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Ngizophenduka – I will return

Friday, August 21st, 2009

[Tom] Sorry for the lack of updates the last few days, as our time in Nzinga was extremely busy and intense.  Honestly, looking back on the last few days now, exhausted, sitting in the Joberg airport, I don’t even know what to write. So much has happened.

Eighteen people received certificates for graduating from our three day garden training provided by Cedara College, and they all have plans for creating plots that can be rotated properly in their gardens in the Creches (preschools) and schools and orphan drop-in centers they represent. They will immediately begin implementing what they learned, teaching the parents and other adults affiliated with their respective gardens. In two weeks when the folks from Cedara and the Department of Agriculture return, there will be more than 60 people in the village who have worked on gardens using knowledge they didn’t have several days ago.

Due to the unbelievable generosity of several people, over 20 people are now constructing fences for their own individual family gardens, and more will begin preparing their family gardens soon.  They will all receive training and a “garden starter kit” when they have finished building their fence (their initial sweat equity).  

There are so many emotional things that happen in Nzinga when we are there, but this time, something happened in the States that made us all really pause and understand the power of connection and the impact one generous person can have in the world… When we received the forty starter kits, we then needed roughly $1,000 to buy the fencing in order to kick off the greatly expanded individual family garden program before we left, so we made a request on our blog. The next day, we received a very generous donation from Diana Getz in memory of her recently deceased brother, who she simply described as “a generous person.” 

We received donations from others as well, and the impact is something that will last for generations. It is the pride of being able to create something themselves, the relief in being able to better take care of their children, and the legacy of once again being able to pass on to their children the knowledge of how to plow the earth for sustenance that was lost over the past decades. And we will make sure they know of the generous people who made it possible.

As we get home and are better able to download and edit photos and video we will be sharing much, much more. For now, ngiabonga – thank you – for everything.

I always wanted to be an anthropologist…

Saturday, August 15th, 2009

[Sheri] So far this trip, Tom has blogged a couple of times about the business end of our work in Nzinga – about the collaborations, meetings, etc. I’d like to try to share my first-time visitor impressions of life in Nzinga, and introduce you to some of the villagers.
I knew from Tom’s photos and descriptions last year that life here is hard and that the people are warm, welcoming and beautiful. Those descriptions are so inadequate. Both the good and the bad here are so extreme.
Life here is unbelievably hard. Right now, it is cold and windy and dry. Dust blows into my eyes and lungs, and grit covers my skin. Every task takes an eternally long time. Although there is cell reception here, many can’t afford a cell phone, so communication often requires walking a long distance to someone’s house in order to tell them something. The terrain here is hilly and very rough and rocky, so even walking is slow. Meals take a long time because the process involves gathering wood and making a fire. Preparation is slow because there’s no pre-packaging, ready-to-eat, or popping anything into the microwave. Cleanup requires heating water over the fire and pouring it into two basins; one for washing and another for rinsing. The plates are scraped and the scraps are thrown over the fence to feed the chickens and goats.
I also experienced bathing in a bucket this week. A bath takes about an hour, even though I was in the water all of five minutes, because the water has to be heated over the fire after the dishes are clean.  Also, I learned that baths are not very effective. I took a bucket bath on Monday and Thursday this week. To take a bucket bath, the water must be heated over the fire, then poured into a bucket. I had to carry my bucket of water to my room (a bucket of water is heavy!) then pour the water into a wider, shallower basin. There is no heat or insulation in the rooms, so it was very cold. After two days of working in the dirt and blowing wind, and smoke from the fires, I was grateful to emerge from my bucket bath feeling squeaky clean. However, the next steps in the bucket bath process are to dump the bathwater and put away the basin and bucket. So after drying off and dressing in clean clothes, I headed out with my bathwater. Now, mind you, there’s no time for a bath during the day, so baths must be taken after dinner, when it’s too dark to do any work. I had to walk about 30 yards in the dark, over  uneven terrain with my bucket of water.  And I’m not familiar with this path in the dark, nor the process.  By the time I got to the place where I could dump the bucket, half the water had sloshed out onto my shoes. I dumped the water, rinsed out the basin at the pump, and went to the rondavel (round mud hut with a thatched roof) to put them away. The rondavel is where the fire is, and there is no chimney so it fills with smoke. I put the bucket and basin away and then returned to my room. The wind was blowing fiercely, and I could feel the dirt getting caked in my wet hair. By the time I got back inside my room, I was covered with dirt and smelled like smoke. So much for being clean!
So you have a sense of just how difficult the simple tasks of communicating, eating and bathing are. Just imagine how difficult some of the other tasks can be!
What amazes me is that no matter how difficult their lives are, and no matter how meager their supplies, the people of Nzinga remain happy, proud and hopeful. And they love and support each other like family.
I spent a few hours at a crèche (preschool) the other day, and still have difficulty digesting what I saw. About 10 children under the age of four, and a teacher who is an elderly woman meet every weekday from 8:30 – 1:30 p.m. in a little mud room that is about 8’ X 12’. In that room is one card table and two plastic chairs, a bag of handmade blocks, and one book that the teacher made herself out of some pieces of paper and cut-out magazine photos. What was most astonishing about this is that with no resources, and no teacher training, this woman manages to spend five hours a day engaging the children in singing, dancing, reciting poems, make-believe play, etc. these children can count, know their ABC’s, the days of the week, the months of the year, their colors, shapes, etc. and can say them all in Zulu and in English! Oddly enough, the old woman can’t speak any English; she just learns enough words that she can pass along to the children so that they have a head start when they reach grade R (equivalent to U.S. first grade). When I told this lady that we were coming back on Monday and would be bringing blocks, puzzles, books and games, she got up and danced a little jig. I told her we would be back every year. She asked me (through our interpreter, Nonjabulo) if it would be possible next year to bring two small plastic tables and 10 small plastic chairs. She explained that it often gets well below zero (Celsius), and that the children’s bottoms get raw and chapped because they have to sit on the frozen floor. This would never have occurred to me. We take the simplest things for granted, and nothing is simple in Nzinga.
The day we arrived in Nzinga, it was National Women’s Day in South Africa. There was no official celebration in Nzinga, although some women told me that they had had their own celebrations. The Zulu culture is paternalistic, and women have very little voice. However, I’ve noticed that women “make the world go ‘round” in Nzinga. The women are incredibly strong. When things need to be done, it’s the women who come forward to do it. The other day we put the word out that we needed some people to come help us hoe a garden. Right away, six old women arrived with their hoes, and got to work. One of them even used a cane, but that didn’t slow her down at all! And I was mortified that she covered twice as much area as I did, and broke up the earth twice as deep as I could!
The people of Nzinga must think I’m pretty hilarious, with my sunscreen and lip balm, and my weak attempts at Zulu language, but they’ve welcomed me like family and I know that I’ve made lifelong friends this week.

40 fences

Friday, August 14th, 2009
Dept of Ag. Garden Starter Kit

Dept of Ag. Garden Starter Kit

We’ve been working for months to get “family garden starter kits” from the government after months of requests to many different departments. Today, seemingly out of the blue, forty arrived from the Department of Agriculture. They include seeds and tools. If you’ve read about our nutrition program you know that fencing and some gardening training are also required to really give the families a chance at success. We’ve already got an agreement with Cedara College of Agriculture to provide gardening training, and only now need funding for an additional 40 fences to be able to greatly expand the Isipho family food garden program.

That is right, you guessed it. The general sense I had yesterday that our opportunities had the potential to outstrip our current funding just became very specific. We need 40 people to donate $27, and we’ll get an additional 40 families growing their own vegetables and improving their own nutrition. Please consider donating now at www.isipho.org/your-participation. The sooner we get the 40 donations, the sooner we can get them integrated into our current round of training. Just click on the PayPal “Donate” button and enter the amount of $27.

Thanks!

Tom

Transformation!

Thursday, August 13th, 2009

We are seeing change happen right before our eyes. People in the community coming together to take advantage of the opportunity we are creating by offering them a hand up. There is a long way to go, but the sparks that have the chance to start a fire of change are here. My concern is quickly changing to being able to keep up. We have to both manage expectations in Nzinga, and fundraising everywhere else, or we risk letting people down, or worse, undermining the momentum that is taking hold here.

If you can, please consider making a contribution of even $25 dollars now at www.isipho.org/your-participation Every little bit more we get before we leave will help us make additional commitments for the next few months. Ngiabonga (Thank you)!

Tom

Working on Africa Time & barbed wire

Tuesday, August 11th, 2009

Sawubona (Hello) from Nzinga!

When we made our two week schedule a while back, Sheri commented that our second week looked a little spare. I assured her we would need the full two weeks despite a series of things schedule in the first week that seemed like sure things, and all of the planning and coordination we’d done. Sure enough, one or two things delayed meant another few things needed to be pushed back, and we’re now looking at a very, very busy second week here. And today, I was part of the problem (more on that later in this post).

Africa reminds me of Hawaii, in that everyone is late (tours scheduled on the hour every hour never leave on time in Hawaii, etc.). It is just a different culture regarding time and time lines. Maybe it is that civilization has been here longer and they just see time differently, or that so little happened for so long that even when they go slower, it seems very fast to them. Whatever it is, today, it turns out, I was the biggest delay…

While unloading supplies of posts and fencing at one of the creches, I briskly walked directly into a strand of barbed wire strung about 5′ 11″ above the ground. Unfortunately, I am 6′ tall, and now have a 5″ long gash in the top of my head. Luckily, today was one of the two days/month a doctor is in town. He cleaned me up, spread it apart, and announced he could only see my skull in a couple of small places and so I didn’t need stitches. Anyway, I had a tetanus shot recently, he had iodine and some antibiotics, and bandaging. So, after a few hours of taking it easy this afternoon, we’ll be at it again tomorrow, digging post holes, stringing fencing, and getting ready for the gardening training. Don’t worry, I’m fine. And now I’ll have a great story to tell about the scar on my head (as soon as I make up one that is better than accidentally walking into barbed wire.)

Tom

Self-sustaining aid programs

Monday, August 10th, 2009

Today in Nzinga we had a community meeting, which is a very important step. It was all about the community coming together to begin collectively taking ownership of these programs. They heard clearly from us that we are not here to give handouts, nor are we hear to do our thing in our way. We have learned best practices, and have a starting plan, but the priorities, allocations of funds, etc., will be determined by them.

We will provide tools (training, fencing, seeds, gardening tools, education materials and teacher training, etc.) they need to take batter care of themselves one time. They have the responsibility to work together to make sure the efforts succeed, and to help spread that success through the community.

The response was amazing. No one will ever convince me that the old ways of doing aid are right. As well meaning as they are, they create a dependency that is self-perpetuating. In every face and voice today there was appreciation for our help, but more so, appreciation for believing in them, for giving them the chance to be responsible for their own future.

There was disagreement about priorities right off the bat, and a quick realization that we can’t do it all. A very powerful moment came when one woman, tears in her eyes staring right into mine as, in Zulu that didn’t need to be translated asked me something that included the word AIDS. Post translation, with tears in my eyes staring right into hers I explained why it is too complex and difficult for me, Miranda, and Sheri to take on, but we will try to encourage organizations with that expertise to come to Nzinga to help. It was added that vegetable gardens do help some in that they help everyone be adequately nourished, which is part of the solution. I agree, but it was a great grounding to a meeting that made me feel so good about all we’re doing, to be reminded of just how big, deep, difficult, and long-term the problems are here.

Despite that, I know after today, that these strong, proud, sharing people will do just what Miranda realized they would do a year ago – stand on their own if we just give them a hand up.

Tomorrow all the fencing, etc. arrives. I will be very sore and tired tomorrow night. But also inspired, I’m sure.

No photos while in Nzinga, as the signal has a hard time even transmitting Web pages without images.

Tom