A Good Poison Called Chagrin

During my first day back at the Lower Primary school after a month-long hiatus, the teachers and I were excited to see each other. They invited me to a Housewarming in the afternoon so we met beforehand at the school. While waiting for everyone to arrive, Achamma Miss, the "Headmistress", and I swept up the office space. Beena Miss soon arrived with her freshly powdered boys in tow. I always want to remember her reaction upon seeing me for the first time since my trip to the north.

She winced.

Then she curled up her nose until I wondered if I stepped in something putrid. She pointed to my face, hers still scrunched, and said with disgust and sincere disappointment, “You have lost your beauty.” Achamma Miss agreed, “Your complexion is gone.” I smiled, having expected this reaction (though not to this extent!). During the trip north I had gotten a tan and, hence, I lost my painfully pearly white complexion that the teachers adore. “Beauty poyo,” they said to each other (beauty is gone), as if my hopes of a good, similarly pale husband are now just a dream ruined by Rajasthan’s desert sun. But we were soon finished mourning and returned to telling jokes, the best of which was on me.

Lunch at the Housewarming consisted of heaps of rice served on a fake banana leaf plate with vegetable curry, curd, beef fry, fish curry, thoran and avail with ice cream to finish. I ate exuberantly and said “nala pachanam!” afterwards, an attempt to say “good meal!” This is a phrase I use often (as most every meal is excellent) and have, until this moment, passed the pronunciation test. The teachers looked at me and laughed hysterically (not an unusual sight). I had said, much to my dismay, “good poison!” instead of “good meal!” This is an apt demonstration of my difficulty with Malayalam pronunciation. I would not be an asset to a peace and reconciliation team, would I?

This banter was familiar to me and it felt like a homecoming party. Amidst the laughs, Achamma Miss pulled out a roll of blue prints and much to my amazement, before me was the sketch of a new school building, complete with classroom separations, new indoor bathroom facilities, and a new office. I picked up my jaw from the dirty, cement floor of the current office only to have it drop again when she showed me the cost estimate of Rupees 1,400,000 ($35,000). I was ecstatic to know that the Church of South India Education Board recognized the school’s great need and is on its way to fixing it. It may take years to raise the funds, but the acknowledgement of need and action to change things is an enormous first step.

I must admit, though, that it puts me to shame. This may be the most important lesson I’ll learn this year and I hope that, through my extreme chagrin, you will also learn from my big-headedness.

When I arrived in Mavelikara in September 2006, I began to teach at this Lower Primary school. It is dilapidated: a 135-year-old building that has yet to be repaired, an outdoor latrine, blackboards with huge scratches making it impossible to write, only 4th standard has desks, the classrooms are not separated. I harshly judged the Church of South India’s (CSI) district Education Board and the local church associated with the school for not seeing what I saw. I tried to learn as much as I could and for some I became a broken record about the school. I wrote a letter to the CSI Eduction Board and never sent it. I brainstormed how I could resolve the problem, thinking, “If no one here will do anything, I must.” I made assumptions upon assumptions, one assumption was that I understood the problem and another assumption was that I could solve it when the community could not.

As the blue print sat in front of me and the carefully outlined estimate proved its reality, I became embarrassed at my presumptuousness. As I outsider, I came in and thought I could fix the problem I saw. I felt I knew better than the community; that they were ignoring a huge problem. It was more than presumptuous, it was orientalist.

A week earlier I asked Thomas John Achen (my country-supervisor) if I could pay for new chalkboards at the LP school (“At least!” I thought). We talked back and forth about whether it is appropriate and how it would be best executed. When I returned to the LP school yesterday, I saw that they had painted over the old chalkboards with glistening, black paint. Tail between my legs, I realized the importance of “accompaniment” over taking control. It is more meaningful that the community and the Church of South India decided what actions to take and did so. Action within the community, instigated by the community, ensures continued support from within. It is empowering and lasting.

This does not deny the continued presence of inequality in education and the prevalence of poverty in Mavelikara. But maybe I denied the existence of those same things in the United States and thought I knew best because of it. In other situations in India or the United States, my accompaniment and advocacy may have proven quite useful. In this instance, I am happy that the improvements are being handled from within.

This may be one of the most important lessons I learn this year about “accompaniment.”

UPDATE: A week after writing this article, a section of the roof of the LP School collapsed. Since then, Bishop Moore College has opened 3 rooms to house the LP School for one year so that construction of a new LP School can begin immediately!