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This blog will be an account my life working in a Refugee camp in Northern Zambia called Mwange. For the next year, I will be working for Right to Play, a sport and development organization based out of Toronto. What follows will be a life altering experience. Stay tuned....
Wednesday, June 01, 2005
May 11th
Another Section Leader meeting today, though the Field Officer for the UN is out of town, so the atmosphere was less convincing than previous meetings. The main topic for the camp leaders was about witchcraft cases which are becoming increasingly common within the camp and which the camp is demanding help from the NGOs as they don't quite know how to deal with it. In one case (if you can believe it) a refugee woman cried witchcraft for the mysterious disappearance of her pubic hair (???). Apparently the lady woke up "bald" and is convinced that someone has cast a spell on her. I think this case will remain unsolved. In another case, a man has blamed his assault on witches. Apparently the man was attacked in the night and couldn't see the face of his assaulters, therefore - witchcraft. There are a lot of misconceptions about magic and witchcraft within the camp as people remain uneducated and want to blame crimes on imagined perpetrators. In reality, the culprits could be members of their own family and they don't want to reveal their names.
Sorghum remained an issue with refugees reporting that people are returning to the Congo due to the food problem. Tradesmen remain the main motivators behind the outcry against Sorghum as there is no market in the area for its sale. and therefore refugees are calling the food "poison" and "uneatable" and "crap" all the while demanding for return to their staple of maize. The sorghum was a donation to the UN and word is it will continue for awhile.
Also facilitated Day One of the netball workshop, which went really well and the girls seem very motivated to learn the skills of the sport. I have one of our coaches, Joseph (a teacher at the secondary school) doing the workshop for me and we hope by doing this that the girls will start playing games every week and maybe even starting up a league or intramurals within the schools. Problems came when we realized that a portion of the netball field had been dug up by refugees wanting the soil from the area. What can you do?
