This was part of the Meet Up run by the museum. I shared a lovely conversation with Pat before the film, as we enjoyed the light refreshments and informational tables around the room.

She'd asked me what drew me to the film. "I'm an Africanist," I said. "So...." She heard me say, "I have an African Soul." While I would not say this, it struck me with some truth, and so I didn't correct her.

The film is extraordinary...showing the power of one steadfast and gutsy woman who not only changed communities, but brought down an entire government.

It's an extraordinarily moving film. Hard to watch in places. I was sitting in a cluster of African American women who had been sent there on an assignment by an anthro class at UMSL. At one point, one woman said, "I don't know if I can take much more of this." I said, "Hang in there. Remember that she prevails." That tenacity against all odds is so moving. Truly she is one of my heroines, as is Madame Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia. And, most African women I've met, for that matter.

After the film Denise DeCou, Executive Director of the National Conference for Community and Justice of Metropolitan St. Louis (NCCJSTL), and Phil Valko, Executive Director of the Urban Studio were joined by leaders from Amnesty International and The Green Space for a spirited discussion with the audiance.

For those with the stamina, the discussion continued on into the evening at The Royale (3132 S. Kingshighway).

How did the Nobel choose Wangari? How did she connect trees, civic education, and Peace?

In 2004 instead of awarding its prestigious peace prize to an individual dedicated to ending armed conflict, the Nobel Committe re-interpreted the 1895 will of Swedish philanthropist Alfred Nobel--who founded the acclaimed prize and expanded its definition of 'peace.'

For the first time in its history the committee recognized environmental preservation, community empowerment, and democratic governance as central elements in the promotion of peace and human rights. The committee noted that forests are a natural resource that sustain life in Africa, and that deforestation leads to poverty, ethnic conflicts, and needless human suffering. Hence, the Nobel Committee selected a Kenyan environmental activist, Wangari Naathai, as the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. Wangari founded the Green Belt Movement, a voluntary organization dedicated to environmental preservation, women's rights, and community.

Community Cinema Series offers monthly special sneak preview screenings of films scheduled for upcoming broadcast on the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Independent Lens designed to help people learn about and get involved in some of today's key social issues.

The screenings are offered free of charge. The films themselves are broadcast at later dates as part of Independent Lens on Channel 9.

Community Cinema is presented by KETC/Channel 9 and the Missouri Historical Society, in collaboration with Independent Lens, ITVS and FOCUS St. Louis

On January 7th, the day I arrived back in the United States, President John Evans Atta Mills was formally inaugurated as President.

I was there for the duration of the elections. On the day I arrived in Ghana, December 7th, a Sunday, the initial elections were held. They were hailed by the election watch commission as a model for democracy throughout the world, and a beacon for fair elections within Africa. A run-off election was held on December 28th. I could tell by the two local polling places I passed that day that Ghanaians had fulfilled their promise and turned out yet again. This, in a country where going to the polling place may involved great expense and sacrifice.

A tidbit from my Author's Guild Bulletin caught my eye:

"Comfy: Where do you do your writing? For a book of photographs, The Writer's Desk, by Jill Krementz and published in 1996, John Updike wrote the introduction.

"He was interested that some writers seem to avoid a desk entirely. Updike wrote, 'Walker Percy is actually in bed, a classic writing site utilized by Edith Wharton, Colette, Proust and James Joyce, who sprawled across his and Nora's bed in a riot of notes to himself.'"

On my recent month-long journey to Ghana, West Africa, I stayed at African Rainbow Resort in Busua Beach for three weeks. These were three of the happiest weeks in my adult life, complete with Christmas, turning 60 and being celebrated as an elder, and Reggae on the Roof for New Years.

Part of my pleasure was having a balanced structure for my day, complete with morning exercise, companionship, and solitude to write in the splendor of my room---complete with balcony.

MORNING WALK: I got up to walk to the point on Busua beach around 6 a.m., before the heat set in later in the day. There, I often met up with Comfort, one of the co-owners of the African Rainbow Resort. She is a daughter of Ghana who survived transplanting to Canada for many years and then came back home with her husband and family to fulfill their dream of building a beautiful and welcoming place for traveler's to sojourn. Often, Comfort would be accompanied by Stevie, her 6-month old basic African mutt who I developed an affectionate relationship with, even though I am not usually so much of a dog person.

Or, I might encounter Nat, a local bicycle tour entrepreneur. Or, perhaps the longtime married intercultural couple who invited me over for a stimulating evening visit on the terrace of their room at Busua Beach Resort.

BREAKFAST: Upon my return to the resort, I let Joyce, one of my server-friends, know I was back and what I would have for breakfast. I ran upstairs to sluice off in the shower and change from my now-sweaty clothes into fresh, crisp clothing fit for public appearances. I came down to eat...often meeting more interesting guests in the dining room.

MORNING MEETING WITH NANA After I finished breakfast, Nana (the honorary development chief title given to Rod McLaren) strolled in for our open-ended morning meeting.

We then engaged in what I term "jazz conversations" in which each participant fully engages with the conversational partner. Prerequistes? Enough time to feel there is no time. These conversations are leisurely affairs with one topic seamlessly linking to another, hardly able to tell where one topic or story ends, and another begins. Each participant is both a good talker and a good listener. The latter skill is utterly essential for a jazz conversation to occur. Simply putting two good talkers in a room together with weak listening skills will not do, a'tall.

We spoke of writing and publishing; we spoke of our cross-cultural experiences and perspectives; we spoke of our love and admiration of our mutual friend Alan Brody, recently of Iowa City, but for 25-years in UNICEF a citizen of the world. We'd both met Alan during our time in Ghana during the early 1970s, so we shared that context. Alan was the means through which I came to the African Rainbow Resort. There was no topic off-limits, and these conversations could dip into humor and politics and book reviews and any thing we damn well pleased, with no holes barred, no particular result sought or needed, but in the end...found: enormous riches and soul nourishment.

WRITING IN BED Then, with all my social and physical needs met, I retired to my spacious room with the warthog mural on the well. I repaired to my kingsize bed ("took to my bed" one friend terms it), opened my laptop and worked for hours until I tired.

MID-DAY REPAST Feeling a little peckish, I ambled downstairs to eat yet another of Chef Michael's deliciously prepared and gorgeously presented meals...in the company of my amiable and efficient servers, Joyce and Issac, most frequently. I signed for my meal expenses (the signature that stands for money at the end of the stay...but, I felt like a powerful V.I.P. signing for services).

AFTERNOON WORK SESSION Back to my boudoir, then. Stripping off my public clothes, I wrapped in Ghana cloth for modesty and coolness, as the ceiling fan whirred, sipping the ice tea I'd prepared from my morning tea in my small icebox.

I then wrote again for several hours until I tired in the late afternoon/early evening. I might then go over to the Busua Beach Resort every few days to check my email on their pay-per-use service.

EVENING REPAST Back to the African Rainbow Resort for a repeat performance by Chef Michael and my servers. Sometimes we'd dance together to the music piped in from the bar...or I'd meet some more fascinating guests to chat up...or, Stevie (the House Dog) would come to keep me company under the table, nibbling my ankles...or, Miss Vera and her charming baby Merissa (the House Baby) would come down with Priscilla, the young nursemaid, to visit with us all and liven up the space.

Once as I was leaving the door of the resort to pass into the front garden, I met Grace and her midwife friends, here for a conference at the next door Busua Beach Resort---the adjacent much fancier and less welcoming establishment. This night though the conference was throwing a good-bye dance and Grace whisked me off to it, dressed just as I was. She turned out to be a dancing fool who knew all the lyrics to the songs as did her friends. Later, she invited me to Winneba for Carnival on New Years Day...and I went. I stayed at Lagoon Lodge, a very inexpensive guest house where Nana goes for his writing retreats. I met Grace to watch Carival from the front porch of her house, conveniently situated on Main Street where the parade passed. I was warmly welcomed with emblematic Ghanaian hospitality by her entire family and got to see where my new friend lived.

Thus it was throughout my stay. Everything easy-going and generous. No need for oppulence when you have the riches of friendship...and the anchor of a productive day...writing in bed.

Somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean, my West African speech gave way to my Midwestern speech. I am going home...to my ancestral home, the place of my father awaits, heart beating as promised, and the place of our foremothers and forefathers. This December homecoming pilgrimage to Ghana has been a thorough-going success and given me exactly what I needed at this time of the year and in my life. I salute my West African heart home and the people of heart that land contains...and welcome its new president, installed yesterday, January 7th.

Many things occurred getting on the flight at Accra, at the Amsterdam airport, on that aforesaid flight over the Atlantic, and in the Memphis, Tennessee airport. Perhaps they can be spoken of later. No space of the journey is left vacant.

Upon setting foot inside my apartment and the balance beam scales therein, I discover that I have been on the HAPPINESS DIET: GO TO GHANA AND LOSE WEIGHT. Can't you just see the cover page headlines flogging that article in the women's self-help magazines in America? 10 pounds to be exact. I am now at a weight lower than before my move to St. Louis, a year-and-a-half ago. I have now lost the 10 pounds that I gained during the Winter of My Seclusion...and a few more besides. This is good. May the trend continue.

I'm pretty fried--yes, fried--I think that's a combo of tired and frazzled--and going to bed now...after a theoretical 24 hours of travel, but more because of the time changes. I'll be laying low over the next few days as I catch up on my writing and my biological body.