Seagel in the City

As part of our recently completed In-Service Training program we were required to bring a counterpart (someone from the village that a PCV would like to establish a strong working relationship with) to Lusaka for a 3-day workshop on development and gardening. So, almost by default I invited my most consistent and reliable village friend, Seagel, to come to the workshop. He is only 19 years old (much younger than any other PCV counterpart) and he had never been to Lusaka before. I thought the trip would give him a better understanding of where Joy and I come from and also show him what life outside the village is like. I was right about those things, but I didn’t give much thought to how mind-blowing the whole experience would be.

It is hard to really understand what village life here is like without seeing/experiencing it, but Seagel has lived in a rural Zambian village with thatch-roofed houses, well water he has to carry himself and with the nearest market or town a short 65km away his whole life. He had experienced things and ideas from more developed countries in very small doses – airplanes flying over our village, 2nd hand clothes from America and Europe in small market shops, pictures of home from Joy and me, etc – but never so many new and foreign things at the same time. Seagel had never seen a streetlight or roundabout let alone so many cars as they flew through them. We travelled together to Arcades (a popular, upscale shopping center) because he had heard of it before and he wanted to see what it was like. We walked slowly through his first parking lot and past electronic stores, clothing shops, internet cafes and restaurants. We stopped in at a fast food chicken place to check it out and I offered to buy Seagel dinner. But after looking at the menu, he concluded that it was so expensive (about $8 for a meal) that he couldn’t even let me buy him food there. So we walked to the nearest filling (gas) station and I bought him a meat pie – something he had seen in our local market but had never tried. I took him to a grocery store next and he confidently and calmly walked past shelves full of unfamiliar foods as I pointed out things that I liked and things he would know. We had our picture taken in front of the grocery store and in the parking lot full of cars and in true Zambian style he kept a stone cold face. On our way back to training we walked by the movie theatre and as badly as I wanted to see “Predators” – no sarcasm, I really wanted to see it – I decided that Seagel would have to wait for his first movie which was probably for the better because it’s all downhill from there.

It’s impossible to say what Seagel was feeling during those two hours (for the most part he was silently taking in the whole experience), but he told me how much he enjoyed it the next day at training. We feel that we can slightly relate to Seagel’s overwhelming experience of being thrown into a world that you had only heard of or read about, but I think, at least initially, that it’s easier to take a few steps back than it is take a few jumps forward. Seagel is grateful to have seen a bit of our lives, and I am grateful to have been openly welcomed into his.