On Sunday 15 Aug, Gregor, Mum and Dad accompanied us to Edinburgh Airport and bade us farewell. Our 4 months furlough has passed so quickly, yet we feel that much has been accomplished. It was a cloudless and sunny summer afternoon and it was fun sitting in the window seat on the flight to London matching the landscape below to the screen chart showing our flight path.
The onward flight to Lusaka was crowded and full with the usual universal flurry of returning families heaving and humphing, probably overweight, hand-luggage up the aisles and then carefully stowing it away in the overhead bins before everyone finally settled and relaxed.. A Carry on carry on, indeed!
We flew over a dry, red and khaki-coloured Lusaka, before landing in the early morning at the airport, Mubita was now wearing my sweater with rolled up sleeves to disguise the fact he had no trousers on. They had been removed during the night following a major spillage of apple juice!
We processed without difficulties through the Immigration and Customs formalities, luggage in tact (though now minus a pair of Mubi's shorts), and found a taxi that took us to a warm welcome back at Synod. After greeting the staff, the first thing on the 'To Do' List was to pick up our Entry Permits. After 16 years in Zambia we no longer need a Work Permit. This will save much time effort and money as these had to be renewed in Lusaka twice every five years. A visit to Immigration HQ was required, not an appealing prospect, as it is always hot, overcrowded with long queues there. However, we were fortunate as the officer dealing with our case we had got to know when he was stationed at Sesheke. He greeted us warmly with an 'Ah, my family!' So the issuing of the Entry Permits was done in under an hour.
The next problem to solve was to get our cell phones to work again. Being out of the country for 4 months meant that we needed to buy a new SIM card as our phones had been deactivated. K30 000 later to keep the same number, I was told the phone should work again after two hours. However nothing here is ever that simple and another visit to the ZAIN shop (Cell Phone Company) was required on Tuesday morning to rectify the failure of the new SIM card to operate the phone and to buy another new SIM cars for our Internet dongle. Another major inconvenience is that you lose all the numbers saved on the previous SIM card. Consumer rights and customer service are unfamiliar concepts here. You just have to learn to be grateful that ZAIN condescends to take your money!
We stay in a self-catering guest-house at the Beit CURE Hospital when we are in Lusaka so we were able to catch up with Harold and Susan Haamumba who are chaplains there. Mubita stayed with them after he was denied the visa to visit the United States. So it is like meeting up with family. Likewise we had afternoon tea with the Sitalis, other dear friends.
In the course of Tuesday afternoon we started to try and track down our 7 suitcases of unaccompanied luggage containing baby clothes, medical supplies and other donated goods that we had been given during our furlough. There was paperwork and e-mailing to be done for this. We also met Grant who was up from Mwandi to collect computer supplies that Fred Coates had sent from the States earlier on. Fred was now waiting for them at Mwandi. The day ended with shopping for supper then home to the Beit.
Wednesday morning started with a trip to the barber's for Mubita and me and the hairdresser for Ida. The car too was put into Autoworld for some much needed TLC after being parked for 4 months.Time was then devoted to visiting various retail outlets to price goods and materials for the house. The day was rounded off with a special Mwandi supper and fellowship evening graciously hosted by the Rev and Anne Sitali with the Sitali family, us and the Bangladeshi Mission Partners, Sulota from Mbereshi,and Leya Liton and Akash from Chipembi all of us first getting to know one another at Mwandi.
On Thursday the car was delivered again to Autoworld for wheel balancing and alignment and to correct the pull to the left that NISSAN is unable to fix. Both our Zambian driving licenses had expired during our furlough. Driving licenses need to be renewed here every 5 years..A medical examination and an eye-test are also required as part of the process. We had tried to have them renewed prior to our leaving but the computerisation of the process made this impossible. It was too soon! We could not drive back to Mwandi without valid licenses. So a day at the Road Traffic Department was envisaged , generally another place of officious bureaucrats ,crowds, heat and long lines. So, it was refreshing to meet Mr Mulongwe who listened sympathetically to our story, and when we explained that all the renewal paperwork was in Mwandi and ready to be processed at Livingstone on our arrival, suggested that the renewal be done in Lusaka. He was incredibly helpful in pushing this through and issuing us with temporary licenses which would last for a month, though this will mean another trip to Lusaka within the month to collect them.
We had been in touch regularly with Bridge Cargo who were clearing our suitcases and Fred Coates's computer supplies. At 1500h we were told that we could go to the Cargo Village at the Airport to collect our suitcases. Customs were releasing them early as a special delivery. The computer supplies were at the company warehouse on the Great North Road. Grant had been hoping to catch the night bus but this was increasingly a forlorn hope. We drove out to the Airport and joined the queue with the clearing agents to pay the handling fee and collect the goods. There was only one long-suffering and stoical female cashier to deal with the queue of mainly male agents and their cheeky and good-natured banter. The conversations switched easily from English to vernacular and back again. The agent from one of the major embassies was coming in for some stick as he was clearing tax free! We also met a lady we sat opposite to on the plane who was also in the queue to pick up some goods. We finally paid and picked up our suitcases. The agents from Bridge Cargo had arranged for us to pick up the computer supplies after hours. We arrived at the warehouse and squeezed the 3 boxes and the large dish into the back of our pick-up along with Grant as we had to drive with the tail gate down so the dish would fit. The two Bridge Cargo employees whom we dropped off on their way home were in the backseat along with two suitcases..
We had missed the evening Mazhandu bus to Sesheke so we left the dish in the care of the guards at Synod and arranged for Grant to be picked upby Eddie, a Synod driver, at 0600h and taken to the bus station with the over-sized dish to return to Mwandi on the first morning bus. Grant was staying next door with the Bangladeshis at the YWCA Hostel.
We then picked up Mubita who had been cared for by Mercy Sitali the whole day, allowing us to do what we had to without having to worry about him, otherwise we could not have achieved so much.
After that we bought an Indian carry-out meal and went home to watch the programme commemorating the second anniversary of the death of President Mwanawasa. So ended our 32nd Wedding Anniversary.
Tuesday 24 August 2010
Friday 13 August 2010
The French Connection
We left Vienna early on Saturday morning and traveled comfortably to Zurich where we were to change trains for Geneva. We were met at the station by Philippe and Nadine Buerger. We had been in touch with Philippe by email but had never met. He was born at Mongu, the son of Missionaries to Barotseland, and he grew up in Zambia. He has been working with others on the chronological history book, 'The Spread of the Gospel in Barotseland. From the Paris Mission to the United Church of Zambia.' This will be printed and published next month. His father's notes from 1885-1935 have been used as a primary source. They saw us off, after coffee, on our way to Geneva.
It was a nostalgic journey for Keith. We passed through Feldkirch in Austria where his grandfather, Hugh, a Cameronian, was detrained as a prisoner of war by the Austrians during WW1 and marched upstream to the POW camp in Liechtenstein. We saw the castle at Vaduz in the distance as we passed. A little further on, we went through Walenstadt where Keith had a summer job as a Council Worker as a student in the mid-70s.
We were booked into a comfortable Christian Hotel in Geneva. We worshipped at St Peter's (Calvin's Church) on the Sunday morning and met with Ann-Lise Chatelin (Sibeso) for lunch, a chat and a stroll through the old town with a visit to the Reformation Wall for us and the play park for Mubita. In the late afternoon Jean Fischer who oversaw the building of the Basic School at Mwandi while he was head of the Senanga Trade School took us up into the mountains for a delicious fondue and to enjoy the view from the summit down to the Lake and the city.
The next day we took the TGV to Nimes via Lyon where we met another old friend, Rev Francois Escande, who was formerly a Minister at Mwandi. Mwandi Mission is actually the oldest Mission in Zambia, being opened by the Paris Evangelical Mission Society in 1885. One thing you are always conscious of at a Mission are those who have lived and worked on the station before you, whose work, in a way, you are continuing, so we have enjoyed the fellowship in meeting up with some of our predecessors at Mwandi. Francois, like Philippe and Jean, has been busy with the book.
In Nimes, a beautiful town with a well-preserved Roman arena and temple, we spent a great afternoon and evening with Lucienne Lawton Girard who was a Missionary in Western Province for many years and retired home to France just last year.
The following morning we were welcomed at the HQ of CEVAA (the Community of Churches in Apostolic Mission) in Montpelier by Celestin Kiki the Secretary General and Philippe Girardet, the Projects Secretary. The French Church has been very helpful and supportive of our work at Mwandi and so this was a good opportunity to visit them to say thank you for recent support with the classroom block which they had helped to build for the High School. It was a good meeting with a pledge for further aid towards the Admin Block and the Youth Centre. After a stroll through the town centre with its impressive Arc de Triomphe and Roman aqueduct and a good lunch we set off for a few days break with Keith's brother at Perpignan.
We wanted to visit friends in Normandy on our way home on Friday but were prevented from moving out of Perignan until Monday because of the French August Holidays starting at the weekend. On Wednesday we travelled back to London by Eurostar. Interesting that the Metro-fare from Gare Ste Lazare to Gare du Nord cost 1.10 Euros per ticket, a similar journey on London Underground, in spite of British taxpayer subsidy, from St Pancreas to Marylebone costs GBP4.00!
Finally another French Connection nearer home: Le Monde Diplomatique for August 2010 has a good article on what they call ‘social apartheid’ in Glasgow by Julien Brygo entitled Living the Good life in the Midst of Poverty. He says that in a de-industrialised Scotland the wealthy suburbs of Glasgow enjoy an incongruous prosperity in comparison with the decay found in the poorer housing schemes. Brygo believes the situation is reminiscent of the 19th Century where the lower orders were kept firmly in their place, and toffs thought that a bit of charity and philanthropy was enough to salve their conscience and maintain the status quo.
Are we surprised, in today’s Britain where 18 of 23 members of the 'Austerity Cabinet' in the Westminster government are millionaires and whose collective wealth according to the Sunday Times amounts to over 59 million Euros? As Robert Burns appositely points out in 'To A Louse', it is good sometimes to see oorsels as ithers see us.
It was a nostalgic journey for Keith. We passed through Feldkirch in Austria where his grandfather, Hugh, a Cameronian, was detrained as a prisoner of war by the Austrians during WW1 and marched upstream to the POW camp in Liechtenstein. We saw the castle at Vaduz in the distance as we passed. A little further on, we went through Walenstadt where Keith had a summer job as a Council Worker as a student in the mid-70s.
We were booked into a comfortable Christian Hotel in Geneva. We worshipped at St Peter's (Calvin's Church) on the Sunday morning and met with Ann-Lise Chatelin (Sibeso) for lunch, a chat and a stroll through the old town with a visit to the Reformation Wall for us and the play park for Mubita. In the late afternoon Jean Fischer who oversaw the building of the Basic School at Mwandi while he was head of the Senanga Trade School took us up into the mountains for a delicious fondue and to enjoy the view from the summit down to the Lake and the city.
The next day we took the TGV to Nimes via Lyon where we met another old friend, Rev Francois Escande, who was formerly a Minister at Mwandi. Mwandi Mission is actually the oldest Mission in Zambia, being opened by the Paris Evangelical Mission Society in 1885. One thing you are always conscious of at a Mission are those who have lived and worked on the station before you, whose work, in a way, you are continuing, so we have enjoyed the fellowship in meeting up with some of our predecessors at Mwandi. Francois, like Philippe and Jean, has been busy with the book.
In Nimes, a beautiful town with a well-preserved Roman arena and temple, we spent a great afternoon and evening with Lucienne Lawton Girard who was a Missionary in Western Province for many years and retired home to France just last year.
The following morning we were welcomed at the HQ of CEVAA (the Community of Churches in Apostolic Mission) in Montpelier by Celestin Kiki the Secretary General and Philippe Girardet, the Projects Secretary. The French Church has been very helpful and supportive of our work at Mwandi and so this was a good opportunity to visit them to say thank you for recent support with the classroom block which they had helped to build for the High School. It was a good meeting with a pledge for further aid towards the Admin Block and the Youth Centre. After a stroll through the town centre with its impressive Arc de Triomphe and Roman aqueduct and a good lunch we set off for a few days break with Keith's brother at Perpignan.
We wanted to visit friends in Normandy on our way home on Friday but were prevented from moving out of Perignan until Monday because of the French August Holidays starting at the weekend. On Wednesday we travelled back to London by Eurostar. Interesting that the Metro-fare from Gare Ste Lazare to Gare du Nord cost 1.10 Euros per ticket, a similar journey on London Underground, in spite of British taxpayer subsidy, from St Pancreas to Marylebone costs GBP4.00!
Finally another French Connection nearer home: Le Monde Diplomatique for August 2010 has a good article on what they call ‘social apartheid’ in Glasgow by Julien Brygo entitled Living the Good life in the Midst of Poverty. He says that in a de-industrialised Scotland the wealthy suburbs of Glasgow enjoy an incongruous prosperity in comparison with the decay found in the poorer housing schemes. Brygo believes the situation is reminiscent of the 19th Century where the lower orders were kept firmly in their place, and toffs thought that a bit of charity and philanthropy was enough to salve their conscience and maintain the status quo.
Are we surprised, in today’s Britain where 18 of 23 members of the 'Austerity Cabinet' in the Westminster government are millionaires and whose collective wealth according to the Sunday Times amounts to over 59 million Euros? As Robert Burns appositely points out in 'To A Louse', it is good sometimes to see oorsels as ithers see us.
Wednesday 11 August 2010
Sturm und Drang in Vienna: Our diary
Saturday 17 July: The Multi-Faith Pre-Conference of the International Aids Conference met at the Technical University. The opening religious ceremony was excellent, with all the various faiths found in Vienna taking part. It was also good to see that WHO are giving due recognition to the work of faith-based institutions on the ground but sad to hear that PEPFAR have 'straightlined' their funding. Ida found it a good forum to raise two major concerns she had on the unsuitability of some of the paediatric ARVs and the lack of variety in comparison with adults. The pharmaceutical companies need to be lobbied on this issue. Returning to PEPFAR, if budgets continue to be reduced, then universal access will fall by the wayside and faith-based institutions will end up having to play God which is not their role. Those two points were picked up and used during the conference by more authorative speakers.
Sunday 18 July: The Opening of the Conference with the 18th Life Ball which was being held out of doors at the Rathaus was washed out by a tropical thunderstorm called Petra just as Whoopi Goldberg dressed as Mother Earth started to sing. The great and the good including Bill Clinton, Mette-Marit, the Crown Princess of Norway and various other prominent German-speaking politicians and celebrities rushed for cover including 50 black Promenade Dancers dressed in white and 50 white dancers dressed in black, while those in fancy dress including avatars, fauns, elves and pixies plunged into the fountains. Other prominent personalities present were Boris Becker, Patti Labelle, Prussian and Austrian Princesses plus the Mayors of Berlin and Vienna. Unsurprisingly, there were no Scottish peasants invited.
Monday 19 July: The first Plenary Session of the Conference and Bill Clinton's keynote speech was a highlight. Regarding funding Faith-based Institutions should lobby Congress to make the right choice by supporting, continuing and increasing funds for care, treatment, infrastructure and systems. Greater care and stewardship was also a pre-requisite for a dollar wasted puts a life at risk. Jobs need to be done faster, better and cheaper, in other words doing more with less. African governments need to keep their part of the bargain and devote at least 15% of their national budgets to Health Care. As regards prevention, scaling up should be done with what works. Large sums of money of money can be raised through small amounts given by many people. Education and advocacy are priorities.
Ida presented her poster entitled The United Church of Zambia Mwandi Mission Hospital Voluntary Counselling and Testing Strategy for Hard-to-Reach Populations. This dealt with a mobile outreach program that visited social events and rural and fishing settlements to increase the number of people who know their HIVstatus, so that they can access the HIV Programme before they are ready to start anti-retroviral treatment and become sick.
Tuesday 20 July: The main event was a peaceful but noisy demonstration through the streets of Central Vienna by 15 000 people on Tuesday evening to show solidarity with the campaign for human rights throughout the world and especially for those living with HIV and Aids. It also called on Governments around the world to increase funding for fighting the disease. An interesting fact: the Church of Scotland has given much more money to the worldwide fight against HIV and Aids than the Austrian Government, who to its shame gave a paltry single contribution of E1m to the Global Fund away back in 2002 for condoms for Africa..It was pointed out that the city of Vienna would be benefiting to the tune of E45m going into the local economy from hosting this conference alone. The Demo closed with a live concert given by Annie Lennox, the former Eurythmics singer, who is now the United Nations AIDS Goodwill Ambassador.
Wednesday 21 July: Marjorie Clark's Presentation of the Church of Scotland's HIV/AIDS Project at the Global Village. This was also another good opportunity for networking. Marjorie explained that the Church of Scotland”s Programme started in 2002 and its position was reiterated in 2006. It is to bring life and hope by breaking the silence on HIV and Aids and standing with partner Churches to offer practical support and to speak up for the voiceless, involving all Church members. This year the project becomes an integrated programme of the World Mission Council.
One of the most successful fundraising ventures had been Souper Sunday. Congregations had a simple soup and bread lunch after a Sunday Service in January. Last year over GBP100 000 was raised in this way from over 300 individual Churches. These congregations' generosity was a good example of many smaller sums of money adding up and together making a considerable amount. Mony a mickle maks a muckle.
Thursday 22 July: A good day for hearing about the new WHO PMTCT (Prevention of Mother-toChild Transmission) and Feeding Guidelines. The mothers will in the future be covered by ARVs until they stop breastfeeding. This will mean that more babies should be able to be breast-fed. This is a step in the right direction but in an ideal world all pregnant HIV+ mothers would be able to access long-term triple therapy anti-retrovirals.
The integration of palliative and home-based care at a workshop was another useful meeting and contacts made for future-training. This is an area that is lacking at present in Mwandi but steps are afoot to work at this through the Woman's Christian Fellowship in our 13 out-of-station preaching points.
Another interesting talk was given by a Dutch doctor based in Mozambique who has formed his ARV patients that default into cell-groups that help support each other, provide a form of mutual accountability and pick up ARVs for each other. This is a simple and effective way of cutting down waiting time in queues and transport costs for these patients. This can only happen with stable patients but is another good idea that can be adapted for use by the Mwandi Programme.
Friday 23 July: The closing day. The Global Village is being packed up but nonetheless excellent presentations on the maltreatment of prisoners living with HIV and Aids in Eastern Europe. It has been good to see how HIV and Aids affects other areas of the world and not just Africa.
We have also managed to visit Schoenbrunn Palace and the Spanish Riding School. Keith Catriona and Mubita also toured the Zoo, went to a Gustav Klimt Exhibition and did a cycle-tour of the Wachau are where the imprisoned Richard the Lionheart was found by Blondel, the inconclusive Battle of Duerenstein between Napoleon and the Austro-Russian Coalition in 1809 and the Anti-Freeze in the White Wine Scandal of 80s.
On Saturday 24 July we set off by rail for Geneva via Zurich.
Sunday 18 July: The Opening of the Conference with the 18th Life Ball which was being held out of doors at the Rathaus was washed out by a tropical thunderstorm called Petra just as Whoopi Goldberg dressed as Mother Earth started to sing. The great and the good including Bill Clinton, Mette-Marit, the Crown Princess of Norway and various other prominent German-speaking politicians and celebrities rushed for cover including 50 black Promenade Dancers dressed in white and 50 white dancers dressed in black, while those in fancy dress including avatars, fauns, elves and pixies plunged into the fountains. Other prominent personalities present were Boris Becker, Patti Labelle, Prussian and Austrian Princesses plus the Mayors of Berlin and Vienna. Unsurprisingly, there were no Scottish peasants invited.
Monday 19 July: The first Plenary Session of the Conference and Bill Clinton's keynote speech was a highlight. Regarding funding Faith-based Institutions should lobby Congress to make the right choice by supporting, continuing and increasing funds for care, treatment, infrastructure and systems. Greater care and stewardship was also a pre-requisite for a dollar wasted puts a life at risk. Jobs need to be done faster, better and cheaper, in other words doing more with less. African governments need to keep their part of the bargain and devote at least 15% of their national budgets to Health Care. As regards prevention, scaling up should be done with what works. Large sums of money of money can be raised through small amounts given by many people. Education and advocacy are priorities.
Ida presented her poster entitled The United Church of Zambia Mwandi Mission Hospital Voluntary Counselling and Testing Strategy for Hard-to-Reach Populations. This dealt with a mobile outreach program that visited social events and rural and fishing settlements to increase the number of people who know their HIVstatus, so that they can access the HIV Programme before they are ready to start anti-retroviral treatment and become sick.
Tuesday 20 July: The main event was a peaceful but noisy demonstration through the streets of Central Vienna by 15 000 people on Tuesday evening to show solidarity with the campaign for human rights throughout the world and especially for those living with HIV and Aids. It also called on Governments around the world to increase funding for fighting the disease. An interesting fact: the Church of Scotland has given much more money to the worldwide fight against HIV and Aids than the Austrian Government, who to its shame gave a paltry single contribution of E1m to the Global Fund away back in 2002 for condoms for Africa..It was pointed out that the city of Vienna would be benefiting to the tune of E45m going into the local economy from hosting this conference alone. The Demo closed with a live concert given by Annie Lennox, the former Eurythmics singer, who is now the United Nations AIDS Goodwill Ambassador.
Wednesday 21 July: Marjorie Clark's Presentation of the Church of Scotland's HIV/AIDS Project at the Global Village. This was also another good opportunity for networking. Marjorie explained that the Church of Scotland”s Programme started in 2002 and its position was reiterated in 2006. It is to bring life and hope by breaking the silence on HIV and Aids and standing with partner Churches to offer practical support and to speak up for the voiceless, involving all Church members. This year the project becomes an integrated programme of the World Mission Council.
One of the most successful fundraising ventures had been Souper Sunday. Congregations had a simple soup and bread lunch after a Sunday Service in January. Last year over GBP100 000 was raised in this way from over 300 individual Churches. These congregations' generosity was a good example of many smaller sums of money adding up and together making a considerable amount. Mony a mickle maks a muckle.
Thursday 22 July: A good day for hearing about the new WHO PMTCT (Prevention of Mother-toChild Transmission) and Feeding Guidelines. The mothers will in the future be covered by ARVs until they stop breastfeeding. This will mean that more babies should be able to be breast-fed. This is a step in the right direction but in an ideal world all pregnant HIV+ mothers would be able to access long-term triple therapy anti-retrovirals.
The integration of palliative and home-based care at a workshop was another useful meeting and contacts made for future-training. This is an area that is lacking at present in Mwandi but steps are afoot to work at this through the Woman's Christian Fellowship in our 13 out-of-station preaching points.
Another interesting talk was given by a Dutch doctor based in Mozambique who has formed his ARV patients that default into cell-groups that help support each other, provide a form of mutual accountability and pick up ARVs for each other. This is a simple and effective way of cutting down waiting time in queues and transport costs for these patients. This can only happen with stable patients but is another good idea that can be adapted for use by the Mwandi Programme.
Friday 23 July: The closing day. The Global Village is being packed up but nonetheless excellent presentations on the maltreatment of prisoners living with HIV and Aids in Eastern Europe. It has been good to see how HIV and Aids affects other areas of the world and not just Africa.
We have also managed to visit Schoenbrunn Palace and the Spanish Riding School. Keith Catriona and Mubita also toured the Zoo, went to a Gustav Klimt Exhibition and did a cycle-tour of the Wachau are where the imprisoned Richard the Lionheart was found by Blondel, the inconclusive Battle of Duerenstein between Napoleon and the Austro-Russian Coalition in 1809 and the Anti-Freeze in the White Wine Scandal of 80s.
On Saturday 24 July we set off by rail for Geneva via Zurich.
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