June 27, 2011

I just got back from the Fulbright pre-departure orientation. I learned a lot, already, and I'm not even in Rwanda. Here are two of the insights:
1. the 3 P's: persistence, patience, politeness. These are the virtues that are called for for things to work out for the Fulbright. Another way they put it is to treat all of your plans as hypotheses to be tested. They probably will be at least partially falsified, so have a plan B, C, D, and etc.

2. Deep culture. This is a new concept for me. The concept is distinct from surface culture, what we usually see. The surface culture is things like food, dress, names, language, dance, holidays etc, to list a few at random. It is largely conscious, they say, and easy to observe. Below surface culture is deep culture with two levels: cultural rules, and then cultural assumptions. These are more or less unconscious and very emotionally laden. For example, a deep culture rule is that when you meet somebody on the street you can't just say hello and walk past them. You have to have a fairly long conversation in which you inquire about each others welfare in detail, make a certain amount of small talk, and then depart, wishing each other well. It should take at least 15 minutes. If you don't do it people will get angry at you, and consider you uncivilized. (I've heard stories about this.) The assumption behind this is, I think, that everybody is always connected and that the relationship at the moment is more important than any business type activity. Very unamerican, sensible in some ways, but no one could do it here.

More to follow. My schedule is still a bit up in the air, as the Rwandan government just changed the start of the semester from September to October. I was told that flexibility matters, and that plans are hypotheses, and I'm already seeing that in operation.