The REDES Girls are an Anthem of Hope

The REDES Girls are an Anthem of Hope

A little background first

Five years ago, the PCVs in Mozambique decide to start an extracurricular club for young women in high schools across Mozambique. The PCVs named the project Raparigas em Desenvolivimento de Educacao e Saude (REDES), which translates to Young Girls in Development of Education and Health. What started as a small project has rapidly expanded into a nation-wide project with more clubs starting every year and more girls participating.

In a few sentences, REDES is a group to adolescent girls mold their own lives and to create more options for a brighter future. The girls are actively involved to think about challenging solutions that they face everyday in the school, at work, in interactions with the opposite sex, and with gender roles. The girls are encouraged to take control of their futures and taught they are responsible for the decisions they make. We talk about topics such as health, family relations, education, work, community involvement, marriage, having children, and human rights in our groups.

We are working to start a club at the high school in Chibuto, which starts officially next week in fact! The clubs vary in size and anywhere from 15 to 16 girls regularly attend. Usually a PCV facilitates with a Mozambican professor, but many clubs that have been ran for a few years have been transferred solely into the hands of Mozambicans. The PCV and Mozambican facilitator partner bringing their collective strengths and abilities to the table, but eventually the Mozambican professor usually takes the reins allowing the project to be more sustainable. After the project is off the ground, PCVs take more of a supporting role.

This year Peace Corps put on three REDES Conferences in Northern, Southern, and Central Mozambique, which is funded by PEPFAR. There were 50 students participants and 20 teachers at the Southern conference this year. Each school brought 1 PCV, 1 teacher, and 3 students who take what they learn during the conference back to share it with other group members. The 3 students usually take their enthusiasm back and develop into group leaders.

REDES Conference 2009
Last week I helped with the 5th Annual REDES Conference. When I decided to do Peace Corps, before I left many people asked, “Why I decided to join?” Depending on my mood the answer varied because it was hard to give just one concise answer and truthfully I did not fully know why myself, but I found a concrete answer this week. The concrete answer came when working with these young girls. Participating in this conference was one of the most memorable weeks of my life. One of the most challenging, yet inspiring too.

Memorable
I said this week was memorable. How can I even put into words how fun it was to watch many of these girls who have never been on a week-long vacation respond to the conference? The first day many were shy and unsure of themselves, but man were there transformations impressive. They absorbed information like sponges, spoke with more confidence each passing day, encouraged and respected one another constantly, and naturally, danced like there was no tomorrow. I’ll give a few examples.

• We had a 2-hour session on public speaking where the girls were advised to be confident and have strong contact with other while speaking. This is huge because girls often look down when speaking to you because it’s what they learn in their culture (women are taught to defer to the men and be submissive to authority in general). REDES teaches girls to be assertive and that they are equals. The girls loved the public speaking tips and did an activity where we gave them the chance to be in the 60 Seconds Hall of Fame. In order to be in the Hall of Fame, they had to talk without stopping for 60 seconds about whatever they liked in front of the group as public speaking practice. Many failed at first, but each girl bravely tried. Eventually, most succeeded, some refusing to give up even after 3 or 4 tries, all the while cheering on one another. At the end of the week, many of their feedback comments said things like, “Thank you for teaching us about public speaking. It was the first time I have ever heard of it,” and “I did not realize I could be an equal,” and “I will speak with more confidence in the classroom.”
• Three women living with HIV came to share their stories and afterwards the girls were able to ask questions The HIV positive women had just given their testaments: one had been disowned by her family, one young mother had recently lost her husband and had not yet told her young kids of her status, and the last one experienced a lot of discrimination. The room was somber even though the HIV positive women were insisting that their lives had continued thanks to proper treatment and that knowing their status had saved their lives. They were HIV activists. After the first few questions a young girl named Regina raised her hand to ask if she could get up right then and there to kiss and hug these women for their bravery. She did just that in front of this room of people and others followed her example. Regina was the good Samaritan, unafraid to touch the sick. I am normally “Miss-I-don’t-cry-in-movies-or after-I-lose-my-valuables-or-for-much-of-anything,” but I was moved to tears by her compassion.
• At the close of our first day, the girls changed into their swimsuits and ran straight for the ocean. The conference theme was “Eu Sou Eu” (I am who I am) to encourage them to love themselves and realize they are capable of reaching their dreams. You couldn’t help but see that this week they were getting a chance to take this message to heart when they bounded into the ocean freely, modeling and asking for pictures in their swimsuits. You’ve never seen girls so excited to be in the ocean – they were so full of energy and seemed so empowered!

Challenging
•Hmm…the conference went great and all the girls loved it and got a lot out of it. Of course, I’ll spare you all the logistical challenges, but will say there were additional challenges. I was a camp counselor with another PCV named Sarah for 10 girls. We all stayed in a cabin and did various activities together during the day and then reflections at night. Very much like most conferences I’ve attended in the US. However, Sarah and I were responsible for leading these girls in Portuguese, which was nerve-racking after only 6 months of speaking it. We just went with it, and did the best we could. I’m pretty sure it’s safe to say everyone got a kick out of our condom demonstration on a cucumber in less than perfect Portuguese!
• Also, it was harder to initially connect with the girls because of the dual language and cultural barriers. Generally, carrying on conversations with people I have just met comes easily, but it was work at times as a counselor. This is for a number of reasons:

o 1. It’s harder to say what I wanna say in Portuguese and have them understand me.
o 2. Often American culture dictates that we carry on a constant dialogue while in Mozambique they’re more comfortable to sit in silence and enjoy each other’s company.
o 3. We have less similar experiences due to different cultures and opportunities. That’s not to say similarities don’t exist, because fundamentally we’re the same, sometimes it just takes a little more effort and digging to realize it.
•In order to overcome these challenges and connect with these girls it just took some patience, creativity, and resolve to make it through some awkward silence during meals and miscommunications. I had to be patient because it just takes the girls a little more time to warm up to you. I found that connecting with the girls using things like music, dance, and sports (we played a lot of beach volleyball) works like a charm, which is probably one of the reasons I like those activities so much. I put on Beyonce the first night in the cabin and the girls started singing along in a cross between English and jibberish, ha…and then we started a dance party, which loosened up both me and the girls. Eventually, the creative ways to connect opened up conversation.

Inspiring
You always seem to read about all the colossal problems the world faces such as poverty, suffering, gender inequality, and illiteracy. I definitely see my share of these everyday. But despite all of that, I see bright futures for these 50 young girls. They fearlessly asked questions on women’s health and reproductive systems, gaining so much knowledge last week. They stood up eloquently sharing their dreams and goals to be lawyers, business owners, and singers. They were very self-sufficient and responsible all week-long (skills they have to learn at a young age out of necessity). They were full of energy and enthusiasm. Not only did they sing an anthem of home all week literally about how they would make something of themselves, but they became an anthem of hope to me promising to be a ray of light for Mozambique, for Africa, for this world.