My last 2 days in Zambia. To understand The Kondwa Centre for Orphans, I realize now, one must understand and get to know the slums of Ng'ombe. Taking up a large area of Lusaka, about 90,000 households, maybe up to half a million people, a reported 60,000 orphans (actual number is closer to 100,00-125,00 orphans by people who actually live here, since the confirmed orphans are those who have been registered by a guardian, and the majority of orphans are never registered.) I spent most of my Saturday (from 8 am until about 6 pm) walking the Ng'ombe slums with Angela
- whose spirit and strength and resilience and humility and love and laughter continues to inspire me, and from which I draw strength and understanding - and some of the community guardians and elders (mothers and grandmothers) who walk the slums everyday, visiting the young parents who are HIV positive (or dying of AIDS), and provide home-based care, and psychosocial and community support. We walked for hours and the slums seemed unending.
Visited dozens of homes (of mud-brick walls and palm roofs), rugged winding narrow dirt roads and sewege canals, where I met many of the dying (predominantly from AIDS and AIDS-related illnesses), laying on the cold dirt floor. These "homes" are about 50 square feet (or even less), with entire families living in them. There is no furniture. There are no windows. Just a small, dark, dank, filthy room. These women hold the dying, talk to them, console them, clean them, feed them, pray with them. Young men and women, in their 20s and 30s, most of them in their last stages of AIDS, suffering in torment and pain and poverty and desolation. I thought that meeting with them, in a way, was sort of meeting with part of Africa - suffering in desolate darkness, surrounded by torment and corruption and disease and squalor, abandoned and forgotten by the world, despised by some, misunderstood by many, and existing in the loneliest depths of agony and despair, yet, somehow, mysteriously - hopeful, calm, even joyful, strong, faithful, never too devastated or beaten down to continue to love and live - the darkness of these desolate homes, covered in dirt and darkness, with no water, no food, none of even the most basic of human needs ... and outside in the blinding afternoon sun, the soon to be orphaned children play in the dirt, left alone and abandoned with no care and food or protection. (They are so poor that no one can afford to buy what is sold in the nearby food market - deep-fried mice, animal entrails and dried fish bones.)
The women of The Ng'ombe Home-Based Care Community and Support Centre (co-ordinated by a lovely and dimunitive but robust Irish Fransican nun who has lived in Africa for more than 40 years - Sister Marie O'Brien, another new friend) - these women, come and care and save these children, bring them to Kondwa, while they also care for the dying parents. The dying hold on to you with dark sunken eyes and quiet cries of fear and agony. I cannot bear to look at them, yet I also cannot turn away from them. To weep seems senseless and indulgent to me. So we hold them, pray with them, care for them - and then we carry the children to Kondwa as the parents die. 80 young adults will die this week in this community alone, and more than 100 children will be orphaned this week in the slums of Ng'ombe.
I have only been in Lusaka for 3 days, but I feel like I have been here for weeks. Largely because of Angela's boundless energy and fierce determination to make sure that I see and share and learn as much as possible . I managed to talk my way into getting in to the UN Compaound here - pretty much the same manner I managed to stumble my way into the Peace Corps almost 20 years ago - and spoke to some very nice folks from UNICEF, UNHCR, and UNAIDS.
On Friday evening Angela's sons - Paul and Aaron- took me out to a few neighbourhood pubs and nightclubs for some pints - to show me how the young adults here in this community spent their weekends and cope with the travails of life. In the midst of the drinking and music and fun and laughter, there was also a distinct palpable feeling of depression, despair, and reckless abandon.
Today, I visited the various government offices that are involved with NGOs and local charities - the Revenue Ministry and Registrar of Charities. Dull and fattened bureaucrats and bookeepers.
About a couple of months ago, a small team of CARE International volunteers visited Kondwa. Angela asked one of the fellows who he was and what he did for a living and he replied that he was an American actor visiting orphanages in Africa for a week. The fellow was Matt Damon. Angela had no idea who he was until she saw a photo of him in a magazine, and she soonafter received an e-mail from him whereby Matt told her that out of the dozens of projects he had visited throughout Africa that week, Kondwa most touched his heart. There was an article in People magazine apparently where Matt spoke of Africa, and his fondness and admiration of Kondwa. (Upon hearing this story, I asked the staff and children of Kondwa, and they all agreed that I was certainly handsomer than Matt Damon - the fact that I was handing the snacks and candy at the same time I asked the question, I am sure, did not prejudice their judgment in any way whatsoever.)
Going back to Ng'ombe and Kondwa tonight and tomorrow morning before leaving for Uganda. Uganda and the land journey to Kasese in a remote part of the Western Uganda, I anticipate, will be most gruelling and demanding part of my trip. Consequently, I may not be able to post any blogs for the next few days. I look forward to meeting Edward and the children of the House of Hope (HOH).