A few times a week me and Amiss are going for home visits to different people around in the villages here. We want to reach out to the poorest and weakest in the region. To encourage them and help them with basic health care and advise. This also gives us an incredible opportunity to see the conditions people are living under and what the needs are.
Some days, like yesterday, we ended up walking for an hour (one way) to get to the home of an old man. It was hot, but a beautiful hike! The rainy season has just started and the nature is coming alive again after a dry and rough period. Its incredible how green and fruitful everything turns. Here are some few photos from our walk and visit. To give you an little peek into the beauty of this nation and a snapshot of what our days looks like here at the moment.
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| Amiss, pastor Margareth and me |
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| Yup, we are going all the way up there:) |
There are always some children, some more shy than others
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| I am not sure what I am doing but surly trying to demonstrate something;) |
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| Amiss and the old men |
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| A fast growing bean field |
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| This is apparently where the people in this area get their water from |
Earlier this week we went to another village for some visits. One family we visited because their smallest child of one year did not develop properly. He could still not sit on his own neither turn from one side to the other nor crawl or even eat anything else than breast milk. His hair was light, pretty straight and thin. He is the youngest of 8 children.
The husband in the family does not have a job. Due to their situation none of them have health insurance or money for school fees. They have a little plot of land where they cold grow corn and beans. Which is more or less the only thing they eat. Just a few days before we came for the visit they had been able to harvest all their beans. But since they do not have glass in the windows, thieves where able to sneak in and steal all the beans in the night. Meaning, what should have been a change in diet and maybe their only source of protein was now gone and they had to continue eating corn porridge and only corn porridge...so devastating!
While we were there with them my mind worked hard to see if there were anything they cold do especially when it came to the child and his need of nutrition to grow and develop. I asked if they knew about the Moringa tree. They said they knew about it also where to find them, but they did not know their value. I was happy to explained to them its strong nutritional value, how they can prepare it and how much they should eat ever day for it to be sufficient for a malnourished child.
This little advise seems like a small thing when looking at the amount of challenges this family are facing. One would like to give them money for window, for insurance, for medicines, for food, for school fees and and...the challenge is though that around the corner is the next family with as devastating situation as this one.
And the truth is that giving money never will be a long-term solution.
There are times I give and other times I don't. I believe it is right to do it some times. But the idealist and maybe the realist in me would want to see a greater change in these lives. A change that enables them to make that change themselves. That they become able to get their head above water and by themselves can start to create and live, not only survive. I guess that is why I chose to come here in the end. Though many things seems impossible I have to believe things can change.
And even if they don't it is still worth trying.
The fact that the mother learned about a plant that is for free and that she can get herself to provide for herself and her children its pretty encouraging to me. This knowledge alone i know could already be a small step which could potentially be life changing for them. Especially for the malnourished one year old.
