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Makeshift work: Cemetery
inhabitants step in for gravediggers
Photo: Peter Lemieux |
Jima, Ethiopia: Sister Tsigue Petros pulled the jeep to a stop
behind Maryam Church at the entry to the cemetery, referred to
derisively by the locals of this coffee-growing outpost as "Maryam
Village." No gate adorned the graveyard's entrance; no sign
marked the way. Only a well-trodden path offered evidence of the
living on this sacred land otherwise reserved for the dead. Indeed,
for the past twenty years, fifty-eight families had isolated themselves
in Maryam Village rather than face the stigma of their disease,
leprosy or Hansen's Disease, out in society.
Agitated vultures squawked from their perch in a skeleton-like
tree above the graveyard, seemingly daring us to approach. They,
like the feral dogs that snarled in the bushes along the trail,
were on heightened alert. On this hallowed land where nothing about
life comes easy, survival always comes first. Vultures, dogs, snakes,
humans--all the graveyard's dwellers scavenged on equal terms for
food, shelter, and territory. If any enjoyed the upper hand, it
wasn't the humans.
For each of the 400 residents of Maryam Village, home was a leaky
hut constructed from scrap metal, rags, cardboard, bamboo, and
burlap. This patchwork of debris mish-mashed together with rope
did little to deter animals or disease-carrying insects from calling
it home, too. Unless, that is, the open, cracked tombs next door
appealed to them more. Even the church's gravediggers, who often
forced the dismantling of these huts to dig and bury the newly
deceased, were the enemy.
"We are living on top of the dead bodies," Califa Badedu,
a village elder of Maryam Village, told me--"above the dead
and below the living. Half in the grave, half out." Sister
Ayelech Gebeyehu--like Sister Tsigue, a nun in the Catholic order
of the Daughters of Charity, and intimately aware of the situation--explained
it more directly. "They are not even better than the dead
who are under the ground."
This was not the first time I had witnessed victims of leprosy
living in difficult conditions, and it likely won't be my last.
Five years earlier, in 1998, I encountered my first "leper
colony" while on assignment for a relief organization in Southeast
Asia. I was instantly struck by their plight--the physical disfigurement,
stigma, abandonment, loss of identity, and poverty. But I found
myself equally inspired by their ability to endure and find purpose
in a life so cursed with bad luck. Where did they find the courage
to go on? I wondered.
More questions followed.
More than 10-million people in the world had suffered from leprosy
in the past two decades, but where were they hiding? What, if anything,
had changed in the past 2,000 years for these people who had been
branded, since Biblical times, the most untouchable of the untouchables?
Was there truth to the dark mythology surrounding their disease?
And most important, were there lessons we should learn from their
treatment and perseverance? Five years later, when
I made the transition professionally from relief work to photojournalism,
humanizing the face of leprosy became my first long-term documentary
project.
Since then, I have visited colonies in Vietnam, Thailand, Cuba,
and India, which is home to nearly two-thirds of the world's leprosy-afflicted
people, and debunked for myself a few myths along the way. Leprosy
is not highly contagious, like tuberculosis. Disfigurement can
be prevented if the disease is diagnosed early. And it can be cured
with medicine. Yet while progress has been made, the stigma surrounding
leprosy in many societies can still be as fierce as ever, which
brings me back to Ethiopia.
In November of 2002, Seton Institute, a California-based aid organization,
sent me to Ethiopia to document the health programs of the Daughters
of Charity. Seton wanted to communicate to its donors the current
living conditions of the poor in this stricken nation and show
how the sisters were making a positive impact. AIDS, refugee camps,
and malnutrition I expected, but not a two-day visit to a graveyard
in some southwest Ethiopia backwater.
That said, it came as little surprise that the people of Maryam
Village greeted my arrival with trepidation. Sister Tsigue had
warned me. Outsiders making lofty promises had passed through these
parts before, and it was starkly obvious from first sight that
Maryam Village had not benefited one bit from the trouble.
This reality made Sister Tsigue's job considerably tougher, as
she, too, had hopes of bringing dignity and a better quality of
life to this community. She, and her predecessor, Sister Ayelech,
had worked hard to gain Maryam Village's trust, and finally they
were getting traction.
After more than 250 visits to the local municipality, the sisters
had secured a plot of land on the outskirts of town. International
donors at their request sponsored the construction of new adobe
homes for sixty-four families. If all went according to plan, the
residents of Maryam Village would soon leave their old haunts behind
for good.
What is more, the sisters offered hope far beyond the tangibles
of new land and new homes. Having successfully rehabilitated another
local leprosy village called Ginjo, the sisters had a working model
to follow for weaving Maryam Village back into the fabric of society.
At last check, their plan is on target. Electricity and a water-delivery
system have been installed. Income-generating programs for women
have commenced and a health clinic is operating once a week. The
children, once shunned from public education, are attending school
in nearby Ginjo, until their own kindergarten can be constructed
next year after the rainy season. The leadership council elected
by Maryam Village even voted to change its name. Now, at the entrance
to their new community for all the world to see, a welcome sign
proudly proclaims: Tulema Leprosy Village.
Lemieux '93, who earned an M.B.A. in 2001 at the University of
California, Berkeley, is based in San Francisco.
http://peterlemieux.com
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