Fulbright Pre-Departure Orientation

Two weeks ago, I went to Washington for the Fulbright pre-departure orientation for students and scholars who will be working in Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. The Fulbright Commission is funding me to work in Ethiopia for 10 months starting this fall.

The first day of the orientation consisted of motivational speeches from the Fulbright Commission.  Between sessions, I had the same 7 minute conversation with every other person I bumped into.  ”Where are you going?” “What are you doing?” “Damn, that sounds awesome.”  Projects ranged from studying the rise of woman’s basketball in Senegal to interviewing second and third generation Palestinian refugees in Lebanon about their legal status to producing a documentary on Indian women acting as surrogate mothers for western couples.  It was an honor to find myself among such an ambitious and creative group.

Eileen Wilson-Oyelaran, President of Kalamazoo College unceremoniously ended the rosy, congratulatory tone of the orientation with her keynote speech at the opening dinner.  She has been keynote speaker for the pre-departure orientation for several years now.  Her message consisted of four blessings for our trips.  The blessings were structured like beatitudes from the Gospel of Matthew and rang more like advice and challenges.

  1. Blessed is she who embraces her mother, for she shall be the beneficiary of unimagined gifts.
  2. Blessed is he who knows himself, for he will make better sense of his own responses.
  3. Blessed is she who knows the difference between being a guest and a host, for she will refrain from putting her country and herself in a very bad light.
  4. Blessed are those who are flexible for they will not be tied into knots.

The second blessing stood out as a series of syndromes that Wilson-Oyelaran encouraged us to be on guard for.  Not knowing oneself could produce devastating results in the form of these syndromes.  First, Missionary Syndrome imbued foreigners with a conviction that the people and the ecosystems of Africa were in need of saving through outside intervention.  Second, Curiosity Syndrome saw Africa as an exotic place with people available for scrutiny similarly to intriguing wildlife.  Those with this syndrome might find it totally acceptable  to ‘go native’.  Third, Intellectual Superiority Syndrome assumed that since the university infrastructure is not what it might be in developed countries, it’s welcome and acceptable for foreigners to tell those at the host institution how they should be running their schools.  Finally, the Homecoming Syndrome experienced by African-Americans visiting Africa leads them to believe that they will be welcomed as lost relatives.

Eileen Wilson-Oyelaran’s speech got me mentally on my toes.  I thought about what I needed to do to ward of the syndromes and how to benefit from her blessings.  Several Fulbright alumni said she gave the kind of talk they wished they had heard before they went to work on their projects.  Her full speech is available here. (I had previously liked to last year’s version.  The link has been updated at the request of the State Department.  Sorry about that! – 7/15)

The next day and a half consisted of smaller, region specific sessions, most of which were just as sobering as the keynote speech.  Former Fulbright students to Africa reminded us of the importance of being practical about what we can accomplish, pacing ourselves, and reaching out to the local community.  In the Ethiopia session, I met the other Fulbright student Shawn Mollenhauer who will be doing ethnomusicology research from the capital, and Alice Klement, Fulbright alumni who literally just got off the plane after being in Africa for over a year and a half teaching in Addis Ababa University’s Journalism and Communications program.  I picked their brains to compile a reading list and contacts.

I never doubted the need to prepare for my time in Ethiopia regardless of how much experience abroad I might have. The orientation was a well timed reminder of this.  I still have several months to implement the insight and nervous motivation I brought back from DC.  In New York, I’ve been reading blogs, warming up to the Amharic alphabet, listening to the Ethiopiques series, and scowering a few library systems.  Ethan Zuckerman and Erik Hersman‘s blogs have been particularly motivating and insightful.  A polyglot friend jumped at the opportunity to help me learn the Amharic alphabet as an excuse to learn her 4th alphabet.   The Amharic fidel will only be my second alphabet.

I have an ambitious list of things to accomplish before I leave.  Wilson-Oyelaran’s fourth blessing comes to mind: “Blessed are those who are flexible for they will not be tied into knots.”  She told us that Africa taught her to treat her to-do list as a hypothesis.  I might have to start implementing that mentality now.