A humbling visit

The UN office is cool and clean. I’m here to talk about maternal fistula – a dreadful consequence of childbirth going wrong. Sometimes the infant is too big to pass through the birth canal and, if there is no emergency C. section or forceps delivery, the mother can die in labour. Or, if she’s lucky, be left with dribbling from her bladder and bowel. I saw this problem when I worked at Chilonga and well remember the consequences. The UNFPA is now putting money into training doctors to treat the problem and increasing awareness among women that treatment is available - that they no longer have to live with incontinence. The UN executives I meet are kindly and knowledgable but somehow appear distant from the problem.
And, as I sit in the cool clean air of the UN office, I can't help but think of Garden township with its dried dusty earth, no rain for six months, a few plants struggle through but when you have to carry water from a communal tap that is often shut off during daytime hours, gardening is hard.
A few market stalls, run by those with entrepreneurial spirit sell small packs of mealy meal, charcoal, tomatoes, oils, greens – and even popcorn from a machine plugged into a small generator.
When I return to the hotel I have a beer, still thinking about the VK project and Elsie and Peter. I want to cry for them but how can I feel sorry for people who don’t feel sorry for themselves – it’s irrational. Then there is Inonge with her elfin face that was almost angelic, and her movement that disturbed little but was decisive. She came close to crying while telling her story, and my own throat swelled with tears. But I knew I couldn’t cry. If she could keep back tears, then I had no right to them.
But I care, I can’t help it. While Elsie talked of the debts and the work they do, I should have been planning my story. Instead, I was thinking about what I could do to help VK. I offered to sell the greetings cards they make. I’d take home at least a hundred – but who to sell them to, how to transfer the money back – maybe via VSO- not very journalistic, I know.