International Malaria Day

Malaria day, which didn't go as planned, but turned out to be a HUGE success was a blast!  One of my fellow PCVs traveled to my village to help me host a day filled with activities at the village primary school and to host a Malaria Awareness parade from the school to the village market.  We played a few Q&A games with the kids on the facts of malaria (transmission, signs and symptoms, treatment, prevention, etc); held an art contest where the children were provided with various supplies and were asked to create a positive message about malaria; and taught the children a song (in Kinyarwanda) about the prevention of malaria that would be chanted during the parade.  We also had the children make a pledge to sleep under their mosquito nets and encourage those around them to do the same.  After repeating a short phrase (the pledge), the children signed their names on a small piece of African cloth and then tied each of their cloths together to create a long chain, symbolizing their unity in the fight against malaria.  Just before we left the school to begin our parade, myself, my colleague, and my counterpart surprised the winners of the various malaria activities with prizes!!  Brand new notebooks, flashy pencils, candy, free mosquito nets; and the kids loved them ALL!  I think the prizes may have been my favorite part of the day.  The march was tons of fun, but to see the kids' faces when that something new was placed into their hands was priceless.  At one point, I just watched and thought to myself, I heart my job.  It's frustrating, and stressful, and progress is slow, but those smiles make it all worth it.  In that one instant where the children flashed their pearly whites, all of the stresses disappeared and I forgot how hard it was to make the event happen.  All that existed in that moment was me, the kids, and their smiles--and then I smiled.

Next up was the parade, which almost didn't happen, but

I somehow convinced my counterpart to stick with it out and power through to the end.  The day's events ended up running into lunch time (which was the plan in the first place), however, I guess my counterpart didn't factor into the day how hungry he would be at this time.  Once he finally agreed to NOT leave me hanging, we gathered all of the kids (between one and two hundred), and started on our way, chanting "OYA MALARIYA!" (no malaria), "KWIRINDA MALARIYA!"  (prevent malaria), and sang the malaria song here and there along the way.  As we chanted and marched, the burning sun continued to shine bright and make its way across the sky.  Despite the heat, we continued to chant and sing over and over, "OYA MALARIYA! OYA MALARIYA!" stopping periodically to hand out small stickers with prevention messages and information pamphlets to village mamas that we passed along the way.  We continued this way for about 2 hours and through 4 villages.  Minus the fatal sunburn that had my skin on FIRE, the malaria day parade was a hit!  Woot woot!!

All in all Malaria Day kind of took on a life of its own, but it still went well.  The kids had fun, we (the teachers) had fun; and the kids learned and felt empowered to protect themselves and their community from malaria. Not to mention, I saw them all smile...each and every one (:

Love and Peace Corps,

Dametreea

PS. I was walking home from the market last Wednesday (one week after the malaria parade) and as I walked down the road from the market leading to my house, dog tired from carrying all that food (cabbage, tomatoes, green beans, onions, rice, and 3 kilos of potatoes!) for 35 minutes, I heard to my left, "Keza! Oya malariya!"  I looked over at a little kid waving frantically at me and chanting the very phrase from our parade!  Boy did my heart do a somersault; I got through to someone!! Yayy mee!!!