Hello From Zambia!

“There is nothing that brings success in the Faith like service. Service is the magnet which draws the divine confirmations.” Shoghi Effendi

So here I am in Zambia and after having been here a week, friends and family at home are starting to ask me a lot of questions. I’m still adjusting and don’t know fully what I’m doing yet; I don’t have answers to all the questions. I have, however, learned a great deal and been involved in a few exciting activities which I will share with you below.

What is Zambia like? Banani International School is situated between Kabwe and Lusaka along the Great North Road. It is surrounded by a habitat called miombo woodland. Right now is the rainy season and it rains almost every day. There is an abundance of wildlife, including vervet monkeys that run across the roof of the dorms. Zambia boasts around 700 species of birds. On the Banani campus are large green and blue birds, turacos, which sport red primaries in flight. They look like something out of Jurassic Park….

Ok, so that’s the atmosphere. Let’s talk about the people. Zambians are very friendly. It’s rude to walk by someone and not smile and say hello. Or you might say “mulishani” which is something like “how are you?” in Bemba (to which one might reply “bwino”, meaning “good” or something like it). When I first arrived at the school everybody was asking me so many questions about where I was coming from, what I studied in school, if I had siblings or a boyfriend or friends from school and if I had pictures I could show them. Oh, and they ask the boyfriend question about a million times.

Service at Banani includes a variety of duties. I am currently the dorm mother for 15 or so tenth grade girls. Duties include calling lights out and quiet time, overseeing cleaning of the dorm, general encouragement, and providing fun activities (or evening prayers). When the girls are in class, the youth also facilitate/participate in Ruhi Study Circles, animate junior youth groups, teach a class for children in the nearby residential area, or type Ruhi books that have been translated into Bemba.