This is a blog about what I thought I would be facing the whole World Race, so since it hasn’t been obvious to me I thought I was fine. I’m grateful I haven’t seen it much, but it’s been introduced to me so slowly I haven’t noticed it until now; in its most stark form. So far it has just been… normal. Now that I see it so overwhelmingly am I truly noticing it for what it is; the “it” is poverty.
When we started in this continent I was excited about everything. “This is African dirt!” “This is an African tree!” “Whoa! An African rock!” Well, newsflash, an African rock is not very much different from normal rock. Yes there are strange signs like “Potholes, 10km” and “Cows, 20km,” they drive on the other side of the car and the other side of the road – those things are strange – but my time in Africa hasn’t been the Africa everyone expects; until Swaziland.
This month has been everything a typical American would imagine “Africa” to be. We are in the bush, far from anyone or anything, there are huts and red dirt everywhere, and cows, chickens, and goats just doing their thing in the middle of the street. Little shoeless kids and not-so-little shoeless teenagers run around playing ball or kicking a tire with a stick, run up to you to say hello, and have walked for miles with a bucket on their heads because the property you live on provides the source of clean water for the community. “Sunday best” is sometimes a knockoff Adidas sweatshirt (even though it’s 1,000° outside) because it’s name brand so it’s “nice.” Kids wear the same clothes every day; a shirt with a hole in it large enough to put your fist through, and typically two pairs of pants – both with holes in them – because the outside pair with holes is covers up the holes on the pair underneath. Then when you reach down to give a high five or pick one of them up, their shirt raises up just high enough to see the witchcraft band tied around their stomachs; and some are barely 3 years old.
This country has the highest rate of HIV in the world, the highest number of orphans due to AIDS, and 40% unemployment. In the US there would be street riots at 15%.
If you follow me much on Instagram (@meredithshaddix) you’ve seen my “Sometimes Ministry Looks Like” hashtag. This month we’ve been at an Adventures in Missions base and gotten to work in the admin office profiling the kids so they can be sponsored. We photograph them, take down their information, and enter it into the database during the week. This has been some of the most heartbreaking work I’ve ever done. A typical entry looks like:
Name: Celia Age: 6 Siblings: 3 Number of Children Living at Home: 8
Father: Deceased (or worse, “Healthy. Moved away.”) Mother: Sick. Unemployed. (Or sometimes, “Healthy, unemployed.) Caregiver: Grandmother. Sick. Unemployed.
These are the kids we play with and feed during the week. They have up to 15 people living in their home and usually no income, no parents, and no opportunity. Some of the kids even take their food home to feed only God knows how many more people at home. Meanwhile these kids are laughing at me for having a ring on my toe. Something that cost me $20 and says “walk with Jesus” screams opulence because I can afford to wear jewelry on my feet. The contrast has never been so strong.
I spend these days praying over these names and breathing John 16:33 – “take heart, I have overcome the world.” But sometimes that doesn’t scratch the surface of what I’m struggling with. My favorite professor in college told me not to get bogged down with all there is to be discouraged by, but to focus on the bright spots. Well Dr. Newell, I found one.
I got to interview one of the women that works in the admin department who deals with this every day. She was one of those kids. AIM is really into sustainable development and they take children that show potential in the care points, put them into leadership programs, and raise some of them up to run other care points. Nelly now has a family of her own and is helping to run all ten care points in this village. There is hope. There is possibility. The king of Swaziland may have 14 wives and spend all his money living lavishly instead of benefiting his people, there may be kids here that don’t get that chance, but people have a story and there is hope in some of them.
In other news, this is a hard month for me. I’m thankful to finally be jarred out of the fading-in of poverty I’ve seen and to finally see it for what it is, yet these people don’t need money or handouts. Giving them the things they lack solves nothing. They don’t know they’re lacking them. The things they do need I can’t even provide, but I can love them and it’s about all I can do. So I will keep choosing to.
