As much as I love writing crazy stories about what happens in my life here or chit chatting about random veggies I’m growing, I’m assuming many of you would like to hear about the work I’m actually doing. Yes, yes, I do “work” although I must refer to it as “play” since, well, it never feels like the coined term we are all accustomed to.
Women’s Sewing Group
To give a little background, not all of my projects I have attempted thus far are continuing. The first project I began in August of 2010 was a women’s sewing group. With the help of a former counterpart (a person in the village we as PCVs work with in order to bridge some gaps) in Bwanje, we set up a meeting with a group of women a few villages over. The first meeting went off without a hitch and I was thrilled to begin a group with seemingly excited women.
What I hadn’t originally taken into consideration was the 15 minute bike ride to this particular meeting point. This distance ultimately meant that chances of me seeing these women on any sort of regular basis was virtually out of the question. A 15 minute bike ride means at least an hour to two hour walk for people, of which most are unwilling to subject themselves to unnecessarily.
Second hold up simultaneously coinciding with the distance was the language barrier. Being only about four months into my stay in Bwanje, my knowledge of the Chichewa language was still at a kindergarden level which was most unhelpful especially when discovering no woman in the group knew enough English to converse. And with these hold ups also came with my inability to find someone to travel that distance with me on a weekly basis to assist translating with the group.
However, in the time I worked with these women (25 originally showed up to the first meeting, ultimately only 3 showed with any regularity) we managed to sew a money purse for their use. With my obvious difficulties I decided to discontinue this group and try again closer to my house in the trading center.
Fast forward to Sewing Group #2! Having taken all my struggles of group #1 into consideration, I confronted my counterparts’ wife, Evelyn Matekenya to propose the idea of beginning a group. Needless to say she was excited about it and thus a new age was born! Evelyn and I converse regularly in english, which has been a godsend for me working the group, and her ability to translate to Chichewa bridges the language barrier gap..
Our first official meeting took place in December, with some 25 women showing up. I thought “oh, this is fun, we’ll see how many last and continue to come.” Two months later, we still have a solid 25 women showing up to participate in our projects. So far we have taught basic sewing skills by hemming a handkerchief (very appropriate for wiping sweat during hot season) and are currently working on a money pouch. I learned the hard way with group #1 that you have to take baby steps assuming no one knows how to sew.
Along with sewing in the group, we chat about certain issues such as: how to keep a healthy and clean household by making sure to wash hands after usage of the toilet and gardening, child spacing (Malawi wants families to space children by 3 years), and malaria prevention (yes, I know how to prevent it despite my mishap with meds :p). I would like to expand our small projects to cover proper dental hygiene (since it is not widely stressed in the village), peanut butter making, and cooking. Evelyn stresses that we must keep our weekly meetings, Sundays, since the women enjoy a release from regular household activities which include making maize flour for nsima or fetching water. Heck, I enjoy the break from my regular routines as well!
Over the course of the last 7 months in Bwanje, I have grown very close to Evelyn through our regular visits and chats. She and her husband run a maize mill which makes it’s easy to find her. Between loads of women coming to have their maize ground to flour we chat about the group, different things we cook, and possible projects. She gives me advice on how to handle things culturally here and instructs me honestly in how to handle different situations. I can safely say she is the one person here I would trust with anything concerning my house or beloved pups and I have the utmost respect for her.
Wildlife Club
My next project is working with the Wildlife Club at the private secondary, Kalikokha. This began back in August or September with me heading to the school to see where I could do some work. At the beginning we had a lot of students, almost 30, interested and excited to do projects. With meetings on Mondays, I would meet with the patron of the group on Thursdays to discuss ideas and talk about the next steps to go. I was so excited with all the ideas I had from beginning a tree nursery to educating the students on wildlife within Malawi and at the National Parks. My vision was to teach them about such things and then take them on a trip to Liwonde National Park, about an hour and a half from Bwanje.
In short, without dragging on the details, I was genuinely excited about the project when it began. Thus far the students have planted a garden, planted tree seedlings (our success with matured seedlings was about 30%), and visited Liwonde National Park. However, consistently the patron has not been of much help in the direction of keeping the students motivated and organizing for projects in terms of materials needed and lesson plan preparation. On our trip to Liwonde, students were found with alcohol and it’s presumed the patron as well as the minibus driver were involved as well. Let’s just say I was extremely upset and embarrassed after having put so much time into organizing the trip. I was also concerned about the reputation of my group and how they park would perceive us. The garden failed since responsibility was not taken over who would water and transplant the sprouts at a proper time. We will have to wait and see if the newly planted trees will make it.
Some of you might ask why I’m not stepping in more to control or direct these project. Reason being that anything I start during my service here must be sustainable. While working with groups, even the sewing club, I’m trying my hardest to have people take responsibility from the beginning. Sure, I could go to the school and water the plants and trees daily but it would completely defeat the purpose of making people responsible for their projects.
If I can throw it out there, my motivation for this project has pretty well diminshed. I have about a year left in my service to do projects and quite honestly I refuse to waste my time with a group that doesn’t seem to care whether or not I work with them. Some of you may think I’ve given up to easy, but it’s all relative, and trust me I’ve tried. I’d much prefer putting time and energy into the Sewing Club and/or beginning Safe Water Clubs to educate the villagers on proper water practices.
Mosquito Net Distribution
Net distribution is actually a quick project from where I am sitting. Population Services International (PSI) has distributed 500 nets to me and in turn I am in the process of rallying for distribution.
With the help of my counterparts, the area Group Village Headmen, and Village Headmen, we will distribute nets to pregnant women and children under 5. Thus far, we are still in the process of organizing everyone and gathering names of those women who still need a net. A big problem is that the Health Clinic has run out of nets to distribute and once a woman gives birth she cannot obtain a net. Therefore, we have a lot to cover!
Our goal is to have all these nets distributed before March 12th, which is doable if we can get everyone organized and working together. I will update you all to let you know how it goes!
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