This morning I had a quick look at our South Australian divisional newsletter and saw that this blog rated a mention... so I thought it was about time I made another entry.
One of the key parts of our project in Mali is to provide some material items to displaced people that have fled the northern regions with nothing. Some of the stories are tragic - people without their children, people without their parents, wives without their husbands, all running away from a conflict which is still simmering away.
The process is complicated, unfortunately. In this day of highly coorindated humanitarian responses, we work alongside a range of other agencies to avoid duplication of services. In this case it means that one NGO (IOM) have become responsible, alongside UNHCR, for registering all of the people that are displaced - all 500,000 of them.
When an organisation like The Salvation Army wishes to help these people, we indicate how we can help and give an anticipated number of beneficiaries we can assist to IOM who then give us the names of those 'next on the list'. This also ensures that assistance is provided according to need rather than via any form of discrimination on the part of an assisting organisation.
This can be confronting for some of our Salvationist helpers. Almost 100% of those that we are assisting are muslim. They are from the north where Islamic separatists have operated. They are from other tribal groups, some of whom have been accused of sympathising with the conflicting parties. None the less, they need our help and we will help them.
To add to the difficulties, the lists we have been given by IOM only have phone numbers. So... at the moment we have a few faithful helpers (who speak the right languages) making hundreds of phone calls to offer assistance to these people. We are hoping that this all comes together by the 10th of June when we have our first big distribution day.
Please pray for this process. Pray that we reach the people we need to find, that they can come to the distribution centre (we are providing a cash reimbursement of their travel costs) and that this can be a bridge for the fledgling Mali Salvation Army into their country.
Wednesday 29 May 2013
Saturday 25 May 2013
Mali 10
Fadimata was a lady that I met during the week. She is a proud and incredibly resiliant and strong woman. I left her with a tear in my eye after she generously shared her story - and then thanked me for listening!
I won't share too much... I'm hopeful of publishing her story in a Salvation Army magazine coming your way, soon.
Fadimata is a mother of 7 from the fabled city of Timbuktu. She fled there in the middle of last year during the Malian war, not for fear of the militants, but fearful of the Sharia law being introduced by Islamists in the north.
When she fled, she took with her 7 children. I should add that she is a widow. She did this by herself. The eight of them walked 25 kilometers to where the Niger river intersects the Timbuktu-Bamako highway. They then joined 40 others and 'sailed' in wooden canoes for four days to reach the city of Mopti. From there they recieved assistance for the rest of the trip to Bamako where they are currently staying in a Catholic conference centre as guests of two incredible nuns I also met during the week.
I can't imagine my two children walking 25 kilometres in 40+ degree heat. I can't imagine spending four days in a wooden canoe on a massive river with crocs around us. I can't imagine doing this as a persecuted minority (Fadimata is Christian) fleeing sharia law.
I should add that all she left with is a bottle of water for her children. No food. No clothes - she wasn't able to get either until she got to Mopti.
My hero of the week is this widow from Timbuktu. Thank you Fadimata.
I won't share too much... I'm hopeful of publishing her story in a Salvation Army magazine coming your way, soon.
Fadimata is a mother of 7 from the fabled city of Timbuktu. She fled there in the middle of last year during the Malian war, not for fear of the militants, but fearful of the Sharia law being introduced by Islamists in the north.
When she fled, she took with her 7 children. I should add that she is a widow. She did this by herself. The eight of them walked 25 kilometers to where the Niger river intersects the Timbuktu-Bamako highway. They then joined 40 others and 'sailed' in wooden canoes for four days to reach the city of Mopti. From there they recieved assistance for the rest of the trip to Bamako where they are currently staying in a Catholic conference centre as guests of two incredible nuns I also met during the week.
I can't imagine my two children walking 25 kilometres in 40+ degree heat. I can't imagine spending four days in a wooden canoe on a massive river with crocs around us. I can't imagine doing this as a persecuted minority (Fadimata is Christian) fleeing sharia law.
I should add that all she left with is a bottle of water for her children. No food. No clothes - she wasn't able to get either until she got to Mopti.
My hero of the week is this widow from Timbuktu. Thank you Fadimata.
Wednesday 22 May 2013
Soap
One of the first projects that we have off the ground involves teaching women to make soap. Today was the first day of the first training class in an area known as Niamana, just south of Bamako.
We travelled to the Catholic Retreat |Centre there, which is playing host to the classes. 18 families were represented in this first class, from towns such as Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal - all hundreds of kilometers from home and driven out by war.
The aim is not just to teach soap making, thus saving their family money and also improving hygiene, but to give them a skill that they can take home to start a business. We are also given them the start up equipment and their first batch of ingredients to get started. Even before they return home, they will be able to create an income stream for their families.
Over the next three weeks we will be teaching 60 women displaced to the areas south of Bamako city this skill.
We travelled to the Catholic Retreat |Centre there, which is playing host to the classes. 18 families were represented in this first class, from towns such as Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal - all hundreds of kilometers from home and driven out by war.
The aim is not just to teach soap making, thus saving their family money and also improving hygiene, but to give them a skill that they can take home to start a business. We are also given them the start up equipment and their first batch of ingredients to get started. Even before they return home, they will be able to create an income stream for their families.
Over the next three weeks we will be teaching 60 women displaced to the areas south of Bamako city this skill.
Saturday 18 May 2013
Mali 8
Today could not have been more diverse, and I think I need to blog just to process some of what has happened. None of it was overly dramatic, but nonetheless...
Earlier today two of us attended a general information meeting for the humanitarian actors in Mali, facilitated by UNOCHA (United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs). There was some hard news. Children in the north are being pressed into the armies of the insurgents. Some girls have been trafficked into this country from Burkina Faso as prostitutes, possible for the soldiers in the north. Some soldiers from Chad are reported to have been hurt, possibly killed, in ongoing fighting. Cholera is spreading south from the warzone towards the peaceful south. Menegitis and Measles are also on the rise.
Access to these areas for humanitarian actors continues to be a problem. Services, including simple medical services, are not in good supply. Food security will hit crisis point in the region of Kidal and the northern part of Mali's most famous province, Timbuktu, very soon.
After this we went to market. You've not been to Bamako unless you've been to the smelly, dirty, chaotic, overcrowded, crazy markets. I feel alive in places like this. People's everyday work in the downtown of the city.
We were there to prepare for next week when we are starting vocational training workshops, including soap manufacturing classes. Paying for and taking delivery of warehouse portions of shea butter (1.2 tonnes), perfume (61 Litres) and coconut oil (1260 Litres) make for a lot of work.
That's where things became comical. We arrived at our store room with our goods to await delivery via another truck of some of the other materials we needed (cilicate, caustic soda etc). Around 6pm we found out that the truck had broken down across town and that it had an open back (where people could potentially help themselves). So in our car (a small 4WD), we drove to start a shuttle service to retrieve what we could. As I'm loading caustic soda bags into the car (and managing to burn my arm because we had two sets of gloves between 6 workers) others were trying to make room in the store.
The storeroom is another story again. The local Salvation Army region recently purchased the building for their headquarters and for the ACI Corps. Unfortunately, the building has started to fall down, so they've had to abandon it while they wait for the builder to come back and repair it. One of the officers is praying that it doesn't fall on us while we are working!
It's a strange job I have. Within a day I'm wrestling with the idea of helping children forced into the hardest and most offensive of situations, then rescuing perfume and caustic soda from broken down trucks. Bed time.
Earlier today two of us attended a general information meeting for the humanitarian actors in Mali, facilitated by UNOCHA (United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs). There was some hard news. Children in the north are being pressed into the armies of the insurgents. Some girls have been trafficked into this country from Burkina Faso as prostitutes, possible for the soldiers in the north. Some soldiers from Chad are reported to have been hurt, possibly killed, in ongoing fighting. Cholera is spreading south from the warzone towards the peaceful south. Menegitis and Measles are also on the rise.
Access to these areas for humanitarian actors continues to be a problem. Services, including simple medical services, are not in good supply. Food security will hit crisis point in the region of Kidal and the northern part of Mali's most famous province, Timbuktu, very soon.
After this we went to market. You've not been to Bamako unless you've been to the smelly, dirty, chaotic, overcrowded, crazy markets. I feel alive in places like this. People's everyday work in the downtown of the city.
We were there to prepare for next week when we are starting vocational training workshops, including soap manufacturing classes. Paying for and taking delivery of warehouse portions of shea butter (1.2 tonnes), perfume (61 Litres) and coconut oil (1260 Litres) make for a lot of work.
That's where things became comical. We arrived at our store room with our goods to await delivery via another truck of some of the other materials we needed (cilicate, caustic soda etc). Around 6pm we found out that the truck had broken down across town and that it had an open back (where people could potentially help themselves). So in our car (a small 4WD), we drove to start a shuttle service to retrieve what we could. As I'm loading caustic soda bags into the car (and managing to burn my arm because we had two sets of gloves between 6 workers) others were trying to make room in the store.
The storeroom is another story again. The local Salvation Army region recently purchased the building for their headquarters and for the ACI Corps. Unfortunately, the building has started to fall down, so they've had to abandon it while they wait for the builder to come back and repair it. One of the officers is praying that it doesn't fall on us while we are working!
It's a strange job I have. Within a day I'm wrestling with the idea of helping children forced into the hardest and most offensive of situations, then rescuing perfume and caustic soda from broken down trucks. Bed time.
Monday 13 May 2013
Mali 7
Coordination is something that we need when we are working with complex issues and many actors are invovled.
For a number of years now, when there is a major conflict or disaster that attracts UN agencies, NGOs, government actors and others to assist, a cluster coordination system is put in place. There are, at it's peak in any scenario, around 9 clusters that cover: sanitaiton and health, shelter, water, food security, protection, child protection, general information, security & civil/ military actions etc.
As part of our engagement in the humanitarian work in Mali, we are registered with three clusters: shelter and non food items, protection and the general information cluster. These groups meet weekly under the leadership of an UN agency and coordinate the work between agencies to maximise assistance, avoid duplication and direct the work. They are also great opportunities to meet with other workers in the field and learn from each other.
For a number of years now, when there is a major conflict or disaster that attracts UN agencies, NGOs, government actors and others to assist, a cluster coordination system is put in place. There are, at it's peak in any scenario, around 9 clusters that cover: sanitaiton and health, shelter, water, food security, protection, child protection, general information, security & civil/ military actions etc.
As part of our engagement in the humanitarian work in Mali, we are registered with three clusters: shelter and non food items, protection and the general information cluster. These groups meet weekly under the leadership of an UN agency and coordinate the work between agencies to maximise assistance, avoid duplication and direct the work. They are also great opportunities to meet with other workers in the field and learn from each other.
Wednesday 8 May 2013
Mali 6
Just at the moment we are relighting the candles in our living area and hoping that they last long enough until we go to bed. It's 38 degrees, 9:15pm at night and there's been no power since around 7 pm. This is the third power cut for today.
And yet we actually have power in this part of Bamako. Not everyone can say that. Similarly, this morning we had the water company doing works outside our accommodation. As incovenient as it was... we actually have water much of the time and we can do down the street to buy bottled water to drink.
Experiences such as a few months in a country like Mali bring you back to earth.
This afternoon, among the many people I met in Niamana (south of Bamako at a Catholic retreat centre) were people from the Taureg tribes of the north, from places like Gao and Timbuktu. One had taken a bullet through the nose during the conflict. Others had sent their families away from the conflict on motorbikes or in the back of trucks while they walked the hundreds of miles from Timbuktu to Bamako. They are among the 500,000 people displaced by this conflict - 300,000 of them still in the country and just under 200,000 of whom have fled across the borders to Burkina Faso, Sengal or Niger.
I am a blessed person from a blessed country. I pray I never forget that.
And yet we actually have power in this part of Bamako. Not everyone can say that. Similarly, this morning we had the water company doing works outside our accommodation. As incovenient as it was... we actually have water much of the time and we can do down the street to buy bottled water to drink.
Experiences such as a few months in a country like Mali bring you back to earth.
This afternoon, among the many people I met in Niamana (south of Bamako at a Catholic retreat centre) were people from the Taureg tribes of the north, from places like Gao and Timbuktu. One had taken a bullet through the nose during the conflict. Others had sent their families away from the conflict on motorbikes or in the back of trucks while they walked the hundreds of miles from Timbuktu to Bamako. They are among the 500,000 people displaced by this conflict - 300,000 of them still in the country and just under 200,000 of whom have fled across the borders to Burkina Faso, Sengal or Niger.
I am a blessed person from a blessed country. I pray I never forget that.
Monday 6 May 2013
Mali 5
Today we took a break from IES work to go to the local Corps. First it was a trip to ACI2000 Corps where I was the guest preacher. I was prepared for translation into French, but didn't realise that I would also be translated into Bambako. Working with two translaters can ruin your train of thought, not to mention making your message really long if you're not careful.
The meeting at ACI2000 was a typical Salvation Army meeting, except that much of the congregation enjoyed dancing to everything, and everyone danced forward for the offering. The hall was outdoors - their original building is not safe enough to meet in. We were under an iron-roofed shelter with generator power. And it was hot. By the time I got up to speak the theromometer on the platform clock (yes there was one) was reading 40.7 Celcius. And that was before 11 in the morning. It was dusty, too, with the Niger's red dust blowing around us.
In the afternoon we went to Sogonoko Corps where we had an official welcome to our team. Again I was asked to speak, this time just in response to the welcome message. I tried to keep it short becuase there was also an introduction to the Region's annual theme, and another Bible message from the regional commander. If I thought it was dusty in the morning, it certainly was this afternoon as we met in the Corps hall which is next to a trucking depot.
As an observation on African culture - timing is less important that an event. This afternoon we were an hour late in starting the meeting, and even then sat around waiting for a generator (there was no power in the hall due to an outage - a regular occurance). But no-one was phased. All that mattered was that the people had gathered and we were welcomed. When doesn't matter. Just the event. There's a lot to learn in that for us Westerners.
I was impressed by how much this small region has grown in only five years. The three Corps that gathered for the combined welcome meeting are quite obviously vibrant and growing. They are assimilating the gospel well with the vibrant music, drum and dance culture of the Malian people.
The meeting at ACI2000 was a typical Salvation Army meeting, except that much of the congregation enjoyed dancing to everything, and everyone danced forward for the offering. The hall was outdoors - their original building is not safe enough to meet in. We were under an iron-roofed shelter with generator power. And it was hot. By the time I got up to speak the theromometer on the platform clock (yes there was one) was reading 40.7 Celcius. And that was before 11 in the morning. It was dusty, too, with the Niger's red dust blowing around us.
In the afternoon we went to Sogonoko Corps where we had an official welcome to our team. Again I was asked to speak, this time just in response to the welcome message. I tried to keep it short becuase there was also an introduction to the Region's annual theme, and another Bible message from the regional commander. If I thought it was dusty in the morning, it certainly was this afternoon as we met in the Corps hall which is next to a trucking depot.
As an observation on African culture - timing is less important that an event. This afternoon we were an hour late in starting the meeting, and even then sat around waiting for a generator (there was no power in the hall due to an outage - a regular occurance). But no-one was phased. All that mattered was that the people had gathered and we were welcomed. When doesn't matter. Just the event. There's a lot to learn in that for us Westerners.
I was impressed by how much this small region has grown in only five years. The three Corps that gathered for the combined welcome meeting are quite obviously vibrant and growing. They are assimilating the gospel well with the vibrant music, drum and dance culture of the Malian people.
Saturday 4 May 2013
Mali 4
Ok.. the number might be wrong, but I'm not sure where I'm up to.
We are staying in Bamako and enjoying (?) the crazy heat. The house we are staying in is very nice, however power is often off and today we have no water supply. This is creating some team humour as we discuss toilet protocols etc. Air France managed to lose our luggage, which arrived 48 hours after we did.
During the week we have met with some great people at the OCHA (United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Aid) and UNDP (United Nations Development Program). We've recieved good updates on the security situation and been able to establish our role within The Salvation Army region here.
The Salvation Army have only been in Mali for 6 years. Given that it is a country that is 95% Muslim, you would think that it has been hard going. However there are already three Corps in Mali and two in Burkina Faso. Also, an outpost has started in Chad! There are six officers, four in Mali and two in Burkina Faso. There are also candidates and cadets, but they are sent to the Congo for training and then usually to another country to learn more about The Salvation Army (e.g. Congo or Zimbabwe) before returning to Mali to work. The first of these 'returned' officers is due back next year and will make a big difference to this small region.
They are very entrepreneurial. The local women's ministries team have opened a small supermarket to raise money for their work!
We will learn more tomorrow about the Corps when we visit. I am preaching at ACI2000 Corps in the morning and then we are to attend a welcome meeting for our team at the Sogoniko Corps in the afternoon.
To sum, it's been a fun couple of days as we settle in. Our flexibility has been tested as we accustom ourselves to the African way of timing things, telling stories and building relationships. We are hot, sweaty and dirty, but managing to keep good spirits. Thank you for your prayers.
We are staying in Bamako and enjoying (?) the crazy heat. The house we are staying in is very nice, however power is often off and today we have no water supply. This is creating some team humour as we discuss toilet protocols etc. Air France managed to lose our luggage, which arrived 48 hours after we did.
During the week we have met with some great people at the OCHA (United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Aid) and UNDP (United Nations Development Program). We've recieved good updates on the security situation and been able to establish our role within The Salvation Army region here.
The Salvation Army have only been in Mali for 6 years. Given that it is a country that is 95% Muslim, you would think that it has been hard going. However there are already three Corps in Mali and two in Burkina Faso. Also, an outpost has started in Chad! There are six officers, four in Mali and two in Burkina Faso. There are also candidates and cadets, but they are sent to the Congo for training and then usually to another country to learn more about The Salvation Army (e.g. Congo or Zimbabwe) before returning to Mali to work. The first of these 'returned' officers is due back next year and will make a big difference to this small region.
They are very entrepreneurial. The local women's ministries team have opened a small supermarket to raise money for their work!
We will learn more tomorrow about the Corps when we visit. I am preaching at ACI2000 Corps in the morning and then we are to attend a welcome meeting for our team at the Sogoniko Corps in the afternoon.
To sum, it's been a fun couple of days as we settle in. Our flexibility has been tested as we accustom ourselves to the African way of timing things, telling stories and building relationships. We are hot, sweaty and dirty, but managing to keep good spirits. Thank you for your prayers.
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