Austin House, the house in which I am living is located in Njiro, one of Arusha's most affluent areas. It contains compounds that even American standards would deem decadent. And yet, next door, across the street,
and just around the corner exist equally beautiful but tragically poor villages containing twice or three times as many people. The affluent of Arusha build walls around their compounds and higher the poor as their cooks,
gardeners, and night watchmen. We pay our highered staff $50 a week and those with whom I have spoken consider this, comparatively, a good salary. Every couple of days as I walk to and from work at least one person will say to me, "Give me money". I regrettably shrug and say that I have none (I never carry around money if I do not need to). I would like to carry on a conversation with these people, but my Swahili is still very poor and "Give money" and "good morning" are typically the only English phrases they know (I can not tell you how many times I have been walking home at 5:30 pm and someone will greet me "good morning". I
respond "Jambo" and carry on). On Thursday afternoon, following an exhausting game of football (soccer
for you Americans.I should add that African football makes me feel old. A combination of not having exercised for the past month and the altitude has sent this Mazungu (white man) gasping for air) a housemate introduced me to alternative rout home from work through one of these villages "just around the corner". This walk has weighed heavily on my mind over the past few days.

Michael and I strolled rather slowly through the village, as my muscles were unwilling to move very quickly (they were voicing their discontent at three consecutive days of heavy physical activity). It was a beautiful walk. The residents, taking advantage of the areas high water table and the run off from the adjacent hills, have fashioned irrigation ditches to nourish groves of bananas, maize, potatoes, shrubs, and shade trees. The sound of running water through these open channels coupled with the lush greenery that these ditches support create a serine environment. The trees ward off the harsh afternoon sun while the flowing water masks at least some of the days busyness.

Unfortunately, the village's aesthetic beauty does not indicate equal access to wealth and social services. Instead, it acts only to soften the injustices that exist throughout Arusha. It makes it easier for people like me -
people with at least modest wealth, people on the other side of the world's inequality - to walk through this village. I can marvel at its beauty, at the flowers, at the trees, at the signs of life, while remaining blind or at
least in denial of the village's other, less attractive, attributes.

As Michael and I were walking through the village, a group of young children ran to us. While Michael was speaking to a group of them in Swahili, one of the younger members, I would say about four years old, reached for my hand. His tiny fingers closed around mine and her large round face (large in proportion to the rest of his body) filled with joy - a grin graced his lips and his eyes filled the sparkle only a child's eyes can fill with (a shaven head is typical of both boys and girls. I suspect this has something to do with hygiene, perhaps lice, but I am not sure. Regardless, this unisex haircut makes it difficult to distinguish between boys and girls. This is why I alternate between feminine and masculine pronouns). It was a precious moment, again illustrating the beauty here and I suspect anywhere in the world children are present. Yet, a closer look at this beautiful face revealed some of the other realities many of Africa's children experience. The child's bright eyes and
contagious grin filled a face streaked with dirt - dirt possibly from a day spent with her older sister minding his family's grazing cows and goats, or possibly dirt from the previous few day's activities - dirt that remains because the water his mother brings from the community spigot is only enough for cooking and drinking. The cloths this child was wearing are also telling. They sport faded and tattered American logos - the leftovers of what even a less than affluent American child has replaced with something newer.

It is easy to walk through life enjoying this village's beauty. As my time in Mexico and now in Arusha illustrate, even the most impoverished of places - where food is scarce, medicine unaffordable, and water dangerous to drink - possess beauty. This perhaps speaks to a powerful and hope-giving component of
the human spirit. The resilience of beauty - that regardless of our predicament, we can create something that conveys hope, peace, joy, serenity, comfort - leaves me with faith that the future will be at least tolerable - that despite the quagmire we humans create for ourselves, some sort of beauty, some reason to live will persevere.

Unfortunately, focusing only this beauty and the perseverance of the human spirit does not expose us to all of life's realities therefore weakening the possibilities for the future. If I were to look at the face of the poor child
who shook my hand and simply revel in her beauty, I would be acting only to perpetuate his poverty. Yet, ironically, when I immerge from my mystification, when I truly try to acknowledge this child's life (admittedly, in one brief encounter I have not adequately done this), my mind becomes muddled by a thick West Highland fog. It reveals both my privilege and my helplessness.

This afternoon I was looking over an Anthropology book. The author, Clifford Geertz, in exploring the morality of the social sciences, paraphrased a quote from Francis Bacon. Bacon with the help of Geertz said, "Knowledge - at least the sort of knowledge I have been able to dig up - does not always come to much in the way of power" (Available Light 24). I think that this quote adequately describes the source of the cloud that currently hangs over me. I can acknowledge the poverty, I can see the beauty and at least some of the
hardships many Africans must endure. I can try to come to a more complete understanding of what their "life" entails (I do not want to delude you, I am still in the infantile stages of this discovery). But what can I do with
this knowledge? It is sometimes better to remain above the clouds, to simply see the beauty that exists in things. For when we sink into the clouds - when we begin to see things more completely (and I want to stress begin because I do not think that we can ever truly see things completely), we often see how powerless
we are. Fortunately the clouds, even in the West Highlands of Scotland, dissipate from time to time. Sometimes the clouds do recede and people can make a difference. The challenge is entering the clouds and remaining in them long enough to find your way to the surface.

I am sure that this dilemma will be with me for a life time.
From Arusha,

Tim