Non-Verbal Communication 101

The most interesting people here are the ones who I feel like I can’t adequately communicate with. I’m frustrated by my verbal limitations here. Even when I am (I think) speaking the same language, the accents are so different that both I and the other person end up repeating ourselves over and over trying to be understood. Sometimes I finish a conversation aware that my mouth is really tired because I have been focusing so much on an exaggerated enunciation of each and every word, every syllable. It reminds me of vocal warm ups from drama class in high school.

But then there are the situations where I have a true language boundary. Like I have with the gardener. He’s a very sweet guy. He greets me every morning with a big smile and “good morning madame!” Most of the exchanges we have usually consist of me saying something, usually with pantomime gesturing, and him grinning and nodding saying “okay!” It doesn’t matter what I have said, or what I have asked him. The response is always a spirited “okay!” He has no idea what I’m saying, I think.

Today (Saturday) I was sitting out on the front patio writing Christmas cards. He came around the corner, saw me sitting there and greeted me. We briefly discussed the universally appealing topic of the weather (I said, “the sun came out!” because this morning it was overcast. He grinned and replied “okay!”). He sat down on another chair and looked off across the yard towards the primary school behind us, where there seems to be an all day festival going on with lots of singing and dancing and drumming. I’m not entirely sure what he was doing there, and I tried a few more angles of conversation before I gave up and got back to my Christmas cards.

It’s quite possible that he simply wanted company.

See, this guy is the gardener, and as far as I know, that’s his main, possibly only job. He lives in a small house on the compound. At night I hear music playing from his house. During the day, he is often talking to the day guard, a young woman who is also very nice. (I have decided that they would make a good couple. :-)) He is single, and his family is in a village far, far away. He says he may get back there over the holidays at some point but that's not certain.

It must be really lonely being far away from your family, and not having people to talk to who understand you. The day guard was gone today, which probably added to his boredom.

I can understand what he’s going through. I went to hang out at the mall today. The MALL. I’m 31 years old. Hanging out at the mall on a Saturday afternoon is something that people don’t usually do past the age of 16. Nevertheless, sometimes when you need human interaction, you are willing to go to desperate measures. So, when push comes to shove, I hang out at the mall in a far away country, and my gardener friend hangs out on the front porch with the Mzungu who can’t even communicate with him. Sometimes we expect very little from companionship I guess. Sometimes someone’s presence is just enough.