‘Where I am today is far from where I will be in future.’
 Melody's family Every child has dreams and it is their wish that their dreams come true. However sometimes the circumstances they find
themselves in tend to make the achievement of these dreams farfetched.
Melody Mungole is one such child at 13 years, who lives in Ngwenya, a large township in Livingstone and she was orphaned while still quite young she is being taken care of by her aunty who is also a widow.
Apart from Melody in this household there are five other children living here; luckily for them Melody’s grandfather owned a plot before passing on and this is where Melody’s family managed to build 3 rooms. One of the 3 rooms is where Melody’s family stays and the other 2 rooms are rented out to meet daily needs.
Generally, it is tough just to survive in Ngwenya,as there is an absence of the basic amenities like piped water, decent housing to mention but a few.
 Bathroom at Melody's house
Despite all this, Melody s aunty has not relented, she works hard to ensure that the children she is taking care of have a meal by being involved in a stone crashing business which is a common business venture for most households in Ngwenya.
From her stone crashing business Melody s aunty makes about K10, 000 i.e. ($2) profit which she supplements with the money received from the rented rooms.
Education wise, Melody’s situation looked hopeless but not for long as help was on the way.
She got sponsorship from Academic work at Ngwenya basic through Response Network. She is now in grade 8 and her dreams of becoming someone in future have been restored. What is left is for Melody to do her part and drive herself to her destiny the rest is history.
 Response Network team at Melody's house
“Each time we act to improve the life of another person… we send forth a ripple of
hope in that appears to be a hopeless society.”
 Twambo Chingobe
Twambo Chingobe is a 15 year old girl from Ngwenya compound in Livingstone. Twambo was
a twin at birth unfortunately she lost her twin sister. Later in life Twambo
lost her father, this loss was an uphill battle as the relatives to her father
were not anything to fall back on; properties were grabbed from Twambo and her
mother. This made Twambo and her mother seek alternatives to survive, they
moved to their village in Kalomo.
However, Twambo’s mother died in the village this made her future even bleaker. Her aunt
came to her rescue by bringing her back to Livingstone to continue with her
school.
Her aunty is married to a bricklayer who is not in full time employment. Twambo’s aunty has no stable job too. She moves around in low density areas to do piece meal jobs of laundering people’s clothes, cleaning yards to make a bit of money.
Twambo and her new family have no housing of their own. The house they live in is for someone who is not even their relation but needed somebody to take care of his property so in the mean time asked them to live at this particular house as care takers. Besides Twambo there are seven other people residing here. These all have to share the only 1 room which is complete.
 Twambo's house
Having caring neighbours; the boys from Twambo’s household have been offered space to spend nights to allow for space in the 1 room Twambo shares with her aunt, uncle and the other girls in the family. Twambo is asthmatic and sometimes faces challenges with
her health especially in the cold season when she experiences frequent asthmatic attacks which to some extent affect her performance at school.
Despite this hectic side of her life Twambo in a very hardworking and bubbly child both at home and at school. Today Twambo attends school at Ngwenya Community School
through the sponsorship she gets from Academic Work of Sweden. She is in her 8th grade. Twambo’s limit is the sky, with hard work as her strength Twambo is determined to soar higher.
Sibyl Chavis wrote:
You can spend minutes, hours, days, weeks or even months overanalyzing a
situation, trying to put the pieces together, justifying what could’ve,
would’ve, should’ve happened … Or, you can stop wasting your time, take
advantage of your best option today … And just move on, appreciating the moment
you have right now and living in the best way possible.
 Ngwenya community school Ngwenya compound is about 8 kilometres on the southern side of Livingstone town. In this compound lies a school called Ngwenya Community School. And at this school Academic Work through Response Network supports 55 orphans and vulnerable children with education materials.
Today, the 4th day of April 2012 Elizabeth and I (Frayor) decided to visit 5 of the 55 families. Our trip started with a courtesy call on the Headmaster Mr Lusaka whom we found in the company of the guidance teacher Mrs Zimba.
 Guidance teacher Mrs Zimba and the Headmaster Mr Lusaka We received a very warm welcome and immediately we were shown the 20 children who were all anxiously waiting to take us to their respective homes! We explained that we would not be able to visit all the 20 homes due to insufficient time. So we settled on visiting 5 girls only. We could see the disappointment on the girls’ faces upon hearing this announcement. However, we assured them that we would still return to complete our visit at another time.
 Entry into Ngwenya compound on foot! Frayor and Mrs Zimba with the girls. Now come with us as we start our trip into the depth of Ngwenya compound!
Our first stop is at Anastasia Mubukwanu’s house. Here is her story as told by her mother!
“My name is Rosemary Muchimba Mubukwani. I am 65 years old. I am a married woman though I have not been staying with my husband for the past 10 years reason being that he is staying in the village with his relatives. This was after he fell sick. He is mentally ill. At one time he was admitted to an institution in Lusaka for the mentally ill people. But it didn’t help until they just decided to take him to the village where he has been for the past 10 years. I had 10 children with him. 4 have since died.
 15 year old Anastasia This girl you are supporting is my last child – i.e. 10th born! 2 of her old siblings are married within this compound. So here I am keeping four of them in these two rooms. It has been hard to keep the family because I do not have a job. I earn a living by going around in people’s houses in the suburbs to look for piece works like washing clothes, cleaning the yard, working in gardens, etc. On a good day, I come home with K40,000 ($8) which I use to buy requirements for the home like mealie mealie, sugar, soap, etc. You can see that this money is not enough to send a child to school. So when I heard that my child was one of those selected to be helped by Response Network, I was very happy and gave glory and honour to God! You are doing a commendable job.
 Main house  Brothers' bedroom There are a lot of people in this compound who have problems. So if you educate our children, then problems will be reduced in the future because we will have an educated group of young people! Please convey my personal gratitude to those people who are sending money for our children. My daughter is very hard working both at home and school. We don’t have electricity but she wakes up at night to read under candle light! My hope and prayer is that she continues studying hard so that her dream of becoming a nurse comes true! ….”
Well, here ends Mrs Mubukwanu’s story!We had to cut her story short as we still needed to visit 4 other homes.
 Interview withAnastasia's mother Our journey continues next week! Hope you will join us as we visit Twaambo Chingobe’s family!
 Toilet and bathroom
 Nothing better than avisible signpost to the brand new school!  Setting up camp for the night!  Very big welcome by the villagers at Namudimba community school! 21st, 22nd and 24th March 2012were special days in the Response Network calendar! Staff from Academic Work in Sweden, led by Katarina Linder, were in Zambia Livingstone to visit some of the many projects they have supported through Response Network. The projects visited were Makumba, Simbayi, and Namudimba community schools, Chinkozya and Siluyasila staff houses. Namudimba community school was handed over on 22nd March 2012.
 - Ready to cut the ribbon!
It was a colourful occasion at which the District Administration Officer (DAO) for Kazungula District, Mr Siachinji Muleya was Guest of Honour. He was representing the District Commissioner Mrs Pascalina Musokotwane who had been unable to attend due to other national commitments.
 - Katarina opening the new classroom
The handover of the classroom was done by the DAO together with Katarina from Academic work.
 the girls listening attentively! Saturday, 24th March 2012 was another special day for the girls under the school sponsorship program. 300 out of the 925 girls supported by Academic Work converged at Response Network offices to meet their sponsors! It was a memorable day in the lives of the girls! They had moments of interactions with the visitors whom they called “muzungu”, a Zambian word for “white” person.
 Girls showing off their new uniforms! It was gratifying to see them clapping each time they heard a familiar name from the introductions; names like Jessica, Sammy, Anna, Gina (which they mistook for Yna – from a filipino soap opera widely watched in Zambia!) The
 Introductions and words of encouragement by Academic Work staff A.W staff encouraged the children to work extra hard at school as this would make them prosper in life.
 Academic Work staff help the girls put on their new uniforms  Girls receiving the sweets! The meeting with the girls ended with the distribution of school uniforms. The girls were also happy to receive sweets – lollipops!
 Frayor going through the Agreement form  Guardians and children listening attentively It looked like an ordinary normal working day, on Tuesday, 21 February 2012 when suddenly around 10 hours a group of about 125 girls with their guardians flocked into Response Network (RN) premises! They were coming from a community school called Nakatindi. The girls’ mission was to collect shoes, school fees, bags and books for first term. While on the other hand, the parents were coming to sign agreement forms binding them to protect the girls from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in their care. (Article 19 of CRC),and also to ensure protection of the child from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development. (Article 32 of CRC). The guardians were grateful at being given education on the rights of children which they didn’t know before then. They promised RN that they were going to safeguard these rights. “I am going to have a peaceful sleep tonight – knowing that my child is going to school tomorrow”, was an expression from one of the guardians of a grade 10 child who had been unable to go to school for one year! It was all smiles on the girls’ faces as they left RN premises around 16:00 hours loaded with all the school requirements! Thanks to Academic Work for the extra support!
 - The ward councilor giving keys to Ministry of Education representative during a handover ceremony held at Siakasipa Community School. The ceremony marked the hand-over of a new classroom to the community donated by Academic Work.
It was all joy in Siakasipa area, as the community rejoiced in singing, dancing and cheering at the handover of Siakasipa community school on 12th October 2011. Ward councillor, chief representative, Ministry of Education representative, Response Network staff, teachers, students and parents were in attendance to celebrate the handover. Academic Work of Sweden supported this community with building materials to construct a classroom and office
My name is Grace Kahima,I was born in 1976. I’m married with four children. I was illiterate until Response Network sensitized my community in 2006. I did not even know how to write my name.
One day, my friends and I took our babies to the clinic for under five and vaccination. My baby was weighed, after the weighing exercise was completed, the Clinical officer asked the women to collect their children’s cards. The women started getting their cards one by one. I watched as they collected until one card remained. I picked the card but since I could not read, I never noticed that the name on the card did not match that of my child. On our way back, a certain woman asked my child’s name, I told her he was Jordan. Then the woman checked on my card, she noticed that i had a wrong card because it was bearing a different name. I had to return to the clinic after walking for 5km. At the clinic, I found that, the card was exchanged with a different woman who was also illiterate. After this experience, I attended Response Network’s sensitization meeting where we were encouraged to start our own education activities through self help. We later formed a literacy class called Siakasasa.
I encouraged all my friends to join literacy classes and I thank Response Network for sensitizing the people in Simwatachela chiefdom. I am now able to read and write.
 Children posing for a photo after receiving shoes donated by Academic Work Academic Work sponsors orphaned girl children to attain primary and secondary school education in Livingstone district in the southern province of Zambia. Recently shoes were distributed to pupils and it was touching to see the impact a pair of shoes make on a child’s life. Elizabeth (Response Network sponsorship coordinator) will never forget that day when she arrived at Bata shop where the children received shoes from. She started giving shoes to each individual child, as they went in she could hear their laughter and excitement as the kids were amazed by their new gifts. As she stood there, she could see the excitement in the children’s face. It was in that moment that she realized that every pair makes a difference.
My name is Mercy Himoonga, I’m 31years old. I live in Siachitema chiefdom. I lost my husband in December 2009. After the death of my husband I had no idea of how to feed my 3 children. I was confused, not knowing what to do; my husband was everything to me. I did not even have relatives to support me. I thought that was the end of my life and my children also. I thought my children would die of hunger. I moved to a village where I attended Response Network village meeting where we were encouraged to start up a Women’s group and skills training. We decided to form a Women’s group and we learnt how to make a variety of clothes. I started sewing clothes and knitting jerseys which I sell to the surrounding villages. This has really helped me and my children. The income that I make now is not enough but helps to keep us going. My children can also go to school because there is a community school nearby and I don’t have to pay much but contribute a bit from what I make to the volunteer teacher teaching at the school.
 Chuma Katungu Chuma Katungu is 9 years old; she lost both her parents when she was 4 years old. Chuma is being kept by her Grandmother who does not work. The grand mother could not send her to school.In 2010 she was listed among the girls to be sponsored by Academic work of Sweden. With the support of Academic Work, Chuma is now in school and she is a very happy child now.
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By Annely C Imasiku, on May 8th, 2012 
