When I run in Africa, I hear the giggles of Tanzanian children along the red dirt road that splits the coffee fields. I’ve been told that Tanzanians only run if they’re running away from something. I can understand this as I zigzag along the road to avoid piles of elephant dung. Yesterday I looked up into the trees and pictured a lioness hanging from a limb, ready to pounce on me at any moment.
When I run, I wear an Argentinian soccer jersey (number 10 for Messi), hoping that at least people will I assume I’m running to soccer practice, or running to get in shape for soccer. As long as it’s only the giggles of children and not the roar of a lion, I’ll keep running on this little road. “Silly Mzungu” I imagine them saying. The lioness thinking… chakula (lunch).
It’s true that Tanzanian women don’t need to run. They spend all day caring for children, cooking, balancing kilos of wood or water on their heads. During a walk last week, I wanted to take a picture of the woman laboring behind the young, healthy man jauntily walking in front of her, without a load to speak of.
In the car yesterday, a group of us had a discussion about how to solve this problem, of women doing all the work. You create women’s groups, give women microloans, but how do you keep the idle men from resenting the women for their triumphs and lashing out at them? What will change the way men think, that to provide for their family is the manly thing to do?
