A Day in the Village of Kabangwe - June 18, 2008

Before leaving for the village of Kabangwe we had a meeting to discuss the purpose of the day. This is a new village for MWB. The plan is to spend 3 years working in this village. MWB wants to track data from their work in this village to try for a $300,000 matching grant with the US government. We would match the money with MWB people and supplies.

Due to the impact of the AIDS virus on families, there are very few traditional families left and many family values have been lost. All the focus has been on the dying, the dead and the burials. Our purpose over this 3 years is to reintroduce play and family time together in this village. This day we wanted to focus on health and hygiene and and play with the kids, hopefully get the kids and adults to play together and have everyone interact with the Americans. Women never get a day off and we wanted to do some relaxing activities with the women. MWB and the volunteers would bring props and help in the play.

We planned to have small groups and rotate through a variety of activities, reading books, playing soccer, jumprope, and other recreational games. For the women, we would have a watercolor painting class, and crocheting happy sac balls. We would introduce Mom's and Dad's to playing with the kids and have medical screenings with the help of a doctor and 2 Zambian nurses.

This is a village, unlike the compound we visited earlier. A village covers miles and miles, the houses/huts are spread out with much space between.

In this village there is a community center with rooms for school classes. There are 1700 students and 52 teachers, this is a government run school. There are 80 desks and no books. This is a village of hard working, dedicated people working to make their country better.

Just as a side note, but not really, Kathy told us at the meeting before we headed out to the village that between Saturday and Wednesday, 30,855 children of sub Saharian Africa had lost a parent. By 2010, 33 percent of the children will be orphans. They become orphans as their parents are dying.

After those sobering statistics better get back to the day in the village. We drove through the village to arrive at the school. The children were waiting for us as the bus drove in. Webster Lengwe, a MWB Zambian staff member, conducts a "SUPER KIDS CAMP" when MWB arrives at a village. He has a flag with SKids Camp on it and he waves it and draws all the kids into a circle together. He leads them in several songs. He gets them ready for the rest of the day. Webster is a charismatic man, with lots of energy and loves the kids. On this day before he could do his super camp the village had a welcoming ceremony since this was the first time MWB had visited. Pomp and circumstance is very important. The head of the community spoke and everyone welcomed us. Then Webster did his SKCamp. We then split up into recreational groups.

I was working in the medical screening area to help set up, as my first assignment. It was a bit disorganized but we unloaded the medical supplies onto a table. MWB had a doctor and two nurses on our team, so they, with a doctor and 2 Zambian nurses, saw the patients. We ended up with four stations. As assistants we packaged snack bags with, for example: Ibuprufen - 200 mg. 18 pills. We changed packing according to the needs of the medical team, trying to keep ahead of them. I began and ended my day here, doing other things in between. I think the pictures will tell you the story. Look at the windowless cement buildings and the dirt floor. We had to end at four, and some people had to be turned away. The medical staff and interpreters worked right through without any breaks. Though English is the national language and the children are learning English in school, many other tribal languages are spoken. There was a need for interpreters in the villages.

I left the medical team after awhile to give someone else a turn. I went to the book reading group. A little girl, maybe 8-10, came to me with the book "A Bug's Life" and pointed to the title. I read it to her and then she wanted me to read each individual word in the story as she pointed to it. The kids here loved the books. Remember their school has no books.

There were other groups playing games. I ended up on the other end of a long jump rope, I thought I would get "jumprope" arm before someone finally came along to relieve me. In the meantime, there was also the painting class and crochet class going on (under a tree.)

You will notice in these photos of the crocheting class that most are wearing long sleeves or a jacket while Brenda, the teacher, is in a t-shirt. It was their winter and they were chilly but to us it was perfect - in the lower 70s and low humidity. This was how it was all the time we were there.

Once again, the great entertainment was having taking their picture taken and then looking at it. They never tired of this.

I went back to the medical clinic to help them finish off the day, we had to finish up even though there were people waiting. No one of us wanted to leave. On the way back I came upon some ladies who had finished their art class.

Outside the medical clinic

Some of the supplies we donated to the village. It is not uncommon to see kids carrying kids.

This was the end of our day in the village. We did a lot of things but what we didn't see happen was the kids and the parents joining together to play. It didn't happen this day, but it is a slow process and MWB will be back to work on this again.

During our meeting after supper, we had our only emergency. Eighteen year old Alex was hit twice on his arm during our visits to the compound and villages. During the meeting his arm became paralyzed and he couldn't move his fingers. Our team doctor and BJ found a private clinic with a visiting German doctor and it was able to be diagnosed as a badly pinched nerve and cast. He was very lucky, Kathy said as we left for the bus, it was better to have something like that than a heart attack. Remembering the hospital, I surely hoped that wouldn't happen to me or anyone else while we were there.

Our quote of the night:

I never look at the masses as my responsibility. I look only at the individual. I can love only one person at a time. I can feed only one person at a time. Just one, one, one.

I picked up one person-maybe if I didn't pick up that one person I wouldn't have picked up the others. The whole work is only a drop in the ocean. But if we don't put the drop in, the ocean would be one drop less. Same thing for you. Same thing in your family. Same thing in the church where you go. Just begin, one, one, one. Mother Teresa

If anyone has any questions, feel free to comment or e-mail me.