Here, There, and Everywhere

Our guest house in Choma seems like luxury after spending two nights in Simaubi! We woke up at 5:30 AM on Tuesday morning just before the sun rose. Nine of us piled into our van packed full with cornmeal, water, cabbage, sleeping bags, and foam mats. I don’t think any of us really knew just how bumpy the ride would be. After two hours of bouncing up and down in our seats, we made it to Macha Hospital (a quick stop before Simaubi). The hospital was very nice and specialized in malaria prevention. We were given a tour where we actually ran into other Messiah students who are spending May Term there. We were provided lunch which we ate with them, then piled back into the van and drove half an hour more to Simaubi. We arrived around dusk and waited around the fire until final host family decisions were sorted out. We went off in pairs to our respective homestay families (except Christine, who was on her own). Each of us obviously had different experiences, but I think there are some things that we all had in common. For example, toilets were pit latrines, roosters crowed every hour throughout the night, cooking was done on an outdoor fire, and English was minimal. Let us expound upon our bathroom situations: Toilet paper—no way. Light—I don’t think so. Small creatures crawling around—absolutely. The smell of fresh flowers—certainly not. A hole the size of a brick—think smaller. So basically, we are trying to say that using the toilet was kept to a minimum, which clearly creates other problems when all you eat is starch (5 times a day). Speaking of starch, let’s talk about our eating situation: enshima: a tan thick corny paste that tastes like mashed potatoes minus all of the good stuff. This is what we survived on. It was a staple for every meal. The only thing worse than tasting it was having it sit in your stomach for days. To accompany the enshima, we had the vegetable rape (no, that’s what it’s really called). We also were served some sort of meat with our meals, usually goat or chicken.

As you know, our purpose for spending time in “the bush” was to develop two Village Savings and Loan Associations. The first day (Wednesday), we were scheduled to begin at 9 AM. However, in typical Zambian fashion, people didn’t show up until 10 and the full group wasn’t there until nearly noon. It was exciting to see nearly fifty people so eager to be involved in these Associations. Mary and Matt (or Matayo, as he is called in Zambia) trained one Association with the help of Pastor Nambala, who can speak both English and Tonga. Laura and Larry taught the other Association through Ndala (let us tell you a side note about this very intriguing Zambian: He is a young man who works with Ron Herr, our BICC-Z contact. Ndala has been really helpful throughout this whole trip. He also happens to be our chosen export upon our departure. To say the least, we really enjoy his comical addition to our team.). We trained for about 3 hours on Wednesday and 5 hours on Thursday.

Jess, Ali, and Christine helped to prepare lunch for about 60 people on both days. Some of their experiences included: learning to carry water on their heads, filleting a goat, stirring 25 pounds of enshima, and Ali cutting off the head of a live rooster (I guess she didn’t like the fact that they kept us up all night). When we actually ate our meals, there were no utensils involved. We used the hands that God gave us, which we cleaned the best that we could with the small bottles of Messiah-provided Purel to prevent swine flu (thank you, DT). It’s funny because Zambians don’t drink with their meals (actually, they don’t drink ever). Needless to say, our experience was one of humility, learning, and dirt—lots of dirt. Mom, Dad: we miss you. We will never complain about your cooking again. Love you all

-Laura and Ali