Perspective

While living in San Antonio, I taught in Boerne where I had many students whose families were incredibly financially well-off and honestly made me feel pretty poor. However, then I would encounter other students both in Boerne and while I was doing some student teaching at an inner-city school in San Antonio that reminded me of the plenty that I do have. Really, there are some very poor areas in most cities of the United States that require attention and support. In spite of this, all cities and citizens have running water and public electricity and telephone services (to my knowledge). When I arrived in Lagos, it was clear that I had arrived in a developing country indicated by the lack of air conditioning and the dilapidated state of many of the buildings but there was a bustling business-like feel to it. After a flight to Yola and a two hour drive to Jalingo, I realized that I had left the big city and arrived in a huge “small town” with erratic electricity, no public water and allegedly no newspaper. Just when I thought, WOW, I remember I still have access to internet and a cell phone. I, then, arrived to the small village of Sibre where everyone lives in huts and farms and realize that the people of the city of Jalingo are living in luxury because many people there have access to generators. But, the village of Bargarmi added yet another layer of perspective.

This village was settled in the 70’s when people were looking for an area of land that could be cultivated for farming. This village was about 6 miles (thank you GPS!) off the main paved road and we reached in an hour thanks to about 8 guys from the village that walked about 3 miles to meet us and navigate the massive wash outs, lift us out of muddy bogs, and push us through the river. Sibre instigated a church in this village a few years back and a church in Nebraska had helped to fund a building for them and the Iowa-Nigeria Partnership and assisted them with a deep-water well. Seeing the villagers show off their well and the pristine water that was flowing from it was a spiritual experience for me. There is nothing more loving that could have been given to this community than clean water. This community has no school for its children no healthcare facility and lives off of the food they are able to grow, some of which comes from the donated seeds.

While we were there and Beverly was reading a letter of greeting from their partnering church in Nebraska, they were intent listening to the translation (they don’t even speak the native language Hausa…but only their tribal language Mamui…I was proud that I was able to tell that it wasn’t Hausa…baby steps!!) when one of the villagers brought in a tubular plant they hadn’t ever seen before but wanted to know how to prepare it. James identified it as a type of radish and sliced it for them. They were all tried it with great expectation! Really, it’s a radish, a little is okay, but they were eating thick cucumber slice sized pieces….yuck! Most enjoyed it, but this woman that I had sat with couldn’t keep the squeamish look from her face! It was cute!