Community-based sanitation-slab casting workshop

"Designing and teaching computer courses can get dreary at times. Fortunately, I do get some breaks to go on field visits, get muddy a bit and absorb the vast countryside. I will describe two such visits.

The first was participation in a tree planting. There was a nationwide tree planting week and, as an organization, we planted over 400 trees. All the staff, over 40 people, got into pick-up trucks. We had a big Canadian flag and drove across town through different villages to a little cleared area an hour away. We stopped by a village and let some villagers accompany us. Most of the village women tied their babies to their back and hopped on the trucks with us. It was very exciting. The high pitched voices, singing away...about the future, the good of trees. We had a demonstration on how to plant correctly, and then we got to the job. The trees were a fast-growing species of acacia that would form a woodlot in the future (most people in Malawi use fuelwood, and there is a lot of deforestation). It was a different activity, unusual from the norm but best of all, it brought our worlds together. For an hour or so, we did not care about status, riches, jobs....we just participated and it felt really good.

The second was an intense field visit to the dams and a permaculture site. I probably visted over 10 villages. We started off in our 4WD pick-up and got the agricultural government officer to accompany us. Just about 20 minutes from the city, we were in a rural area...I mean really rural, no water, no electricity, minimal roads, no cars and just loads of people in the fields. The rains had turned the vegetation to deep green and the maize fields were in bloom, tobbacco was being harvested, cassava and groundnuts were plentiful. We headed out to the first site. A dam was being constructed as a water catchment area. The people have dug by hand a ditch that was 100m, by 2m wide. Very impressive...since these people were overburdened with work just to meet their basic needs. We drove through murram roads, filled with mud and overgrown bushes, sometimes with grass as tall as 2 m so you could not see ahead of you. Yet the lush green, the sparse settlements, the birds,the bugs, the butterflies...I was in a trance. A heron flew above, coloured birds lingered for grain, and the wildflowers in pink and purple hypnotized us.

Then we came upon a village, a little settlement...some huts were made of red brick, others with mud and hay thatched roofs. The skimpy village dogs had a fascination for car tires. They'd run up to the car, look at the tires then chase...I still cannot comprehend this. As we stoped at a village, either to drop off a pump or pick up equipment that we previously lent, we were greeted by numerous peoplein a very formal tradition. The handshakes make it impossible to consume any food, a hand could be really dirty but you still had to shake or you would be offending tradition. At this village, they were harvesting tobbaco, curing it through the first phase. They collected the leaves, hung them on sticks and dryed them under shade. I was surrounded by children...some who have rarely seen a foreigner. Some children began to cry since cars were monsterous creatures that scared them. Some brave children tried to come close and touch me, then they would run away. Others got really intimidated. I was a constant source of entertainment. The kids were smiling constantly, most were covered in mud and tatered clothes. Almost all were suffering from malnutrition, scurvy, kwashiokor, skin rashes, conjuctivitis. But we made their day. They'd run up as soon as the car approached, we'd entertain them for a moment. We could see their hope and optimism.  

The battle for children here is to survive up to age 5. Some parents believe that if a child cannot cope or survive the first years of life, then they are not fit to live...this attitude is deeply ingrained. You often see 3 or 4 yr old girls carrying 1 or 2 old yr old boys. It's just remarkable how women do their chores...child on the back, a bucket of water on the head, a basket of maize in the front....another kid latching on. People striving to survive...never will they see a TV, a movie, the net, their only hope is to survive and feed their family...the vicious cycle of poverty. Strangely, most people you see in the village are kids or the aged and a few mothers doing chores. With a life expectancy of 40, and the pandemic of HIV, serious implications lie in the social structure.The people can't afford clothes, why should they buy condoms, what hope do they have to survive HIV? What opportunities do they have for the world? Can they dream and desire to ever be rid of their poverty? Deep contraversial questions float through my head but for the moment I am happy to be here...just to be reminded of the necessities and basics of life I take so much for granted. My single meal is a family's food ration for the week...why is there so much disparity? Yet for the moment my heart is at peace. The smiling white teeth on a little face just won my heart and overwhelmed me with an inexplicable feeling of hope and motivation. The blue skies, the mud huts, the chickens and goats, the malnourished children, the toothless old women...this is a different world - almost a dream! We proceeded from village to village providing assurances of different supplies. We provided seedlings for soil conservation, fish fingerlings for the permaculture projects and sometimes stopped to lend our pumps to drain out water. I was in my office attire but not for long...my pants were rolled up and I was in the muck...wading through iron bacterial blooms, loads of reeds and bugs. It felt right, moments later I was savouring a sweet cane of sugar...I smiled."

Tariq - Malawi, 2001

CSIH