Gomboi and Dwere

This past weekend, we departed for our first village visit, and for the first time, I had the chance to travel with Amy Smith, the woman who got me into international development in the first place (she’s also the founder of IDDS). Our village visit was quite the experience, right from the very start. As the bus pulled in, we saw children pouring out of their homes to chase down the bus. Smiles and waves were exchanged.

When we got off the bus, dozens of eyes stared at us, and we started to point to ourselves and tell them our names. As we pointed to ourselves, the kids repeated our names. The most hilarious aspect though was when Ste had the grand idea of repeating our names really really fast. Just to paint the scene…it was like, “This is Amy.” “Amy,” the children recited. Then Ste said, “Amy, Amy, Amy, Amy” And then a chorus of “Amy Amy Amy Amy” went off and a burst of laughter. The most hilarious thing was when Gago was introduced…and it became “Gago Gago Gago Gago,” and it sounded like “gobble gobble gobble gobble.”

The next big event was meeting the chief at the committee meeting, which the children were sure to follow us to. One minute into it though, the craziest thing happened, We saw the children suddenly part, the adults jumped up, and then we saw a snake fly through the air. One of the leaders had just flung the snake aside. As the snake writhed in a panic, the elder beat it to its death.

Later on, I asked Benjamin, a local, what would have happened if the snake would have bitten someone, and he said that the poison would kill the victim within three hours. Yeah, I know it sounds scary, but supposedly there’s some anti-venom that can save you from the doom.

The remainder of our days was spent talking to villagers, in particular groundnut farmers and learning about their daily life. The most special aspect though is we weren’t just there to visit, but because we were passionate about helping these people. One event that brought this to light was when Amy mentioned that a lady had a foot infection and she hadn’t gotten it treated because she couldn’t afford to go to the hospital. Amy just said she’d take care of it, and we took the lady the 11 km to the nearest hospital. We went to those villages because we cared for these people.

To cap off our visit , we had a football match, and it was the most incredible thing! We decided we would be divided as IDDS and Gomboi vs. New Longoro, and after running out to the field, we were suddenly called back by the locals on the sideline. Lo and behold, a bag of uniforms materialized! That’s right…they had picked up uniforms for us to play in, and we were a real team. It was great fun, and I can’t wait to return!