LA ÑAPA
In Dominican Spanish la ñapa refers to "the little extra" added on at the end. Just when you thought you'd gotten all that you would get, along comes your ñapa, like a baker's dozen, with one more kiss, one more pastelito, one more mango at the mercado.
CROP Walk: October 4, 2009
On Sunday, October 4th, I'll be leading the CROP Walk in my home town of Middlebury, Vermont. If you think CROP Walk is a harvest festival, then you're in good company. That's what I used to think, too. And actually it is a harvest festival in which we walk in solidarity with those who are not getting any part of the harvest of the world's goods.
Speaking: 12:45 pm
Walking: 1 pm
Middlebury Town Green
CROP stands for Communities Responding to Overcome Poverty. CROP walkers raise money for those in need around the world and in our own backyard. In fact 25% of all money raised by CROP participants stays in our local communities to help with needs there.
Why walk? We walk because they walk. They are all those who labor, walking every day, to try to keep their families from starving.
For the first time ever there will be a solidarity walk in the Dominican Republic, organized by Ria Shroff, our volunteer along with Eli Berman at Alta Gracia this year. Check out their blogs:
Ria's riashroff.wordpress.com
Eli's eliinfairfield.blogspot.com.
I urge you to visit the CROP website: churchworldservice.org and consider joining a walk in your own community this Sunday, October 4th. Or, if you'd like, you can make a donation to my county's walk. And if you are reading this note after Sunday, October 4th, remember, you can still go online and pledge your support for CROP.
I confess this is my first CROP walk. For years, I thought CROP walk was a kind of goodwill harvest festival, like Addison County Field Days, but with a dash of religion and exercise thrown in: people walking in support of, well, crops.
CROP actually stands for Communities Responding to Overcome Poverty. And at the essence of CROP walks is a word that Desmond Tutu brought to the attention of a conference on world hunger a few years ago. He spoke about an important concept in African cultures called UBUNTU. He said it was difficult to define UBUNTU, but basically it meant the essence of being human, forgiveness, compassion, taking care of each other, not just to be altruistic but because it really is the best form of self interest. Preserving the human family. Taking care of each other. He went on to explain that literally the word UBUNTU translates as, I am because you are.
Communities Responding to Overcome Poverty, CROP walks, have at their essence this idea of UBUNTU, I am because you are. As the CROP walk website describes it: "We are walking because they walk." We are walking, sure to raise money for people in need around the world and in our own communities. But we could just raise the money, leave it at that. But CROP walk is more than a fundraiser. Throughout the United States today people are walking in solidarity with women and children and men around the world who walk every day in their struggle for existence. Children and men and women, carrying firewood, babies, crops, looking for food, shelter, looking for help when disaster strikes or someone in their family gets ill. One of my favorite Christian liturgies takes place on Good Friday: the Stations of the Cross. The congregation walks through all the moments of Christ's last suffering and crucifixion. And at the end of each moment of meditation we recite: "Walk with me, as I walk with you, and never leave my side."
We walk because they walk. I am because you are.
In Go And Come Back, a novel for young readers by Joan Abelove, the narrator is a young girl of the Isabo tribe in the Peruvian jungle. Her village is visited by two nawa, white women, who are anthropologists and have come to study the Isabo people for the year. On the day they arrive, the whole village turns out to help the two women unload their supplies, which are packed in clear, see-through bins, so the villagers can see all kinds of goodies, more food than they have ever seen collected all together. After they are done unloading the supplies, the villagers wait around for the party to start. But, they are surprised to learn, there isn't going to be any party. The two women explain they are saving this food so that it lasts them till the next shipment. The villagers are mystified. As the young girl says: They were saving it! What was the matter with them? When you have liquor, you drink it. When you have food you eat it. It's only natural When you have food, you make sure to be generous and give some to all your relatives and friends, so when they have some, they will share it with you. That is how you save food.
Out of the mouths of babes and the under-developed, the poor, the ones who have never seen so much food gathered in one place. For whom it's only natural to save food by sharing it! I am because you are. We walk because they walk. This is how we save ourselves, by saving each other.
I often feel at events like this that I'm shirking my responsibilities unless I quote the facts and figures, the solid reasons why we should be walking, not just today, but every day: the fact that out of the 2.2 billion children in the world, 1.1 billion live in poverty -- that's one out of very two children. The fact that 25,000 children under the age of five die each day due to poverty; that's one child dying every 3.5 seconds. How many have already died since I started speaking? That's over nine million children dying every year. And we're just talking children under five. If we up the age a few more years, say eight, nine years old, we'd have the equivalent of the population of Addison County dying every day. And here's another fact that should have us walking to the halls of power, talking to our legislators: for every $1 in aid a developing country receives, over $25 is spent on debt repayment.
I don't know about you -- but these facts and figures become so overwhelming to me that I feel defeated before I even start, thinking how can I make any difference?
And maybe because I'm a storyteller, I often turn to stories or poems to remind me and compel me to keep walking, to keep trying to make a small difference. There's a story the Peace Corps tell volunteers during orientation before they go off to their placement for two years. Knowing that these volunteers will often feel numbed and overwhelmed by the seemingly insurmountable problems they will encounter every day. It's called the Starfish Story and it goes like this: After a storm, thousands of starfish wash ashore. A little girl begins throwing them in the water so they won't die. "Don't bother, dear," her mother says, "It won't make a difference." The girl stops for a moment and looks at the starfish in her hand.
It will make a difference to this one.
I want to finish by telling you the story I tell myself from time to time, a story that reminds me of how generosity of spirit can transform the kind of world we live in.
Some followers go to their rabbi.
"Rabbi," they ask, "what is heaven like?"
"In heaven," answers the rabbi, "they sit at a table with all sorts of delicacies and good things. The only problem is their arms do not bend."
"And what is hell like?"
"In hell they sit at a table with all sorts of delicacies and good things. The only problem is their arms do not bend."
"Then, Rabbi, what is the difference between heaven and hell?"
"Ah, my children," said the rabbi, "in Heaven they feed each other."
This story reminds me of why we are walking today. Participating in creating a different kind of world, a world where we feed each other. It will make a difference to one or two or maybe more. I am because you are. We save ourselves by saving each one another. We are walking because they walk.
So, let's get started!
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