baby whack

There is a little boy who lives in our neighborhood that Julie and I have fondly dubbed "Baby Whack." Why do we refer to him by this strange nickname, you may ask? Well, it has something to do with the fact that he is probably only one and a half years old, and he carries around a small machete. His parents have a produce stand on our street, and its common to see Baby Whack, knife in hand, sitting on the ground next to it chopping away at something, keeping himself entertained.

Can you imagine how mortified an American parent would be to see their child sitting on the side of a ditch on a dirty road playing with a rusty machete? But the funny thing is that Baby Whack has probably never cut himself with that old knife... In fact, his little hands are quite capable. Because he's probably been playing with that knife for awhile now. He's seen his parents cutting the pineapples and potatoes that they sell, and he's just imitating them.

American children do the same thing. Julie was telling me that one of her friends recently told her a story about her two year old daughter. The little girl picked up her mom's iPod and started making a small, circular motion with her thumb. While Baby Whack is learning how to chop things, this baby girl is learning how to select a song on an iPod. Amazing.

All children learn different motor skills early on, and its been so fascinating to see how the culture you grow up in dramatically effects that. I'll give another example.... One of our new summer interns, Meagan, has been living at the workshop with our two Ugandan managers, Emma and Agnes. Meagan decided that she wanted to learn how to hand-wash her clothes, since washing machines are virtually non-existent here. {side note: I tried to wash my own clothes by hand for the first three months I was here, but caved and now have a woman come once a week to wash for me... I got tired of being dirty all the time and having stained clothes} Anyway, Meagan was an eager pupil, and Agnes went out to observe the lesson.

The next week at work, Agi was telling me all about the lesson and cracking up. She said "my little sister is better at washing clothes than Meagan, and she's only 6!" She thought it was hilarious that Meagan didn't know how to do a chore that in Uganda is so common and simple. This lead to an interesting conversation with Agi.... I told her that I didn't know how to wash clothes by hand either... And bet you would have a hard time finding any American (child or adult) who knows how to wash clothes like that. Maybe they can work the washing machine, but the idea of washing by hand is pretty foreign to Americans.

So I told Agnes that we learn other skills early.... like skills with electronics. Most kids in elementary school know how to work Tivo (better than their parents in some cases!) and can pre-set the TV to make sure they catch their favorite shows. And I had learned how to type and use a computer by the time I was in late elementary school.... And I'm sure that kids these days are learning even earlier. But what about in Uganda? We've been giving the Sseko ladies typing lessons and trying to teach them basic computer skills, because most of them have never had access to computers before... So what if I flipped the situation on Anges, and while watching her type said something like "Any American kid could use a computer better than you!" First of all, I would never say that because I think its rude even though it may be true, but also I understand that we just learned different skills and were exposed to different things as children.

What started out as a funny conversation about Meagan's inability to washing clothes turned into a fascinating conversation between Agnes and I about cultural differences and experiences. The conclusion we came to was that being understanding and graceful in situations like that is always best... because you never know why someone doesn't know how to do something.... whether its an adult's inability to perform "children's" chores, or a baby's impressive skills with wielding a knife.