It was the barren dirt yards dotted with small patches of flowers that brought Dorothy Graham back to the Delta of her youth. Mozambique is more than 9,000 miles away from her childhood home in Marvell, Arkansas, yet the living conditions brought back a flood of memories and established for her an instant connection with the people and the land.
“They use hoes to cut their grass, so their yards are nothing but dirt because they cut all the grass out plus the children playing in it,” she said. “And I can remember growing up, that’s the way my mother did our yard.” Dorothy Graham, the planned charitable giving officer for the nonprofit organization Heifer Foundation, had traveled to Mozambique in October of 2008 to take part in a study tour of the projects of Heifer International, an organization dedicated to ending hunger and poverty through education and livestock.
Finding home an ocean away
“I was thinking about my childhood a lot when I was traveling in Africa because I’m from the Delta,” she said. “Anyone familiar with the Delta knows that it is poor. Growing up, I realized I was poor, but it wasn’t until after I graduated and moved to Little Rock that I realized how poor I actually was.”
Dorothy was quick to point out that while she was considered poor growing up, it was still nothing like the challenges and conditions faced by many of the people she visited on her journey. “Poverty is different here in the United States than it is in the third world countries,” she said. “Even with the poorest people here, it’s just not the same. They have nothing. We at least have the government to assist us. They don’t have that because their governments are so poor.”
Her own personal heritage also made the trip more poignant. “Being an African-American, I have always dreamed of going to Africa,” Dorothy said. “When I first started working [at the Foundation] and realized I had the opportunity to go to different countries around the world, I made up my mind then ‘I want to go to Africa.’ I can’t even describe what it meant to me.”
Witnessing the triumphs and struggles
The first project group Dorothy and her fellow study tour members visited had been involved with Heifer the longest. “You could really tell a difference between them and the other groups that were just starting out, but yet what impressed me about that first group is that, yeah they knew they were doing better, but they still wanted to do more. They talked about how they have the animals and are able to farm their land and can put tin roofs over the top of their houses, but now they realized they needed an education.”
The people were very eager to share with Dorothy and other members of the group exactly how their lives had changed. “In the first village we visited with a man who was so happy he could put a tin roof over his house because of the goats,” she said. “This one lady was able to build a house big enough to store extra grains of rice. You could tell they were a proud people. “
Some of the newer projects were still experiencing the challenges and obstacles that come with teaching and training people in new techniques in livestock and agriculture. “When we went to the fish farm they seemed a little disheartened that they had tried this before and the first time it had completely failed,” she said. “So this was their second attempt. It’s a slow process, but you can tell they wanted it to happen overnight. “
All of the trials and tribulations were showing so much on their faces, Dorothy said.
That particular group needed some words of encouragement, and Dorothy was the one elected to give them a speech. “It gave me the opportunity to tell them right then, ‘don’t be discouraged, you are doing good. You started with three families receiving three goats and as they grow you pass those on to other families, so you will eventually get to where you want the outcome to be.’”
Dorothy was also impressed with how Heifer Mozambique stressed the importance of getting people to think differently about their land, resources and potential.
“Many people still use slash and burn techniques to clear land,” she said.
“They have the resources that they need, they just don’t know how to implement them. They have the land, but don’t know how to cultivate it to grow the things that they need.”
The people spoke primarily Portuguese and native dialects, but the nonverbal communication made an impression on Dorothy. “I couldn’t speak the language so the smiles and handshakes was how we interacted,” she said. “They were very generous. This one village expected us to stay all day, but we were only going to be there a couple of hours because we were going to visit another village. But they gave us what they had – two chickens, a bushel of beans, a big bunch of bananas, and I don’t know how many sugar canes they gave us. I just thought, ‘wow, you may go to bed tonight without eating any dinner, but you are giving us this.’” When asked how this made her feel, Dorothy replied with only one word: “Humbled.”
Working with a purpose
Dorothy said she feels blessed to work at Heifer Foundation because it gives her more of an opportunity to help people that she felt a kinship with in Mozambique. “It’s a cliché to say it’s a blessing to be a blessing, but it really is and I enjoy being able to help someone every day,” she said. “This is more than a job to me. It’s a job with a purpose, with a meaning. I am doing something to make a difference. Now I can share my experiences through my eyes. I love it.”
Shortly after arriving back in Little Rock, Arkansas, Dorothy closed on the purchase of her first home. She knew immediately what her friends and family could get for her house warming. “I don’t want any gifts,” she said. “Anybody that wants to give me something I am going to ask them to put it in my Micro-Endowment through the Hope Equity initiative here at Heifer Foundation. It’s set up for the Delta, AIDS/HIV and Mozambique. That money will go to help the people in Mozambique whom I saw that really need it. They do need our help and we can make a difference.”
-Jeremy Glover
