Right now, Emerson is out on the green lawn in front of our apartment, doing soccer exercises with the Kenyans. There is a family here while the father is working for the UN, with two boys who are 10 and 12. Through mutual gregariousness, and the magnetic attraction that boys have towards other boys, they befriended each other the very first day. The older boys have a genial tolerance and friendliness towards the much littler one, and happily play at kicking the ball around or hide and seek. This morning while eating breakfast, we saw the big boys out with their dad on the lawn, all wearing their soccer outfits, the dad coaching them through various exercises and preparations, obviously very serious about their football. Emerson couldn't wait to get his clothes on and run out and join them. I hoped he wouldn't get in their way, but figured when you live in an apartment you can't stop other children from playing on the lawn too; but the father smoothly switched to English and coaches all three boys. Now they are all earnestly stretching and sideways-running and high-leg jumping across the lawn: the two big Kenyan boys in their sports uniforms, the tall and athletic father, and one little bitty dandelion-headed boy in a button-up shirt.
So, Emerson has decided that he is going to get dark brown skin and look just like the Ugandans. Perhaps this is my fault; after just reading a book about children's racial development, and that in the preschool stages they notice skin color but not race, and don't yet realize that people can't switch colors at will and at random, I shouldn't have made a joke like that. I saw Emerson's hand "helping" hold something next to a black man's hand, and couldn't beleive how dark my boy had gotten in just a couple of days here, so later I commented he was going to get so tan he was going to be as dark as the Ugandans. This is now his goal, and my observation about his hair being silky instead of wooly and his eyes being blue and so forth has made no impact; he is sure he is going to look just like a Ugandan any day now. He observes that his elbows are almost there.
I am not positive why the desire to look Ugandan: if it is simply that he wants to be part of the majority, or he doesn't want to be singled out as looking different any more. I think that actually he thinks if he looks like the Ugandans he will be able to understand their language. It really bothers him that he can't understand what the other children are saying.
Emerson is very popular amongst all the random Ugandans, on the street or in the minibus or at the market or among the children. Women love to call out "Hello Bay-bee, how you doing?" and they long for him to answer, but they laugh when he does. Children on the street call out "hello mzungo" (which means "white person") as we pass -- actually, many of them are more enthusiastic about the "bye mzungo" part as we are just past them. A few of them have asked for names and remember his and call "hello Eh-son" instead. It's very hard for Emerson to recognize the pronounciation, and he struggles with understanding even the English words. Some of the older girls want to walk with us and hold his hand. To me, this attention seems different from what I remember as a girl in Asia, when many women just wanted to see what my hair and skin felt like and maybe thought I was like a little walking doll: this seems like natural gregariousness and friendliness, and pretty much how the children would treat each other. Emerson is obviously noticeable and special because he and I look so different, but I think it's more like the children want to be friends with the special boy than to just have the chance to touch or gawk at him. However, the whole thing makes Emerson feel awkward, and he usually doesn't want to answer or hold hands. I remember being a singled-out white child and how terribly awkward it feels, so I can empathize deeply, but at the same time, my understanding of the situation is that if would just smile or say something back or otherwise act naturally, the situation would actually become fairly natural. The children want to make friends and he wants friends too.
None of the adults have touched him (or me) randomly or inappropriately at all (meaning feeling our hair or skin or otherwise touching us for no real reason), but the culture here is a lot more affectionate and physical with children than it is back home. For instance, whenever we get into or out of a minibus the "conducter" will lift Emerson up and hand him to me, or lift him down; when we went on the boat the driver cradled him in his arms to get him to and from his seat; if he falls down near someone else they will lift him up and brush him off. When we had a driver or a guide from the orphanage, they told him not to touch things or to wait. They were very appropriate comments, but in our culture we have very stiff walls around other people's children and that it is not allowed to help them or tell them what to do. I actually like this way much better: it seems natural to pick up a little child who falls at my feet, or keep them from grabbing something dangerous, when I am right there. And frankly, I think a child listens better when he hears the same message from different adults; and safer if he knows it's not only mom who is going to watch out for him.
Emerson tells me that he has made "a friend" at the orphanage. I think all of the children would consider him their friend, but perhaps they seem, collectively, a little too overwhelming, not to mention similar. I know our eyes tend to be attuned to the type of people we are used to seeing, so it is a little harder for us to distinguish amongst all these children, who are of the same tribal ethnicity, which we are not used to seeing at home. But it gets more confusing than that: they all have the same haircut (a little bit of fuzz), and they all wear the same clothes. Clearly there is a big box and anyone puts on anything, so one day a little boy is wearing a dress that drags on the ground, and the next day a big girl has on the same dress as a tunic over leggings. It is amazing how confusing this is! Anyway, Emerson has "his friend," who is a girl of about 5 or 6 who apparently is good at running around doing something complicated with a plastic card or a stick. Whether or not Emerson and Daffodil agree that that they are playing the same game is unknown, but Emerson at least has a complicated narration to go along with it, which Daffodil doesn't seem to argue with.
All the orphanage children have been learning from Emerson, though. The main method of teaching here is call and response, and obviously imitation is the main way in which little kids all over learn, so Emerson has had a great opportunity to teach the children to say "stop copying me." However, what they have taken most to heart is "not funny." We can now overhear the children, in random other parts of the grounds, scuffling with each other and yelling "not funny!", which apparently they have observed means something generally to do with frustration -- and nothing whatsoever to do with funniness.
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