On one of my trips first to a village location north of Beira called Nhangua, we had arranged a courtesy call with the Administrator of the region around Nhangua, a Mrs. Simango, to tell her the things we were planning to do in her region. During our hour-long conversation while we were describing our “Water for Gardens” program I mentioned that we were looking for a beneficiary for one of our Rope and Washer pumps. We also told the Administrator that in a few weeks when our gardening expert Eric Crowther arrived we wanted to have someone that she might recommend to work with Eric on some garden projects in the area. She said she would look around for someone who might benefit by having one of our pumps installed on their property and also someone we might work with on the garden program.
Maria working on her new pump.
On our next visit to Nhangua Mrs Simanga told us about a widow in the village who needed a pump for a garden plot she was working on. Her name was Marie Da-Conceição. Maria was there on the government property that day and we went out to visit with her. In a few moments talking with Maria, we learned that she wanted her life to be different. She wanted a real life for herself and her nine year old daughter, and she was willing to work for it. Maria is a 48 year old widow and at the time was living in a cluster of small one-room homes built by a humanitarian organization working in this area, Care For Life. These homes were provided for widows and orphans in Nhangua Region. She was living in this hovel with her daughter and two other women.
We loaded Maria in our car and made our way out a muddy track that led into the bush where we eventually were asked to stop where this property she owned was located. It was about 3 km from the main road by the Government Administrative Offices. We learned that Maria was frequently walking this 3 kilometers to where her deceased husband had acquired the small plot of land some years back. There she was attempting to work the few pineapple plants that were yellow and crowded with weeds, but it was a hopeless job as there was no water except when it rained. That didn’t stop her, however. In an effort to have her own home, she had cleared a small part of the land, gathered sticks and had begun to build a mud and waddle one-room shack.
We looked over her property at several possible locations where a well might be drilled for a water pump and Maria immediately saw the vision of what was possible when she could use water from a new well and pump for irrigation. Days later with Maria’s constant help we had the pump installed and operating. Maria had carried all the sand in a bucket on her head from some source hundreds of meters from her farm that we needed for the pump’s concrete base; plus she was there through every stage of the construction leaning about tool use and building and maintenance of the pump. Between our visits there she cleared the land around the pump and began to cultivate some of the property for a vegetable garden. She also obtained some tomato and lettuce seed, and had planted seed beds that were already growning.
We loaded Maria in our car and made our way out a muddy track that led into the bush where we eventually were asked to stop where this property she owned was located. It was about 3 km from the main road by the Government Administrative Offices. We learned that Maria was frequently walking this 3 kilometers to where her deceased husband had acquired the small plot of land some years back. There she was attempting to work the few pineapple plants that were yellow and crowded with weeds, but it was a hopeless job as there was no water except when it rained. That didn’t stop her, however. In an effort to have her own home, she had cleared a small part of the land, gathered sticks and had begun to build a mud and waddle one-room shack.
We looked over her property at several possible locations where a well might be drilled for a water pump and Maria immediately saw the vision of what was possible when she could use water from a new well and pump for irrigation. Days later with Maria’s constant help we had the pump installed and operating. Maria had carried all the sand in a bucket on her head from some source hundreds of meters from her farm that we needed for the pump’s concrete base; plus she was there through every stage of the construction leaning about tool use and building and maintenance of the pump. Between our visits there she cleared the land around the pump and began to cultivate some of the property for a vegetable garden. She also obtained some tomato and lettuce seed, and had planted seed beds that were already growning.
The house built with help from Maria's neighbors.
Villagers heard about her pump and came by to see it, and then we heard that on the Sunday after we finished the project a dozen or more villagers had all showed up to finish the building of her house. With a home of her own, she and her daughter would now have a chance to change their lives forever. In addition we promised her that with instructions she would receive later from our Gardening Interns she could become an entrepreneur produce vendor selling her vegetables in the village market.
We continued working with Maria on her garden project, first by bringing her a sprinkling can that she could use to water the plants she was starting on her own. On one visit we made to her place she had a huge area already planted and vegetables of several kinds that she had grown in her seed beds and transferred were coming up. I caught Maria on video on one of the trips using a large axe and a machete cutting out a large stump that was in the middle of an area she had started to cultivate for more garden room.
Maria's garden today.
Eric Crowther finally came to her place and began working with her with all due diligence on planning techniques for her vegetables along with some strategies for irrigation of the plot and marketing of the vegetables she was planting. The included photos show her progress.
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At the same time that we started working on Maria’s pump and garden we were introduced to the young woman who Mrs. Sinango said she would find for us to possibly be a garden coordinator for this area. We hoped she who would eventually work with Eric Crowther. On several of our visits to Maria’s home we picked up this young woman, Feliciana, a 16 package of dynamite known in the village as “Nene.” She immediately became an active part of our team building Maria’s pump by carrying sand in a bucket on her head, mixing cement, and assisting Maria cultivating her garden. I was so impressed with this young woman that I was determined that some way we should continue w
orking with her and committed to find a way later on to hook her up with Eric.Feliciana
That day came a couple of weeks after Eric arrived in May. We were on our way out to a part of the village where we were working with another client building a pump when we happened to see Feliciana next to the school where she was attending 7th grade. I had told Eric about this young woman and at first he was hesitant to have us make contact with her because with him being single and the other intern who was helping him also young and single, Eric didn’t think it was ethical to work with this young single 16 year old woman. Before we saw Nene that day by the school, Eric and I had several conversations in which I finally convinced him that he at least needed to meet with the woman if nothing else. That day of our chance meeting we stopped the car and Eric got out to meet Feliciana. When Eric got back into the car after only talking with Feliciana a few moments, he was committed to finding some way that they could work with her.
Over the next few weeks Eric and Adam (the other intern) continued to make visits to Nhangua to conduct business with Feliciana and to work with other farm projects they had scheduled for that area. Every time they went there and saw what Feliciana was up to in the community they became more and more impressed with her. On one of their visits they found out that she had begun to buy lettuce from a local lettuce grower and was walking several kilometers to the beach and a resort that was located there selling this produce for a small profit. Leaning that, they decided that somehow they were going to assist her with a startup loan so she could start her own garden, grow her own vegetables and make a small business out of the project. Their excitement grew every visit they made to Nhangua when they met with Nene. More and more they were impressed with her drive and spirit.
They came back just yesterday (June 13) after a long visit with her and her family with a story they had not heard about Nene until then. Their purpose in going there was to start drilling a well on the small property she had by the housing complex where she was living. Without having heard about this before, on this visit they discovered that she and her sisters owned another small bit of land some distance from the complex; and after looking at it were convinced that this was a better place to drill a well, find a cheap way to lift water from the well and start a garden. They went back to the house to meet her other sisters and found out some other news that was considerably different than any of us had heard about her family or expected. She has two sisters, one older and one younger. Both their parents are dead. The older sister who is about 22 years old is chronically ill with Malaria and possibly HIVAIDS. She spends most of her time in bed. The younger sister, a girl of 13 is about to have a baby. There is no aid for this family from any source, so Nene is the sole bread winner of the family and completely takes care of and supports her sisters at the same time as she is going to school. The boys also learned yesterday that the even though there are cousins, an uncle and an aunt living nearby this young group of orphans get no support or attention from any of them. By what they learned yesterday, our interns are even more motivated to get this young woman off to a good start in her new business. And I am sure they will do just that.
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