Two weeks ago we officially began our educational outreach workshop sessions with women in Pulang Lupa. Because of the large number of women in the community (there are about 60 households and 60 women and girls of reproductive age) we decided to schedule two sessions per week at different times on different days to try to accommodate as many differing schedules as possible. We settled on one session on Wednesdays at 4 pm, and a second session on Fridays at 1 pm.

We told most of the women about our sessions and urged them to come. We had also distributed flyers and even sent text messages to the women with phones. Many had said they would come, but a lot of ladies were noncommittal about whether they would attend. We had to guess how many people would show up on day one and we didn’t want to run out of our snacks so we decided to plan on a maximum of 50 attendees.

I was a nervous wreck on that first Wednesday. I really had no idea what to expect. Lyn Lyn and I had prepared an introductory session explaining in greater detail what Roots of Health is all about, and we had a general brief intro to women’s health. We had practiced our lesson several times and had some games and activities planned. We had the food and drinks for our merienda (snack) ready. We had permission to use the local church building. We had prepped everything we could and I had double-checked everything at least twice. I told myself again and again that I was ready for this and after we’d packed up the car, Lyn Lyn and I headed off to Pulang Lupa.

As the community came into view and I started to make the last turn off before the church, I was alarmed to see two of the young women we’d gotten to know, blocking the road and motioning for us to stop. There had been a mix-up with the pastor who oversees the church and we couldn’t use the church for our programming. I tried not to panic and was trying to envision us holding the sessions under a tree somewhere when one of the women said that she had already asked a neighbor for permission for us to use the private community center he was in the process of building. The center at this point is really just a shelter – there is a roof to shield from sun and rain, but there aren’t any walls or floors. So we wouldn’t have the privacy or the space I had been counting on, but we would have chairs for people to sit on (courtesy of the pastor), and a roof over our heads. Crisis averted.

We parked and started carrying chairs from the church to the shelter. By the time we had set up the chairs, we only had about 10 minutes until our scheduled start time, and we only had two women at the session, and about 15 curious little kids. So, we did a quick round up and urged the women we saw on the road and in their homes to come to our session. We returned to the shelter and finally began about half an hour late. We had 11 women under the shelter with us and about 50 children playing in and just outside of the shelter as we struggled to make ourselves heard and engage our participants. We did the best that we could under the circumstances. We had to cut out our activities because of our late start, and because we didn’t have any tables or a floor to work on, or any walls to hang up our props. After we had presented our program, we served our merienda. Because we had prepared for 50 participants, there was more than enough food for all the women plus all the children hanging about. We packed up and drove home exhausted.

Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed with how the first session went. The sessions I had imagined in my mind in no way resembled the chaotic reality of that first foray. I was bummed not only by the lack of privacy and the distraction of all the kids, but also by the low number of attendees. I really should have known better. Some of the women at Pulang Lupa have errands to run or work to do outside of the community, some of them have sick or small children to care for, some probably aren’t quite sure if they can trust us or want to get to know us, and some just aren’t interested. It was foolish of me to think that they’d all drop everything to come and hang out with us. With this new understanding and feeling much humbled, Lyn Lyn and I spent Thursday tweaking our lesson plans and preparing for a second session.

Thankfully, the second session went much more smoothly. 10 new women attended, and there were only about 20 younger children hanging around this time because school hadn’t let out yet. We had changed up our plans to reflect our surroundings (or lack thereof) and the lesson went really well. Some of the ladies who had attended the session before stopped by again to say hello. I came away from the second session feeling much more positive and upbeat about our workshops. Despite my earlier assumption that everyone would come, I have realized that 21 attendees out of 60 households is really not bad at all. One third of our target community came out and I continue to hope that more women will come as time goes by.

We found that the women who did attend were all very engaged and interested in the information we were presenting and they were animated and asked questions and shared their views and experiences. The women and girls range in age from 17 to 56. All of them have at least one child. Three of the women have seven children. Four of the women are currently pregnant and we plan to provide special outreach to them to help them have the healthiest pregnancy possible.

We noticed that the younger women and girls were especially engaged and excited and we think that they may be enjoying our sessions more so because they would probably still be in school if their circumstances allowed. They asked a lot of questions and some even took notes and gave us lists of topics relating to their health and their families that they’d like us to discuss. So that has been encouraging.

In reflecting on the sessions, we decided that not interacting with all the kids hanging around would be a missed opportunity. So we are creating lesson plans for the children and we asked Jane, a teacher who worked with us during our needs assessment phase and during our nutrition programming, if she would be willing to work with the kids while we are working with the women. Thankfully she agreed. Jane started coming with us to the sessions this past week, and we have seen a world of difference already. Jane entertains the kids and plays with them and will eventually have some simple lessons covering basic issues such as good hygiene, manners and values formation and hopefully even basic reading and math. We saw a huge difference in our interactions with the women during our second week of sessions when their children were being cared for by someone else, and we now have the added bonus of having an opportunity to connect more with the kids and teach them some valuable lessons. Attendance during our second week of sessions differed, as some of the women who had attended in the first week didn’t make it, but some new participants came so we still had about a third of our target group.

Despite months spent planning for our sessions, in these first two weeks we’ve had to improvise and tweak and figure out new approaches more than we had anticipated. But we’re flexible, and we’re learning. And I am hopeful that as the weeks pass that our programming will continue to improve. We still have much to learn but we are excited and ready for the challenges ahead!