JANUARY 2017 - VISIT TO OUR COMMUNITY IN BUTEMBO (Congo)
On New Year's Eve, I left for Butembo (Congo). After making the pastoral visit in the communities of Brazil and the Philippines in November and December, it was time to visit the Congolese community for the first time. Father Charles, our young Nigerian priest, also traveled with me. The flight of the Etiopian Airlines airline, after stopping at Adis Abeba, took us to the international airport of Goma (Congo) at 2.30 pm the following day (10 actual flight hours). The next day, January 3, we landed at the small airport of Butembo.
BUTEMBO, a small town, more than a city, despite the population of 1,200,000 inhabitants (as extensive as the metropolitan area of Rome), sits at 1800 meters above sea level.
Without a master plan, it extends over a vast plateau occupied by a dozen large hills, with slopes of varying slope, with most of the low houses built of bricks or shrubs covered with mud. The houses are connected to each other by roads (euphemism, better to say dirt tracks), more or less wide but carved out over time by the rain (at the famous holes in the streets of Rome, they make him a mustache). It is possible to travel using only motorcycles or cars with high and 4 wheel drive suspensions. The vegetation is sparse.
All around the city are high mountains that reach an altitude of 2,200 meters. A positive and very important note concerns the aspect of health: in Butembo, being very high and very far from the forest, there is no yellow fever and malaria. The red soil in Butembo is very fertile. The countryside produces an abundance of vegetables, legumes, rice, corn and wheat. There is not a wide variety of fruit because of the height, abundance of poultry and beef, pork and sheep. Despite the geographical position (we are right at the equator), due to the altitude, the climate is mild and pleasant. In the morning and late afternoon, you can feel the pleasure of wearing a sweater or sweatshirt. The dry season runs from January to April.
Moving away only slightly from the city center, poverty reigns supreme; what we are used to seeing in documentaries. People, however, especially in this area, react as those who have learned to live with the endemic situation know how to do and therefore, without crying on themselves, they roll up their sleeves, just as one can clearly understand, by turning and observing the activity of people. There are children. Their curious and inquisitive eyes hit you. The little girls, you see them with the little brothers / sisters on their shoulders.
The official language is French. The school year has the same timing as the Italian one.
The value of hospitality is widely practiced. We were surrounded by a whole series of attentions by the parishioners and friends of the mission, who in addition to coming to visit us to welcome us, also gave us two goats, a rabbit and various products of the earth. I thought, coming here to fall ... it will be for another time)
And then, what about the joy and joy that explodes on Sunday mornings during the three mornings of our parish "Santa Maria del Silenzio". (Title very little consonant with the situation !!!) Live celebrations, pleasant, liturgically well animated and enlivened by very rhythmic dances and songs. (average duration of the festive Mass: about 150 minutes, including a sermon, of course). The official language is French.
THE WORLD OF THE DEAF
The almost absent vaccination, as well as any form of prevention, means that the presence of deaf people on the territory is just over 2,500 units.
There is only one special school for hearing-free, run by the diocese and which welcomes about 80 primary school students. No compulsory middle school.
Absent any form of assistance from the State.
During the visit we made a certain number of students happy, those most in need, according to the director, because thanks to the friends of Camponeschi of the "Tours Service", to Tonino Ferralis and to the non-profit organization "Superfac- Onlus" of Pagliare del Tronto, it was It was possible to pack a large number of school backpacks and stationery.
Unfortunately, there is this is the thing that hurts so much; there is a big atavistic, cultural problem, for which the deaf person is seen as a curse or worse, as the origin and the cause of all the misfortunes of the family. The family is ashamed of the deaf person and often reacts by segregating them, moving them away from home or beating them. "Marginalized by society and denied by families, they live like ghosts among others, condemned to a deafening silence". Thus stated Antonio Spanò, in the documentary that produced in 2012 precisely on the reality of the deaf of the great Butembo.
From this it can be deduced that the greatest job to do, for the future, is to help the population to frame the problem in the right light and to make deaf people to have sense of dignity, through education and work. There is really a lot, a long way to go in this sense for the community of the Little Mission for the Deaf that arrived in this land about two years ago.
OUR COMMUNITY
In one of the peripheral areas of the city of Butembo, quartier Kimbulu, Cellule Kihiana. Nord-Kivu is the Community of the Little Mission for the Deaf and Dumb - Opera Gualandi - (with 13 people) in a house onthe crest of one of the hills near the parish that was built by our Congregation and where every Sunday, the deaf people also participate in the liturgy. (I cannot give you the address because the Post does not exist here and there are no street names - Only private couriers work). Free of its artesian well, difficult to realize because of its high position on the hill (we should probably drill up to 90 / 100m), for all the needs of the house, it depends on rainwater, collected in large rubber containers . (sometimes you get the temptation to do .... the rain dance).
As far as drinking water is concerned, we resort to a spring that comes directly from the rock just over 3 kilometers from home (given the line and the scarce quantity that comes out of it, we need to have a good book). Since there is no network for electricity, for lights, and only for that, it uses the energy produced by the few solar panels and stored in special accumulators. To cook, instead, the community serves a large economic kitchen of cast iron, wood-burning, 50s (other than Scavolini !!). A lady is in charge of preparing meals.
The wood, bought in large quantities, usually arrives in logs of medium size, then cut to size, with the help of axe and machetes, by the youthful strength of the seminarians. (a form of voluntary physical exercise, which cannot be avoided). Moreover, the young people take care of all the other services, including washing their own linen and ironing them. For ironing use the old charcoal iron of our mothers. (Here, Stirella, has no market!)
Our Community also takes care of a small rabbit farm.
Unlike the Asian nations that consider the rabbit a domestic animal, like a cat or a dog, and therefore enjoy ... long life, here it receives a very different consideration (I had a blatant fortune).
Obviously, I imagine that they too, like the two goats, did not really appreciate our visit ...!
I am sure that the experience in the Philippines and the advice of the local community will be of great help to think of a first general program in order to offer education, work and therefore a future and a dignity, to the many deaf people who , in these lands they live in the most extreme poverty and in the most total marginalization.
For this reason, as soon as possible, to make the potential of deaf people (who can do everything except hear) visible, we will start with a small school and a simple shed for learning some trades. The sale of products and manufactured products will be a sort of self-financing.
Our congregation has already purchased the land (about 2900 square meters) for the realization of the project. We are also seriously considering the possibility of creating the deep artesian well, since there is no water network.
I hope, in the future, to be able to count on the help of future Italian volunteers, to offer useful courses for deaf people to enter society (carpenters, plumbers and tailors). If, as the great Chinese sage says, every journey begins with the first step, well, the Little Mission for the Deaf, with the help of the Lord, has already taken the first steps and is already ... traveling. The Lord knows that He can count on our collaboration.
In the future, hoping to welcome you, I will keep you informed of progress.
I greet you all dearly and I wish you all good in the Lord for the new year.
F. Savino
On New Year's Eve, I left for Butembo (Congo). After making the pastoral visit in the communities of Brazil and the Philippines in November and December, it was time to visit the Congolese community for the first time. Father Charles, our young Nigerian priest, also traveled with me. The flight of the Etiopian Airlines airline, after stopping at Adis Abeba, took us to the international airport of Goma (Congo) at 2.30 pm the following day (10 actual flight hours). The next day, January 3, we landed at the small airport of Butembo.
BUTEMBO, a small town, more than a city, despite the population of 1,200,000 inhabitants (as extensive as the metropolitan area of Rome), sits at 1800 meters above sea level.
Without a master plan, it extends over a vast plateau occupied by a dozen large hills, with slopes of varying slope, with most of the low houses built of bricks or shrubs covered with mud. The houses are connected to each other by roads (euphemism, better to say dirt tracks), more or less wide but carved out over time by the rain (at the famous holes in the streets of Rome, they make him a mustache). It is possible to travel using only motorcycles or cars with high and 4 wheel drive suspensions. The vegetation is sparse.
All around the city are high mountains that reach an altitude of 2,200 meters. A positive and very important note concerns the aspect of health: in Butembo, being very high and very far from the forest, there is no yellow fever and malaria. The red soil in Butembo is very fertile. The countryside produces an abundance of vegetables, legumes, rice, corn and wheat. There is not a wide variety of fruit because of the height, abundance of poultry and beef, pork and sheep. Despite the geographical position (we are right at the equator), due to the altitude, the climate is mild and pleasant. In the morning and late afternoon, you can feel the pleasure of wearing a sweater or sweatshirt. The dry season runs from January to April.
Moving away only slightly from the city center, poverty reigns supreme; what we are used to seeing in documentaries. People, however, especially in this area, react as those who have learned to live with the endemic situation know how to do and therefore, without crying on themselves, they roll up their sleeves, just as one can clearly understand, by turning and observing the activity of people. There are children. Their curious and inquisitive eyes hit you. The little girls, you see them with the little brothers / sisters on their shoulders.
The official language is French. The school year has the same timing as the Italian one.
The value of hospitality is widely practiced. We were surrounded by a whole series of attentions by the parishioners and friends of the mission, who in addition to coming to visit us to welcome us, also gave us two goats, a rabbit and various products of the earth. I thought, coming here to fall ... it will be for another time)
And then, what about the joy and joy that explodes on Sunday mornings during the three mornings of our parish "Santa Maria del Silenzio". (Title very little consonant with the situation !!!) Live celebrations, pleasant, liturgically well animated and enlivened by very rhythmic dances and songs. (average duration of the festive Mass: about 150 minutes, including a sermon, of course). The official language is French.
THE WORLD OF THE DEAF
The almost absent vaccination, as well as any form of prevention, means that the presence of deaf people on the territory is just over 2,500 units.
There is only one special school for hearing-free, run by the diocese and which welcomes about 80 primary school students. No compulsory middle school.
Absent any form of assistance from the State.
During the visit we made a certain number of students happy, those most in need, according to the director, because thanks to the friends of Camponeschi of the "Tours Service", to Tonino Ferralis and to the non-profit organization "Superfac- Onlus" of Pagliare del Tronto, it was It was possible to pack a large number of school backpacks and stationery.
Unfortunately, there is this is the thing that hurts so much; there is a big atavistic, cultural problem, for which the deaf person is seen as a curse or worse, as the origin and the cause of all the misfortunes of the family. The family is ashamed of the deaf person and often reacts by segregating them, moving them away from home or beating them. "Marginalized by society and denied by families, they live like ghosts among others, condemned to a deafening silence". Thus stated Antonio Spanò, in the documentary that produced in 2012 precisely on the reality of the deaf of the great Butembo.
From this it can be deduced that the greatest job to do, for the future, is to help the population to frame the problem in the right light and to make deaf people to have sense of dignity, through education and work. There is really a lot, a long way to go in this sense for the community of the Little Mission for the Deaf that arrived in this land about two years ago.
OUR COMMUNITY
In one of the peripheral areas of the city of Butembo, quartier Kimbulu, Cellule Kihiana. Nord-Kivu is the Community of the Little Mission for the Deaf and Dumb - Opera Gualandi - (with 13 people) in a house onthe crest of one of the hills near the parish that was built by our Congregation and where every Sunday, the deaf people also participate in the liturgy. (I cannot give you the address because the Post does not exist here and there are no street names - Only private couriers work). Free of its artesian well, difficult to realize because of its high position on the hill (we should probably drill up to 90 / 100m), for all the needs of the house, it depends on rainwater, collected in large rubber containers . (sometimes you get the temptation to do .... the rain dance).
As far as drinking water is concerned, we resort to a spring that comes directly from the rock just over 3 kilometers from home (given the line and the scarce quantity that comes out of it, we need to have a good book). Since there is no network for electricity, for lights, and only for that, it uses the energy produced by the few solar panels and stored in special accumulators. To cook, instead, the community serves a large economic kitchen of cast iron, wood-burning, 50s (other than Scavolini !!). A lady is in charge of preparing meals.
The wood, bought in large quantities, usually arrives in logs of medium size, then cut to size, with the help of axe and machetes, by the youthful strength of the seminarians. (a form of voluntary physical exercise, which cannot be avoided). Moreover, the young people take care of all the other services, including washing their own linen and ironing them. For ironing use the old charcoal iron of our mothers. (Here, Stirella, has no market!)
Our Community also takes care of a small rabbit farm.
Unlike the Asian nations that consider the rabbit a domestic animal, like a cat or a dog, and therefore enjoy ... long life, here it receives a very different consideration (I had a blatant fortune).
Obviously, I imagine that they too, like the two goats, did not really appreciate our visit ...!
I am sure that the experience in the Philippines and the advice of the local community will be of great help to think of a first general program in order to offer education, work and therefore a future and a dignity, to the many deaf people who , in these lands they live in the most extreme poverty and in the most total marginalization.
For this reason, as soon as possible, to make the potential of deaf people (who can do everything except hear) visible, we will start with a small school and a simple shed for learning some trades. The sale of products and manufactured products will be a sort of self-financing.
Our congregation has already purchased the land (about 2900 square meters) for the realization of the project. We are also seriously considering the possibility of creating the deep artesian well, since there is no water network.
I hope, in the future, to be able to count on the help of future Italian volunteers, to offer useful courses for deaf people to enter society (carpenters, plumbers and tailors). If, as the great Chinese sage says, every journey begins with the first step, well, the Little Mission for the Deaf, with the help of the Lord, has already taken the first steps and is already ... traveling. The Lord knows that He can count on our collaboration.
In the future, hoping to welcome you, I will keep you informed of progress.
I greet you all dearly and I wish you all good in the Lord for the new year.
F. Savino
