Rotarians see how grants to Zambian mission are helping
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By BOB REEVES / Lincoln Journal Star
When people give money to help people in another country, they often wonder how their money is being spent.
That’s not the case for a group of Rotarians from Nebraska who recently traveled to Zambia for a work trip at the Sons of Thunder mission.
The 12 members of the team led a training program there for native women who work in an orphanage that serves about 50 children, some of whom have lost their parents due to AIDS.
The team also got to see the day-to-day operation of a school, clinic and agricultural program that has benefited from nearly $40,000 in grants through a humanitarian project sponsored by Rotary clubs in eastern Nebraska and western Iowa.
Zambians who live and work on the mission farm proudly showed off two wells that are bringing clean water to two villages, thanks to assistance from a family at Lincoln’s First-Plymouth Congregational Church and a Rotary grant.
Mary Ann Erickson, a member of the team from Nebraska, was impressed with how appreciative the Zambians were for the Americans’ help. One village leader told her, “I just couldn’t believe that the white man would come halfway around the world and give us water.”
She’s the wife of Dr. Chuck Erickson, whose initial trip to Zambia was the impetus for the Rotary project.
Erickson, a retired Lincoln pediatrician, went to Zambia in 2003 on a Yale scholarship funded by Johnson & Johnson. He worked six weeks in a children’s ward in a hospital in Livingstone, in the southern African nation of 11.5 million people.
“I saw lots of malaria,” he said. He also treated children with worms and other parasites, malnutrition and other diseases, including AIDS.
“I saw problems that could be prevented, like malaria (through the use of mosquito netting and insecticides), malnutrition and severe dehydration,” he said.
While there, Erickson visited a 10,000-acre farm north of Livingstone operated by Sons of Thunder Mission, a Christian organization that has comprehensive goals for improving Zambians’ lives.
The mission has an orphanage, a school for 300 children in first through seventh grade, a medical clinic and a Bible college. Erickson got to know medical missionaries Sal and Renee Marini and other mission leaders, and he was impressed with what they were doing.
The Sons of Thunder farm includes seven villages where natives are learning improved farming methods so they can raise enough food to feed their families.
Back in Lincoln, Erickson reported what he’d learned in Zambia to his Lincoln East Rotary Club. In 2005, Erickson returned to Africa with other Rotary members, Ozzie Gilbertson, a retired professor of agricultural education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Carolin Roehr, who is a teacher.
Gilbertson said he was impressed with how hard the Africans were working to try to raise crops in poor soil with lack of sufficient water. One of their problems, he said, is attempting to grow corn when other crops, such as millet or sorghum, would require less water and provide equal nutrition.
Rainfall varies widely from year to year, he said, In the rainy season of 2005-06, the farm received 66 inches of precipitation, washing out some small dams that held water for irrigation. The following season (2006-07), it received only seven inches, creating conditions of severe drought.
One of the farm’s biggest needs, Gilbertson said, is a more reliable source of water.
Rotary District 5650, including 45 clubs in eastern Nebraska and western Iowa, made a five-year commitment in local matching funds for grants from Rotary International for the Zambia project.
The grant provided $17,500 for the first year (2006-07) and $22,000 for the current year (2007-08), and more grants are planned for the future.
The funds helped provide computers, medical equipment and supplies, a blood count machine, furniture for the orphanage and a septic system for the school. In addition, Lincoln-area retired teachers donated 100 books, and a Sunday school class at First-Plymouth, where Erickson is a member, donated children’s garden supplies.
Frank and Lois Mills of First-Plymouth, along with others, contributed funds for a bore hole to create a much-needed water well for one of the villages. Another well was completed using donations from the Mills couple plus matching Rotary funds. Three more bore holes, expanding the availability of water, are planned under this year’s grant.
Gilbertson and his wife, Kay, received a Volunteer Service Grant through Rotary International Foundation to return to Zambia in November 2007 to assess the needs of the project for coming years.
“We’re hoping we can put our money to the best use as a result of learning more about their needs,” Gilbertson said.
The work trip in May included: Erickson and his wife; nutritionist Amanda Perrin and her father, Bob, an architect; registered nurse Dorothy Zimmerman; Rotary District 5650 Governor Sharon Wherry and her husband, Dan; Carolin Roehr, her son, Nash, and his friend Chad Jenkins; Austin Person, a graduate student in public health at the University of Nebraska Medical Center; and Nicki Klein, past president of the Lincoln South Rotary Club.
Several of them helped teach a class in nutrition, hygiene and other basic skills to about 40 women who work in the orphanage. Other team members painted buildings, helped with the farm work, assisted in the clinic and constructed mosquito-net bed frames to prevent the spread of malaria.
The women who participated in the four-day workshop “were so appreciative of what we did and took everything we taught them to see how it could apply to their lives,” Klein said. “We weren’t trying to westernize them but giving them information to make their health systems a little better, within their own culture.”
For example, she said, while learning about how to prevent the spread of AIDS, one of the women talked about the traditional practice of using tattoos.
“They thought that if they set their needles aside for awhile on a shelf, the germs would go away,” Klein said. “We suggested that they boil those needles to be sure the germs were gone. We recognized the custom, but told them a way to make it a little safer.”
At another point, they were explaining the use of rubber gloves to stop the spread of disease, and one of the women explained that they couldn’t get rubber gloves in their village.
“We told them to take a cloth and wrap it around their hands” when touching a diseased person or contaminated materials, she said. “It’s an alternative way of doing the same thing.”
Erickson noted that while the Sons of Thunder Mission has a Christian evangelistic goal, the Rotary funds have all been used for programs to improve the health, educational level and self-sufficiency of Zambians.
Local Rotarians and others involved in the project come from many religious backgrounds, including United Church of Christ, Unitarian, Lutheran, Mennonite, Presbyterian and Catholic, he said.
Asked what he has gained personally from participation in the project, Erickson said, “This is something I can do in retirement,” using his medical skills. “I enjoy working with a variety of people to accomplish this, and I enjoy helping people who really need some help.”
While some people are pessimistic about the future of Africa, Erickson said he feels optimistic, especially after visiting Zambia and seeing the positive, upbeat attitude of the people who are benefiting from the Sons of Thunder programs. They’re still very poor, but “they can see improvements in their lives, so they’re hopeful,” he said.
And that hope is contagious to the Americans who are seeking to help them.
Reach Bob Reeves at 473-7212 or breeves@journalstar.com.
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