Human Compassion

By: Esther Babson

Makaphutu(By Anna)

Our last week was spent on the edge of the Valley of 1000 Hills at the Koinonia Retreat Center. We arrived at the center, after winding through the hills of Durban suburbs, in an eerie fog which seemed to consume everything. But after a foreboding arrival, the week turned into an incredible experience.

Most of our time was spent working at the Makaphutu Children’s Village. As my fellow group members have mentioned, the Village is a small orphanage for children of AIDs/HIV victims or sufferers. Originally we had planned on working mostly with the children but as it was the holiday season the kids were mostly at relatives houses. We ended up helping with sorting through donations of shoes/clothes and also painting rooms in one of the houses.  The work reminded me of a class I took last year on Non-profit management. We as the volunteers were so eager to help but without the proper instruction we ended up having to redo some of the work a few times. Even with the few backsets, it was amazing how much we were able to do. We went through a room practically filled to the ceiling with shoes and another room equally filled with clothes of all genders and sizes all mixed together. In places like Makaphutu there just aren’t the resources to usually deal with such an overwhelming task and it was fantastic that we were able to do the work for them.

Another rewarding aspect of our work was when I was able to personally help hand out some of the shoes we had organized to the local community. Though the entire group helped with a distribution later the same day, Tim, Sam Pollen and I were able to help at a smaller, more personal distribution. We brought the food and shoes from Makaphutu to a distribution point and moved the boxes(with the help of those there) into a line so they could be fairly distributed. Then the 30 or so people lined up and a prayer of thanks was said before the distribution. As the food was given out the three of us alternated between helping hand out products and playing with the few kids who had come with their families. Only three or four of them ventured over to play with us but they all became fascinated with Tim and Sam’s cameras. Barely listening to instructions on how to use the cameras, the kids snapped away dozens of pictures.

At one point the main man helping with distribution got to a point where there were only about 9 cans of certain foods so we handed each of us 3 cans and essentially told us to “chose who you think should get them”. Well I have to say that was a shock. How do you choose whom to give a can of food to from a line of 30 people? Is it the women with children who “deserve” it? Or is it the elderly man suffering from AIDs who has been waiting here since 9am? I found myself almost blindly handing out the cans.

But this led to one of my favorite parts of this trip. As I went back from round 2 of blindly giving out a few cans, I attempted to hand a can to a women and she waved it away pointing to another women in the line. That single wave of a hand reminded me of the deep human compassion that lives within us all. Sometimes that compassion can be hidden by the struggle to survive, but this woman proved that no matter what your situation we can all be caring.

Going back to the “real” world I know I will remember these moments and I hope that as I continue on in life my new experiences will shape my actions, even if it’s organizing my goodwill donations more precisely.