Peace Corps Volunteer Brett writes: Bubble Violations in Zambia



So like most Americans, I have a personal bubble that only a few select people can enter without making me uncomfortable. Zambians, on the other hand, do not. I'm not here to attempt to figure out what American's have against people being close to us, I'm just here to give you a few examples of how far over the line Zambian's go.

Peace Corps Volunteer Brett writes: Bubble Violations in Zambia

Wednesday, April 19, 2006
My Bubble

So like most Americans, I have a personal bubble that only a few select people can enter without making me uncomfortable. Zambians, on the other hand, do not. I'm not here to attempt to figure out what American's have against people being close to us, I'm just here to give you a few examples of how far over the line Zambian's go.

At the bank, we have orderly queues and very large bubbles. Zambians have neither of these. Not only will they skip the queue without a second thought, they'll do even worse. There have been many times that I've been at the counter withdrawing hundreds of thousands of kwacha, when some stranger will come and stand shoulder to shoulder with me in my window. Subtlety does not go far here, so you can turn and stare at them, and they'll kindly ask how you're doing. I continue to stare followed by, "Excuse me" and then they figure it out and move about 6 inches.

One day I was in Mporokoso conducting some business with Annie when we came upon this incredibly drunk guy. With my full beard he put the comparison together, despite his stupor, that I looked like Jesus. So he said, "This guy, my friend, he looks like Jesus. I like this guy, he looks like Jesus." At this poing he was about 6 inches from my face informing us that I look like Jesus. Then he posed the question, "You know who this guy looks like?" Annie answered correctly, "Ummm, Jesus?" So he was impressed and congratulated her on a correct answer. Then, as he started to inform us of my resemblence to the Son of God, he reached out and started stroking and pulling my beard. As we just started chuckling, Annie was saying, "Yep, that's his personal space." So we told him to have a good day and left. I don't remember ever having anyone touch my beard without permission back home.

The most offensive and blatant bubble violation that I've seen to date happened on my last ride into Kasama from Mporokoso. We were sitting in a flatbed truck with 2 foot walls all the way around the bed. In a front corner was sitting a young man relaxing and taking advantage of the right angle formed against the passenger side wall and the cab. After getting a ways out of Mporokoso, one of the other passengers decided he didn't want to sit where he was and spied the wall where the young man was sitting. Instead of sitting on the bed though, the guy wanted to sit on the 2 foot wall so he could look over the cab. In order to do that, he had to step over/on several of us, put his left foot on the left side of the young man, and his right foot on the otherside. So this poor kid had to go from comfortable, to having some random dude straddling his head. The course of action that followed was similar to the course I would have taken, he got up and changed seats because he didn't like having a strange man straddling him.

These are just to serve as warnings that if any of you come to visit Zambia, or another African country, that people's bubbles are far smaller here and you will be made uncomfortable once or twice.

When this story was posted in June 2006, this was on the front page of PCOL:




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