Say What?
Posted on June 2, 2009 - Filed Under General News | Leave a Comment
SAY WHAT?
You can tell a lot about people by their language. Someone recently
asked me if I speak Samburu. I don’t, but I know a few words and phrases. I
can greet and say polite words like, “peace, daughter, my son, thank you,
good, elder.” I also understand simple commands such as “get firewood”, “sit
here”, “put the tea in the pot”, “bring water.” Then there are words I’ve
learned because I’ve heard them over and over again. “Child, God, heaven,
milk, cattle, cows, small cow.” Get the picture? Make a list of
top 20 key words in English that someone following you around might learn.
Hello, goodbye, please and thank you would surely top the list.
As I thought about my limited tribal vocabulary, I immediately formed a
picture of Samburu culture in my mind. And the one word on my list that I’ll
bet isn’t on yours is hunger – “somach”. I’m not sure of the spelling, but
I’m certain of the pronunciation (sew-mawsh) and the meaning. You can hear
it nearly every day if you go to town. People walk up to you with one hand
on their stomach and the fingers of the other hand to their mouth. It must
be the universal gesture for begging for food.
You could go 2 ways with the rest of this story. One would be to state
how much begging is an ingrained and acceptable practice in the culture and
it is. The other is to point out that people really are hungry. These days,
I’m preferring to point out the latter. The truth is that the starving are
not always located close to town. Many times they are up in the mountains or
forest. They live too far away and are too weak to walk to town and beg.
Hungry people can walk and stand. Starving people cannot.
Some elders in one area recently banded together and persuaded the
government to come and assist over half a dozen desperate elderly. They
decided to transport some to the hospital. One of them died on the way. I’m
not trying to be dramatic or morbid, I’m merely trying to paint the picture
of what is happening. There are likely some who are still in danger of
starvation. I’d say the majority of these are either ill or elderly. These
are the ones we will continue to help. I wanted you to know that your giving
makes a difference. Funds for this feeding project come directly from
Baptist Global Relief. Your gifts to Lottie Moon and the Cooperative Program
allow us to be here. Thank you.
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