On Wednesday July 8th the Swaziland Relief team traveled a second time to the remote village of Zindwendweni in southeastern Swaziland. This time we were expecting a large crowd and planned a full-on distribution of clothing and shoes. Our expectations were not disappointed.
Our morning began a usual with breakfast at the convent. We had to get up early, thought, because we had a lot to do and a long drive again. After breakfast we took the khombis (vans) to the main CMC church in Matsapha to load boxes for the distribution.
The method we use when deciding which boxes to load is orderly but not precise. When we loaded the container back in May we sorted all the clothing donations by gender, adult or child, and size. So when we load up for a distribution in Swaziland, we take a certain number of boxes marked "Men's S-M" or "Girls size 7-16" along with boxes labeled "shoes" or "coats." We bring more women's and children's clothing because they make up the vast majority of the people that come for the distribution.
Once we had our boxes for the day selected and loaded (precariously) on a flatbed truck that was about the size of a Ford F-150, we made the 2 hour drive to Zindwendweni.
Once at the village, we were provided with four rooms of the school to use. One was strictly for shoes, and the other three was for adult men, adult women (with or without small children), and children of either sex. I was assigned to the "men's department." Each department set up the room to facilitate movement through it, opened boxes, and sorted clothes by size and type. For example, in the men's department, we sorted S-M and L-XL separately, and for each size we separated pants from shirts and cool weather shirts from sweaters and sweatshirts. I also set up a station for the suits that we had. The men, especially the older men, love to get suits and sportcoats.
Once we were set up (a process taking about an hour) we started to take people through each of the departments. The school's layout helped us here, because it consists of an open courtyard surrounded by all of the classrooms, with the doors facing in. We were thus able to set up queues (that's "lines" to you Americans) in the courtyard that ended at the doors of the various departments.
The distribution was very orderly, but there are always many people and the numbers swell throughout the day as new people arrive and those who were already served hang around. I took the picture above from the doorway of the shoe department late in the day. It is difficult emotionally to know that no matter how long we stay, we will run out of supplies long before we are able to meet every need. But then, who can supply all of our needs except God alone?
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