“If you can’t say anything un-nice…”, Disney World, and other illusory constructs - A cultural encounter

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Dreadful things happen in Africa. Even those that have never been to the continent can name three or more dreadful African things.

I can name plenty.

I can also name several dreadful things about Disney World’s Magic Kingdom (queues; gum on the sidewalk; castle actually uninhabited; that vague creosote odor; teenager dressed as Mickey hard as heck to find; “it’s a small world” lily-white and pretentious; central Florida is all around you; etc). I can certainly divulge plenty of horrible things about each the solar system’s inhospitable eight or so other planets (Jupiter, for example: stormy; cold; gaseous; excessive moons; crushing gravity; that silly, mysterious “Great Red Spot”; no Wal-mart, etc.)

As this blog implies, I live in Africa and, despite getting no kickback from the, AU, SADC, or local Chamber of Commerce, I maintain that there are several not-so-terrible things here.

As an example, I have included the story below. Like most stories in this blog and the Swaziland version that preceded it, it showcases one of the continent’s many protagonists.

For no reason in particular…except to generate intrigue, I will call this brief story “Deus ex machina.”

In my free time, I like to mountain bike. Recently, we took a dusty, grueling loop in Botswana’s so-called “bush” (of Ladies No 1 Detective Agency fame). At our destination—the parking lot of a BP garage—one of the group, to his dismay, noticed that his GPS, which he had secured to his handlebars that morning, was affixed no more. Retracing our steps (or rather tire tracks) some 10km's back proved fruitless.

Two weeks later, about half way into a similar bush-ride, we encountered a lady standing on the single dirt track deep within the rural countryside. In her hand she held the GPS device. She had found “the telephone that didn't ring" in the grass near the trail two weeks prior and had been waiting since early that morning for “the men on the bicycles" to pass by. She had stood in the same spot all day the week before, but we had not ridden that weekend.

Neo was her name. Thanks, Neo.

Quand on a terminé sa toilette du matin, il faut faire soigneusement la toilette de la planète – Eight patient encounters.

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1) She was six. She came in the room and gave me two thumbs up.
2) He was seven. He was given stickers for remembering the names of his meds, one on each hand, and, to protect them, he spent the remainder of the consultation (fifteen minutes) with his hands held upright, as if holding an invisible basketball.
3) He was sixteen. He had no family, at least none that claimed him. He was by himself at the clinic. He was not attending school. He asked if we could help him become a student again.
4) He was five. He spent the visit playfully chewing the edges of a Styrofoam cup, until there were about a hundred such pieces scattered around the floor around him.
5) She was nine. She was angry with her mom for delaying her visit with the doctor. (Mom had been next door refilling her own ARVs.) I reached out my hand for a high five. She frowned at me. I asked what was wrong. She said she was hungry. I gave her a cookie. She smiled, gave me a high five, then remembered she was cross and frowned again. I gave her another cookie. Her mood was thereafter cured. The virus that brought us together was not, but it was not detectible in her blood.
6) She was eight. “My last name means ‘little snake’ she explained. “The snake lives underground and is not a poisonous one. We only see it when we plow. It is a nice snake.” This marked the very first time I had heard an African compliment a snake.
7) He was five and named Prince, but his name was pronounced “Prin-see,” with an emphasis on the second syllable. When asked how he was, he said “Well, doctor, I am just fine.” His mother, in agreement, said, “Prin-cee is very well.”
8) She was eight. She looked four, maybe five. She had a thin face, with sunken cheeks. I asked her to draw a flower for me. She had drawn the same flower a year prior and I wanted to see how she was developing. She refused. “I want to draw a boy,” she insisted. She drew a boy holding a flower.

Because of the HIV medicines now available to these eight and tens of thousands of other African children, they have the opportunity to survive childhood...just like we did.

Isn’t that just wonderful?

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"For me, this is the loveliest and the saddest landscape in the world...I've drawn it one more time [below] to be sure you see it clearly. It's here that the little prince appeared on Earth, then disappeared. Look at this lanscape carefully to be sure of recognizing it, if you should travel to Africa someday, in the desert. And if you happen to pass by here, I beg you not to hurry past. Wait a little while, just under the star! Then if [a child comes to you], be kind! Don't let [him] go on being so sad: Send word immediately that he's come back..."
-The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry