Letter from Kenya: heading to Africa
Stephanie: I remember very few things from my first time in Africa — I was only 18 months old then — although I've never forgotten the sweet taste of guavas and the smell of the fresh peanut butter my mother made from peanuts she bought from a local woman.
Today I keep one of my favourite pictures from those two years (my family was in Nigeria, where my father had a teaching posting through the World University Service) on my desk at work. In the photo, a bustling market scene is brought to a standstill by two mothers holding two daughters. My mom, in a white hat and large '80s-style glasses, smiles at me and the baby next to me. I'm wearing a white dress and bonnet, probably made by my mother. The other child's gold earrings and vivid green-dyed traditional dress match her mother's as well.
Two sets of mothers and daughters; two different worlds. Yet the photo has captured an unspoken feminine bond — one that unites all mothers in their hopes, dreams and desires for their daughters. It is that bond that drew my mother and me back, in 2007, to Africa.
Like many strong and independence-minded women raised in male-dominated homes, my mother vowed that her two daughters would grow up knowing their worth and the power of education. Her lessons directed me into my career, which involves working with women on issues of empowerment all over the world.
When I learned that I would be going to Kenya in January 2007 to set up unique partnerships between our centre and grassroots women's organizations that promote education there, I asked my mother to come with me. Besides attending the World Social Forum — a meeting of tens of thousands of representatives of civil society working for social justice and community development — we would be hearing the vibrant, courageous stories of other mothers and daughters, grandmothers and granddaughters.
To me, education is as much about learning outside of the classroom as inside it. For example, most of my knowledge about the world and about myself as a woman came from my relationship with my mother and strong, courageous women I've been privileged to meet in the course of my work.
In Africa, a continent devastated by AIDS, this understanding could not resonate more. With an entire generation wiped out, with grandmothers caring for their grandchildren and orphans tending younger siblings, what education, what stories, are lost as a result? How can we support those who are trying to preserve and pass on those stories? These questions are what this journey is about.
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