Today’s Transform Your Life quote and assignment were about being fully who you are. On the drive to Kantolomba this morning, we all agreed to practice being fully ourselves today.
While driving to the property, we passed Rose heading the opposite direction. Being her astute self, Theresa saw her, honked, and signaled for her to pull over so we could talk. With her were two representatives from St. Theresa’s, a nursing home in Ndola. Rose and Theresa are working with them to consult on the care of Anne. Anne is a member of the cooperative who is very old and unable to work or even care for herself. All of her 13 children have died, so there is no one readily available to take her in. We are all working together to find good care for her in her final stages of life.
Rose in her nurse uniform
Rose, Theresa, Jen and the women from St. Theresa’s discuss the care of Anne.
Jen says hello to Josephine and little Immanuel.
Rebecca meets Immanuel. It’s universal – all babies love the beads!
It was Donna's first time at the property and she was greeted warmly by the women of the co-op, especially Josephine and Susan who served as her "tour guides." They showed her the property and invited her to participate in the feeding program. They spoke of their work and accomplishments with such love and pride.
Donna enjoys seeing the Living Compassion compound for the first time.
Carrying the nchima is a two-person job!
Josephine shows Donna how to scoop and serve the nchima.
"Well done, Donna!"
The girls enjoy their lunch. The menu today is nchima and pinto beans.
This young man came up and introduced himself to us. His name is Jeff and he is one of the recipients of a Living Compassion school scholarship. He just sat for his exams and assured us he would pass!
A familiar lunchtime scene.
While the tour was going on, Rebecca and Jen worked on organizing a massive “child photo” project with Theresa, Georgina, and Veronica. The goal is to take a photograph of each of the 800 children in the program! Charles and Veronica have already started organizing the master list by grade level, now it’s time for the picture-taking to begin! We trained Georgina and Veronica to use the digital cameras, to make sure the lighting was right, and, most important, to remind the children to seca! (Smile! in Bemba) The children are fascinated with cameras, and soon we had a small mob gathered around us while the pictures were being taken. Helpful little hands would smooth the collar and wipe the face of whoever was sitting on the “picture bench.” You could hear a dozen or more little voices encouraging the subject of the picture to “Seca!”
Rebecca showing Veronica and Georgina how to use the digital camera.
Veronica is a master at this!
Giving the “A-ok” sign to the smiling child sitting on a bench in front of that hedge.
Here is one of the photos. 799 more to go! This is truly heroic work this cooperative is doing.
The women prepare the greens for tomorrow’s lunch.
The work on the Pulumosa stoves is continuing.
Peter and Reiben working on the stoves.
A familiar summertime chore – pulling the nutgrass from the yard.
We love projects like this because we get to interact directly with the children. Today, we got lots of “face time” with the kids (pun intended). After the picture-taking was done for the day, an impromptu game of the Zambian version of duck-duck-goose and ring-around-the-rosies emerged. After that, Brenda and Estella signaled to a few girls to go get the drums. These “drums” are bright yellow empty plastic containers that once held cooking oil. Much singing and dancing ensued when the drums showed up. Adults and children alike took turns choosing and leading the next song, and the next, and the next. At one point Veronica organized the children and led a line dance around the yard. Since the songs were sung in Bemba, we asked Georgina to interpret some of the words. The songs were about friendship and gratitude and love.
Jen helps this little guy in his headstand.
You’re never too old for duck-duck-goose!
Rebecca and the kids enjoy some games.
Estella and Brenda lead the drumming.
Singing and dancing!
Veronica leads the dance-train.
Little (no longer Baby) Cheri and Testimony look on. Testimomy has been carrying around that “toy” all day. It’s a plastic sprinkler head with a fun little twirly thing.
Earlier in the day, Jen had invited four girls, Josephine, Miriam, Evening, and Jane to read aloud a book with her after lunch. They gathered under a tree and immediately attracted a crowd to read along too. Most of those present could read along and were following the story -- in English. The children have an insatiable hunger for books! We have known for a long time that being fluent in English is the clearest path out of poverty for the children in Kantolomba. It feels the time is ripe to intensify our efforts and saturate the project with opportunities to learn and master reading, writing, and speaking English. The desire we saw during this “story-hour” confirmed what we thought – that the children themselves are hungry for this! We are conspiring with Theresa to fully stock the new library and find a way to give the children regular, extended access to lots and lots of books.
Josephine, Jane, Evening, and Miriam looking lovely.
Jen reads with the children.
Just look at those smiles!
In the course of our conversation about the library, Theresa told us about her own love of books as a child. She would go to her school’s library every spare minute and soak up everything she could read. While her friends were out playing, Theresa was reading. In third grade, her teacher, Mrs. Cox, noticed her passion for reading and began encouraging her to read aloud publicly. Theresa won the “best reader” award and was regularly asked to read aloud for the entire school. Mrs. Cox was a white woman from Great Britain and was a stickler for correct pronunciation, so Theresa was held to a high standard of speaking. She described the pride and confidence she felt as a result of the training and recognition she received. She would stand in front of the room, clear her voice, and launch into the story, commanding the attention of the entire room! We are grateful when we think of Mrs. Cox nurturing Theresa’s gifts and Theresa in turn nurturing the children in Kantolomba today – a giving/receiving loop inside of a gratitude loop.
We thought this was a great shot of the kids!
Enjoy these adorable faces.
And these!
Josephine, Immanuel, and Cheri say goodbye to us at the end of the day.
On our drive home we see pigs enjoying the rain puddles from last night’s storm.
After leaving the property, we made a mad dash to the fabric store, the bank, and the grocery store – all before 5pm, when it was time to return the car to Martha. Then it was back to Castle Lodge for dinner. We have been using dinnertime for processing what we noticed arising in ourselves throughout the day. It is an opportunity to see how we were fully ourselves today. Practicing as sangha in this beautiful place evokes a heart full of gratitude.
These girls work at our favorite fabric store -- one of the only Zambian-Woman-Owned businesses in Ndola.