The Gift

It took eight months of fundraising and three days to travel from Boston to the village of Kwama. With 11 other apprehensive and impressionable college students, I boarded planes, trains, and overcrowded buses to traverse the countryside. We were in Zambia as part of an effort to ameliorate the crisis of substandard housing in the third world. We were representing the nonprofit organization Habitat for Humanity. Habitat's initial housing effort in Zambia came in 1985, in the impoverished fishing and farming community of Chanyanya. Since its inception, the Chanyanya affiliate has grown to include 500 houses, a health clinic, a new bridge, and modernized roads, thus vastly improving the lives and outlooks of its inhabitants. Our team was the first international group in Kwama, brought there to inspire and learn from the locals. It would be a symbiotic relationship, but difficult to determine which group would gain more from the exchange.

The bus ride from Zambia's capital of Lusaka to the small village of Kwama seemed endless yet passed by too quickly for me to capture a clear understanding of this foreign land. The bus bumped sloppily over dirt roads and was awkwardly quiet, despite being overcrowded. The hushed stares of the passengers seemed a mix of wonder and skepticism. Already I was uncomfortable, a seemingly misplaced minority in this foreign setting. I, too, sat in silence, shifting my hands and wishing to be anywhere but here. Through the smudged glass windows, Zambia's landscape in early July was the color of wheat. In sharp contrast, the endless sky was blazing blue, enhanced by the overall absence of clouds.

When we finally arrived in Kwama, it turned out to be nothing more than a series of dilapidated shacks in the distance and a row of new, box-like brick houses in the foreground. We would never see the 50 completed houses that would help transform this community, but the experience of building just one would leave a strong impression on me. Here I would spend one month working side by side with families living in squalor while learning more about the boundaries of my own character than the physicality of building a house. The new Habitat Kwama houses would consist of stone foundations, hand-made brick blocks, and cement tile roofs--far superior to the traditional and inadequate huts in which these people had previously spent their nights.

Upon arriving in Kwama, our team was instantly confused by foreign chatter. Calls of "mazunga, mazunga" later translated into "white person" accompanied giggles from the children's lips. Women in bold yellow-and-red-patterned dresses, elaborate head wraps, and bare feet circled us with song and dance. As the heavy orange sun began to retreat to the horizon and the temperature plummeted, opening ceremonies commenced. In a temple of bamboo, children welcomed their visitors with song. After a few words, the head of the village lifted his night-colored hands towards the sky and began to chant,

Pan-an-a, pan-an-a empili boula
Little by Little he's changing me
Limb upon Limb, until I can see
Jesus is changing me

His piercing eyes made contact with each of our team members as he said, "May you be changed as we are with your presence," while the delicate hairs on my neck began to rise. I stood very still, trying to assure myself that I was truly having the pleasure of experiencing this surreal ceremony. After a community prayer, the villagers began to disperse down different brush paths.

After unloading our small packs and shower bags, our jet-lagged and uncertain team crowded around the campfire for orientation. There was a thick atmosphere of excitement and nervousness among us, wishing away the night so that our "true" experience might begin. Edward, our national host, spoke softly so that we all leaned in to hear his secrets. After describing the project and plight of his people in broken but deliberate English, he introduced his daughter. "This is my Pillar. She is called Pillar, because she is my first. She the foundation of family. Everything revolves around first-born." As I smiled at Edward and Pillar, who peeked out from behind his long leg, my thoughts began to stray with the distraction of the outdoors all around us. It was like sitting at the base of a snow globe, with stars falling as far as my eyes could see. The ground was cold and uneven, but we all sat there, watching the orange and yellow flames fade in front of us. The smell of burned wood was strong in the cool night.

As the group quieted, a faint squeaking grew louder and closer. In the distance a bicycle approached, methodically cutting a path in the brush. An elderly man dressed in gray wool pants and a sweater appeared through the darkness, moving slowly but with a sense of self-determination. His knuckles whitened against his dark skin as he steered towards us, finally stopping just outside our ring to say, "You have made my heart so proud, coming to help us out. And so, I give help to you."

Tied by twine to the back of his aged red bicycle was a mattress. Thin and worn, it had been pulled from the clay floor of his modest dwelling and meant for us to sleep more comfortably on. His hands shook with age as he worked to undo the rough twine. It was in that moment of basic selflessness that the significance of my travel became clear. This old man, with nothing to claim as his own by our first-world standards, had offered us everything. His hazel eyes were glazed with pride as he insisted we accept his gift. Sylvester, as he would later introduce himself, had worked in a coal mine until he became too sick and weak. He would now be assisting the Habitat for Humanity project by cooking for our group and sharing stories on our daily walks to the market.

Despite the initial excitement, almost two weeks into the experience I was unsure whether my efforts were even helpful. As I labored to brush red bricks and carry heavy stacks of cement tiles, the women of the village would stride past me transporting an even higher stack on their heads, with a gurgling baby in tow, while mixing batches of cement. The strength of the village women was remarkable. The responsibilities of motherhood, homemaker, and laborer were just a few of their tasks. The women would exchange telling glances as they watched me struggle to imitate their actions. Meanwhile Pillar hid her laughter with tiny dirt-drenched hands. When it was time for a break from the afternoon sun, I would pull up a piece of brick to sit on for a moment's rest. In silence, Pillar would disappear behind the house and return with her own piece of brick for her much-needed break. We would share smiles and clapping hand games.

Despite my determination and a borrowed cloth head wrap, I never did master the brick-balancing act. And even after weeks of trying, the women would good-naturedly laugh each time I dropped something. Pillar would follow me, happy to help pick up my messes.

I arrived in Kwama to find a place depressed and downtrodden. How would I simply leave after a few short weeks, knowing I could return to my comfortable first-world lifestyle while these people lived with so little? But the strength on these women's faces was reassuring. On each aged and sunned face were laugh lines--not wrinkles from work and worry, but laugh lines from nights with neighbors and bellowing at their children's impromptu actions and watching me try to balance anything on my head.

In fact, my fears had been groundless and overly stereotypical, for the people of Kwama were far from hopeless. Often we would discover remarkable similarities in our cultures, sometimes slightly trivial ones. Taking a mid-afternoon break from the house on one of our first workdays, my teammate Brendan began to explain, in a loud and embarrassingly slow tone, "In my country, we count hours until noon, then start with 1 pm, 2 pm, etc." The teenage son of one of the homeowners began to laugh out loud, replying, "Yes, my friend, we understand and don't always use "military time." And we're not deaf--just sometimes speaking a different language!"

Sylvester prepared our meals each midday and evening over a smoke-laden fire pit. After daily walks to market for produce, he would create the staple of each lunch and dinner, enshima. Despite our invitations for him to join us, he insisted, "You are the guests; I am here to cook. Enjoy the feast on your own. My pleasure is you full." A thick white starch, enshima had a consistency like that of Cream of Wheat but with even less flavor. On the side we peeled plantains and mixed rice with rape, a spinach-like green vegetable. We ate these dishes perched upon concrete slabs, amid heated discussions of the absolute first food we would devour upon returning to our home soil. My teammate Mark swore it would be steak, while Gina feared withering away from a lack of chocolate. Meat would have been far too expensive to eat on a regular basis but was served, in some chopped form, as a Sunday family dish.

Directly following worship services each Sunday, we were invited to a different villager's house for an afternoon meal. Often as these afternoons turned to dusk, we found it difficult to break away from the thatched huts and stories of a life of which we would never be a part. While the men would take long walks, hand in hand with neighbors, I lingered in the candlelit kitchen.

On the cracked concrete, I spent hours with Pillar's mother, washing and cleaning up after our feast, and preparing enough vegetables for another day's meal. Lorraine had only a few years on me, but life experience I found hard to imagine. "After year six at a poor Christian school, I went to work at factory near Lusaka," she explained. "And then I met Edward, and we returned to our village. To our home." When I questioned if she ever felt the need to explore, as I was doing in my trip to Africa, Lorraine had a very different understanding as she said, "Your home is where your family lies. This notion of travel you speak of, I don't think about. Sometimes my mind wanders and wonders, but my husband and child's voices bring me back. The greatest understanding is humanity; to revel in the sight of each other--not the sight of faraway lands."

I sat in silence for a moment before gently challenging her wisdom, "But then I never would have had the pleasure of meeting you," I said, "and thinking about family."

"Well, now you must return to your own," she said and squeezed my hand as I began to think of my own mother, methodically pumping her green wooden rocking chair, thousands of miles away and wishing to hear her children's voices. It was after that conversation in the tiny hut's kitchen that I knew my work in Zambia was done.

Although emotionally I was ready to go home again, our team rose with the sun that Monday morning to continue the building process. Materials at the site reflected efficiency, limited means, and respect for the environment. Bricks for the houses were not brought in on big trucks, as they would have been in the US, but instead created by the villagers. Each morning men and women with metal picks and shovels would grind up the red earth. Water was added, and the muddy batter was placed in a large, simple, green "brick maker" that sliced dirt like a cookie cutter. The bricks then rested in the warm summer sun to dry. Although a tedious and lengthy process, brick laying reflected the careful and distinct lifestyle of Kwama. Life there was at times calm and still, and always filled with laughter. Waiting was not the hardest part, but instead a moment to steal a deep breath. I knew upon returning home I would begin to ache for things to be slow and simple.

We completed three houses and a latrine during our stay in Kwama. I left with teary eyes, only after a long hug to little pig-tailed Pillar, whom we dubbed my "shadow." Sylvester gave a hearty handshake to send me off, accompanied by many thanks. "Couldn't have done it without a good night's rest," I whispered with a wink. He smiled broadly. But the real gift wasn't the mattress; it was being invited to step into a unique and wild culture, to walk to market for daily supplies, and to awaken to sunshine and a cloudless sky. And mostly, it was a gift to simplify and relearn the fundamentals of family and community. We weren't there to make things better, but simply to observe them as they were, and to take a piece of Africa, even in a faded memory, back home.

Copyright © 2003 The President and Fellows of Harvard College.
All rights reserved. Comments. Last modified Mon, Nov 3, 2003.