You are the SALT of the earth

This afternoon we visited part of Sarenga known as choto sarenga (little sarenga). This is part of a program called SALT which KSN hospital are trying to develop. Shubhro and Elisabeth have tried to explain to us what this is but Shubhro says that no one really knows. It involves lots of buzz phrases such as "going into the community" and "collaberation of hospital, church and community". The letters stand for various things (all of them pretty vague in meaning). For example S stands for supporting and situation.  Neil and I were very confused. Bobby (an indian- south indians have western names apparently), who works for various charity projects using a technique called Human Capacity for Response (another buzz word), is visiting trying to help get the program going. Again we don't really know what this means but I think it is humans know instinctively when things are not right so you can ask people about concerns that they can identify and work on them.

So with the unknown ahead we jumped in the back of an ambulance with 4 young people from the church and drove for 5 minutes honking at goats to get out of the way. Once out of the car we walked to a courtyard between 3 houses. Each had mud walls and a thatched roof (one also had the addition of a satellite dish!). There we split into 4 groups and went to a few of the surrounding houses and talked to some families about concerns they had about the hospital.  Then we all came back together and discussed it as one big group. Plastic seats were brought out for us to sit on and the community people sat under a veranda. It was a bit slow to start off with but eventually things got underway. It was very interesting and good to see what some of the people thought problems were. Outpatients has a bad reputation.  If you want to see a specific doctor that can be a problem. Also notes get lost. They were insitant that neil and i contributed to the discussion so we said who we were and that it was all very good for us to hear. After this we were brought some tea and biscuits. There is no way to voice a complaint in the hospital so this was a good opportunity for people to get things out in the open. Hopefully it can be taken on board and things will change for the better.

One theme that came out from discussion was that parents consider their own lives to be of poor quality and so do everything they can so their children can live better. It's a nobel thought but it's slightly depressing that peoole have no hope for their own lives and try to live through their children. It makes the church involvement in SALT understandable. Healthcare, sanitation and education may take a generation to change but hearts and lives can change in an instant. These people live and exist in the present but their hope is in the future. We are praying that the church can give them hope in the present for that is where true reality is found.

Jenni and Neil