What to say, what to say….it hasn’t been a particularly eventful couple of weeks in meheba, and that suits me just fine. Jeremy is feeling much better, which is quite good because his birthday was the 19th and no one wants to be sick on their birthday! Alice, our amazing super woman housekeeper, helped me bake a cake (no small feat over coals) for his birthday and we made (soy) tacos, one of our favourite meals here. We had a good old gin and tonic to ward off malaria and ring in his 22nd year in style. All and all I think it was a good celebration! I’m pretty excited that I’ll be celebrating my birthday here this year as well. My second birthday in Africa...woot!!
My friend Sara is coming to visit next week and I can barely contain my excitement. She is busy shutting down FOGE operations in Kala right now. FORGE is moving out of Mwange and Kala as UNHCR is shutting down Mwange entirely and Kala population has dropped more than 60% since Sara got there in July due to repatriation. Sara is moving to the Democratic Republic of Congo to work for FORGE there in January and is coming to Meheba to study how some of our projects run. She’ll be here a week and then is taking a much needed vacation with her good friend, ME!! We’re leaving December 13th and heading to Lamu Island and Malindi Beach in Kenya, then down to Zanzibar for Christams, and finally ending on the lake in Malawi for New Years before heading our separate ways. I’m not sure when I’ll get to see her again, so I’m pretty pumped about getting to spend so much time together and doing such a fun trip. Lamu island is supposed to be amazing; there are no motor vehicles allowed on the island so the only transport is donkeys! Malindi Beach is a town with a thousand year history and is most recently famous for their Italian food of all things! Hopefully I’ll get to see some old friends from my first trip to Tanzania when I’m in Dar and Zanzibar; Zanzibar is one of my favourite places on earth and I’m excited to be getting back there. I hear Malawi is just gorgeous and hopefully Jeremy will be hopping a bus to come meet us for New Years. We’ll see if he can make it, the bus ride is about 10-12 hours.
As for life in Meheba, the rains are starting to make things a bit more difficult, and a lot more green! I feel as though I live in a completely new place now that everything is so green and lush. Its a far cry from the dried grass and dead trees we arrived to. Its really gorgeous, but I had such an odd feeling the other day when one of my staff members remarked that everything being so green and lush reminded her of Christmas and New Years. Funny, because I was having the exact opposite reaction! I heard Christmas music playing the other day and was shocked. My first reaction was ‘Why on earth are they playing Christmas music this early!?!’ until I realized that its almost December. Holy cow, its almost December. This will be the first Christmas I’ve spent away from my family, and I admit thats pretty hard for me to swallow. Of course, sipping pina coladas on a gorgeous beach in Zanzibar will probably help ease the pain a bit…
Its beginning to look a lot like christmas
Women's Work
One of my projects is the Women’s Centre. I am privileged to work with some amazing women on this project and am pretty much in awe of them. Not only do the three staff members work full time at the Women’s Centre, they are also still responsible for taking care of their children, cooking, washing, and running their houses. They each have three or four children, one each who is young enough that they come to the centre with their mothers each day. One of the women is pregnant and she still walks an hour to work each day. They’re passionate about empowering women in Meheba and take their jobs very seriously. These women kick ass.
One of the things the Women’s Centre does is hold outreach classes in different parts of the camp that run six to eight weeks and teach women how to hand sew and knit, along with teaching on SGBV, nutrition and childcare, and reproductive health. The workshop teaches women skills to use at home or to start small businesses to earn their own money. The sewing and knitting outreach finished in October and a graduation celebration was held for the thirty women who finished the course. This was a party. The women sang songs and performed dramas they worked on during the outreach that taught about topics such as SGBV and HIV/AIDS. They showcased the items they had made during the workshop and it was amazing to see all of these beautiful hand sewn baby dresses, school uniforms, adorable knitted baby hats, sweaters and pants. To think that a couple of months earlier these women had no idea how to make these, and to look at their perfect creations that they would surely use or at least be able to sell to make some money for their families, it nearly brought me to tears. Their excitement was contagious.
The Women’s Centre also runs saving circles. Many of these saving circles start as a result of the sewing and knitting outreaches where women want to continue meeting together. A saving circle is a group of ten to twenty women who meet weekly for one year to save a fixed amount of their own money. The money saved is loaned out to the members of the group and repaid with interest. The saving circles provide a safe place for women to keep money outside of the home and allow women to have control over money and lessen their dependence on men. This can begin to address gender inequality issues at the household level. Saving circles also provide access to loans when emergencies arise and give women access to loans for use in business. As well, perhaps one of the most crucial aspects of the groups is that saving circles serve as a kind of support group where women share ideas and encourage each other in business and in life.
One of the saving circles recently finished their year of saving and divided the money. The women in this saving circle ranged from age 16 to 45 and had varying levels of participation. When they split the money, many of the women took their savings (with interest) and purchased female goats or chickens to begin raising and selling as a small business. Others bought fertilizer and seed to begin a farm, and still others paid school fees for their children that they wouldn’t have been able to without saving. The group was so pleased with the results of the saving circle that many of them want to reform the group to continue saving for another year.
I love seeing women take control of their own future. I love seeing women learning skills that can generate income for themselves and their children. I love seeing women saving money, having access to loans, and starting small businesses. I love seeing practical ways that women can step towards independence and equality, ways that give women a choice besides marriage as a survival tool. We’re working on registering a new intake of women for the next knitting and sewing class, as well as forming new saving circles. The staff at the women’s centre are excited to reach more women and have devised a strategy to reach out to new arrivals in Meheba. I can’t wait for the next graduation!
Tricks are for kids
Take it from me, malaria is not fun. Oh sure, it may sound great, “You get a fever and chills and aches and pains everywhere!!” but trust me, its not all its cracked up to be. Those aches and pains are really a pain. And the chills? Be careful what you wish for: even when its 95+ degrees outside and you have been praying for the day you get to wear a sweater again, chills are not the reason you want to don that sweater.
Unfortunately, malaria parasites have no manners at all. They feel it is perfectly acceptable to attack at any time, including a lovely Halloween party at the Peace Corps house. Halloween isn’t celebrated in Zambia, but lucky for us my fellow Americans in the Peace Corps seem to share my affinity for childish holidays and dressing up and making the ever so difficult decision between trick or treat. They hosted a Halloween party at their provincial house in Solwezi and invited Jeremy and me along for the festivities. I spent the entire week making wings out of the tall reeds that grow behind our house, and I made a Tinker Bell dress out of a green mosquito net (did I mention there’s not much to pass the time when you live out here?). I got to wear my costume for all of an hour at the party before the fever and chills and the aching like crazy started and the realization hit that the parasites had decided trick not treat this year. I went to bed early and had one of the worst nights of my life. Next morning I got tested and low and behold the dreaded malaria parasite.
Of course, if you MUST get malaria, Zambia is a pretty good place to get it. They don’t have an abundance of the nasty “drug-resistant-hide-in-your-liver-and-kill-you-three-days-later” version of the parasite common in some other parts of Africa, and they’re so used to seeing malaria that they know exactly how to diagnose it and exactly how to treat it. A little finger prick here, a blood slide there, and boom, they know what you’ve got beyond a shadow of a doubt. Then its just a matter of a series of pills and some pain killers to get you through the first couple of days, and before you know it you feel like new. I was amazed that in less than a week I went from feeling like I wanted to die to feeling like the world was made of roses. Very effective drugs. And luckily, we caught it early before it moved on to complicated malaria.
Just as I was starting to feel better, Jeremy started to feel worse. We were afraid it might be malaria for him as well, but we took him to the clinic in Meheba and the malaria test came back negative. Honestly, that was more disconcerting than if he had malaria. At least a positive malaria test would mean an easy treatment and speedy recovery. This illness was unknown, and thus untreatable by anyone in Meheba. After a few days of him being unable to eat I loaded him up into the car and took off for Solwezi to find a doctor who could diagnose him. One of the clinics in Solwezi, the very one that had treated my malaria, has this great Nigerian doctor who is extremely friendly and very knowledgeable. After spending some time with Jeremy he diagnosed a stomach problem due to diet...apparently too much spicy food, coffee and other acidic foods have deprived Jeremy of a stomach lining. I think we have those stomach linings for a reason, and when you don’t have one anymore, its a problem. SO, now he’s not allowed to ingest any of those tasty things and is on a series of other pills and injections. I’m pretty happy with my malaria diagnosis at this point. At least I can still have coffee...that is, if we could find it. We have a beautiful French press but I would dare anyone to try and find anything other than instant coffee in Solwezi or Meheba. Shoprite used to carry it but has stopped for some godawful reason. Its a travesty. Almost as bad as having no stomach lining. Sort of.
So the moral of the story is: well I don’t really know. I’m sure with that much pain there must be a lesson in there somewhere, but I’m just a little fuzzy without my morning coffee.
Shameless Fundraising Plug
I mentioned in my previous post that I have decided to extend my contract another six months. While I’m unbelievably excited about this opportunity, there is also the added burden of additional fundraising. To come for the first six months I needed to raise $3,500 for FORGE, and through your generosity I did! With the addition of six months to my contract, my fundraising obligation goes up to a total of $5,000, or an additional $1,500. I know times are tough around the globe and I know that many of you already made donations to FORGE and have other charitable contributions you make, especially around the holidays, but I would sincerely appreciate your consideration of a donation to FORGE this season as well. FORGE is a lean organization and you can track every dollar you donate. On their website you can even chose which project you would like your donation to support, although unassigned donations are always appreciated as well since they can be directed to the most urgent needs. If you are considering a donation, all I ask is that you please include my name so that the donation counts towards my fundraising goals for the organization. You can find all of the information you need to make an online donation at www.FORGEnow.org or of course you can mail a check to 1904 Franklin St. Suite 701, Oakland, CA 94612. FORGE is a non-profit organization and all donations are tax deductible.
Thank you for your commitment to me and to FORGE. I know I don’t update this blog often enough and your commitment to reading and following my bumbling accounts of life in Meheba is a testament to how much you must truly care :) Or at least how board you are at work…
I spent my morning weighing babies
I spent my morning weighing babies. Our health project has partnered with the Block ‘B’ Clinic to offer the under five clinic services to the residents of Block ‘C’. This is where the FORGE Health Services is located but there is no clinic in this block. Its important that children are weighed to make sure they are gaining enough to be healthy as they grow, as well as making sure they receive their vaccines. The ‘B’ Clinic officer brought and administered vaccines while myself and our FORGE workers weighed the children. After this, Mary, an FHS employee, gave a talk on proper child nutrition. I can’t even begin to describe to you what an amazing program this is.
This morning I held in my arms a set of tiny baby girl twins. I snuggled them into the carrier and weighed them on the hanging scale; they weighed four kilos and four point five kilos each. I held them gently and marveled at these new lives. They were the tiniest most beautiful little girls. And then I found out they were six months old.
Of course there were plenty of children who were at the correct weight or at least very close, but I have never been so faced with the reality of malnutrition in my life. I have also never so fervently prayed that people were listening as I did before Mary gave her talk on nutrition to the waiting mothers outside. And believe me, when Mary talks people listen. Mary is an Angolan refugee and she has this way about her that shows how much she truly cares and also how important the information she gives is. She is friendly and passionate and extremely intelligent, and she’s darn good at her job. And still, I prayed that everyone listened, as if their child’s life depended on it.
Looking at the faces of the women gathered with their babies, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of them were under 18 years old, and how many of those already had at least two children. I couldn’t help but wonder not only how many could not afford to properly feed their children but also how many just didn’t have the knowledge to know what was necessary. At 16, would I have known? What other knowledge might they be lacking access to? Are they being taught about early marriages? Are they being taught about their rights as women? Are they being taught about STI’s and HIV/AIDS? Are they being taught about saving for their future and learning skills to generate income to send their children to school? FORGE is teaching all of these things. The refugees I work with every day are there, first hand teaching and training and changing lives. Every. Day.
And so you see, I need more days to be here. Not because my presence is so important, but because I need more days to be inspired by the refugees I work with and live amongst. I need more days to see refugees teaching refugees about issues and skills that will transform their lives and the lives of their children. I need more days to feel useless as I watch these brilliant people empower their communities.
So I’m staying a few more days. I know many of you were expecting me back in January, but FORGE has offered me the chance to extend my contract until August of 2010, and I’ve decided to humbly accept. I have more to learn, more knowledge I need to access that can only be found here, and more mornings I need to spend weighing babies.
Durable Solutions
When discussing a protracted refugee situation, its always important to keep in mind the three durable solutions. UNHCR describes these durable solutions as a.)repatriation, b.) local integration, or c.) resettlement to a third country.
These each have their own merits, but according to UNHCR the most favourable is repatriation. In this solution lies an acknowledgment that the home country is safe enough for return and a hope that these refugees will be able to play a key role in rebuilding their war-torn country upon their return. There are tri-party talks between the home country, the host country and UNHCR to agree on the logistics and numbers of repatriating refugees and to give assistance to returnees. Repatriation amongst Angolan refugees in Meheba has been almost non-existent for the past few years, but for some reason has considerably picked up this year. Already over 800 people have repatriated this year and UNHCR says they are on course for repatriating nearly 1,500 by the end of December. Its exciting to see this spontaneous movement of people back to their home countries. When the first trucks left Meheba we heard cheering and yelling along the sides of the roads as the trucks drove past bursting with excited returnees bound for Angola. A refugee is stateless; a returnee is granted full privileges and rights as a citizen of their country. A refugee, at least in Zambia, is restricted in their movement and ability to do commerce outside of the camp; a returnee has freedom of movement, the right to a passport, and the opportunity to pursue careers wherever they please. I can only imagine what it must be like to turn in your refugee card and receive your citizenship again. What must it feel like after twenty years in exile to regain an identity in the country you fled? To finally have rights and privileges and to be able to relinquish the title of “refugee”? Next week, I hope I get a glimpse of that. Jeremy and I have been given the chance to accompany a repatriation convoy to the Angolan boarder. At this boarder their lives will change. Some of these people will be setting foot in their “home country” for the first time, having been born in Meheba yet dubbed Angolan refugees. Others will cross an invisible line that has been uncross-able for them for over thirty years.
As a refugee, you are not allowed to return to your home country without giving up your refugee status, even just for a short visit to assess the conditions for return or to pop over the boarder to do business. By returning to your country you are “choosing to avail yourself of the protection of your home government” and thus acknowledge that you no longer need the protection of the UN. This protection has been called into question as the number of Internally Displaced Peoples (IDP) camps grow in many countries where the government is neither able nor willing to protect all of their citizens even within their own boarders.
This same lack of protection, or felt lack of protection, from their home countries contributes to the unwillingness or inability of many people to ever return. In this case, UNHCR looks to the other two durable solutions: resettlement or local integration. In Zambia it seems that local integration is not an option. While many of the Angolan refugees in Meheba have lived in Zambia all their lives, speak the local languages, and even look like the local population, Zambia has been unwilling to explore the idea of nationalizing these refugees and allowing them to stay and live as Zambians. With upwards of 84% unemployment in this region, its not altogether hard to understand.
Many of the Congolese and Rwandese refugees are holding out for the third durable solution, resettlement. This is the topic of constant conversation in the camp. I have never heard a Rwandese express a desire for repatriation, and its rare in the Congolese community as well. It seems someone is always trying to get resettlement, just finding out about interviews for resettlement, going to IOM for health checks, or waiting for a plane ticket. While I know of several people who have been resettled or are waiting for resettlement, I’ve yet to see a group leave from Meheba. Resettlement is a delicate and long process and there are no guarantees. While many people look at being resettled as the end-all-be-all, I’ve known people who work with resettled refugees in the States and comment on how difficult it is to start a new life there. While there are NGOs that work to help resettled refugees find jobs and housing, its not easy and the phobias of the surrounding community can sometimes be severe. Many refugees are resettled to places such as Norway or Alaska, which have very different climates to say the least.
While the Congolese refugees in Meheba don’t seem to be interested in repatriation, that’s not the case in other camps around Zambia. Many of you may recall my early posts mentioning Sara, that we trained with in Oakland and who works for FORGE in Kala Camp in Lulapula Province. Since our arrival here four months ago, the size of Kala has dropped by 60% with repatriating Congolese. The other camp in Northern Province where FORGE operates, Mwange, has seen similar repatriation and is scheduled to close entirely in December of this year. For this reason, FORGE has decided to open a new office in Moba, Democratic Republic of Congo. You can read all about the efforts on the FORGE website. Sara will be moving to Moba to work in January and to start FORGE projects amongst the returnee community there. I think this is an exciting new chapter for FORGE and will look on in eager anticipation.
If you like plagues of locust, and getting caught in the rain
Rainy season has come early. We thought at first that perhaps there was just a fluke thunderstorm in September. Everyone told us that the first rains come on October 24th, and this exact date was given over and over again, so we assumed that rainy season couldn’t possibly have begun yet. We were wrong.
The first rain came in September, and we were completely caught off guard. It was more of a sprinkle than a real rain storm, and the refugees, while shocked, said that it wasn’t really rain but more of a warning to the farmers to get ready to plant. I accepted this. The next rain in September, however, was a full out thunderstorm. It was unlike any storm I had seen with lightening that could steal the thunder of any fireworks show. The rain storm lasted about two hours and then the rain stopped for a couple of weeks.
This past week, October 5-9, its rained three times. We’re nowhere near October 24th, but the skies don’t seem to care. They seem to be bellowing loudly, “rainy season is here [suckers].”
Aside from the audible confirmation from the heavens, there is yet another way to unmistakably tell that rainy season has arrived: the bugs. Riding home from Block G on Monday I was left wondering what we had done to bring about the plagues. A downpour had lulled us to sleep the night before and the skies were looking like they were ready for an encore. Apparently the day after the first rain (the first real rain that is) millions of flying insects are unleashed for one day only and they intend to use the entirety of their brief engagement to create as much havoc as possible. If you’ve ever seen the cottonwood fill the air like snow, you’ll have an idea of what this infestation looks like. Only this little plague of (not technically) locusts like to smack you in the face, fly into your ears and nose and mouth and down your shirt and plaster themselves on your sunglasses as you ride your bike. I feel for windshields. Its less than pleasant.
The second plague was less obvious at first, but just as perilous. The ground was slick as the rain turned the dust into mud and taking sharp turns became a balancing act fit for the circus. To make it worse, every few feet I was forced to swerve to avoid squishing the masses of frogs that had suddenly overpopulated the roads. How does a little rain suddenly produce that many full grown frogs out of nowhere?
While the bugs and frogs were bad and the humidity was smothering, we at least took solace in the fact that we were outriding the rain on our way back from G (about an hour ride). It looked like it would rain again and we contemplated pausing at Road 36 to wait it out before heading home. We had iPods and phones to think about...We chatted with one of the FORGE staff members at Road 36 and he said not to worry about it, that we would make it home before the rain came. We took his advice. He must be a faster rider than we are.
There’s nothing quite like getting completely drenched. As the first few raindrops hit you, you try to ride harder thinking that maybe if you’re fast enough the raindrops can’t catch you. As more raindrops catch you, you are reminded you aren’t Lance Armstrong. As even more raindrops catch you, you realize its futile to run and its best to just enjoy the spontaneity of getting caught in the rain. And it is enjoyable, especially when the temperature drops an instant 10 degrees.
Until the hail. HAIL!?! Its 95 degrees outside, and its hailing?!?! Pea sized hail pelting you from above, flying insects assaulting you from all sides, frogs giving you the agility and balance workout of your life, and rain drenching you to the core. Its almost biblical.
But really….I loved it. All in a days work. I had spent that morning working with our Refugee Health Services coordinator as she gathered together a group in the market in G and taught on STIs. This woman is incredible. G can be an intimidating place, especially the market. The men are built, the women are strong, and half the people are drinking by 11am. They also don’t have a clinic for miles, and her preventative health talks are extremely important. Speaking in the crowded public market about sex and disease she handled that crowd with poise and expertise. She answered questions on gonorrhea and syphilis, handed out condoms, and urged people to be tested and treated. This is the front lines, and no plagues or rainstorm can dampen the high that comes from being a part of that.
Eway, Mwane, Sana, Jambo, Kaze and Fred
When we first arrived in Meheba I was so excited to see that the FORGE house had cats!! Jeremy was decidedly less excited (and in fact somewhat upset) at this discovery, but came around to the idea when he heard that the cats were there to keep the rats and mice and bats under control. As well, Sherie and Sabah ensured us that the cats would become the single greatest source of entertainment around the compound. We didn’t believe them at first, but over time the truth of that statement has been proven again and again (and again by way of the length of this post).
When we first arrived there were four cats. One cat, whose name is Eway (pronounced EE-Way, meaning “Hey you” in Luvalle and is a popular name for Muzungus to name their animals) has been here since the first FORGE project manager four years ago. He was brought to the compound with his brother and both lived here for awhile until one day a stray female cat wondered over. She was promptly given the name Mwane, which means...well technically “respect” in Luvalle, but is probably the most commonly used word in the entire language. I have heard entire conversations last for over a minute using almost exclusively the word mwane.
With the arrival of Mwane, it wasn’t long before Eway’s wild animal instinct took over and he chased away his brother (or the competition as it was) and Mwane became pregnant. Mwane had a litter of two kittens, one of whom was named Sana, the Swahili word for “very” or “much” and the other was named Pedro (as apparently he had a little patch of black over his lip that made a very convincing mustache. I wasn’t involved in the naming). Apparently just as Sherie and Sabah arrived Mwane had another litter but they didn’t make it. A few weeks into their stay in Meheba the bat population was getting a little out of control so they put bat poison out. The following morning Pedro was found dead, and thus I have vowed that during our time here bat poisoning will no longer take place.
A little while later Mwane again became pregnant (seriously, Eway is a haas) and she gave birth to one kitten who was named Jambo (the Swahili word for “hello”). And so it was that we found Eway, Mwane, Sana and Jambo upon our arrival at FORGE. We hadn’t been here long before it became apparent that Mwane was, yet again, pregnant. Only this time, it appeared that she wasn’t the only one. We happened to be the first group of PM’s to have the luck of two female adult cats in the compound, and even though Sana was technically his daughter, apparently Eway had no qualms about getting her pregnant as well.
And thus, we find ourselves with 10 cats. That’s right: 10. Mwane gave birth to a litter of 4, and Sana gave birth to three, though one of them died within the first couple of days. The little rugrats are about 7 weeks old now and are just about the cutest little animals you’ve ever seen. But seriously, 10 cats. Even if most of them are pint sized at the moment, there is just no way we can keep them. We found several peace corps volunteers who will take four of them (we’re definitely giving away incest kitties) but we just can’t bring ourselves to give away all six. As such, Jeremy and I have each chosen one to spoil rotten and bring up to be “our cats.”
Mine is Fred. He’ all black and I’ve always wanted a black cat, and in my opinion, he is clearly the best cat that ever lived. Jeremy’s cat is Kaze (a KenyaRwandan name meaning “come here” because our Rwandan staff complained that we only had Swahili and Luvalle names) and he is white with black patches all over him.
The other two kittens from Mwane were named Gili and Gili after (like the classy folks we are) the alcohol packets that are prevalent in the camp and all of Zambia really. They’re little plastic pouches of some of the most vile and strongest alcohol you’ve ever had. Its about 2 shots worth per pouch, and they sell for the whopping price of $0.20 a packet. There are tons of flavors, but I think the funniest has to be “Rambo” which is pineapple flavor and comes with a fabulous picture of Sylvester Stilone on it. I wonder if he’s getting royalties from that...probably not. GiliGili is horrible, ridiculous and amazing all at the same time, and I can’t for the life of me think of why they aren’t being sold in the United States. Imagine if you could bring tons of tiny little plastic sachets full of alcohol into ball games and get completely wasted on $2. Ok, on second thought, I can think of exactly why they are not sold in the United States…in fact, they were banned here for a short time because someone was dared to drink 17 (!!!!) in one sitting, and it ended up killing him. The rumors are that the beer makers in Zambia are up in arms about these sachets because no one wants to pay $1.50 for a beer anymore. Although really, I don’t think I can accurately describe the vileness of the alcohol in these things…But it would be a serious blow to the culture if they were discontinued, and so a report was put out that warned people to dilute them and drink responsibly, and they were promptly un-banned. And How!
But I digress. The other two cats, incest kitties, are named Pole (pronounced pole-lay, the Swahili word for “sorry” because really, he’s an incest kitty) and Chairman Meow. I know, its brilliant :) And I can’t claim it. That was 100% Kirk (the volunteer) who had the naming rights to Chairman Meow, and I think it was a solid effort.
And thus, the entire lineage and genealogy of the Meheba cat family, which currently totals 10 but will be reduced to the respectable six within a couple of weeks. That’s still respectable right?
From the horse’s mouth - so to speak...
Jeremy is a better events blogger than I am. For whatever reason, I find it almost impossible to sit down and write about what’s actually going on here, resulting in month old posts that were started when the events were happening but only finished once Jeremy had blogged about them and I could plagiarize his posts. As such, I’m giving you all the direct link to Jeremy’s blog so you can keep better tabs on what’s happening here in real time.
www.every2weeks.blogspot.com
With great knowledge comes great responsibility. One thing you have to promise me now that you have this information, is that you won’t mind the obvious similar paragraphs in some of our posts…. :)
Food in Meheba
I’m excited about our many culinary experiments lately. Make no mistake, food in Meheba is basic. The four readily available food items here are rice, beans, cabbage, and nshima, which is a boiled maize product that is a Zambian staple that I almost never eat. I’ve heard it said that on the totem pole of corn based foods, its pretty much bottom of the pile. People here love it, but I haven’t quite gotten there yet.
It is also usually possible to find sweet potatoes, tomatoes, rolls and eggs with a bit of searching. Onions can usually be found and if you’re lucky there might be garlic. If you are REALLY lucky and happen to be in the right season, you can find avocados. Mango season is still a few months away, but I’m going to be the happiest person alive.
Thanks to the spices my parents so generously brought with them we’ve been enjoying chili and tacos and other Texas treasures. We don’t have refrigeration, so cheese is out and much to Jeremy’s chagrin so is meat (though I’m loving the ease of being a vegetarian here!). We have little pieces of soya that parade as chicken and make a good substitute in chicken tacos.
Lately we have been experimenting with baking. Baking with coals and no oven is tricky to say the least, but we’ve developed a pretty good method. We have two pots that are the same size, so we generally light coals under one of them, put the lid on and place whatever we are baking on top of the lid. Then, we turn the other pot upside down on top of that and put coals on top of it. It makes a pretty good little oven and generally avoids burning the bottom of whatever we are making.
And oh the treats that we have been making!! I’m learning a lot about the wonders of flour. In Texas, “from scratch” usually meant that I bought the box of cookie mix instead of buying the already made frozen dough. Here, I am learning the wonders of bread making without a bread-maker, what really goes into biscuits and pancakes (not just a box of mix!), how to make brownies and cookies from scratch-scratch, and I even whipped up my own pie crust and oatmeal crumble for a genuine apple pie!! We’ve made samosas (again with the hand made dough) and chipati and even tortillas (great with soya tacos)!
Let’s just say I’m going to be the girl you want to take camping when I get back. Cooking over coals is a learning process, but so far I’m very pleased with our experiments. With the recent opening of Shoprite in Solwezi (a large American style grocery store) I can see our culinary expeditions climbing to new heights.
The Stars At Night Are Big And Bright
Jeremy often says that if he ever gets tired of looking up at the night sky here, he’ll know its time to go home. Tonight the sky above is full of stars, the warm fire blazes next to me, and the melodies of The Weepies sing in my ears. Its a peaceful evening that almost makes me forget the day that preceded it. Most of the time its easy to forget that Meheba isn’t just like any other rural village in Zambia. Alas, sometimes the realities of living in a refugee camp catch up to you.
In my last post I mentioned that one of our staff members has been receiving death threats. As this is a staff member from one of Jeremy’s projects, he has been dealing mostly with the situation, and thus I’m including his account of the recent events:
This situation increased in its severity during the past two weeks and occupied a large amount of my time, energy and increased my stress level. Unfortunately, due to the public nature of this blog, I can not write details (especially since the police/UN investigation is ongoing) but I can say that the FORGE employee is still healthy and will hopefully be leaving Meheba soon. However, dealing with that situation became a rotten apple for me. I sat up at night stressing, neglected other projects making sure the proper authorities were notified, put dozens of miles on my bike riding around the camp, my music on too loud to motivate me to ride faster when I was exhausted. The thought that a coworker of mine could be killed was too much for me to handle, and it took all I had to keep myself together with all of the stress.
This staff member is awaiting resettlement, and should be leaving within the next few weeks, but the way resettlement works is that it could come at any time. There is no set date and you must be in the camp when the plane ticket comes. As such, leaving Meheba for safer streets is pretty much out of the question. Now, I guess its just a waiting game.
The Beat Goes On
I don’t know what your job entails, but I wonder if it has ever found you waking up drenched in sweat and wondering if you have malaria, with every inch of your body aching in such revolt against itself that you think it is very possible that your insides will infact turn themselves into outsides, only to hear a knock at your door a few minutes later to find your co-worker drenched in sweat, not from fever but from a two-hour bike ride to buy pineapple, who is now announcing somewhat panicked that one of his project staff members has received a death threat and he’s headed back to the police station to try and sort it out.
Such is life in a refugee camp in Zambia. Let me decode that rather long sentence above. While yesterday was in fact one of the best days in Meheba, it also may be the cause of my discomfort this morning. After careful examination of the symptoms over time, it does not appear that my ailment is Malaria, but more likely the result of drinking homemade and possibly not-so-sterile banana beer. I’ve been feverish and chilled all day and completely unable to keep down even water. I ache. So very much, I ache.
But really, this is nothing compared to what is going on outside my doors. Jeremy decided to take a bike ride this morning with one of the volunteers, Kirk, to the Junction, the little intersection between the paved road outside Meheba and the dirt road at the entrance to Meheba. This happens to be the nearest place we know of to buy pineapple, and we had all been craving it for days. On their way back they ran into a FORGE staff member who was on his way to the police station (there is only one in Meheba, at Road 6 near the junction). In speaking to him he revealed that he has been receiving death threats recently.
Jeremy’s account of the interaction:
He told me he was running away from a death threat that he assured me was credible. He wouldn’t go with me to the police, so I rode over and spoke with the head inspector who agreed to watch over him for the evening. I frantically rode home, intending to meet with UNHCR officers to discuss what to do next. However, the UN staff was in Solwezi for the weekend. They assured me they would take care of the problem on Monday, and that the FORGE employee would be safe at road 6 until then. I took the Prado back up to the police station (far too tired to ride back up there for a second time), filed a report and came home for the evening.
This was all quite shocking and not something one expects to have to deal with in their daily managerial activities. Apparently a couple months back another person had been killed by the same people who were levying threats on this staff member. Going from the ultimate high of Friday to the frustration, fear and shock of Saturday was a bit much to handle. I spent Sunday on the couch, reading and watching movies. I’m worried about the FORGE staff member and emotionally exhausted, so I’m hoping the combination of the lazy Sunday and escape to Solwezi recharge me for the busy week I have coming up.
On a positive note, last week brought word of the approval for resettlement of Boniface, one of the subjects of the documentary FORGE recently facilitated and produced, A Long Way Gone. Coincidentally he announced this news to us at road 26 only a day or so after the film premiered in Los Angeles. It will still be several months before he departs, but he will be headed to the United States, news which has caused a shock wave of joy for past and current FORGE staff. I know this is a shameless organization plug, but if you have an opportunity to see the film I would highly recommend it (although I have no clue where it is playing outside of LA). It will give you a great idea of what life is actually like in Meheba, show you what the camp looks like (since slow internet hasn’t allowed for the posting of photos yet) and is a fantastic way to see what gets me so excited about going to work every day.
Where there’s music there’s dancing - August 21
Life in Meheba is not dull. There are of course dull moments, and when I first got here, I thought I’d go crazy with the silence and lack of “entertainment”, but I’m actually beginning to relish lazy Saturdays where I can sit down with my book and not move an inch for hours. While there isn’t a whole lot to do here in the evenings, we don’t have much power and we aren’t allowed out of the compound after dark (and really there would be no reason to go out anyway), truth be told, the job of Project Manager provides its own level of...things to do. In such a way that when you finally get a little peace and quiet where there is nothing to do, its actually much appreciated.
The week began with picking up two new volunteers from the States who are here for a month to work with FORGE projects. Its been nice having new faces around, and of course new music collections, as well as feeling, for the first time, that I might actually know enough about this place after two months to show someone else around. Its sort of a nice realization that hey, maybe I’m starting to get the hang of this.
This week we were also invited to Block G, a predominately Rwandese community about an hour or so bike ride from our house. The Rwandese community is nothing short of amazing. Going to Block G is like entering an alternate universe where things just work and time actually runs on time. The houses are even different in Block G as the Rwandese have mastered the art of creating red tile roofs and real red fired bricks. This morning several people in the community had gathered to make mud bricks for new latrines for the FORGE pre-school. When we got there an efficient assembly line was already in place and our pre-school head teacher was marveling that men and women were both working on this together. Previously, building used to be men only, but now in this new progressive society everyone is pitching in to make sure their children have the necessary accommodations for school. It was really great and even better to see the men in the community so happy about it!
We tried to pitch in and help, but honestly I felt like I was contributing to less work getting done, so I bowed out gracefully and joined some other community members at the local shop for cold beverages and impromptu dancing. This is the thing I love about Meheba: where there is music, there is dancing. As the music blared people started swaying their hips and clapping their hands, and before I knew it, more people were congregating and a circle was forming. Of course being a muzungu (the swahili word for white person) and well, just being me, I found myself in the middle of this circle. Dancing has always been the one thing that makes me crazy happy, and this was no exception. A few of the community members started teaching me how to do traditional Rwandese dancing. Also, rumba is really popular here (its a type of Congolese music and dancing that is really similar to the latin dance) and we danced that as well. Then, shock of all shock, one of the community members started teaching Jeremy Capoeira For those of you not familiar with Capoeira, it is a Brazilian marshal art that mimics dancing. It’s really incredible and also happens to be a ton of fun. I took a semester when I was at McGill and have never had such an amazing work out in my life. I was shocked to see this here!! It’s a much smaller world than one imagines.
After all the dancing we were taken to a meeting with the parents and teachers of the FORGE pre-school. They had prepared an event for us to welcome us and to show us more of their culture. We drank the banana beer that they produce in their community, listened to them talk about what the pre-school means to the community, and watched as they and several children’s groups showed us traditional dancing and singing. Rwandese dance is hard to describe. There are lots of violent hand motions, quick hip turns and hard stomps on the floor. Everything is highly synchronized and everyone participates either by clapping, dancing or singing.
At the end of the day, I was completely exhausted but also unbelievably happy. It was one of the best days I’ve had in Meheba and was such a joy to feel so welcomed and to see what an impact FORGE projects are having on the community. We also have a health center and a library in G. It was also special because just a few short years ago this community was very skeptical of any outsiders. When FORGE first started working in ‘G’ many people refused to take advantage of our services out of skepticism of a white/western organization and they certainly wouldn’t allow photos taken of them. This time, they were borrowing our cameras and taking photos of each other, posing and asking for photos, telling us how much they appreciated our services, and all around welcoming us in full force.
The Island
I’m taking ideas as to which Dharma Initiative station you think I’m currently living in. I’m thinking its “The Ant”, but I’m open to suggestions.
It’s possible that I’ve been watching too much Lost lately, but I don’t think so. I think I really live on the island. While I’m not seeing odd octagon shapes on all of my food yet, there is a wealth of compelling evidence. For example, my house is full of signs of a civilization that once was - one that I know almost nothing about. We have the water tower and pipes that suggest that at one time this house enjoyed running water. There is even what appears to be a solar water heater. That’s right...there was running hot water. (If only I had learned more about plumbing repairs when I was at Partsmaster.)
As well, in my room there is a door that leads to another small room that at one time was a dark room. All the way out here in the bush, someone created a dark room. All the old chemical powders to mix fixer and such are still there, along with photo paper and the enlarger and other equipment needed for developing and printing photos. While I have not found a projector with film of a Japanese man explaining my duties, I do find hundreds of old black and white photos of Japanese men and women standing in what is now my house. I’m still looking for the projector though…
We are always fighting off wild creatures such as snakes (well...Alice fought it off) and ants (which I think might be the others...they are always accompanied by columns of smoke….from the fires we set to get rid of them….). I haven’t seen a polar bear yet, but I bet its out there.
Another and possibly most compelling reason I’m almost certain I live on the island is that there is a button I have to push every day. Every night as the sun goes down and our tiny battery is drained of it’s solar energy, a loud and shrill alarm goes off warning that we MUST hit the button (on the inverter). I’m honestly not sure what would happen if we didn’t push the button, but I’ve been warned that its something like the end of the world.
It’s possible that most of this is explained by the fact that my house at one time belonged to the Japanese NGO, Association to Aid Refugees (AAR). This was in the heyday of Meheba when this 750 sq. km. camp was home to 120,000 refugees and was teaming with NGO’s, foreign aid money, and infrastructure. But I don’t think that’s really it. I mean, it doesn’t explain the button.
I’m waiting for the polar bear….
Oh Happy Day - August 11
I had the joyous opportunity to see my parents in South Africa recently. As they are loving and kind parents, they saw fit to bring me an ENTIRE suitcase full of goodies (!!) as well as taking me to lovely vineyards and wineries to taste and be merry. And merry I am, as I brought back two bottle of some of the most lovely wine I have had in ages. If you ever see a wine from Boekenhoustkloof in South Africa, buy it. Don’t think twice. Buy a bottle, drink it and enjoy it, and then send a case to me in Meheba :) I can’t believe a bottle from the winery was the equivalent of $4. Outstanding!
This evening Jeremy and I decided to indulge ourselves with two of the goodies I brought back from South Africa: Chili spices from Texas and Boekenhoustkloof wine (a lovely pairing actually). We were able to find green peppers in the market in Solwezi and were inspired to make the 2 Alarm Texas Chili my parents brought me to make the best darn bean chili this side of the….Nile? I dare say yes.
And I dare say we deserved it. While I am sure you all are tired of reading about ants, I guarantee you I am more tired of fighting them. Last night we saw a return of the ants, thankfully outside our house this time, and rallied the troops (aka book bus volunteers that have been camping behind our house for two weeks) and created an all-too-efficient-for-Zambia assembly line collecting leaves and brush and creating a perimeter to burn to keep the ants away. It worked. I hope this is the last we see of them. Fingers crossed….perpetually.
Settling In - July 30th
Life in Meheba the past few weeks has been great. Sherie and Sabah left at the end of July and since then Jeremy and I have been running at full speed. While things are busy, they are also amazing. My first official week as Project Manager once the old PM’s left was spent working on a camp-wide Teen Pregnancy awareness campaign with UNHCR. I went with our FORGE health workers from RHS and FHS as well as three community health workers from MCDSS. Our group organized dramas, poetry, songs, and lectures on HIV/AIDS, teenage pregnancy, and abortion, all things that have been on the rise in recent months in the camp. We canvassed one Block a day and visited schools in the mornings and gathered community members in the afternoon.
I had an “I love my job” moment when I was sitting under the trees in the community one afternoon. We had gone through the area calling people to come to the program and inviting them to join us under some shade trees. A group had gathered and our team began doing a drama on early marriage and the importance of schooling and waiting for marriage for girls. After the drama, Mary, an FHS worker, sat down and began lecturing on HIV/AIDS and began a discussion with the community. All of this was being done in their native tongue by a fellow refugee. As people asked serious questions and engaged in debate and discussion, it hit me that this is where change happens. Sitting under the shade trees in rural Africa, these people were acquiring fundamental and vital information about problems affecting their families and neighbors, from one of their neighbors. I love my job.
Interagency meeting - July 21st (I know its late, I'm sorry...)
We had our first interagency meeting with the UN today. This interagency meeting is designed to bring all of the UNHCR Implementing and Operating Partners (IPs and OPs) together and includes the UNHCR Officials, the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Water and Sanitation, Ministry of Community Development and Social Services(MCDSS), and FORGE. FORGE is the only NGO still operating in Meheba and is the only OP instead of IP. There are a variety of reasons FORGE operates as an OP instead of IP, and perhaps I’ll bore you with that in another post some time.
This meeting was quite informative. I have heard a lot of different things about these meetings and have all sorts of preconceived ideas about the UN. I was anxious to see for myself what it was really like.
In college I visited the UN in New York as a tourist. I remember there were so many people, waiting in a long line to get inside, going through metal detectors and having to leave all their bags at a coat check before entering. There was a tour guide and a preset route to take. We were given tourist badges to wear the whole time and there was of course no leaving the group or going where we weren’t cleared to be. Everything was scheduled and precise. I remember being in awe. I even bought a United Nations t-shirt at the gift store.
The UNHCR headquarters in Meheba was also swarming with people when we got there, but there were no lines; these weren’t tourists and they certainly didn’t have badges or security clearance. These were refugees waiting for a chance to see the UN officers who come to the camp from Solwezi. There were no guards or metal detectors, no security at all. In fact, the UN headquarters in Meheba looked very much like any other building in Meheba. The doors to the offices surrounded a courtyard where the UNHCR vehicles were parked amidst bicycles and the waiting crowd. We rode up on our bikes and parked them in the courtyard with the others.
The beginning of the meeting was spent recapping the projects accomplishments and trials during the past quarter- it was a great introduction to see how each agency has a hand in the goings-on in the camp. I’ll admit the meeting was a bit long, but I couldn’t help but smile when I realized I was in a UN meeting, something that requires years of hard work and many more diplomas then I possess to attend in New York or Geneva. It was also great to see the way FORGE programming was received by these agencies and the UN- we are clearly well respected by the powers that be in the camp.
When I visited the UN in college, I remember marveling at the idea of one day attending a UN meeting. This isn’t exactly what I had in mind, but then again I’m a good deal younger than I imagined I’d be when I attended my first UN meeting. I look forward to working more with UNHCR. We have a camp-wide health campaign coming up that is sponsored by UNHCR and FORGE is responsible for canvassing blocks B, C, and G. I’ll let you know how it goes...I may even get a t-shirt. :)
Red Soldiers Strike Back
I am fortunate that my dad travels to South Africa several times a year on business; this month, my mother happens to be traveling with him as it is her summer break from teaching, and they were kind enough to fly me from Zambia to visit them. The land of hot showers and fast internet is a nice break from Meheba!
The night before I was leaving the camp for Lusaka the guards came to the compound in the afternoon to inform us that the red soldiers (the ants) were back again and they were lighting fires to stop their path. Having had such success with this in our previous encounter with these insects, I was supremely confident that they would take care of it and gave it no other thought.
Later that evening Jeremy came into the living room complaining of the painful bites these ants deliver. We postulated that he must have walked through some stray ants that made it past the fires. I left the living room and headed to my room to start packing for my trip. As I walked into my room I also felt the painful presence of these red soldiers on my feet. As I turned on my headlamp to examine my feet the frightening reality became apparent: The red soldiers had broken the perimeter and were all over our compound. Streams of ants lined the outside walls and a few ants had made it under my door and into my room. I ran for the guards and they brought pieces of burning rubber to start burning the lines of ants as Jeremy and I looked for any flammable material in the house. We set small fires of paper near the walls and found great success in pouring nail polish remover on the lines of ants and, in a blaze of glory, dropping a match. While this was somewhat entertaining (fire!!) it was unfortunately limited to my short supply and thus was short lived. It soon became apparent that for all our effort, the ants continued to stream in and were increasingly attacking Jeremy (poor guy!). They seemed to be, thankfully, somewhat deterred by the rubber boots I had donned at the beginning of the attack.
After literally hours of setting small fires, exhausting my nail polish remover, deciding to set a bonfire in the courtyard, and using anything in sight to sweep away the ants, we found ourselves unfortunately unable to win the battle. It was midnight, we were exhausted, and we decided that we had sustained enough painful bites for one evening. I threw a few things into my suitcase for my trip to South Africa and joined Jeremy in our car. We drove just outside the compound, parked, locked everything from the inside, and slept in the car.
The ants may have won the battle, but I am happy to report that in the long run, I think we will end up winning the war. The next morning there were still ants in the compound, but while I had to leave early in the morning to catch my bus to Lusaka, Jeremy was able to work with our neighbors to find some local remedies later in the day that drove the ants out. A mixture of local plants, corn meal, ash and some other things I’m not even sure of apparently were all employed to drive the ants out, and hopefully, keep them out.
I have a new respect for nature. Apparently, ants can read blogs, and did not take kindly to my earlier post reveling in our victory over them. So, I will not revel. Indeed, I will respect the worthy opponents that are the red soldiers and offer a cease fire and peace agreement. Perhaps we can all learn to live together. Meheba is a big place…please find your own home and stay out of mine.
Pictures from Meheba
Hello all!! I am in South Africa with my parents at the moment and as such was able to finally get an internet connection fast enough to upload some photos of Meheba!! Above is a photo of the old Project Managers and Jeremy and I in front of the sign at the entrance to the camp. The police inspector was milling around that area and jumped in the shot as well :)
Here is an album I've created of a few photos from Meheba and I hope you all enjoy it!
FEF Students
Spending time with Students
We biked to Block A today, about a 45 minute ride, to meet the students that FORGE sponsors at the high school. Since I will be taking over this project from Sherie, I was very anxious to meet them. Today the agenda included not only a meet and greet but a poetry reading by the students as well. Sherie had learned from the students that they are not taught poetry in their classes, so she organized for each of the FORGE Education Fund (FEF) students to choose poems to learn and recite. Hearing their explanations for the poetry they chose was really great. One student recited a poem about a long journey and likened it to the journey through education. Another student chose Robert Frost’s Road Not Taken and likened it to taking the straight and narrow path that the Bible teaches. Still another chose Snow Fall and was very interested in our description of snow. Jeremy tried to explain that it gets very cold when it snows, and while it has been quite cold these days in Meheba, it was not nearly cold enough to snow. The FEF Project Coordinator, Bartho couldn’t fathom it being colder than it has been this past month (about 50F in the evenings).
Each student is great and I look forward to working with them over the next six months. It is easy to see that FORGE is really providing them a great program, not just in paying their school fees for high school, but in offering tutoring services and side programs like this poetry reading where they can supplement their education. As well, they have really formed a camaraderie between them, and that can be just as valuable. I really think we have future leaders in that group.
While FORGE is not sponsoring any new students this year, the Catholic Mission in Meheba has offered to sponsor 15 students and has asked FORGE to choose the students for sponsorship. It is an honor to have such a positive reputation in the camp and to be trusted to make these decisions. We are holding interviews next week and while there are certain concrete criteria like cutoff points for grades, much of it will be left up to our discretion. The selection process is based upon merit and need; most of the applications come from students who are double or single orphans. It is incredibly humbling and a bit nerve-racking to think that out of the 79 applications we received it will be up to us to choose just 15 and determine who is given the opportunity to continue their education.
Facing the Red Soldiers - July 4th
Before leaving Oakland I had a chance to speak with the two current Project Managers (PM’s), Sherie and Sabah. In our conversation they requested that we bring s’mores supplies from the States, and on my second night in Meheba we decided to have a bonfire in the courtyard and utilize those supplies. It was the 4th of July and we thought a bonfire could be our fireworks and would be a great time to relax and hear Sherrie and Saba’s stories about Meheba from the past year. We listened to music (the PM’s were so happy to have two new music libraries in the house) and celebrated Independence.
A short time into our celebration the guards came to the gate and called for Sherie and Sabah. He proceeded to tell Sherie that the red soldiers were coming.... questions flooded my brain as I tensed at the thought of soldiers coming to our house. Sherie seemed just as confused by this term and looked as startled as I was. The guard brought Sherie out of the gate to look at the situation, when it became clear that Red Soldiers were not armed militia men, but were the very real and threatening carnivorous ants...and they were headed straight for our compound! Think Indiana Jones and you’ll have the right insects. We had heard that pouring boiling water on them had worked in other FORGE camps, but there were too many for the amount of water we already had boiled from dinner. The guards however were already set to work creating a perimeter of leaves and brush to light on fire. While we stood there amazed at the swarm and pouring water on the ambitious ants that made it past the brush piles, the guards set fire to the brush. In a matter of minutes the ants were destroyed or diverted and the compound was saved from the Red Soldiers!
How the guards knew the ants were there in the pitch blackness of night and were able to catch them before they got to the walls of the compound, I have no idea, but I think I will soon learn that the local people here have more knowledge about nature than I will ever hope to understand. Sabah once mentioned that Nature will run our lives here in Meheba, from eating only what is in season, to rain storms dictating freedom of movement, to animals and insects interrupting a perfectly nice 4th of July bonfire. I actually look forward to learning more about nature and being closer to the earth. We eat only fresh food that is in season at the time, and the sky here is unlike anything you can imagine.
While there may be some challenges, I’d actually say that freeing our compound from the Red Soldiers and watching the blaze set by the guards was one of the best possible ways to celebrate the 4th. Take that red soldiers...let freedom ring!! :)
The Light of Day - July 4
We had the chance to sleep in this morning and I feel 120% better after 10 hours of sleep. The day was absolutely beautiful and the things that seemed so scary last night didn’t in the light of day. The compound is great and I am looking forward to making it my home over the next six months.
As it is with any place, the people are what will really make Meheba. Today was the all staff meeting and we got to meet all the FORGE staff and they seem to great! There are definitely some characters!! We also divided up the projects in terms of responsibility between Jeremy and myself. My projects are:
The Women’s Centre
The two health centers, FHS and RHS
Meheba Scholarship Fund and
The Meheba Libraries.
I am really excited about all of these and think its great because I have projects in each block of the camp, so I’ll really have a chance to see the whole place and get to know the different people in the camp. Meheba is 750km2 and divided up into Blocks A-H. We live in Block C and will be biking everyday between these blocks. Even the nearest market in block D where we will buy most of our food is a good 30 minute ride from our house. It will be a great physical release I think to be biking a few miles every day, although I haven’t been on a (non-stationary) bike in about 10 years….
Hearing Sherie and Sabah talk about their time here makes me so excited to get to work and I look forward to creating my own stories and starting my own adventure. It seems that every set of Project Managers here has been very different, and I look forward to seeing what Jeremy and I will think at the end of our time here.
I'm in Meheba! - July 3
Home sweet home...for the next six months at least. We arrived in Meheba late Friday night after traveling for 9 hours by bus from Lusaka. I’d like to say I got to see a lot of the country that way, but honestly I couldn’t even keep my eyes open on the bus. The previous four days of traveling had taken their toll and I actually slept for most of the trip. Both Jeremy and I commented that the last day we actually remember was Monday when we left Oakland...it is Friday.
Arriving in Meheba at nightfall was somewhat ominous. You’ll never hear silence so loud as in the bush, and never see darkness so fully. I know that when the moon is gone (its practically full now) that the stars here will be incredible. The first night, however, I was more interested in what was on the ground than what was in the sky. While I have only seen Meheba in the dark, its pretty clear that both Jeremy and I are wondering what we have gotten ourselves into. I think there is a point of reality when you stand outside and pump water to brush your teeth -- there is a difference in saying, “no running water” and living it.
Conditions aside, I’m really excited. All the people I have met so far are really incredible and seem to be a lot of fun. I do miss Sara already though; poor girl had a 16 hour bus ride to Kala, and after our 9 hours on the bus I do not envy her. The bus was unpleasant mostly because I had the middle seat, but all and all it was quite bearable. I have heard stories of the terrible Nigerian movies they often play on the bus, but thankfully we didn’t have that experience...yet.
I’m not exactly sure what to think about all of this. Sherie and Sabah, the two current Project Managers that we will be replacing, seem so used to everything and really do not want to leave. That is reassuring and hopefully with time this will all just be normal: pumping water, mosquito nets, spiders on the wall, long bike rides, dusty feet, limited solar power... I’m looking forward to it all.
I'm here!!
I'm sorry for the silence over the past few weeks, but I am indeed in Zambia and have been spending the past two weeks in Meheba getting to know everyone I will be working with and being trained by the outgoing Project Managers. I will be posting some blogs I have written over the past two weeks but have been unable to upload here due to lack of internet.
We will be coming into Solwezi, the nearest town to Meheba, every two weeks, at which point I'll be able to upload blogs and check email. I hope to have LOTS of comments from all of you and I hope you enjoy the blog posts. Check back tomorrow for new pictures and posts that I'll upload and post date so you will have something to read more frequently than every two weeks.
I'm loving my time here, the people I will be working with, and the projects we will be working on. The blogs you will read from here out will be two weeks delayed, but will chronicle what I'm doing and will hopefully be heavy on pictures. Miss you all and hope to hear from you soon!!
EDIT: So the internet quality in Solwezi is not so good...very slow and apparently not very conducive for uploading photos. I'll keep working on it.
Safe and sound in Lusaka! - July 2
Hello friends! I have arrived! I actually arrived in Lusaka Wednesday after more than 30 hours of travel. Since arrival in Lusaka we have been very busy running errands with the Lusaka FORGE staff and we will be leaving for Meheba, my home for the next six months, at 4:30am tomorrow. Tonight, however, we are making baked ziti from scratch and enjoying our last few hours at the FORGE house! While I can't wait to get to Meheba, I will be sad to say goodbye to my friend Sara from training who will be headed to a different camp, Kala. Our bus ride to Meheba will be 8-10 hours, but that's nothing compared to Sara's 15-17 hour ride!
As I am typing this I am sitting here in a layered fleece AND sweatshirt and two pairs of socks...I was not anticipating Lusaka to be this cold! I have the feeling this will not be the last surprise Zambia will throw at me. I’m looking forward to getting to the camp, and I promise I’ll snap pictures and upload them as soon as I can.
The week in review and World Refugee Day
After lots of anticipation I arrived in Oakland, California and began training at FORGE headquarters on June 15th. After the first week of training I can assure you that I am LOVING it! Training is a pretty tight schedule with two sessions a day and pages and pages of reading before, between, and after each session. It is all such interesting material and I'm eating it up! We are learning about the history and conflicts in the countries that produced the refugees we will be working with (mainly Angola, DR Congo, Rwanda, Sudan, and Burundi) and FORGE's unique Collaborative Project Planning approach that embodies the FORGE mission.
I am training with two other Project Managers: Jeremy, who will be in Meheba with me, and Sara, who will be in Kala camp. As well, Mateo has joined our training as he will be spending the next few months being FORGE's pro bono attorney helping to set up FORGE's new work in the DRC. We all get along great and the FORGE staff is wonderful.
This past Saturday was the 9th annual World Refugee Day. FORGE hosted a benefit in San Francisco at Mr. (Urban Barber Shop and Lounge) in honor of the more than 2 million refugees around the world. The event was a success and was the first time that I was able to meet past Project Managers and hear about their great experiences. Bellow is a photo of me with Jeremy, my partner in Meheba.
This photo is quite misleading as Jeremy is actually about a foot taller than I am, but was kind enough to come down for a photo :). If you'd like to see more photos of the event, go here.
This week has been full of firsts and full of excitement. I know that as the training goes on I will continue to have confirmation about this step I am taking in going to Zambia. While I am loving training, I can't wait to get on the ground!! Less than one week!
FORGE Project Leader Wins Prestigious Changemaker Award
Hello friends! Its my birthday, and I couldn't have asked for a better gift: This morning I found this news in my inbox and it only reiterated to me how important the work I will be doing with FORGE really is. I wanted to pass along this amazing news to you!
"Dear Friends of FORGE,
As news of crisis and loss rapidly fills our information flows, FORGE is delighted to share one refugee's story of triumph over adversity. Just last week, Anthony Sibomena (pictured below), a 21-year-old Rwandan refugee who lost his whole family while in exile, was awarded the highly prestigious Ashoka Changemakers Award through the Staples Youth Venture Competition. With this award, Anthony became the first ever Changemaker recipient to come from a community living in extreme poverty without any access to modern communications or organizing tools.
Anthony received this esteemed award for his past and future work on health care access for refugee populations. In 2008, Anthony and fellow community leaders conceptualized and designed the project through FORGE's flagship Collaborative Project Planning Process, a framework with which FORGE supports emerging local leaders as they develop solutions to the most pressing problems in their communities. With the generosity of a group of donors called The Experiments in Hope, the Refugee Health Services project was launched in early 2009 and now provides one of the most isolated areas of the settlement with basic health services, maternal health care and clinical referrals that were previously nonexistent. You may read more about this project, including monthly blogs from the project staff, here.
Anthony's story about the important role Africans refugees can play in rebuilding their communities is just one among hundreds that FORGE has witnessed and supported over the past 5 years. We are so proud of Anthony's vision and commitment, and yet we know that he is just one of many deserving individuals that typically lack access to the resources necessary to pursue their dreams. Anthony's work exemplifies the community leadership that runs across all of FORGE's 26 projects and well beyond."
FORGE is dedicated to continuing our success at empowering leaders like Anthony to successfully rebuild their lives. Thank you for joining with me and allowing me the opportunity to work with leaders like Anthony on the ground in Zambia.
While times are tough for everyone, your generosity toward those less fortunate has never meant more. Your gift right now will make a tremendous difference toward creating a world that works for everyone. If you would like to contribute to my trip to Zambia to work with FORGE you can make a gift to FORGE in my name, or you can mail checks to 1904 Franklin Street, Suite 701, Oakland, CA 94612 with "Jessica Zetzman" in the memo line to ensure this goes towards my fudnraising efforts.
Thank you for being part of this growing movement of community-driven development. I am proud to work with you to support refugee-led opportunities across Africa.
Preparing for FORGE
Over the past two weeks my life has changed dramatically. On May 1st I got a call from FORGE offering me the position of Project Manager in the Meheba Refugee Settlement for 6 months. In the 3 days following I wrestled with the decision, accepted their offer, turned in my resignation to my current boss, informed my roommate I would be moving out, started my fundraising efforts, and began preparing for the experience of a lifetime.
I am excited to be joining such an amazing organization as FORGE. There is a lot to be done before I leave, but I can't wait to get to Zambia and be a part of the work being done on the ground.
As I prepare to leave and while I am in Zambia, I will be chronicling my adventures on this blog. Please feel free to share the blog with your friends and family that might be interested in following my journey as well.
A Little bit about FORGE:
FORGE (Facilitating Opportunities for Refugee Growth and Empowerment) is a non-profit organization which works to end the cycle of war and poverty in Africa. FORGE builds upon the capacity of African refugees to cultivate empowered communities and to create the conditions for peace and prosperity in their countries. FORGE believes in the power of individuals to transform communities, and thus invests in the education, economic self-sufficiency, and community development goals of the refugees themselves. To get an idea of the type of self sustaining projects FORGE is engaged with, check out this blog post on Saving Circles from a former FORGE Project Manager http://nickandaudrey.blogspot.
What I will be doing:
For the next six months, I will be working for FORGE on-the-ground in Zambia. As a Project Manager in Meheba Refugee camp, I will be responsible for managing previously-implemented FORGE projects and working with the refugee communities to develop new projects. Some projects include FORGE Microlending, Refugee Health Center, Meheba Women’s Center, Peace Education and Computer Training Center. For a complete list of projects visit http://www.forgenow.org/locations/1/projects. I am confident that through this work, FORGE and I can make a marked difference in the lives of thousands of refugees.
Why fundraise?
FORGE believes that every person involved should contribute to the achievement of the organization’s goals, and thus every international staff member is asked to raise at least $3,500. These funds go toward allowing FORGE to continue its work and pursue its mission of investing in individuals affected by conflict. If you are interested in contributing to FORGE's mission, I'd love your help in reaching my fundraising goals. FORGE is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization and your donation is 100% tax-deductible. FORGE offers a tax receipt for all donations over $20. You can log onto http://www.forgenow.org/content/donate-now and click "Donate Now" in the middle of the page. Please be sure to write my name, Jessica Zetzman, in the "purpose" field to ensure your donation goes towards my fundraising goals!
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