Walls Around Us

A view from our rooftop of neighboring walls
around almost every piece of property

I remember being somewhat ashamed last summer when my son was in the US in a preschool setting and the teacher mentioned to me that when he built a house out of blocks, he built walls around it. Oh it sounds so terrible - closing off the world. I thought, 'my children are not going to be right if they think all homes have a wall around them'.

Recently I was thinking about these walls and realized that in Niger, although they are physically built, the wall really isn't there. For most of our neighbors, there are no boundaries! People walk into homes and properties without knocking (or more commonly without waiting for an affirmative response). I am guessing homes average 5-15 visitors a day. Every person at the home at a meal time or snack time is fed. Neighbor children literally become your children for the day. Tea is something to enjoy with your neighbors or friends for at least two hours. Cards are played with neighbors and friends regularly. People who are sick or in mourning are regularly visited (not just by a pastor / elder / deacon) by church members, women's groups, neighbors and friends daily. Although there is a wall around homes here, there is no wall. Or it certainly doesn't function like we think of walls.

Another view of walls after walls in the neighborhood

These walls that aren't fully walls are very visible to us here, but we are just as used to being exposed to our own kind of walls back in the US. We have so many societal expectations that build walls (realizing there is also much diversity of culture in the US; this does not apply to all, but certainly many neighborhoods)

While most houses in the US don't have 7 ft. walls around them, we certainly have ways of cutting ourselves off from our neighbors across neighborhoods, picket fences, property lines, sealed air-conditioned houses etc. Or it may be over-scheduled activities, lack of conversation, and the individualizing of everything that build so many more walls.

We were told an example that has become somewhat proverbial among "africans" to describe the differences we have in our excesses and values. A westerner will build a very big house and then each member of the family will sit in a different room. An african will buy a piece of cloth big enough for four people and then just wear it himself. We find it is taking a while to weed our individualizing societal norms and expectations. But it is a work in progress, and we are grateful to be taking more steps towards being more open.

--La Maestra