How do you help?

How do you help?

What do you do?  How do you handle requests?  How do you say no when even the little you have as a PhD student seems like absolute wealth to those in your life?  How do you manage ethical guidelines with reality, morals, and the desire to be a human being who still has a heart?  These are questions I face daily and I want to just tell you about one woman in particular whose life story implores me to continue contemplating my place in this world as a researcher and human being.

Let us call her Christine.

 

Back in February, I met this woman named Christine.  I sensed something horribly sad in her demeanour even though she was very polite to me.  My language guide told me to take a picture of her granary even though it sadly was empty.  On that first visit she told me she couldn’t afford to send her children to school and asked if I knew anyone who could sponsor any of her children to go to school.  I apologized and told her no, explaining my role as a researcher but told her if I found a way, I would let her know.  I then encouraged her to seek support from some of the NGOs that sponsor children – I felt pathetic saying this because I know how these things work and her daughters weren’t going to get a sponsorship after the beginning of the school year.  I also knew she had no chance since some of the recipients had parents who were able to ‘manoeuvre’ their way into sponsorship, an ability I know Christine didn’t have.

Ever since meeting her, something compelled me to always return to her and visit.  People here ask for many things but Christine struck me differently – she never tells me she is hungry (which is so commonplace here that is now part of the greeting) or complains – but only enquired if I knew about sponsorships for school, which is how many kids here attend school. 

So last week I went back again to Christine as she agreed to do an interview for my research.  And I want to share some of her story with you.

The day I met Christine she was contemplating suicide; she told me life had become too difficult and she had no hope and nothing to give her children.  Christine had lived for seven years in that village before it was burnt down.  The previous night men quarrelled and disputed the land ownership which led to its firey demise.  Christine watched from a distance as her home compound burned to the ground – a home she built literally by hand and by walking long distances to cut and carry wood, mold and bake mud bricks and collect grass bundles to make the roof. The day we met she returned to this village because she was seeking some support from her sister-in-law Lucy (they married brothers) who lives next door.  She wanted to try to rebuild her old compound next door to Lucy.

Christine had struggled for years and things seemed to just get worse.  Her husband was murdered roughly 12 years ago in a cattle raid and all her cattle, and thus wealth, was gone. Two of her children have died and she has one boy and three girls left.  She has been farming to feed the family ever since.  She managed to scrape together some funds to send two of her daughters to school – Helga is in Primary 6 (second to last year of elementary) and Katerina is in Primary 1 (Kindergarten) walking several kilometres back and forth each day scholar because that’s all Christine could pay for.

Christine told me that just before her village was burnt, she had a dream in which two ladies came to her home and asked her to go with them.  She saw them as a blessing and followed them in the dream because she believed they would help her.  When she escaped the village fire the night before we met, she escaped by the route from her dream and felt blessed because the normal route had been taken by those who burnt the village and they beat the newly homeless villagers along the way.  

That is how I found Christine.  She has been wearing the same dirty shirt and skirt since the day we met so that she can use all she has for her children.  Like many here, she sniffs tobacco since it is cheaper than food and it curbs the hunger for longer.

Christine after receiving a skirt as a gift from a religious sister who moved away.

The problem here is that there are no easy or correct answers and yet all the answers you can imagine leave you unsatisfied, wishing for an easy way to handle dilemmas in life.  But I think maybe that’s the way it’s supposed to be – difficult, a constant challenge to your heart, your intellect, your character.  How am I 'to be' with Christine?  Who can I be to her and with her?

There are no easy answers and it’s not just a problem here in Africa or Uganda.  How do you help and how do you know that what you are doing is actually helpful?  

Does it make you feel good?  Is it helpful to make yourself feel good?  If you feel good about helping does that mean that’s why you did it or you did it because the people you helped asked for it?  How do you look out for the well-being of others in a way that is not paternalistic and demeaning?  How do you help someone and treat them with dignity acknowledging their capabilities?

Christine told me in the interview that she had nothing to give her children.  Nothing.  She said she had nothing and it broke my heart.  Think about that.  Is it my place to try to show her that the sacrifice of her entire life and dedication to her children is worth everything?  Then again, who I am to say it is worth everything when it’s easy for me to think about feelings and emotions since I know I will eat today and tomorrow and the day after that.  It’s easy to think about feelings and values when you know you will be fed.  It's too easy to see her as heroic and it's too easy for Christine to see herself as a failure.  How do we meet?  How do encounter one another?  How do we 'be' with people?

How do you negotiate and navigate a relationship with Christine?  How can you help and continue to treat people with dignity?  

Who is the Christine in your life?