This morning I awoke to the sound of silence at around 4:30 am when the power went off. Dawn is about 5 am and within moments, I realized it wasn't silent after all. There was the chirping of the little birds. There was the wind and the leaves rustling. Then there was a rooster's occasional crow, a child's cry in the distance - so beautiful, these sounds that God gave us that we typically ignore.
We traveled to Kamichanga today. This is a remote village that we had to travel through a huge tobacco plantation to reach. The plantation is of course owned by some westerner and the land is farmed by sharecroppers. Last year there was only two months of good rain and so the crop suffered as did the farmers. They do the work, the landowner gets paid first and if anything is leftover, it's theirs. As a result, families may live indentured to the landowner year after year living in a 10x10 room with one small window. This is what your $7 pack of cigarettes buys in addition to your health problems and the wealth of Phillip Morris - the primary contract.
The team I was on in July, 2014 visited this village so it was quite familiar. We had a great day there seeing patients for follow up from previous teams, and seeing only a few sick children. Once clinic was over, the children decided to ham it up by singing and dancing for us. The natural ability to harmonize is so impressive and their dancing skills were too fun. I will post a video as soon as I get to edit and rotate it on my computer.
Afterwards we told the kids they could ask us anything. They asked if they could touch our white skin and straight hair. What an honest, innocent request. And oh the giggles...
No comments:
Post a Comment