Community outreach: Tumungu, Akwang sub-county

Our first community outreach activities brought us to the isolated village of Tumungu. I knew from the beginning that it wouldn’t be easy. The village is one of the poorest villages I have ever seen and the people appeared extremely disorganized and had difficulty planning ahead.  We had organized with the community leaders to come for the first of four educational workshops on a Tuesday. When we arrived on Tuesday, no one was in attendance and we waited for three hours with promises of “people are coming”. I regretted not sending someone (or myself) the previous day but then again, would it have even mattered? No one in the community has a cell phone so calling the day before wasn’t possible. One of the major challenges I’ve found in working with rural areas is they often lack conceptualization of time. When villagers' lives are without a clock, there is simply morning, evening and nighttime. It makes sense but is so far removed from most westerners (or urban people’s) approach to life that it can be frustrating to adjust to. So I am well aware that when I came four days previous, there would be very little chance people would remember. And it’s not that they would necessarily forget I was coming, rather they would fail to recognize that it was actually Tuesday at 10AM until I was in their presence.

We decided to adjust our strategy for the following Thursday. We would first go to the school in the morning and then go to the village in the afternoon. This allowed us to get to the village at about 11AM and give them time to organize themselves. This worked well and three and half hours later, we were ready to start. Luckily, I am well versed in “waiting for the village” techniques and I had remembered to bring my Kindle (e-reader) and mp3 player. It’s amazing how three and a half hours can either be incredibly boring or incredibly relaxing.

We met a group of about 30 people, most of whom had just come back from farm. They were extremely welcoming and we began our first educational workshop which focused on diarrhea prevention and treatment. I can’t say enough about our main facilitator, Charles. He is extremely engaging and lacks the usual pretentious and elitist attitudes that many educated workers have when working with impoverished rural areas. This kind of attitude and approach cannot be taught and is invaluable. I was a bit shocked at the villagers reception of our message; they were pleased we were there and even apologized for not having more people in attendance. They said they had never received any health education messages and they wanted us to come back. Most villages tend to want “something” for their time or promises of something greater to come. It was refreshing and humbling to meet a village content and excited to hear what most of you would consider basic messages. In fact, I’m sure if I sat you down and administered the same program, most of you would feel insulted within the first five minutes due to the basic nature of the message.

The most interesting moment came after the demonstration of how to prepare homemade oral rehydration solution. Many people believe that if a child has diarrhea, the best thing to do is withhold food and water. We explain the method of preparing homemade rehydration solution from water, salt and sugar, as well as encourage them to do administer the drink to their children when they are sick. Ana and I were watching the demonstration when she points to a woman and says, “Look at that….” I saw a woman toward the back who had a baby that was not only practicing open defecation  but was also suffering from a terrible case of diarrhea. The child was not more than a few months old and the mother was balancing the baby between her two legs as she sat on the ground, as if to conceal what was happening to those around. A small pool began to seep out from around her and her eyes caught mine, full of shame and worry. It was obvious to those around her that Ana and I had seen the incident though we were a bit shell shocked. I was trying to figure out what the best thing to do would be but before I came to a conclusion: an older woman sitting next to the mother asked Charles if she could try the oral re-hydration solution. Charles obliged and after the woman tried it, she encouragingly passed it to the woman with the sick child. She fed the child the solution and the child happily lapped it up. Small victories!