Through the eyes of a mother

Today we travelled to another community near Marsabit, Garqasa.  Garqasa has not yet received any livestock from Sauti Moja, but in the next few months they will be the next village to receive help for their most vulnerable widows.  The process for choosing recipients of the livestock is to first of all meet with the elders of the village to explain the objectives of Sauti Moja, and then to ask the elders to name the poorest widows who also have children who are dependent on them.  One of the staff from Sauti Moja then goes to each home to interview those widows who have been named.  Sometimes, the person doesn't meet the criteria, so Sauti Moja will go back to the elders and explain why this person won't meet the criteria, and they name another.  Once Sauti Moja has received enough funds from Canadian donors, they then purchase 4 goats and 1 donkey for each of those women.  The aim is to have the animals remain healthy, so they also arrange for the Ministry of Agriculture to come and train the women on caring for their livestock, including disease control.  In the case of major droughts, Sauti Moja will provide the women with hay and food concentrate to keep the animals alive - they have done that twice in the last 6 years. The understanding in this process, is that when the animals reproduce, the widows, as a group, will choose the next poorest woman in the village who needs to be the recipient of that baby animal.  In this way, the hope is that the aid that is given will eventually benefit the whole village. Today was the first time for Sauti Moja to meet with the widows who have been named.  This is the group outside of the church where we were meeting.   In the midst of a rather rainy afternoon, it was quite beautiful to see the color of the scarves of these women - I felt very white beside them!

As we met with them, I brought greetings to them from Canada.  I told them that when I went home I wanted to be able to tell the mothers back in Canada about this group of strong, courageous women in Africa - that we would connect with each other, mother to mother.  Here are some pictures from inside the church, where Philip and Tim were spending time explaining the process of receiving the livestock, and asking the women if they had any questions.  There were moments when the women became quite animated - one of them was when I talked about how mothers around the world were connected to each other.  Another was when Tim made the promise that within the next few months they would be receiving their livestock.

After we had finished the large group discussion, Tim, Phillip and I went to the homes of two of the widows to hear their individual stories.  Before we left the church, these four women wanted their picture taken.  They very rarely smile when they see the camera - but as soon as I showed them the picture, their faces lit up - you will have to do your best to imagine them giggling! 

The first woman we met was Bokayo.  She has 7 children - plus she was offering shelter to her mother-in-law.  Although she used to do some casual work in town - washing clothes for other people, or burning charcoal - she has not been working for some time now.  So to feed her family she relies on food relief which is generally delivered every one and a half months or so.  She fears that with this rain and the washed out roads, that the food relief might be spread out to two and a half months since it is so difficult for the trucks to travel right now.  The food that she has to make spread out for all of that time is 20 kg of maize, 4 kg of peas, and 1/2 litre of oil.  I told her she is very wise to know how to make that amount of food feed her family for so many days - I would find that very hard.  As she says, she has no alternative but to make it work.  During the dry season she has a very long ways to go to get water - she leaves home at 7:00 in the morning, and comes home about 6:00 at night, sometimes not having been successful in actually getting water.  Right now, in this rainy season, there is plenty of water close by, and she is very thankful for that.  When I asked her what gives her the strength to keep going, she said knowing that God would take care of someone like her encourages her to keep trying her best.  She knows that she is only alive through the grace of God, and through God sending her help through groups like Sauti Moja.  Here are Bokayo and I in her home, and a couple of pictures of her and her children outside of her home:

The second woman we interviewed was Wato.  Wato has 3 children - her eldest son is 15 years old.  Wato has some difficulty with one of her legs, so she is not as strong as she used to be, and can no longer work.  She used to be a house maid for someone in town, but since she has not been able to work for quite some time now, she relies on food relief to feed her family.  Because of her difficulty walking any great distances, she cannot carry her own 20 litre jug of water.  For awhile now, she has been getting water from some of her neighbours, perhaps a litre or so at a time.  She is very much looking forward to one day having a donkey.  In that case, her eldest son could go with the donkey to get water for their family - she says that will be extremely appreciated.  Before we left her home, Wato modeled for us the piece that she makes for those occasions when people wear traditional outfits - beads and bells - it was quite lovely.

One of the effects of all this rain is that the countryside is very beautiful - green and lush.  People keep telling me that I am seeing a rare thing - that normally everything is very brown and dusty.  But today we certainly had some beautiful scenery as we walked between the homes:

As we left this small village and headed back to Marsabit, it began to rain very heavily.  Driving on these roads when they are wet is very similar to driving on black ice in Canada - only include in that experience huge boulders to climb over, sometimes large pot-holes, or places where the road is quite eroded.  As I said to Tim, at least if we got stuck somewhere we wouldn't freeze to death in our vehicles!  However, our driver managed to get us back to town without us ever ending up in the ditch - it was quite a relief to get back to solid ground!