“A
heart that melts” Foundation together with Unicoop, Florence worked on a project
with two Italian high schools. The positive impact of their encounter with
their African peers.
Twelve
students (representatives of two Italian high schools) left for Africa
accompanied by 3 teachers, 2 animators, two Unicoop shareholders, a
representative of the Focolare Movement and a cameraman.
Their goal: to spend a
week of sharing with the African youth of their age-group, from 16th
to 24th January.
The venue chosen: Fontem, in the
Northwest, English-speaking Cameroun. Today, Fontem has a population of 40
thousand inhabitants. The Focolare Movement is present since the 1960s. But let
us interview Stefano, one of the youth, to share his experience which was
published in their school bulletin:
“…It
was a trip to discover a different reality, at times difficult to digest,
because of the poverty that we encountered, but it was a school of life, for
all the things that we were able to learn… We discovered a different culture
that thinks differently… We started off with the idea of going there to give
medicines, pens, papers, notebooks, to share about ourselves, about Europe, only
to discover instead that … there are still people who would sell even what
little they had just to make you feel at home;
people who have never seen you and yet welcome you like kings; they are
not racists as many of us are; that in a few days they have grown fond of you
in a way that you would never know how to repeat with with someone else.
The
meeting with the young people of Our Lady, Seat of Wisdom College had a great
impact on us: we were welcomed with songs and dances, and to our great surprise
they also embraced us. After a few moments of disorientation we were brought to
a different dimension, we were no longer afraid to interact with them in their
way, which had already become ours. They melted our hearts with their dances
and songs we danced with them, laughed and built such a strong bond that was
almost too hard to believe. This way of interacting also brought about a
beautiful chemistry even among us Italians. Aside from the joyful moments, we
also had to bear with situations that were difficult to accept, such as the
widespread poverty in Besali village. Even along the roadside, we saw many
under-nourished children with bloated stomachs, and other people who were
living in extreme poverty… But even there the people welcomed us with great warmth.
The schools in Besalì, built and supported by Unicoop, Florence, are a very far
cry from Italian school buildings …
Great
people helped us understand what we were going through, starting with Dr. Tim,
an Italian focolarino who has been living in Fontem for the last 27 years. He
is a very important person for the whole community. We were impressed by the
greatness of heart of Pia, a focolarina volunteer worker who has been living in
Fontem for the last 47 years. She has become an icon of the Focolare community
and she is capable of transmitting incredible energy.
As the days passed a very strong bond was
created among all. On the last day, we were under some kind of enchantment. We
had already been told: “You will cry and they will cry”. In our hearts, we were
sure that this will not happen, and instead it really happened. After
exchanging gifts, we were really moved: everyone embracing, silent, in the
total darkness along the road that lined the forest; a deafening silence
punctuated only by the sound of muffled sobs, of the efforts of trying to hold
back that incredible surge of emotions. Still not fully aware of what we had
experienced, we are grateful for those who had made this experience possible: a
trip that someone described as “A once in a lifetime trip”.”
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