So yesterday, I came to water my tree nursery. I planted it in a new cooperative that I haven’t worked a lot with recently. They’re in a different part of town, but were really excited when I said that I would plant tree’s for them. I planted 200 Moringa tree’s in little tiny black tree sac’s. One of the Ag/Fo objectives is planting Moringa tree’s in Co-op’s. So, I was excited.

I had been away for a few day’s visiting my friend Liz in Silibe, in South Brakna. I wanted to bring some Neem tree’s to Taiba. So, I went down to her site. It just happened to be during the iid. Everybody was celebrating Mohammad’s birthday. They were still celebrating when I got back on Wed.

Anyway, so I hadn’t been in town for a while and before I left I had told them that I wasn’t going to be able to water them and if somebody could take over the position for me while I was away. I think they understood what I was saying. You never really know.

Apparently, while I was away, the fence broke. The animals took over everything. They ate the entire garden: all the tomato plants. They destroyed my tree nursery. All 200 tree’s. Half of them I moved into a new co-op. The one that I normally work with. The other half are just sitting there: dirt, sand, and ash spread everywhere–bag’s torn in two. All the tree’s that were sprouting were bent over from lack of watering. The co-op members just abandoned them and left them for the goats. After all the work it took to crush dried cow manure into fine powder!!!

So, I sat there crying. I was upset. I was angry. I was frustrated. I didn’t know what to do or who to complain to. I didn’t know if it was just a whole big misunderstanding. Did they not care?

And what happened to the fence? Did the wind blow it down? Did a cow run over it? I left it in perfect shape five day’s before…

They might be mad at me for leaving and say that it’s my fault. But, when I started the nursery I told them that I wasn’t always going to be in Taiba and that I would need them to water it while I was away. It was for them, I shouldn’t have to do all the work. How is that sustainable?

So, frustrated and crying I took trips back and forth between the two co-ops. It had to cross over a dried up river bed. Full of sand and garbage. Tree sac’s would fall and the dirt would get everywhere, it was hell. I couldn’t collect myself for whatever reason. I couldn’t explain to the co-op ladies why I was frustrated with the other co-op. I think I said that the animals got to them. That the women just left them sitting there over the iid. They thought my description was hilarious and I did look rather pathetic.

However, after making five or so trips it was getting to late to work any more. God knows what they think of women who walk around by themselves at night. I didn’t want them thinking I was a prostitute.  So I went home.

But I had to go home through their neighborhood. The co-op where I had the tree’s. I was so mad that I walked right by the ladies boutique (store) without greeting her. She was the one that I had asked to oversee the watering. When I’m a mess, I can’t speak Hasseneyan. So the kids, in that neighborhood got angry. They said I was crazy. One tried to throw a rock at me. So, the situation got out of hand. I was trying to block them all out. I was trying to calm myself down. But, of course, kids can’t realize that. Kids, don’t realize these things.

So that was my hellish day: A destroyed tree nursery, two misbehaved kids, and thousand tears later I crawled into my mosquito net. Played U2, Coldplay, and the Cities 97 Sampler. Trying to figure out how I was going to fix the situation. How I was going to explain my actions to kids. How I was going to work with a co-op that wouldn’t pull their weight.

Sometimes I just have to take things one day at a time. I have to focus on the future and try to see what can be scavenged from all this. If anything. Sounds like fun right?

I woke up in the morning, fixed the tree’s, watered them, and hopefully they will grow. Hopefully it won’t all be a waste. I guess we’ll see though. It’ll take some time to know if I’ll need to replant.

~Ava

~ by avalambrecht on March 13, 2009.