The first time I was called a child here in Pemba I WAS FURIOUS. I am thinking, I went to college, flew half way across the world, to have a room full of middle age women to call me a “Criança”. Since those first days in northern Mozambique, I have earned the respect of my coworkers and community because of my acceptance of the roll of not only teacher, but learner.
I have been a Peace Corps Volunteer in the beach side town of Pemba, Mozambique for a year now. As a Community health volunteer I do not teach formal classes. My job consists of helping improve the community activities of the Ministry of Health. I do this by helping to manage a group of community health workers or 'ativistas'. This group of 18 men and women many of which are HIV positive Peer Educators are my biggest source of information about life here in Pemba. Even though much of my day is spent showing them how to fill out forms or search for information in a digital patient database; I come home each day mind full of new understanding of how people live outside our “city on a hill” called the US.
This experience has been a blessing and eye opening. Being on the grassroots of development I get to see how the policies and practices we implement affect everyday life for thousands. But also being an American living in a developing country, I have access to the public health specialists who shape the opinions of the decision makers back home in the states. The lessons I am learning, about how to motivate people, how to measure the repercussions of my actions will stay with me for the rest of my life.
Pemba, Mozambique
“School is more than a building. Life is a school. Every day you will learn something new until the day you go home”
-Ossie-May “Big Mama” Griggs