Young mothers

The girls I am traveling with on this adventure are pretty amazing. I found out during my travels here that all of them and most of the girls working at the office in Lusaka are orphans. Camfed is not only a campaign for education but also focuses on making the lives of girls around Africa more stable by sponsoring their education, clothing, food and helping them pay for their families. They do this for girls who have lost one or both parents and who likely already have one or more children of their own. Penelope, who I am mentoring to be an IT manager, lost both her parents and all but one sibling. On her own, she raises 12 kids, 2 of her own and 10 of her sisters.

All the girls I am working with and who work at the office are in a similar situation as Penelope. As we travel I realize that every time we eat a meal or stay at a guest house, the less they spend, the more they can save for their families. Unlike me - looking for good food and comfortable accommodations in each place we stay - the girls want to eat cheap and stay in the least expensive guest houses we can find so they can pocket their per diem. It took me 6 weeks to learn all of this. But now that I know it, I am starting to pay for many of the meals and incidentals. Ironically, they all get paid for the work they are doing while I am doing volunteer work and get no pay. But the per diem is more than enough for me to pay my way and then some.

A couple of the girls really impress me with how dedicated they are to the program and the work they do training and mentoring the girls. Fatuma is extremely motivated to learn IT and asks questions all the time. She will stay up to late hours with me writing IT reports and this is after long and stressful days driving long distances, installing the IT equipment and training and mentoring the group leaders.

Melody is very passionate and inquisitive. She asks great questions during the mentoring sessions and when she finds the girls are losing motivation or not focused she will look them in the eyes and have a heart-to-heart with them about how they have to work hard and take advantage of this great opportunity they have been given to start-up their own businesses. She is great with words and you can tell that she means every word that comes out of her mouth. Her words come from her heart and she has a big heart.

Ruth told me the story of how she got pregnant at a very early age and how she and her mother help take care of her mother’s 22 siblings and her sibling’s children. It is a large clan all said and Ruth takes the money she gets from Camfed and pays for raising her family as well as sending herself to school for economics. Ruth, too, does a great job with the girls and is very motivated. The first day I worked with her I could tell she would make a great mentor. She listens carefully and she does a great job of “drilling down” to get the answers and helping the girls. She inspires the girls and she tells them personal stories of her own experiences to motivate them and keep them interested.

Mwangala is a program officer and is fantastic - she is very driven and obviously interested in the girls’ projects. You can tell she cares and you can see her passion when you watch her work. I love when I see people passionate about their work and I feel it makes them much more motivated in their work and generally makes them more effective and better at their job. She asks very good questions, she keeps things positive and she re-focuses the group when they get discouraged or side-tracked.

When I consider what these girls have been through and the hardships they are faced with it is truly impressive. I feel proud to be part of the team and I also feel lucky to get to work with these young women. On the other hand, some of the petty things that I have complained about in my past or little things I get worked up about during my career – they all seem so insignificant. These girls are an inspiration and they face life head-on, even when it treats them poorly or scares the hell out of them. What they have gone through to get where they are today is incredible. If I can go as far ahead in my life as these girls have in theirs, I would do myself and my parents extremely proud, of that I am sure.