Sunday, March 1st, 2009...2:57 pm

An afternoon with Zhie

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Sure, Jack Bauer sniffs out ter­ror­ist sleeper cells to save the world in 24 hours, but did you know…

Zhie heads a wom­ens’ empow­er­ment project in Maun.
Zhie har­vests maize and peanuts and guavas in her back­yard.
Zhie has pro­vided fos­ter care for a local child.
Zhie sin­gle­hand­edly raises at least three kids at home, at least one of whom is an adopted rel­a­tive.
Zhie is a com­mu­nity orga­nizer, vis­it­ing folks, mak­ing con­nec­tions, inform­ing them of local events.
Zhie is the cool mom all the kids wish they had.
Zhie has the coolest back­yard in the neigh­bor­hood.
Zhie goes four-wheeling to get to houses out in the remote bor­oughs.
Zhie does most of the con­struc­tion in her home by her­self.
Zhie knows every­body in Maun (or at least seems to).
Zhie dreams of start­ing a busi­ness of her own.
Zhie is a social worker, get­ting fam­i­lies the food they need, doing coun­sel­ing and advis­ing with folks in the com­mu­nity that need it.
Zhie prob­a­bly needs a vacation.

Need­less to say, Zhie’s pretty cool. We got to hang out with her all of today after church. First we made some sand­wiches for lunch. Then we got to work, fix­ing up her dresser drawer that was com­ing out. Sarah and I put together a heroic effort to get every­thing together before storm clouds began rolling in.

Here, Mike and me show em what it took to fix up that dresser.

Here, Mike and me show ‘em what it took to fix up that dresser.

Not long after that, we walked over to a local back­pack­ers’ camp, where we shared some sodas.

On the road.

Zhie and Sarah on the road.

Finally, we enjoyed a tra­di­tional meal under the clouds and stars. We had a blast laugh­ing, swap­ping sto­ries, talk­ing pol­i­tics, and watch­ing light­ning elec­trify the whole sky.

  • Dave Liu

    Looks like you are about to smack that kid!! :-O

    Just kid­ding, it’s a cute pic­ture if I may say so.

    Awe­some to see this :-)