Growing The Girls Who Will Lead Our World

 I have taken a little bit of a turn since leaving my previous community. Instead of sitting and observing injustices, trying to understand them before finding a culturally appropriate way of addressing them, I am just speaking up right when I see things. A few weeks ago I had a talk with the head teacher regarding the way he was treating the orphans at school. This was not our first conversation along these lines, and Charmain has had these talks with him, and so have other volunteers who have been through here. Anyway, he lost it, started shaking and screaming, and long story short, when I was not intimidated and kept my calm demeanor, insisting that the orphans be treated the same as the other children, I got kicked out of the school, and all of my programs and classes were canceled. I'll be honest, I still taught the lessons I had planned for the next week, but after that I made myself scarce.

However, I was not about to allow this to hinder GLOW Club. That is one thing, if nothing else, that I refuse to give up. GLOW is an acronym standing for Girls Leading Our World.  It is a girls’ empowerment club that Peace Corps is pushing worldwide to try and give girls in developing nations a voice through confidence building, education, and growing healthy support groups for girls. When the head teacher deemed it canceled, I moved it out of the school to one of the empty soon-to-be-trade-school buildings just outside the school gates. GLOW was successfully running out of the empty building for three weeks when the head teacher caught wind of it. He then made an announcement to the entire school that I am a bad person, that I do not belong in Swaziland, that I need to go back to America and teach the kids in my own country. He issued a threat to the girls at the school saying that if they go to GLOW Club, they will never be allowed in the school ever again. He told them I have no right telling them what to do. The children must answer to him. He is the boss of them, and they will do as he says. If I want the girls to be in my club, then I need to go to every single girl’s home and ask their parents’ permission. Naturally, this was not going to slow me down. On Wednesday, I posted my “GLOW Club Today!” poster on the building as usual and stood outside with a smile, greeting everyone that came by. Luckily, I had a group of missionary girls with me (here to volunteer for the month) who gave me confidence in my actions (I didn’t really tell them the whole background, so they weren’t quite up to speed on what was going on. I just felt better with numbers). The head teacher came out and stood by the school gate. He sent all of the male teachers to fan out in front of the school - creating a barrier between me and the students. They pretended to browse the “tuck shop” (there are three women who sit in the dirt and sell candy, chips, and fat -cakes), keeping an eye on me. I wanted to collect names and information so  I could visit girls' homesteads. The girls I approached turned away and cautiously whispered their names to me behind their backs before running away. I only got names and parents’ of a few girls who had been coming to GLOW, but a small group of girls stood around the door of the building chatting. One girl in grade 5, Gift, was standing in the doorway. She smiled at me when I went over to talk. Then, she took a step back, into the building. “Head Teacher’s gonna kick me out of school,” she said raising her arms with a  grin, “but I don’t care. I wanna be in GLOW Club!” 

I was beaming I was so proud. “He can’t kick you out of school.” 

“He will. He said he will.” 

“And what do you think Charmain will say when she hears that? You think she’s going to let that happen?” (Charmain is the head of the orphanage where I live and work. She built the school.) 

Gift backed into the middle of the room and began to twirl. “I’m in GLOW Club!”

I came in after her and we started laughing and dancing. When I turned around, I saw Nothando had come it too and was joining our circle.

“Head Teacher will kick me out too!” She giggled and began playing. The missionary girls came in and started playing and dancing as well. Soon Lindokuhle was in the room, nervously playing along and Takhona was in the doorway.

“Come on in Takhona!” I hopped along to our singing.

“I am scared of Head Teacher.”

“Scared of what?” I said.

“Yeah,” Gift chimed in, “he can’t do anything! It’s Charmain’s school! He can’t kick us out!” 

Takhona cautiously entered as we circled up to read the Glow Club Pledge at the top of our lungs... just to make sure everyone heard. We spent an hour playing hand games and rhyming games and whatever else we could think of. The Head Teacher finally left the gate and went back to school, and by the time we were through, there was no one around.

I was so proud of those girls. SO proud of them. What they did was exactly what GLOW is all about. Those four Swazi primary school girls stood up for what they believed in. They stood up to the man that has been bullying them around, and let him know that they are Girls who will Lead Our World!

*side note: Attendance has grown since then. These girls will not be stopped!


Speaking of GLOW!
If this story caught your attention, please click this link! We are getting ready for our GLOW camp next April, and as the GLOW liaison, I need your support!!!  Swazi GLOW Camp 2014