We had walked a mile or so, first on a main dirt road,
almost dry after the rainy season, then winding past house after house through
the unplanned compound. I still wasn’t quite sure whose house we were going.
The older sister to a young woman in our CYF had collapsed outside the church
the previous day and we had come to pray for her. The house was cramped, its
walls lined with shelves and cupboards filled with the staple tin and ceramic
dishes that every Zambian owns. The only light came from the sun shining
through the door. In the darkness, I didn’t know where to sit. Luckily my
friend gave up his seat, telling me to sit there; otherwise I had spied what
looked to me to be an open spot, which invariably turned out to be the invalid laying
down! Thank God I didn’t sit on her!
Our leader asked the mother what was wrong with our sister.
I sat and listened to her speak in a local language, wondering what she could
be saying. Then we sang some praise songs. Even eight months in, I’m surprised
with songs I don’t know. After a few verses I can usually join in. Energy was
rising. Voices were louder. Those sitting rocked back and forth a bit. Those
standing marked time by stepping along with the music.
As far as I know, there’s no correct time to transition from
song to intercessory prayer, but at some point people start talking to God
while others continue the song. I still get surprised to find myself in a room
where each person is speaking aloud, but not to each other. Their eyes are closed,
bodies moving and gesturing.
As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I finally saw the
motionless body lying opposite me. I didn’t know her condition, but there was
something eerie and ominous about her stagnancy and I had visions of the worst.
As the voices lulled to quiet murmurs, a man got up and
stood over the sick person and started shouting over her body.
“IN THE NAME OF JESUS RESTORE THIS VESSEL, OH JEHOVAH JIRAH.
WE KNOW THIS IS THE WORK OF THE DEVIL, MIGHTY GOD. OH GOD OF HEALING, WE
RENOUNCE ALL EVIL SPIRITS. WE RENOUNCE THE WORK OF SATAN. IN THE NAME OF
JEEEESSSSSUS RESTORE THIS WOMAN, OUR SISTER, OH HOLY GOD, IN THE NAME OF
JEESSSSUSS…”
The prayers finished, and she slowly sat up.
“Our prayers have been answered,” our leader said as he made
his concluding and parting remarks.
On the walk home, I asked what the mother had said about the
young woman’s condition. A man explained to me that the sickness had to do with
the young woman being recently disowned by her uncle. She had been living with
her uncle, but needed school fees for a post secondary school program. The
uncle refused and didn’t even give the girl transport money to return to
Chawama and her own mother.
“Counseling,” the man told me. “She needs counseling so she
can understand that there are other ways to make money to get her degree. She
could do piecework for a year to raise funds for school.”
To an American, a sickness and family or money problems are
very separate entities. In an African context, they are related. Events,
challenges, and disputes can result in physical ailments. The devil and
witchcraft take hold of people’s physical bodies.
The next day, I finally went to visit a teacher that has
been sick since January and recently lost her mother. She has been in the
hospital for weeks, but no test showed anything wrong with her. And yet she
remains weak, unable to walk or take much food and her chest remains congested.
I went with four other teachers. We
found Teacher Mekelina’s kids, including her five-month-old daughter, playing
outside the house. Her oldest daughter, probably around eighteen, was inside
watching TV. I couldn’t help but remember the last time I was in this house,
two months ago or so. Then I found Teacher Mekelina in that very room, sobbing
and wailing at the loss of her mother. This time Teacher Mekelina was in the
back room. She lay on a reed matt and a few blankets. Her chitenge couldn’t
hide her skinny legs. I noticed she had lost a lot of weight.
But she still had a smile for us, with that beautiful gap in
her front teeth. Her breathing was labored and you could hear the rasp in her
voice.
Teacher Violet offered her words of comfort, “Whatever you
do, don’t lose faith in God. God has a plan for everything and is in total
control. Trust in him and he will make you well. Your sickness is the work of
the devil, but you are not destined for sickness. Just wait in faith and God’s
time will come. God’s time is the best.”
Then I told Teacher Mekelina that I remembered the first
time I met her. I remembered her warm smile and laugh and cheerfulness. I
remembered thinking—this woman is a woman of life.
And I’m still meditating on those thoughts. Teacher Mekelina
is a gift of joy to this world. I am worried that an illness and the loss of
her mother are keeping her from seeing how much she has to live for. I miss her
presence at school and I ask for prayers from all over the world for the
recovery of this mother and teacher and friend. She is a woman of life and her
spirit spreads that life to those around her.
The family doesn’t plan to take her back to the hospital or
clinic. They didn’t receive help there before, so they are convinced her
ailment is simply the work of the devil. I am scared and worried for her and
her family. But as we all ask her to have faith, I must have faith in her
spirit to bring forth resilience and fight to live. I have faith in Teacher
Mekelina.
As we finished our prayers and left the room, bugs scurried
across the walls and around the cups on the end table. We passed her four
daughters and nieces watching TV in the next room. Emma, in grade one, had
finally stopped crying. She too has been sick lately.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...
Yesterday, I finally visited UTH (University Teaching
Hospital), the biggest and best hospital in all of Zambia. We were there to see
Reverend Tembo’s Momma (Aunt) who has been sick for some time and in the hospital
for a few weeks. She is seventy-seven years old and is suffering from heart
failure and anemia. In the part of the hospital I visited there were no rooms,
just wards—with six to ten people in each interconnected section. I noticed
some people on mattresses on the floor. Reverend Tembo explained to me that
there is so much congestion they have to put some patients on the floor. The
disparities between American hospitals I’ve visited and this one hit me in the
gut, taking the wind out of me, and silencing my mind in confusion about how
inequality exists. If this isn’t fair, why hasn’t it changed?
I immediately got the sense that the section where Momma lay
was full of seriously ill people. Some of the patients around her never opened
their eyes. They were motionless and skinny. One woman to the left of Momma had
bloodshot eyes that barely blinked and a tube down her throat. She was young and
yet had a near-death look of fear and surprise on her face. Her breathing was
fast and labored.
I couldn’t help but think of the one in ten Zambians living
with HIV. I have no idea what was ailing this young woman, but I know AIDS can
slowly take life from young people, making them look like the seventy-seven
year old Momma in the bed next to her, but years too early for that young life.
Momma was quiet but alert in her bed, covered up with a
fleece blanket decorated with dog prints. I greeted her for the first time,
trying to convey as much compassion with my eyes, hoping that a random white
person she never met before wasn’t going to be more distressing to her at this
time. Her nieces and nephews surrounded her, but it seemed just breathing and
lying there was all she could muster at the moment.
Then the sound of metal chains closing a curtain around the
bed behind us reached my ears. The wailing started as I turned and saw some
nurses dressed in blue, with white hats pinned to their heads, start covering a
body with a brown fuzzy blanket I’ve seen in other people’s homes and at the
market.
“They’ve passed on,” Reverend Tembo explained.
Someone just died behind me, I thought.
High-pitched sobs followed the bed as the nurses wheeled it out
of the ward. It was actually a relief when I saw others staring at the scene
like me. Showing deep emotion at death is expected in Zambian culture, but even
to those around me this was tragic and startling. Someone just died behind me.
How quickly can life slip away? And yet life goes on.
Patients fought on, despite seeing their comrade’s shell whisked away. A choir
sang in the ward across the way. The grass was marvelously green outside, a
rare sight in a dusty country. I was meeting Reverend Tembo’s younger sisters
for the first time.