A defining moment: A group of women, all new mothers seated on low stools in raggedy rows outside, were watching a nutrition demonstration being taught by an eager nursing student. One mother, her face looking older than her actual years, smoothed her worn yellow dress and listened intently while the student explained the need for protein in a young child’s weaning diet. She watched as a small spoonful of peanut butter was added to a bowl of boiled greens. When the student held up an egg and remarked that eggs were also a valuable addition to a child’s diet, the mother sighed and said for all to hear, “Don’t you think that if I had an egg, I would give it to my child?”
In that moment, sitting to one side of the demonstration, I suddenly understood something important. In fact, her question was a game changer for me. I had assumed that being poor meant needing “health education.” Despite my years at university, I had not fully grasped that poverty had root causes, that economic poverty had social and political determinants, and didn’t know how to do a structural, critical analysis of poverty in a given place. In a real practical way, this mother certainly understood all that. This brief moment changed how I acted in the world, gradually developing ability to “read context.” I have lived and worked internationally for more than 30 years, most of the time with people entrapped in poverty, many living in destitution, in fear, or in violent aggression - people whose dreams have dried up, who do not believe that tomorrow could be any different from today and yesterday. This has been long and frequently difficult journey for me, an unpredictable one, fraught with times of doubt and gnawing anxiety. Now, I am the founder and Director of Atzin, a small non-profit organization working in the mountains of Guerrero in south Mexico, with a sister association, Atzin Canada. Looking back, I realize that certain events became defining moments, events that were embedded in everyday life and that caused me to pause and think, or as with the woman and the egg, provoked a flash of insight. These experiences continue to pile up, often intensely, one by one, and sometimes, the smallest incident provides a wealth of knowledge. They etch themselves on my being and reshape it.
0 Comments
|
Add a ReflectionWhat was the lasting impact of the CUSO Botswana experience on the rest of your life? How did it change you? How did it affect your values, beliefs, actions? Your thoughts on the meaning of the experience are important to all of us and to Cuso International (200 words max). Email your reflection to: Archives
June 2019
Categories |