"There's no place like home." It's not quite like it sounds....

by Terri Horn, IWM returning from 21 months in Bukoba, Tanzania.

*This blog is written in two parts, the first part leaving Tanzania and the second upon being back in the USA.

Today is December 9^th, 2010. It is Republic Day of Tanzania and next year they will mark their 50 years of freedom from English colonization. For me, I am sitting in an internet café in Dar es Salaam, the business capital of Tanzania, writing my last in-country blog of my experiences here.

I will leave soon to begin a Master’s degree program in New Mexico, studying Sociology and Globalization. I hope to use this degree to further my work of human rights advocacy and non-profit sector work. I know that my time here has prepared me for school and it has given me a real chance to work for community development in a country that is so poor, but yet has so many resources.

So how do I feel about leaving? I am leaving 3 months earlier than expected. I was to stay until March, but ultimately I decided to begin studies in January. It is not that my placement has been a “failure” or even unfulfilling- I have been fighting an internal struggle of to stay or to leave. To stay longer means that I am denying myself an opportunity to make myself a stronger, better person, and the decision was not one of disaster or strife- it is that I truly believe that the Bukoba Women’s Empowerment Association has taken gigantic steps to improve their record keeping, monitoring and evaluation of programs, and expansion of their soy commercial farm has allowed them to invest in social projects that benefit the co-op members, such as educational seminars and a clean water project. Assisting them in this journey was my exact job description when I came here. I have been able to spend my last few months away from the office, conducting focus groups with Global Business Partners, visiting the site of the water project, and spending one last time in the villages with members. I am thinking more about the members that I have met. They have accepted me openly and whole-heartedly. They have not judged me at all and have been welcomed me into their homes. For the many challenges that they face, they are a true example to me of perseverance, wisdom, and grace, and I hope to one day be more like them. I will never forget them and I love them all very much. 

December 16, 2010

When I arrive on Saturday afternoon, I am greeted at the airport by my WGC boss, Tere Dresner, who welcomes me with affectionate greetings and roses. I am staying at her house for 1 week so that I can be at the WGC office, transferring files, having exit evaluations, tying up loose ends. It is a necessary investment- without this, WGC will have less of the documentation that I have worked so hard on. It is the past year and a half of my life- I won’t let it unravel.

As I arrive back into American Holiday culture, finding myself surrounded by Christmas music, stiffening cold weather, and mass advertising, I temporarily distract myself from my feelings by watching new movies and going shopping for accessories such as a computer and a much needed car. This lasts for approximately 3 days and then I am sick of it all again. Sick of shopping the aisles, waiting in lines, reading up on the newest notebooks when I have spent the past 2 years operating on a Windows 2003, stone-age, virus-filled desktop. It doesn’t even matter; and this scares me because it had been my most creative vice for escape. One of my down moments is when I try to go car-shopping at 7 p.m. at night and I find I don’t even have the strength to discuss the different cars with the representative leading me around the displays.

Tuesday is the day when I finally have my first downfall. I wake myself up from crying and 2 hours later, I am still touching up the makeup on my face. I try to perk myself up by finally purchasing a highly-discounted notebook (I bought the 2^nd to last one in the stock!) and my morning improves a bit. At noon, Simone Brown, an IWM associate and board member picks me up for lunch and she begins to discuss with me my experience, comparing it to her 2 years in Peru. Her open demeanor hits me and the tears are coming again so I tell her all of my excuses that I had so wholeheartedly believe in, “I’m getting older”, “I feel it is time for me to be back in school again”. She says how proud of me she is that I listened to myself in deciding whether to stay or go. After this, I have an appointment with Clare, the assistant director of IWM, and I literally walk into her office crying, saying, “It is so hard”. It is like I am compromising a part of myself. Reality is, I just don’t feel the “no place like home” high that comes after the once in a lifetime adventure. Even when I sleep well, I cry almost every morning. I have no appetite and when I do eat, the food doesn’t taste good. I have withdrawn- I am a sad, scared turtle. I don’t have the energy to talk to people and if I’m being completely truthful, I don’t really want to be around anyone, not even my family, as much as I love them, and I’m tired of hearing the question, “How is Africa?!” Not Tanzania. AFRICA. It isn’t the change of scenery or the fact that I left early or that I even felt Bukoba to be a ‘home’ for me; what tears through my chest and rips me up inside is when I get past the excuses to the part of telling people, “But I still love them”. Even though it sounds so self-centered, it is the hardest part that I cannot get past- that no one, not even my coworkers or family, can really understand how I feel.

I feel that I am on the outside looking in- that I am divorced from my own culture. Everyone is telling me this will pass and I know it will, in time. The most paradoxical part is that I cannot solve this for myself, even if I tried. There is no way to make it stop, it’s just a daily process. We will see. Time changes everything.