Hakopa Village Visit Saturday

Hey everybody!!

Today started out a little differently then the rest of the other days. After a wonderful breakfast over at the Thuma’s, we packed into two trucks and headed out to Hakopa, a village about 13 miles away. Hakopa looks a little different then the base here in Macha. It is much more “in the bush”, and because of this, we had to drive through narrow  dirt back roads filled with potholes which made the trek to and from an hour long. When we arrived at the village, we went to their Brethren in Christ Church where about 100 kids and 20 older members were gathered waiting for our arrival.

After a brief message given by their pastor, the individuals were split up into 4 groups and cycled through 4 different activities: soccer, jump rope, lacrosse and wiffle-ball. One of the groups consisted of middle-aged women who carried infants on their back with various cloths to hold them up. You would never guess that however, when they would come up to bat or get involved with the jump roping. Their child was just along for the ride. After the sports and activities, our group and the community headed down to their hand dug well where we demonstrated how to use the Sawyer water filters. Showing the families the brown water turning into clear, clean water was amazing because they were so happy to have some pure water to drink.

Following the water demonstration, we headed back to their community center for lunch. Little did we know, when we first arrived and saw the chickens and goat tied up, that they would turn into our lunch. The women had been cooking all morning to prepare this awesome, authentic meal for us. Although it was scary to try at first, the meal they prepared was very good. Along with the goat, we had nshima (mashed maize, something they have with every meal) and some type of green leafy vegetable. We expressed our gratitude for their amazing hospitality, and then piled back into the trucks to head back to Macha.

Thanks so much for your support,

Alex Reinhard and Emily Quatrale.

ps. hey ma, im alive, see you soon. -em