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I am now back, two months or so. Well, its snowy, windy, cold, and all the jazz. Ha! Not for me! I can feel the warmth of Burundi, the heat of inequality, the sun of hope. I miss the totally organic food, the feeling of being in community, and being able to walk down the market and handshake people, as if I have know them for a long time! I am back, confident, with fresh eyes on the global world. Yes, I went there to “help” people, well, my experience was far deeper than that. I got helped! Totally life changing experience.

Always passionate to help people who I felt were less disadvantaged than I, I decided to halt my career, leave my family and friends, de-strip myself of comfort…and gained a new career, new family and friends and self comfort!

Rolling back in time, I can still see flash backs of hope. I sit and wonder how these incredible and remarkable people are doing. Whilst I sit here writing my world away (and writing essays), there are a group of girls tilling the ground, engaging in subsistence farming. They are hoping and waiting for Mr-Handsome to come their way and whisk them away to have children. Then they will have children, plenty if possible, as a form of insurance against the future and to help them continue in farming.

Well, then stood out Aileen, 15. A tall, dark, smooth skin beauty. Well, in Nigerian circles, she would be called a “fine-gal-no-pimple”! More remarkable than her beauty, was her stark determination to learn English. Shyly. I always noticed her with an exercise book over the past 7 weeks or so week, but thought she was just taking notes. As I practically survived on translation, conversations with her basically resulted to “amahoros” (means peace in Kirundi, a form of hello), handshakes, hand sign language and hugs! Oh, and my photos. My canon was a hit! One beautiful day, 7 weeks into the program, while running sessions on hygiene, I caught Aileen with a exercise book, writing down phonetics to English words spoken in the session. My heart sunk. I learnt two remarkable lessons from her.

  • YOUTHS, we say the education system isn’t good enough..I mean, we went to inner city schools and not grammar schools, teachers were terrible…blah blah blah…so society is the factor for my resistance to achieve in life. STOP! Some people do not go to school at all. They have to farm with an exercise book and pen in their ankara wrapper (wrap around skirt), in case a group of volunteers pop along and teach them things other than English!
  • Second thing which hit me hard was the lack of literacy. United Nations, why isn’t she in school? Imagine what she could become with such determination to learn? I feel pain. Something needs to be done for girls like Aileen. She is definitely a leader of tomorrow. With ICS, you can get to meet people like Aileen, you can be a tool to help her achieve her dream. And you will be inspired too.

Then, you may meet passionate, fun loving, determined women like Fabiole, Josephine and Anna. Wait, you really need to meet Fabiole! The team members can testify to her infectious character. I cannot understand how someone can live with so much joy, whilst living with HIV! We were to impart our business knowledge to a group of people in the HIV Business Association. Totally remarkable people. With ICS, you become aware of global issues such as HIV. To be honest, I thought of HIV/AIDs as a far fetched ‘sickness’ that people live with ‘somewhere in Africa’ and beyond. I didn’t understand the level of mortification this disease has, not just on individuals and families, but in deepening poverty and inequality. Wow. You will hear stories on how HIV was transferred, anger in injustice against them, frustration for the lack of love from families and hope that things will change! Despite cultural and institutional stigmas (even worse if you are female), they are totally willing to live with the consequences of HIV/AIDs but not let it limit them to dream big!  How about us who have small set backs, well, dust-ya-self, move on and live a life of legacy! If you can’t, take a flight to Burundi, meet Fabiole and maybe life won’t seem so bad. You know what Fabiole said she wants future volunteers to help facilitate? Sessions on forgiveness and reconciliation for those with HIV/AIDs, to reconnect them back with the wider community. You can offer that!

Deeper into AIDs itself, volunteering means you can share a hug with someone who has no hope for tomorrow. I met one. Sat on the steps outside the business development class in her beautiful blue chiffon outfit, weeping weakly but uncontrollably, was a recent widow. She was weak. She was in too much pain and her antiretrovirals medication isn’t helping the situation. I felt helpless. All I could do was hug her, tell her that ‘it is well’ and pray in my mind that it will be okay! She stopped crying and smiled. Then it hit me, people suffering locally and globally just need a hug, reassurance and that someone shows that they care. With ICS, you get to do just that.

Time fails to tell you about Chantelle and Alfred, the passion of the youths, the boy with Disability in Mugutu, and of the measures poverty does to drive people to make decisions which deteriorates the soil and hence livelihood. All, I know is that your global action, will help to give economic, social and environmental benefits. And we are all one big village, your decision to be an ICS volunteer will also make a positive impact in the UK.

More on Burundi on my blog

Find out more about ICS

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