Au Congo, n'importe quoi est possible.

Anything is possible in Congo.

Congo is understood as a failed state by its people. Often when there is talk of anything related to infrastructure - the unreliability of electricity and water; the deplorable conditions of the roads - people will say with a chuckle and a shrug simply 'ça ne marche pas' (it doesn't work), referring not only to the electricity or the roads, but moreover to government. The DRC's economy is so dysfunctional that over half of its people can go their entire lives without a job. In urban Congo, there are three socio-economic classes: embarrassingly rich, dirt poor, and a level of poverty that shames the West.

My aunt and uncle have a very close friend who has lost three family members over this past year; most recently his sister, yesterday (Sunday) morning. She had been ill for some time, but was gone within just a few hours of taking a turn for the worse. She left behind a four-year-old son, who is now an orphan as his father died a couple of years ago of the 'Angola sickness,' an illness that many men who travel to Angola fall victim to there and then bring back and transmit to their wives. This little boy's uncle, my aunt and uncle's friend, has incurred the costs of all of these funerals. He does not have a job because there are no jobs to be had and he does not have the means to become self-sufficient in any entrepreneurial capacity, as so much of Congo's population does to make ends meet. Because there are no jobs. It takes money to make money. My family want so much to help him acquire the start-up capital he needs to begin raising chickens and rabbits, but the recent deaths in his life have redirected the financial support that they are able to offer. They really do all that they can for their friend.

"Fais tout ce que tu peux faire tel que tu es (do everything you can as you are).
Fais tout ce que tu peux faire avec ce que tu as (do everything you can with what you have).
Fais tout ce que tu peux faire là ou tu es (do everything you can where you are)."

These words hang on the wall in the little CPLB office, which is about the size of my bedroom; Jean Claude wrote them when he was in Zambia working on his masters thesis last year. Anything is possible in Congo. This is what everyone in Congo says at least once per day and I immediately picked up on it. Jean Claude's words embody the souls of the people of this country. Truly, anything is possible. Taxis have no mirrors, bumpers, doors, shocks, and various other pretty important parts and still operate all day and most of the night every day. On fumes. Women with no ovens sell fresh bread every morning. Men push 500 lb wagons for miles on end around Kin (you can pick them out of crowds - they're built like brick shithouses). Other men pound sheets of corrugated metal into sheets of flat metal with nothing but their bare hands and the inside rims of tires on the side of the road (these guys are also fairly sized). Families of eleven with unreliable incomes of $100-150 USD per month manage to eat once, twice, even three times per day. And still, they give everything they possibly can to others in need. Walk an hour in 39° weather instead of taking a 500 franc taxi ride (the exchange rate has been floating around in between 700-900 Congolese francs to $1 USD for months now). And laugh every day. Sincerely and heartily.

Anything is possible in Congo.

On my flight from Paris to Kin, the plane had a camera underneath it so you could watch everything you flew over throughout the entire duration. Although much of it was just white, once we reached Africa the clouds parted beneath us. I was able to see the burnt orange/red rippled sand of the Sahara as we flew over it, and the shadows of the few and sparse little clouds on the ground. As we continued on to sub-Saharan Africa, the clouds returned for a while and I switched channels on the satellite TV for a while, periodically checking back. After about six hours on the plane I couldn't concentrate on anything anymore and I just switched back and stared at the white screen... and then we reached the DRC. I could tell because through openings in the clouds, I caught glimpses of the Congo River. Although there are many large rivers that flow through Congo and really, it could have been any of them, somehow I just knew that what I saw was the river. I have been studying this country for two years, as most of you know, and no academic work is without mention of this river. It is the very lifeblood of Congo; a source of food and water, transportation, exploitation through brutal colonial methods of forced labour for resource extraction, and of life. I just knew it when I saw it. As we continued to descend and reached Kinshasa; I could see the river winding around and through the city. What I felt was simply indescribable. I, Megan Christine, was and still am at a complete loss for words. So inarticulate. A surge of energy, a wave of hope, a profound sense of awe just rocketed through my body. The river. Last night, my aunt and uncle took me for a walk along the river, where it separates the borders of Congo-Kinshasa and Congo-Brazzaville. I finlly got to see the river up close!! The path they took me to along the river is marvelous - lush green and full of the sounds of birds, the scents and sights of blossoms I've never seen before, and the branches of absolutely massive mango trees hanging over the walls of the courtyards along the path. It was calm and quiet. The sun was setting on the river in an explosion of pink and orange fire. It was magnificent.

Somehow, the physical beauty of the scenery last night both embodies and yet does not come close to touching the absolute beauty of Congolese resilience. Resilience in the face of desparity is something so beautiful as to evade accurate description. But the river is truly an incarnation of Congolese resilience.