I Learned Much From Africa

By Warner Woodworth

One of the most absolutely amazing Christmases of mine occurred in the deserts of sub-Saharan Africa in 1998. We wandered through the sands of impoverished African villages, observed men and women dressed in their traditional robes called boubous, along with their sandals and occasional headdresses. In one of the poorest areas of earth, my wife, Kaye, and I, along with a few friends, spent the last 10 days of December that year getting to know and serve the loving people and culture of West Africa.

In November our Provo, Utah church group had launched several projects for us to take gifts to the people we were serving. The young men collected dozens of soccer balls, used and new, to distribute so each village would have at least one new and several used balls, along with an air pump for maintenance. It would be a sharp contrast to the rags tied together as soccer balls they had used for most of their lives.

Over the same several weeks, the young women and their mothers set up a “sewing factory” in our LDS ward cultural hall where they made cute dolls out of various fabrics. Each produced a soft, huggable African doll to be given to village girls, along with homemade dresses to enjoy several doll outfits. Needless to say, we had a lot of luggage.

When in Africa, darkness came early each evening. We could see tiny fires outside the mud huts where families cooked their meals, ate, played drums and danced. With no electricity in the region, the darkness overhead was a stark contrast, with constellations of the southern skies shining brilliantly above. The stars made us think of that first Christmas 2,000 years ago when a tiny Babe was born in a similar dusty village called Bethlehem.

At times, we would walk through the dirt paths surrounding our simple compound, viewing thatched-roof huts and palm trees swaying in the breeze. We could see the occasional run-down manger with dry hay on the ground, often with Brahma cattle lowing and goats scampering underfoot. It couldn’t have been different at the birth of Baby Jesus.

Stark poverty was everywhere, infant mortality among the highest in the world — 18 times higher than the United States. Families there operated at a subsistence level. Living occurred in simple houses made of mud with wooden frames and hard dirt floors. Water was hauled by the women from thousands of yards away at a communal well.

This was a place where few children had opportunities for a healthy life, let alone an education. Sanitation was provided by pit latrines or the bush. With deforestation occurring over the years to secure cooking fuel, accompanied by an 18-year drought and a lack of wild game, survival was a harsh taskmaster. The region’s GNP per head was approximately $250 U.S. that year.

I recall the experience of giving one of our soft dolls to a 5-year-old girl in a large village. A day later we happened upon the family compound where we saw the child’s mother, Maineh, cradling the new doll in her arms, swinging back and forth while humming a lullaby. When we enquired, she simply told us the doll made her remember her babies that had died at birth, or soon afterward. Tears came to our eyes, as well as hers, as we reflected on the deep pain suffered by so many women in the region. We hadn’t dreamed a single doll would mean so much.

At Christmastime that year, I learned much from Africa — lessons of love and dignity, as well as peace, humility and human betterment. Despite their abject poverty, villagers taught me to thank God. I gained important lessons from them about how to truly love others, to live life to the fullest, to be grateful for every blessing, great or small.

On that Christmas Eve in 1998, we lit a candle, softly sang some of our favorite Christmas songs, and shared our thoughts about the miraculous birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was a sacred experience, a holy time, as we crouched around our little campfire and reflected on our blessings. We could certainly empathize with the plight of Joseph and Mary. We felt a bit of what the shepherds must have felt in the deserts of Judea long ago.

Every year since then, I recall that first experience as a few humble Utahns ventured to Africa to bless the lives of 25,000 native people in 20 villages during a wonderful Christmas season. It wasn’t a massive change project, but it gave comfort to at least one mother who’d lost her little one.

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