Location(s):
Cote d'IvoireType:
Cote d'IvoireCreator:
Sarah Erdman
Publisher:
Picador
Erdman, who now works for the Peace Corps in Washington, D.C., spent
two years in Nambonkaha, a northern Ivory Coast village, starting in
1998. As a culturally sensitive community development volunteer it
took her time finding her place in a culture so outside her own. She started working on maternal and
child health by introducing the regular weighing of babies, as a means
of monitoring malnutrition and as a way of opening the door to essential health-care. Without funds or equipment, she only has access to rudimentary first aid: cleaning and bandaging wounds,
cooling down a fever or recognizing malaria and going to the nurse for
pills. By the end of Erdman's stay, with the support of the village,
she'd moved on, to birth control and AIDS prevention
education. Erdman focuses on the story behind the story: how
she learned local ways, how she gained the confidence and friendship of
assorted villagers and even how she felt helpless in dealing with issues, like female genital mutilation. In the end, she understands
the village world view so well, she can imagine better ways to deal
with certain issues. This is an engrossing,
well-told tale certain to appeal to armchair travelers and to
anyone-especially women-considering international volunteer work.
