Bridges
>> April 15, 2010
written by Nathan
One thing we got right, even in Africa and Asia, we are best suited working with our own people.
This morning, we said it again to one another as we joked about the caravan of “Save the Children” SUVs posted in front of a fancy sweet shop, ‘If we used all our eagerness to save other peoples within our own communities, the problems in the global south would work themselves out.’ Simplistic truth. As we travel further afield, our local encounters are building bridges across nations. Yet, our work turns constantly inward, toward home.
Our friend Tony Lowe’s father Vin might come across as cynical. Yet, his words of experience ring truer today after a couple weeks in Ethiopia. ‘All aid,’ he says, ‘should be cut off immediately. That will free the nations.’ What he means, I think, is that aid is a form of control in conceit. Aid is corruption contrived.
But, I have seen a better world. I have seen local communities with local leadership. I have seen inverted pyramids of leadership. I have seen collaboration and new role-modeling. I have benefited from exchange.
As the world moves closer together, we feel our options growing. I have thought about my class reaction to an inverted paradigm I offered at a national training of leadership in D.C. last December before leaving on this trip, ‘Instead of Think Globally - Act Locally, try Think Locally - Act Globally.’
This morning, we said it again to one another as we joked about the caravan of “Save the Children” SUVs posted in front of a fancy sweet shop, ‘If we used all our eagerness to save other peoples within our own communities, the problems in the global south would work themselves out.’ Simplistic truth. As we travel further afield, our local encounters are building bridges across nations. Yet, our work turns constantly inward, toward home.
Our friend Tony Lowe’s father Vin might come across as cynical. Yet, his words of experience ring truer today after a couple weeks in Ethiopia. ‘All aid,’ he says, ‘should be cut off immediately. That will free the nations.’ What he means, I think, is that aid is a form of control in conceit. Aid is corruption contrived.
But, I have seen a better world. I have seen local communities with local leadership. I have seen inverted pyramids of leadership. I have seen collaboration and new role-modeling. I have benefited from exchange.
As the world moves closer together, we feel our options growing. I have thought about my class reaction to an inverted paradigm I offered at a national training of leadership in D.C. last December before leaving on this trip, ‘Instead of Think Globally - Act Locally, try Think Locally - Act Globally.’
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