Chakama is a village like many in the hinterland of Malindi along the Galana River.
From here, it's just savannah.
Wild animals, herbivore bushes, groups of nomadic shepherds and the large Tsavo East National Park, which has always been an attraction for tourists.
But Chakama, for those who know these areas, is also a symbol, a touchstone.
It is the emblem of a solidarity that no longer has any reason to be and perhaps it was a dramatic and all too much discussed and commented story to clarify once and for all.
I have been writing for years that we no longer help anyone with caresses and candies or by teaching them funny words in our language. Those who have frequented Kenya for so many years have certainly done so, extemporaneously and no one can say that there is anything wrong with it.
As a tourist, especially, it is easy to make it part of the experience of a holiday in Africa: two bags of flour, a box of biscuits, pens and notebooks in exchange for smiles, grateful looks, music and personalized dances. Maybe, think about it, in the village of Watamu's animator or the Rasta boy he met on the beach in Malindi.
Today all this is already a bit more impressive, because there is almost always a nice video to shoot and share on social media and some self-deprecating comments.
Thanks to these unaware and superficial tourists, the boy met on the beach will probably never look for a job, but will continue to wait for Italians with a heart of gold and his children will go to school unwillingly but with Nike's feet, dreaming of making a career as a father.
These are the realities of tourist destinations, but the hinterland is something else.
There the misery is touched with hand, you see it in the so-called clinics where babies and mothers still die from a trivial umbilical cord infection, where young girls prostitute themselves to buy tampons and young people talking to shepherds of Somali origin dream of joining the warriors of Al Shabaab.
Here we need serious, ongoing projects, shared with the good part of the institutions and possibly with international organizations and experts in the field.
The "one-night stand" charity is not only an end in itself but becomes even counterproductive in places like these where all around comes the progress made by motorcycles and smartphones.
The few children who are still helped by former volunteers or heartfelt people who approached this reality some time ago, as well as other neighbors, are pointed out by their companions as being kissed by fate, without understanding by what criteria fate has chosen them instead of others, perhaps even more deserving. The same thing happens between families who cultivate envy, no longer speak to each other and make creak that idea of community that has ancestrally kept up the tribal Mijikenda societies.
Here it is no longer a question of drawing lots and giving the image of the white man as a strange demigod who draws at random and rewards on the basis of a smile or, worse still, friendship with the waiter or the most paraclete tour leader in Malindi.
Here there are new generations to enhance, there is a community to grow that does not need a smiling Padre Pio who arrives, gives and leaves everything as it is because it is always useful to collect donations and maybe build his own cottage in the countryside.
Chakama does not need those who propagate projects that will never be completed due to lack of planning, continuity, and the presence of professionals in the field.
After the kidnapping of Silvia Romano and her liberation, Chakama is back exactly as it was fifteen years ago, when no Italian knew her.
Poor, abandoned and hopeless.
With the difference that here they know the taste of expectations, the scent of promises and believe that that little bit of well-being they could have, should fall from the sky or from an Italian off-road vehicle.
We at Malindikenya.net, with our friends from the Malindi community who followed us, went to talk to them to explain that in order to leave again you have to get busy and not expect caresses and candies, forget that fatalism that made the belly of those who exploited it swollen (maybe even with heart and in good faith) to gratify themselves and demonstrate their spiritual greatness.
In practice, a backwards colonialism.
Per carità, non è per questo che Silvia è stata rapita anche se guardacaso, la solidarietà “che resta”, quella che fa crescere una comunità e porta all’autosostentamento, creando studenti veri, professionalità e modus operandi moderni, spesso non tiene conto di protocolli di sicurezza, regole imprescindibili e nozioni geo-sociali. Ma se davanti alla “casetta dei volontari” senza cancelli e senza askari stazionano oggi gli ex studenti della onlus Africa Milele e ti avvicinano parlando italiano con la verve di Beach Boys chiedendo qualche scellino e quando gli rispondi in kiswahili e parli loro di coinvolgimento di istituzioni, di lavoro, di borse di studio da guadagnarsi ti guardano come fossi un pazzo eccentrico, capisci che non solo in questi campi che sono fertili come la Langobaya dove Karibuni Onlus ha fatto tanto è stato seminato poco, ma soprattutto quel poco è stato seminato male, molto male.
Quando Albert Chome, capo villaggio e leader del consiglio degli Anziani di Chakama mi ha chiamato per dirmi che i capi famiglia di Chakama erano alla fame, ho pensato che raccogliendo un po’ di derrate alimentari mi sarei calato anch’io per un giorno in carezze e caramelle.
Poi ho pensato che invece così come Chakama è stato suo malgrado il simbolo di qualcosa che doveva chiudersi, potrebbe diventare quello da cui ripartire.
Non è facile, perché qui sono stati fatti molti danni (soprattutto psicologici), ma chi mi conosce e mi segue da tempo sa bene qual’è la mia filosofia, e lo sa anche chi sostiene le mie iniziative.
Al mio fianco, in una giornata che non è stata solamente donare cibo in un periodo particolare di emergenza, ho voluto i rappresentanti del Governo di Chakama e di Langobaya, Macdonald Ngowa e Gunga Baya, quelli di Karibuni Onlus che ha spiegato come da un villaggio povero si può creare una realtà di autosostentamento che nutre, fa sopravvivere e studiare i ragazzi senza aspettare per forza la mano dal cielo e il Rotary che durante la pandemia è funzionale al discorso da noi condiviso di far capire che le emergenze arrivano per conto loro e bisogna adeguarsi. Per tutto il resto invece, anche quel che può sembrare ineluttabile, si può fare qualcosa ma solo se veramente lo si vuole.