Service Work South Africa

Speak, Speak Up, Speak Out and Then Do it Again

November 26, 2017 by judithb 1 Comment

I remember it clearly—my surprise and growing sense of horror.

Somehow my mother being unable to speak honestly to her doctor of many years awoke in me a deeper understanding of how I was raised. She wouldn’t speak that day about all the problems and discomforts with her heart, her appetite, her body.

I had accompanied my mother, who was in her 90’s, to the doctor. He had been her doctor for years, knew her well, was a caring and careful man yet that day, when he asked how she was, she smiled with awkward shyness and replied, “Just fine.”

I realized that, I, too, wasn’t raised to speak my truth. Continue Reading

Ready to Laugh!

March 8, 2016 by judithb 6 Comments

Many, many times in the last 14 years I have flown the thirty-some hour passage between Portland, Oregon and the Limpopo province of South Africa and I did it again Tuesday. Always the vast difference between the two worlds startles me as I wander about in a jet-lag haze. Arriving at PDX at noon (10pm in S.A) I clutched onto the illusion that a nutrition filled smoothie would wake my head up.

The bright, spring, well-watered greens of my N.E. Portland neighborhood and the moist air were shocking after being in the late summer world of the drought stricken Lowveld. As I walked towards the entrance of the neighborhood Whole Foods Market I was struck by the orderly visual of neatly stacked pots of small daffodils and bikes, dogs carefully tethered outside the store. Continue Reading

David’s Inspiring Dance

December 13, 2015 by judithb 1 Comment

David Patient inspired me when I first met him fifteen years ago and he inspires me still. He and his partner, Neil Orr, are masters of assessing any situation and finding a way to make it workable which in their world means alive, challenging and fruitful. They know how to dance.

They will never occupy the space of the helpless victim. They will rarely accept stasis. They thrive on new ideas, new approaches, new angles and movement. Over the last twenty years they have worked all over Africa to empower thousands upon thousands, from top executives to rural grannies. Much of their work has been HIV related as David has carried his HIV diagnosis since 1983 when they still called it GRIDS.