—Senator J. William Fulbright
I have to admit that when I heard I'd been granted a Fulbright Scholar fellowship, I was pretty happy. It is one of the foremost awards given to academic types; although, to be fair, I am guessing the competition was a little less fierce to come to Namibia. But, one never knows and the end result is the same, so I won't ask too many questions. Fulbright administrators are quick to point out that 48 former Fulbrighters are Nobel Prize winners--more than any other academic program. So, this is just the beginning, I am sure...!
My happy mental state was set back a bit when I attended the Fulbright orientation program in Washington DC in June 2008 (I applied in August 2007, was accepted in March 2008 for the award which is in place for the entirety of 2009...it's a long process). The orientation made it clear several times that the large-picture goal of the program was to effect world peace, as shown by the quote, above, from Senator Fulbright who started this taxpayer funded program after WWII. OK, so this isn't just a vacation....we have to bring peace to the world before we come home? Hmmm...
Perhaps it's appropriate--given the recent 64th anniversary of the bomb at Hiroshima--to be thankful our policy-makers still choose to spend our tax money on programs like Fulbright. But, that places a big burden on us Fulbright folks, right?
Well, I'm used to big burdens. I'm an ecologist and our environment is going to pot. That's on my shoulders, too. So, now I have world peace and climate change to fix? No problem--remember the adage, "Think globally and act locally"? I think that is still the answer.
This is all a long introduction to convince you, readers of NTN, that today's American Cowboy Chili booth at Polytechnic's International Cuisine Day was more than just a chili give-away. It was our first official act as ambassadors for the good ol' USA. The US Embassy does not host a booth at the Cuisine Day, which is dotted by booths from other Embassies in town. But, the US Cultural Center (part of the Embassy) was nice enough to provide us with a bunch of red-white-and-blue banners. We took it from there, with the help of our fellow Fulbrighters the Bates family, Polytechnic's English Language Fellow, Marsha, and our friend Uapii. We had to invite Uapii, because he's a nice guy and because he calls himself the "Kunene cattleman". We had to have one real cowboy at the booth...
We arrived early to set up and soon had the USA represented 'in the house'. Workers from other booths, who owned much more appropriate clothing to represent their country (what is the official uniform of the USA?) came by and were early samplers of our chili. Everyone loves a cowboy, we found out.
After the ceremony to start the Cuisine Day (Rector's speech, dance, karate demonstration, dance, speech), the flood gates opened and we were set upon by Polytechnic students looking for cheap food. We were providing a cup of chili, garnished with cheese and sour cream and 4-5 Doritos chips (cheese flavor--closest thing to tortilla chips we could find). Our price was initially N$10 (about US$1.20), but we quickly lowered it to N$5 to satisfy the students.
Then, the rush was on. We served over 4 gallons of chili in about 45 minutes--about 70 servings and were the first booth to run out of food. That either means we had the best food, or we were the least prepared with large quantities. Maybe a mixture of both.
We had several students, who we didn't know, come over and have their photo taken with us in front of the American flag. One lady brought her baby over for me to hold so she could take a photo of us. Turnabout is fair play, I suppose--we've been taking photos of Namibians all year. But, it felt good to hear good things said about our country.
One passerby, upon hearing we had sold out, commented that "I think it is ironic that the USA is a superpower, and yet today you have run out of chili."
Well, maybe the USA needs to run out of chili more often. Is that what Senator Fulbright meant?
2 comments:
Great post, Larkin. Sorry I couldn't/didn't help out more; my plan was to take the second shift, but, quite conveniently, there was no second shift! Now that you've figured out the dynamics of supply and demand, it's a shame you won't be around Polytechnic this time next year... Marsha
You're doing good work and your post made my mouth water. It's 96 in Lincoln and I can't imagine eating chili, but you made it sound good. Keep up the good work!
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