Zambia Journal - Aug 15, 2005
Ok. We’re back in Lusaka, so its time to catch up on the happenings of the weekend.
The whole weekend got off to a rocky start because of the shortage of diesel in Zambia. We need lots because of the road trip. Planning to leave by 9am on Friday we eventually end up leaving at Noon. This becomes a major problem later in the day since the trip is scheduled to be a 4 hour trip plus bathroom stops and diesel top up stops and we are supposed to be visiting 1 village school before we get to our final destination and we weren’t able to make contact with either of to let them know how late we had set off.
The trip down to Choma was fairly uneventful on the major highway, which was a single lane road with few potholes. Of course we had to begin the trip with our first case of travelers’ tummy. Other than having to go through a foot and mouth station, and a few interesting sights like bullock carts and straw huts, we had a pretty uneventful trip.
We got to Tara a village we intended visiting only to check out their sewing project, and we were arriving 3 hours late. However, as is becoming obvious a visit from 18 Americans is anticipated and prepared for in a major fashion. So canceling was impossible since these folks had been waiting for us from 9am in the morning and we got there at 4pm. We all agreed this was our worst experience – dashing in and out in an hour with a group of people who had been waiting for us for a whole day and preparing even longer.
So off we went to Simukanka, this is a school in a remote rural village to the south east of Choma. The trip took us along a dirt road and since it was dusk we eventually got there in he dark. This was not a road I would have liked to have been driving a bus on in the dark. Most of the village had walked home the 7 or more kilometers to their homes (that’s up to 2 hours for the most distant homes), but a few of the nearest ones remained to greet us in the wonderful exuberant Zambian way with dancing, drumming and singing. They also then fed us a wonderful traditional meal that had been prepared with great care since they knew we were at risk of tummy bugs. They also boiled water for us and had bowls for us to wash our hands. This was all in a drought stricken area of people with barely enough to eat. We had tried to get out of this but were assured that it would be considered a great insult if we did not accept their hospitality. We were all amazed at how good the food was, I think most of the youth enjoyed it too: beef, chicken, rape, nyshima. We ended the day sleeping in the school on mattresses that came from we know not where, under or mosquito nets for the most part. One big slumber party including the 18 different snores.
Amazingly I was one of the first up and about the next morning. For some strange reason I have naturally fallen into a Midnight to 7am sleeping pattern, something I have great difficulty with at home. At 6:30am after my first experience with an African Latrine I was able to see the place coming to life. People walked slowly in from the surrounding settlements to get there water from the well near the school buildings. Some of the women may need to walk 7 kilometers or more to pump a barrel full of water and then put it on there heads and walk back Everything is carried on the heads in the city and the rural areas: wood, suitcases, water barrels, huge bundles of clothing.
I walked away from the village to see the African sunrise and was surprised to see he number of paths winding in from all directions some of them running straight across a regulation sized football field (soccer) field with perfectly sized tree trunks for goal posts and cross bar. They also had a volley ball court with tree trunk posts but no net. When I headed back I saw one of he teachers who live in the modest buildings around the school brushing the dust off the path around her home, some of the kids also had the jobs of washing this painted surround after the dust was removed. As I got closer she entered her cooking structure behind the house with her baby strapped to her back. I introduced myself to her and, as all the people here are, she was more than happy to talk and explain about her life and the life of the community. As a teacher she was very well educated and spoke very good English. Monica (people use a mix of either English names or local names), had Sean on her back and was working with Moses to prepare breakfast on her charcoal brazier. Moses is and AIDS orphan who she has taken in herself, with her husband Steady. So many women here, especially in the compounds have taken on 1, 2 or as many as eight orphans. The problem is just unbelievable.
They served us a porridge of mealy meal or mealy meal with ground nuts (which are a close relative of peanuts if they aren’t the same thing). And then we loaded all of us plus the village “Committee” (all men) to head off to visit a couple of the settlements. On the way we passed hectares and hectares of fields, which were basically dust with the occasional wilted green leaf struggling through. We began our education of what drought means. The settlement was the sort of thing you see staged in a Smithsonian museum, and if not for the drought I could see people having a comfortable existence there. But with the drought the couple of dozen people there were all malnourished as are all the people in this village of dispersed settlements. Their cattle are suffering obvious even to untrained western eyes. Even before the drought a disease wiped out lots of their cattle. One man had 104 head and was reduced to 7.
The second settlement we visited after a discussion with the ‘Old Man” in the first was a real change; this one was suffering more than the first, the children were a little frightened of these white people they had not seen before and their “Old Man” lay dying in front of us. We left a few of the food item were carrying with us, and some painkillers, a took a much more sober attitude away with us.
After a lunch of Sweet Beer (non alcoholic), the only drink you can chew, the Committee had organized a big village meeting with all of us and as many of them as were willing to walk in. Think - New England town meeting under an acacia tree. There were 2-300 people from this village who turned up. Remember some of them were walking 2 hours to get here. It was all very democratic and we caused a little stir by suggesting we break into smaller groups with a translator. So the women went with the women, men with men, young girls and boys with our youth. This was useful because each group came away with clearly different knowledge after these meetings. One interesting side note is that the Committee Chairman got called away by his cell phone that was ringing Xmas tunes. Surreal though this was, in the middle of the African bush, cell phone are obviously impacting life here in Zambia and helping with communication. We could not do what we have done without them.
We then took a walk down to the sacred spring. The only piece of damp within fifty miles and its only a bathroom sink sized puddle at that. The discussion around this was very interesting because there is obviously still some belief about this spring being under the guard of bad spirits but because these people are Christians (a sight majority of Seventh Day Adventist’s in this particular village), they should not believe in these things. A small banana grove near this spring had been decimated by a small herd of 5 elephants three weeks earlier. Their footprints were still obvious in the boggy ground.
We walked back to the school with the glorious African Red sunset behind us and by the time we got back it was dark and drumming, dancing and singing had begun in the square in front of the school. I spent a good part of the night sitting around the fire chatting with people from the village and learning more about them and their lives. Lots of time was spent around the fire, not the least because although I was quite comfortable with long sleeves, the villagers all were complaining of the cold. Partially the effects of malnutrition I think. Before we ended the evening with another guilt laden meal we were basically the entertainment for the evening with dozens of small kids peering into the windows of the school to she what the strange visitors were doing with their toothbrushes and hand cleansing, and hairbrushes, and mosquito nets, and mattresses, and sleeping bags, and toilet paper (the local alternative is a corn cob when available), and headlamps, and books, and pens and paper, and backpacks, and some other things I’ve forgotten. As we were called in to eat the villagers disappeared into the night. We were lucky to be in the school which had solar powered lights funded by an NGO. Some of the teachers’ homes also had solar panels and at least one was able to run a TV.
After the meal we said our good byes since we were leaving very early the next morning. And left them with money for 5 goats and the hope we may be able to provide help in the future. The next morning we awoke before dawn to start on our way to spend a tourist day in Livingstone. I spoke with a few men around the campfire again and it became apparent why we had not been the focus of children’s eyes all night. It seems these 4 or 5 men had sat around the fire all night – to protect us, not from any real dangers but to ensure we were not disturbed during the night.
One of the men around the fire rode with us in the bus to guide us back to the main road. A few kilometers out we passed his bone dry farm and he dropped us at the last junction before the main road (3-4 kilometers) and we left him to walk the hour or so back to his settlement. The hospitality we have been receiving is truly unimaginable.
On Sunday, Livingston was like a small drop of the West in this African Vastness. We visited the truly awesome Victoria Falls, toured the Livingstone museum with some of his Original letters shown in cases, took a short “safari” in the local game park which has “nothing dangerous” except a loan rogue elephant who doesn’t live with the herd and a couple of white rhinos that gave us all quite a thrilling photo op. We ate at a western style restaurant with the obligatory obnoxious expats returning from their booze cruise on the Zambezi. Our down market Tunya Lodge was within sight of the neon glow of the Zimbabwe border post, and provided us (or at least the female youth) with endless entertainment with lack of mattresses, bedding, towels, soap and a lockable door.
We turned in early to get another early start for our 6-hour drive back to Lusaka on Monday. The drive was uneventful except for our need to stop at every gas station in the vain hope of supplementing our supply of diesel before getting back to Lusaka with its know shortage. Even Jane Ndolo was unable to get any from relatives in her village that we passed through on the way. Jane is CWB’s envoy here in Zambia and she has been invaluable to us in helping to arrange things and acting as translator when needed and making sure we aren’t robbed blind because of being the obvious rich foreigners. Anecdotal evidence indicates a white face double the cost of all items.
A few of us got back just in time to pay a visit to ZNAN and organization that’s brief is to co-ordinate the activities of non-church based NGOs that are focused on AIDS here in Zambia. Elizabeth Makaka is the Exec Director and I love to see her in action on the committee she shares with Senator Tobias from the US.
In the evening, our youth had invited the actors and actresses from Mtendere to Mulungushi to have dinner with us. This is an incredible bunch of young adults who have all finished high school and hope to go to college. Most of them are in their early twenties but the determination they have shown to pursue their education in these unbelievable living conditions is quite incredible. Our youths talked to them about their life stories and their dreams for the future and we’ll try to find sponsors for these young people back in the U.S.
The whole weekend got off to a rocky start because of the shortage of diesel in Zambia. We need lots because of the road trip. Planning to leave by 9am on Friday we eventually end up leaving at Noon. This becomes a major problem later in the day since the trip is scheduled to be a 4 hour trip plus bathroom stops and diesel top up stops and we are supposed to be visiting 1 village school before we get to our final destination and we weren’t able to make contact with either of to let them know how late we had set off.
The trip down to Choma was fairly uneventful on the major highway, which was a single lane road with few potholes. Of course we had to begin the trip with our first case of travelers’ tummy. Other than having to go through a foot and mouth station, and a few interesting sights like bullock carts and straw huts, we had a pretty uneventful trip.
We got to Tara a village we intended visiting only to check out their sewing project, and we were arriving 3 hours late. However, as is becoming obvious a visit from 18 Americans is anticipated and prepared for in a major fashion. So canceling was impossible since these folks had been waiting for us from 9am in the morning and we got there at 4pm. We all agreed this was our worst experience – dashing in and out in an hour with a group of people who had been waiting for us for a whole day and preparing even longer.
So off we went to Simukanka, this is a school in a remote rural village to the south east of Choma. The trip took us along a dirt road and since it was dusk we eventually got there in he dark. This was not a road I would have liked to have been driving a bus on in the dark. Most of the village had walked home the 7 or more kilometers to their homes (that’s up to 2 hours for the most distant homes), but a few of the nearest ones remained to greet us in the wonderful exuberant Zambian way with dancing, drumming and singing. They also then fed us a wonderful traditional meal that had been prepared with great care since they knew we were at risk of tummy bugs. They also boiled water for us and had bowls for us to wash our hands. This was all in a drought stricken area of people with barely enough to eat. We had tried to get out of this but were assured that it would be considered a great insult if we did not accept their hospitality. We were all amazed at how good the food was, I think most of the youth enjoyed it too: beef, chicken, rape, nyshima. We ended the day sleeping in the school on mattresses that came from we know not where, under or mosquito nets for the most part. One big slumber party including the 18 different snores.
Amazingly I was one of the first up and about the next morning. For some strange reason I have naturally fallen into a Midnight to 7am sleeping pattern, something I have great difficulty with at home. At 6:30am after my first experience with an African Latrine I was able to see the place coming to life. People walked slowly in from the surrounding settlements to get there water from the well near the school buildings. Some of the women may need to walk 7 kilometers or more to pump a barrel full of water and then put it on there heads and walk back Everything is carried on the heads in the city and the rural areas: wood, suitcases, water barrels, huge bundles of clothing.
I walked away from the village to see the African sunrise and was surprised to see he number of paths winding in from all directions some of them running straight across a regulation sized football field (soccer) field with perfectly sized tree trunks for goal posts and cross bar. They also had a volley ball court with tree trunk posts but no net. When I headed back I saw one of he teachers who live in the modest buildings around the school brushing the dust off the path around her home, some of the kids also had the jobs of washing this painted surround after the dust was removed. As I got closer she entered her cooking structure behind the house with her baby strapped to her back. I introduced myself to her and, as all the people here are, she was more than happy to talk and explain about her life and the life of the community. As a teacher she was very well educated and spoke very good English. Monica (people use a mix of either English names or local names), had Sean on her back and was working with Moses to prepare breakfast on her charcoal brazier. Moses is and AIDS orphan who she has taken in herself, with her husband Steady. So many women here, especially in the compounds have taken on 1, 2 or as many as eight orphans. The problem is just unbelievable.
They served us a porridge of mealy meal or mealy meal with ground nuts (which are a close relative of peanuts if they aren’t the same thing). And then we loaded all of us plus the village “Committee” (all men) to head off to visit a couple of the settlements. On the way we passed hectares and hectares of fields, which were basically dust with the occasional wilted green leaf struggling through. We began our education of what drought means. The settlement was the sort of thing you see staged in a Smithsonian museum, and if not for the drought I could see people having a comfortable existence there. But with the drought the couple of dozen people there were all malnourished as are all the people in this village of dispersed settlements. Their cattle are suffering obvious even to untrained western eyes. Even before the drought a disease wiped out lots of their cattle. One man had 104 head and was reduced to 7.
The second settlement we visited after a discussion with the ‘Old Man” in the first was a real change; this one was suffering more than the first, the children were a little frightened of these white people they had not seen before and their “Old Man” lay dying in front of us. We left a few of the food item were carrying with us, and some painkillers, a took a much more sober attitude away with us.
After a lunch of Sweet Beer (non alcoholic), the only drink you can chew, the Committee had organized a big village meeting with all of us and as many of them as were willing to walk in. Think - New England town meeting under an acacia tree. There were 2-300 people from this village who turned up. Remember some of them were walking 2 hours to get here. It was all very democratic and we caused a little stir by suggesting we break into smaller groups with a translator. So the women went with the women, men with men, young girls and boys with our youth. This was useful because each group came away with clearly different knowledge after these meetings. One interesting side note is that the Committee Chairman got called away by his cell phone that was ringing Xmas tunes. Surreal though this was, in the middle of the African bush, cell phone are obviously impacting life here in Zambia and helping with communication. We could not do what we have done without them.
We then took a walk down to the sacred spring. The only piece of damp within fifty miles and its only a bathroom sink sized puddle at that. The discussion around this was very interesting because there is obviously still some belief about this spring being under the guard of bad spirits but because these people are Christians (a sight majority of Seventh Day Adventist’s in this particular village), they should not believe in these things. A small banana grove near this spring had been decimated by a small herd of 5 elephants three weeks earlier. Their footprints were still obvious in the boggy ground.
We walked back to the school with the glorious African Red sunset behind us and by the time we got back it was dark and drumming, dancing and singing had begun in the square in front of the school. I spent a good part of the night sitting around the fire chatting with people from the village and learning more about them and their lives. Lots of time was spent around the fire, not the least because although I was quite comfortable with long sleeves, the villagers all were complaining of the cold. Partially the effects of malnutrition I think. Before we ended the evening with another guilt laden meal we were basically the entertainment for the evening with dozens of small kids peering into the windows of the school to she what the strange visitors were doing with their toothbrushes and hand cleansing, and hairbrushes, and mosquito nets, and mattresses, and sleeping bags, and toilet paper (the local alternative is a corn cob when available), and headlamps, and books, and pens and paper, and backpacks, and some other things I’ve forgotten. As we were called in to eat the villagers disappeared into the night. We were lucky to be in the school which had solar powered lights funded by an NGO. Some of the teachers’ homes also had solar panels and at least one was able to run a TV.
After the meal we said our good byes since we were leaving very early the next morning. And left them with money for 5 goats and the hope we may be able to provide help in the future. The next morning we awoke before dawn to start on our way to spend a tourist day in Livingstone. I spoke with a few men around the campfire again and it became apparent why we had not been the focus of children’s eyes all night. It seems these 4 or 5 men had sat around the fire all night – to protect us, not from any real dangers but to ensure we were not disturbed during the night.
One of the men around the fire rode with us in the bus to guide us back to the main road. A few kilometers out we passed his bone dry farm and he dropped us at the last junction before the main road (3-4 kilometers) and we left him to walk the hour or so back to his settlement. The hospitality we have been receiving is truly unimaginable.
On Sunday, Livingston was like a small drop of the West in this African Vastness. We visited the truly awesome Victoria Falls, toured the Livingstone museum with some of his Original letters shown in cases, took a short “safari” in the local game park which has “nothing dangerous” except a loan rogue elephant who doesn’t live with the herd and a couple of white rhinos that gave us all quite a thrilling photo op. We ate at a western style restaurant with the obligatory obnoxious expats returning from their booze cruise on the Zambezi. Our down market Tunya Lodge was within sight of the neon glow of the Zimbabwe border post, and provided us (or at least the female youth) with endless entertainment with lack of mattresses, bedding, towels, soap and a lockable door.
We turned in early to get another early start for our 6-hour drive back to Lusaka on Monday. The drive was uneventful except for our need to stop at every gas station in the vain hope of supplementing our supply of diesel before getting back to Lusaka with its know shortage. Even Jane Ndolo was unable to get any from relatives in her village that we passed through on the way. Jane is CWB’s envoy here in Zambia and she has been invaluable to us in helping to arrange things and acting as translator when needed and making sure we aren’t robbed blind because of being the obvious rich foreigners. Anecdotal evidence indicates a white face double the cost of all items.
A few of us got back just in time to pay a visit to ZNAN and organization that’s brief is to co-ordinate the activities of non-church based NGOs that are focused on AIDS here in Zambia. Elizabeth Makaka is the Exec Director and I love to see her in action on the committee she shares with Senator Tobias from the US.
In the evening, our youth had invited the actors and actresses from Mtendere to Mulungushi to have dinner with us. This is an incredible bunch of young adults who have all finished high school and hope to go to college. Most of them are in their early twenties but the determination they have shown to pursue their education in these unbelievable living conditions is quite incredible. Our youths talked to them about their life stories and their dreams for the future and we’ll try to find sponsors for these young people back in the U.S.
posted by Rodney | 5:10 PM
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