The World Connected

Spending time overseas has shown me how much the world has shrunk. Sitting at my computer in Kenya feels remarkably similar to sitting at my computer in Boston. I type out emails and chat with friends. I read the New York Times online and feed my addiction to Politico. I see the same screens that I’ve always seen – a virtual home that I can come to no matter where I’m physically located.

I remember hiking in the mountains in rural Rwanda last year. I was a two hour drive from Kigali out on a farm with no electricity or running water. We were at the base of the jungle, surrounded by green pasture dotted with thatch huts on one side and a thick, tangled forest rising up the slope of the mountain on the other. A friend's cellphone rang: it was his girlfriend calling from NYC. He excused himself and had a ten minute conversation.

Yet below the surface of this tremendous interconnectedness, there’s still a stark divide. When the internet is down, I suddenly realize how far away I am from home. If I get into a car accident here, help is probably not on the way unless I get out my cell phone and call a friend. If I want to send or receive a package, it takes almost a month to navigate the global postal service – if it arrives at all.

Deeper than that, I see the separateness of this community that I am now a part of from the one that I left. Eldoret is not exactly part of the multinational community. There are no American or European chains here, except for a peculiar, hand-painted sign for a “Marriott Hotel” that probably won’t accept my Reward points. And of course, most people here are not world travelers; they are subsistence farmers who have seldom ventured more than 200 km from where they were born.

The world has become incredibly connected in some ways, but remains incredibly separate in others – an obvious truth. My next thought is how the easy of communication and data flow could make a difference in the lives of people here – a topic that I’m sure a lot of smart people are already working on. More thoughts later…