Hello World

By Ryan Moyer

View from the hostel

I can’t even convince my good friends to listen to my stories about Africa’s trials and tribulations without them being a few pints deep. Prior to departure, I spent 10 days with friends and family in the GTA catching up, getting nostalgic and gossiping. Towards the end of our last family gathering, I asked my family members if they knew why I was going to Africa and what I was doing there. They responded with answered filled with a slur of sociology buzzwords that surprisingly did somewhat resemble my purpose and project. This situation brought about the realization that Chomsky may be right; humans usually remember only the ‘gist’ of what has been heard in speech. It also made me wonder if it was them whom had ignored or forgotten what I had explained about my project due to their busy lives, wandering minds, apathetic attitude or discomfort in addressing the situation, or rather if it was myself who had failed in animating just how important, interesting and imperative this work is. If it is the latter, this is something I will have to remedy during my week making preliminary visits to villages. Here we go again!

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