Sweet Moments in Life

May I have the pleasure of introducing you to three special people in my life...

Tate
Tate (grandmother in Swahili) is an ancient woman who is also a fistula patient. Her body has been weakened and emaciated by years of suffering and hard labor, but she is a dear person. Even when people steal her little bag of soap while she does other chores, she does not display bitterness.
The day that Chelsie and I returned from Rwanda after the attacks in and around Goma in late October, the first thing we did was to visit the women at the transit center at the HEAL hospital. They laughed and danced, celebrating that we were back, that we had not abandoned them. We played ball with some of the younger, louder women; talked with the children about school and how they felt when they were hiding under their beds listening to the gunshots; we joked with the older women about life and the process of existing. We also made the rounds to the post-op rooms for fistula patients, where Tate was recovering. As we were catching with up with Tate and getting to know the newer patients, Tate reached over and started playing with my hair. The other women gasped at her audacity to touch a white person’s hair. She glared at them with daring eyes and told them in a stern voice, “I’m her grandmother. She is one of us.” Then she turned to me and informed me, “I’m going to braid your hair. Sit on the ground.” Obediently, I eased myself in between the two plastic-encased mattresses on their simple, chipped aluminum bed frames, trying not to wonder when was the last time they were cleaned. Calmly, with wrinkled hands and decades of experience, Tate proceeded to braid my hair. The rest of the women sat comfortably around us, another barrier being broken forever between us. Although my braid looked beautiful, my spirit was lifted by this undeserved grandmother’s love.

Cristina
About a week ago, I was visiting some of the mamas in their living quarters. This particular day, I happened to be teaching them how to use my camera, and they were giggling hysterically at the pictures they were capturing. One of the young fistula patients walked into the room and when she saw me, she urged me to come and see something. The Mama took her newborn from her friend’s arms and put the baby in my arms. “Majina yako!” she exclaimed. Surprised, I asked, “you named her Cristina?” She nodded proudly as I held this beautiful little baby; my heart warmed all over as the infant stared deep into my eyes. The mother grabbed my camera and took this picture of my namesake.

Helena (Evira)
Helena you already know… she has received a few name changes since the time we met her in the middle of the road in Masisi, unable to walk and stiff to stretch her legs. She has now been at the handicap center, through the support of HEAL Africa’s “Children Like Us” program for children with disabilities. As she has been receiving nutrition, physical therapy, play therapy and care, she has gained much strength. The doctors estimate that in two or three more months, Helena will be walking completely on her own. Her mother beams with joy and pride as she describes how little Helena now sits like a normal person on a chair, how she can lift herself up, and how she has even started walking on her own if she can lean on a wall. Helena herself shines as she exhausts herself in her efforts to show me that she can even jump if I am walking with her! Yes, Helena will walk.

Minova Refugee Camp, Eye Stings and Water

Yesterday we went to a brand new refugee camp that sprung up in Minova, right past Sake, about 10 KM away from Goma. We have a team of aid workers from Samaritan’s purse, namely surgeons and water treatment specialists. They were quick to respond to the vast needs here in North Kivu and invited Chelsie and I to help them set up a training session and distribution of water purifying materials. Cholera is quickly becoming a severe problem, and can kill many people simply because they cannot access clean water.
We bumped over the rain washed dirt roads that my body seems to never get used to. As we turned yet another hill next to beautiful forests and bright lakes, out in the middle of nowhere, we came upon the new Minova camp. This refugee camp houses 1,800 people, families from many different tribes, all shoved in in one faraway place out of reach of commerce and food. Their makeshift shelters lacked the UNICEF tarps, showing the camp’s newness, and how little help they had received since their recent flight.
Robinson, the Kenyan water technician, asked for the people to bring them the water that they usually drink. The men came back with a bucket full of muck. It is difficult for it to not seem like I am exaggerating, but truly, this water was dirtier than anything, like water you would be hesitant to wade in, like shallow, slightly stagnant sides of soft mud. The dirt particles, bacteria and mitochondria hung and waved lightly in the pail. We asked if they boiled the water before they drank it, at which they responded, “Rarely, because firewood is difficult to find, and it is rainy season right now. But this water does make our stomachs feel funny.” Samaritan’s Purse was happy to begin training some of the team leaders.
In the meantime, we roped off an area for working in, and the rest of us began separating pails in pairs, with stir sticks, a cloth to drain the clean water in, clothespins for securing them and PUR water purifying packets. Hundreds of people stared at us and then started laughing and joking with us as they realized we spoke Swahili. So many questions, so many proposals!
Out of nowhere, a misfortune for me: a random bug flew into my eye and stung my eyeball. I was told there is a bug that likes to sting people’s eyes and aims for them in their flight. And here I had been nervous about my feet and the huge spiders and bugs of all kinds crawling and hopping around in the bush! My eye has gotten quite swollen and red and constantly tears in pain; I’m also allergic to the bite, and the sting’s poison has spread out past my forehead and down past my nose. I’ve sneezed more times today than any other day of my life!
Back to the story. We finally set up 300 water purifying kits and people were being grouped in teams of six to share the kits, as it would give them enough clean water for 4 days. The results showed a sparkling clean glass of water after 20 minutes. We all tasted its refreshing coolness. Suddenly, it started raining. People got desperate and started pressing. The men guarding the twine barriers got nervous and began swinging sticks to warn people to stay away. We stood in the middle, trying to guard the kits as the mob began throbbing. Pressing in, pushed out. Tempers flared in a moment, rain came down faster and suddenly, they were all gone. The people ran for buckets and escaped as quickly as they could. Men with sticks chasing pregnant women. Children stealing stir sticks, having no idea how to use them. All this work, so close, and they will still have no clean water to drink. Desperation. How many children will die today because starving, thirsty refugees could not retain their anxiety, their fear that maybe they would be left out?

What about Galula's Sisters?

Gulula is 6 years old and has two brothers and two sisters. The innocent little girls were playing together in their home last week when, in a moment, their lives were altered forever. They found a grenade in their yard, and thinking it was a toy, they played with it until the grenade exploded in their faces. The two oldest have severely burned their faces and arms; Gulula’s eyes were burned, and the scars on her face will change her look forever. Although the mother showed up immediately with all three girls, by the time we were able to visit them at HEAL Africa this week, only Gulula remained at the hospital.


Between two hospital cots in the crowded post-operating room, she sat shyly hugging her knees, motionless. The stiff, fluid-hardened gauze clung to her face like a cast, rendering her expressionless. Many attempts at connecting with her finally earned me her little, scarred hand, which she allowed me to hold as we talked with her mother. Annifa, the HEALing Arts manager, asked the woman where the Gulula’s sisters were. The mother looked down, ashamed, and whispered in a sunken voice, “We can only afford to pay for one of our daughters to have medical treatment, so we had to send the older girls home.” We asked what the rates were, at which she responded the insurmountable amount per girl, $5 per day. Stunned, I thought about what $5 per day meant to most of us in the developed world and my heart was suffocated even further. I looked into Gulula’s soft eyes through the blood-stained gauze and almost wept before them in the crowded, smelly room full of suffering victims.


Gently, we explained to the mother that HEALing Arts had an Emergency Fund that would pay the cost for her other two girls to receive treatment for their burns immediately. I also explained that HEALing Arts has a school where her girls can continue studying as they heal, and that she can learn to sew at our Sewing and Weaving School. The mother could hardly believe all we were telling her, but her smile was big and her handshake was strong as we said good-bye.

How You Can Help & Partner With Goma

PRAY FOR PEACE, SAFETY AND RESOLUTION BETWEEN GEN. NKUNDA (CNDP FORCES) AND KABILA (CONGO PRESIDENT)

To Donate:
1) Send us an email with the amount of your donation prior to mailing a check at cristina.m.edelstein@gmail.com. This allows us to approve funds for food relief and pre-approving medical procedures in a timely manner.
2) Write checks out to HEAL Africa with “HEALing Arts- EMERGENCY FUND” written in the memo. Mail checks to Harper McConnell at P.O. Box 147, Monroe, WA 98272.

To Advocate:
1) Write to your politicials using the letter below. To find them:
Senators: http://www.senate.gov/index.htm
Congressman: https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

2) Letter to ban "Conflict Coltan" from being imported to the US; to advocate for conflict-free trade of minerals.
http://healafrica.org/cms/files/media/Coltan%20Letter.pdf
To understand about the coltan problem, read http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-h

3) To receive a copy of the Global Call for Action to Stop New War-Rapes in Goma & Eastern Congo! please email Harper McConnell at harper@healafrica.org to sign the petition and distribute it.


On behalf of the people of Goma, thank you for helping us. We thank God for his continual protection of our friends and that nothing- even catastrophes and evil people- is outside of his control. We will once again stand strong. ASANTE! (THANK YOU!).

Countdown to our Evacuation

Sunday, October 26
2:00 PM Chelsie and Cristina walk 30 women from the fistula transit center and 8 children over to the sports center, where Yole! Africa has organized a festival for peace and safety. Today’s activities include a ‘battle of the bands’ from local hip hop dance groups and a film about this year’s election conflict in Kenya. The women love the entertainment as we sit in the sweltering heat with 3,000 other Goma residents enjoying local talent.

Monday, October 27
7:45 AM Sun shining bright. Chelsie does some yoga as Cristina rides the stationary bike and studies Swahili. We go to the breakfast table and meet Lyn, who somberly warns us that we should know where our passports and money are. Nkunda took over the neighboring town of Kibumba and pushed back the UN forces in the Congo (MONUC). We expect 20,000 refugees running to Goma.
1:28 PM Distracted day with news reports; regardless, we plan for growth of HEALing Arts and Upper Room and CPC’s involvement in DR Congo. Cristina’s French lesson with Stewart is all about the imminent war. Thirty rounds of bullets go off two blocks away in the center of town, where we had heard reports that civilians were stoning MONUC for running away from the war; the UN soldiers responded by killing two civilians and wounding several others. As usual, HEAL Africa has to take care of them. Within one hour, tensions rise. Chelsie downloads some news articles before we race home past thousands of residents heading home.
8:00 PM We send house staff to purchase extra gas for the house and for the motor for our boat. He reports that gas and food prices are already increasing quickly. All short-term volunteers are ordered to return to their home countries the next morning.

Tuesday, October 28
7:04 AM Chelsie is getting dressed and Cristina is in the shower. Jo Lusi knocks on our door saying we should leave Goma immediately for a few days, because “the soldiers will see young girls and then there’s only me between them and you. Better leave and come back in the weekend.” Soon after, Lyn learns that the MONUC general resigned which pleases the people and gives hope. We decide to remain and go to work to fight for normalcy of life.
11:40 AM All our Congolese friends urge us to leave; they say it doesn’t matter that we don’t want to leave them. We are different and an easy target given the attitude towards the UN at the moment. This is the third time they will have lived this war in Goma, they tell us. “We just want them to do whatever they are going to do, kill and steal and then let us get back to life.” Government soldiers lost again and are fleeing to Goma, which is only worse than bad. Many prisoners from the local jail have escaped and increased the chaos. A sense of anarchy settles in.
2:15 PM We cross to Rwanda, our border friends eyeing with reproachful eyes, “You’re abandoning us, too?” We try to justify it, convinced we will return in a day or two. On the Rwanda side, there is a deluge of mzungus who have also been ordered out of the country. Unlike the wealthier NGOs, Chelsie and I are the only white people riding motos to the crowded bus on the way to Kigali. Friends open their homes to us, having cooked fresh lasagna for us. What world do we live in?

Wednesday, October 29
8:00 AM First thoughts after restless nights with dreams: our friends. We call the Lusis, HEALing Arts, Yole Africa and others. Only one friend’s dad was shot by a stray bullet, stores pillaged, bullets ringing all night long. Government soldiers are the main instigators, followed by hopeless and angry young men. HEAL staff lost in the region; found at a Red Cross camp that was later looted.
2:00 PM The urgency for food increases as we worry about our friends locked up in their homes with no provisions and the little groceries and gas available with sky high prices. We worry about how they will survive, since payday has not yet happened for the month and probably won’t anytime soon. We spend at least $20 per day on phone credit, checking up on people and assuring them we are praying and that God will keep them safe and that the world has not forgotten them.
6:15 PM Reports say Nkunda has taken over Goma. Any remaining NGOs are evacuated; Goma residents cringe all night long as more homes are looted, people hurt and many dying. Around 45,000 internally displaced peoples have arrived in Goma in two days, hoping to find safety there- which continues to elude them.
Night Nkunda steps back his CNDP forces, ‘generously ‘allowing the MONUC to keep Goma calm under the chaos and panic caused by the defeated soldiers and fear of the CNDP forces, under the claim that it is to “stop panicking the population of Goma.” Looting and the sound of bullets continue to assail our friends, who still have no food. Rwanda exchanging gunfire over the border into the Congo.

Thursday, October 30
6:50 AM First text messages from Congolese friends assuring us they are OK other than losing belongings to theft. The silent but screaming question demands: how will everyone eat?
9:00 AM Once the roads are a bit less dangerous, our friend finally carries his father to the HEAL hospital for treatment to his gunshot. His medical bill will be passed on to HEALing Arts as his family has not money to pay and surgery is needed immediately.
2:00 PM Hope seems dim that the door will be opened for us to return anytime soon. We now focus on pooling together our resources via friends who care, to start supplying starving people with food and medical treatment.

The Hardening of Boyhood

We received a little 7 year old girl at HEAL Africa last week. She arrived on emergency at midnight. She was brutally gang raped in her home and then shot in the vagina. She will never have babies and her pelvis is shattered. Although she is “awake,” due to severe trauma, she is completely unresponsive emotionally and psychologically. Her father had both of his arms smashed for trying to save her. Her brother is in intensive care from a gunshot to his stomach.
When I have no way to express the injustice that happens to innocent people, what I call “free verse” is my outlet. Forgive me for sharing so blatantly some of the thoughts that cross my mind, the struggle I experience in trying to make sense of the world I am faced with- the reality I have to face, but others have to live.

This free verse was inspired by this child’s experience, and my thoughts about the members of her family.

The Hardening of Boyhood

Fathers emasculated by their inability to protect their daughters and wives.
The blank stare of trauma, the troubled mind eased by its surrender
To nothingness.
The anger, the pain, the inability to change
The government, the soldiers as they range
With empty, greedy, starving eyes.

Too easy to blame them, but little would you know
Their wives have also been ravaged with that blow
The stripping of feminine privacy, purity marred for the world to see
But would you believe it?
Often children they may be.

The destruction of war is destruction by greed.
Mask it as tribal, mark it as sexist; hatred is only the seed.
Who doesn’t want more- more wealth, more power?
More ability to protect one’s own family?
Dignity vanished…

A young boy dreams of becoming a doctor;
His impoverished father hands him a gun.
“Your work is cut out for you now, boy.
No, in this hard world we live in,
I must teach you to fight for survival.
Education is for the wealthy, not for people like us.
Let go of your childish dreams, wipe your tears, and straighten your back.
Today you will learn to defend your family so that when you are married,
No man will be able to do to your wife and daughters
What those men did to your mother and sisters.

Listen and learn:
Run until you can go no further, fight for what is yours.
In this world of evil, in this war, there are no rules.
Grab what you can, eat it while you have it.
Trust no one and do not plan for a long life.
This world is not a happy place,
So wipe your tears, straighten your back and
Stop your hand from shaking
As you hold this gun.
This is your future.”

The boy tightens his grip on the cold metal,
Wipes his cheeks with his tattered shoulders,
Bites his trembling lip and with eyes still welling with tears,
Learns as he looks up into his father’s hardened eyes.

Back to My World: A Dichotomous Life?

Fifty-some hours of travel back to the Congo after my whirlwind of a fun and intense “vacation” in Minneapolis, San Francisco and rural Minnesota. Eating food from all over the world with people, enjoying Caribou coffee, friends and family, jogging alone around the clean lakes by my old house. Paying over $4 for a simple coffee in the London airport.
My new coworker, Chelsie, and I arrive to Goma from Rwanda in a crazy thunderstorm, our taxi driver evading fallen trees on the road, driving through muddy fields to find an opening back to the main road, windshield wipers speeding like crazy to whisk away the torrential drops battering our car. We cross the no-man’s-land border by foot in the now sprinkling rain, pay a total of $4 to the four porter boys who are grateful for work in this weather and greet my border friends, flying through the paperwork for our visas without a problem. We wait tired and somewhat frustrated in the darkening evening by the border crossing for over 40 minutes until the driver arrives to take us home.
We pile in with about 8 other HEAL Africa staff into the vehicle, tossing our luggage inside. I am happy that I did not forget Swahili (as I feared) during the 3 weeks I was gone; instead, it’s almost as if it settled in. I catch up with the driver and some of my friends, all of us laughing and excited to see each other again. They update me on how Nkunda has been shelling the refugees in Masisi Center… my memories go back to the people I met there, the destituteness of tens, even hundreds, of thousands of lives compacted into a small geographical area.
I arrive home and am instantly inundated by guests’ needs. Practically hallucinating from exhaustion, I answer questions, concerns, collect rent payments and more until well after 9:30 that night, trying to shower and pass out before the lights are shut off. Sleep eluded me. I had been moved to another room during my vacation. I tried to calm my speeding thoughts as I sought sleep and readjustment to life in Goma yet again.
I leave my beautiful home by the lake, the morning sun glistening happily on the gentle waves by the flower garden. I drive over the lava rock and bumps, that familiar jostling of my body and feeling of dust invading my eyelids.
Joyous cries of “Cristina!” greet me as I walk past the smelly, bare-essentials transit center for fistula patients. They crowd around me, touching my clothes and my hair, “You are back! You were gone for so long. What is the news of your family?” They eagerly show me the scraps of African material they are sewing together into the body parts for the baby dolls at Healing Arts. “You know,” they tell me, “we are almost done with the order of 1,000 baby dolls. What will we sew after that?” I tell them of plans to make banana leaf jewelry and other items. The newer women that arrived during the time that I was gone eye me from afar. Their glazed-over eyes slowly warm up at the strange sight of a mzungu talking with them familiarly. They begin to laugh with me- and sometimes at me- along with the women who know me better. They like to tell me, “You, we know you well.” They love to laugh at my attempts at expressing more complicated thoughts in Swahili, and giggle whenever I get any phrase right. “Cristina loves to dance!” they chuckle to each other whenever I shake to the music in the sewing room.
My heart is at peace again. “I love these women,” I think to myself, “I didn’t realize how much I would begin to see them as friends.” During the days that pass, we joke together, I hear their stories, learn more about their children back at home, their extreme poverty. We pray together and sing songs about Jesus with the pastor who stops by to greet them. Oddly enough, I feel comfortable, albeit the smells of smoke, urine and dirty babies with ringworm. Even as I write this update, I sit comfortable by the lake with the breeze and the slowly-setting sun gleaming gently on the water.
A week flies by between the ups and downs, stresses and joys, lack of sleep and exhausted rest, wealth and poverty, successes and challenges: I am back in Goma, and most of the time, it makes me smile.