Derek Walcott, poet and Nobel laureate born in the Caribbean island state St. Lucia, died in March at the age of 87.
A wonderful poet – his work indicates that there is a complicated history behind every origin. Derek Walcott has influenced and supported the project “ctp 3.0 Caribbean”. Thank you.
-> article in tageszeitung (taz) “Homer aus der Karibik” (German)
-> “Sea Grapes” by Derek Walpott (English)
Picture: Judith Fraune
Rain forest. Green, green, green, everything is so green that you can hardly look your fill. Loud chirping of crickets. Gardens. Fertility. Affectionate people. Lost Souls. Loneliness. Cheerfulness. Sadness. Fog. People behind bars. A lot of Space. Crying. Shouting. Whispering. Silence. Patients in shirts and jumpers discarded by the Bielefeld police. Singing. Prayers. Homemade tea, served veeery sweetly. Five dogs reminding of the five friends by Enid Blyton. A small, beautiful, sad place on a mountain in the middle of the rain forest. Is this the end of the world? Or the beginning?
Judith Fraune
Edson, a cab driver from Daressallam, told us this story:
https://youtu.be/-tSR9_j0MZ4
„A sick person is only sick with regard to a certain idea of health“
(George Morel, Question d’homme: l’autre, Aubier-Montaigne 1977, p.97)
In our search for intercultural differences in the conceptions of disease, we travelled to Tanzania.
We met people with psychiatric illnesses, relatives, doctors, nurses, home care giver, psychiatrists, anthropologists, actors and taxi drivers. We read books and we listened. These are their stories … (to be continued)
When I meet Dommo for the ninth time, we stay between ourselves for one hour. Dommo speaks eagerly about the burial ceremony which the village is preparing for the smith who died recently. All of a sudden he gets anxious and thinks that the goats have invaded the gardens. He jumps up and looks after them. Then he returns and says he was wrong. Suddenly he asks me: “Why do you come here to talk to me for one hour? Then you will go back to Sanga and never come back to talk for an hour again.”
Me: “We have come from far away to get to know the Dogon. We want to talk to them to understand how they live and think and feel.”
Dommo: “This is very costly. Why are you doing that?”
Me: “In our country we are doctors and treat people who are mentally ill. We have learned to understand what makes people unhappy although they could just as well live a happy live. We came to the Dogon to learn how this is with them.”
Dommo: “I see; you come here to see that everyone is happy and content. Then you return home and tell others about it. But why are you doing that: just for fun?”
Me: “Partly for fun, but not only.”
Dommo: “You are doing this to know more than the others living in your country?”
Me: ”Not to know more than others. Maybe we will understand people in general better than before.”
Dommo: “With us it is like this. You go away from home and learn about many things we don’t have in here. You have to be clever in live. But why are you coming to us where there is nothing? Why don’t you go to the big cities? There are factories, cars, schools, cinemas.”
Me: “We have come to the Dogon because we want to know what is going on in their souls, when they are sad or happy, when their lives are difficult or when they are well.”
Dommo: “So you want to know what the soul of the Dogon is like. You won’t earn any money with this. This will only cost you money.”
Me: “You are right. We don’t earn any money with this.”
Domo: „Voilá … what you and your friends are doing here is the same we are doing when we shoot into the air with our rifles. You don’t earn any money with this. The gunpowder costs a lot of money. You understand this and know that you just shoot into the air, for nothing. You are doing it for the soul. Also out of joy, of course, but not only for this. There is a deeper sense to it.”
In this way Dommo understood our intention.
From: „Die Weissen denken zuviel“, Parin, Parin-Matthèy, Morgenthaler, Europäische Verlagsanstalt, Hamburg, 2009, p. 112-113.
A friend from Gambia told me this: „Old people in Gambia still believe in ‚herbs and rooots‘ – like they believe in ghosts – Islam notwithstanding … I often spend time with my grandma in the countryside. When I had a cold, I had to drink a brew made of leafs and blossoms which she had prepared. Ugh, it was a horrible taste – I often spat it“
I am reflecting: Why does modern medicine in fact tastes of nothing – and why do drops or cough syrups have a sweet taste? Because they are produced without vegetables? Or because they do not have any effect?
Today, we are starting to publish posts about the current state of the project ctp 4.0 Africa in a loose connection. They are a kind of brainstorming at which we would like the interested community to participate.
For a start, here is a shot of a script:
INSIDE – EMERGENCY ADMISSON OF A BREMEN HOSPITAL
A young African woman is admitted to the emergency room.
She is accompanied by her brother, a young man, hardly speaking any German, yet a little English. He reports that his sister has come to his place that same day from Frankfurt, where she was living at a casual acquaintance since her arrival in Germany some weeks ago. She was trying to find a job there. For the last days, she had behaved „strangely“, she had seen things obscure to others, been mistrustful, expressed to be fearful – if she expressed anything at all for she would hardly speak, neither with her acquaintance nor with her brother, though she had asked him for help.
The psychiatrist that has been called finds the woman lying on the floor of the emergency admission, hardly responsive. An internist is providing emergency care. Next to the woman there is a little plastic bag with dusty grey flour and a spoon. Other people waiting there report the woman to have eaten a spoonful of the flour.
The brother is not present any more.
