Widows and orphans matter to me

Growing up in the small village of Wagoma, Bondo district in Siaya County, 39-year-old Roseline Orwa had always been an outstanding pupil.

She performed well in secondary school, enough to earn her a spot at Kenyatta University for an education degree.

But she turned down this coveted opportunity, which was rare in her village.

“I did not want to be a teacher. I have always had an interest in design, so I enrolled for a diploma in graphic design at the Kenya Polytechnic instead,” she says.

After graduation, Roseline got a job at the Government Press as a graphic designer. In a career she was passionate about, and earning enough to afford a comfortable life, Roseline, then 24, met a man who wanted to marry her. After dating for about a year, he asked her to get married to him.

“He was 20 years older than me, but was kind-hearted, so I accepted his proposal. He met my parents, paid my dowry, and took me with him to his home in Nairobi,” she says.

When they got there, Roseline was surprised when she found a woman and four children in the house. He introduced her to them, and then showed her the bedroom she would be sleeping in. She would soon find out that the woman she had been introduced to was the man’s first wife!

DUPED

“I was shocked to discover that I was a second wife. Honestly, I had no idea that he was married. I was quite naïve then, and during our courtship, he never once mentioned that he was married. Even when he introduced himself to my parents, he did not indicate that he was taking me as a second wife,” she says, and adds, “Polygamy among my Luo community is common, but I was shocked because I had gotten into it unknowingly. Even though my co-wife treated me well, I was unhappy because I felt as though I had been duped,” she adds.

Unable to bear the uncomfortable living arrangement, she moved out of her matrimonial home after just two months. In her new house, her husband would drop by occasionally, since she was still married to him.

A few months into the marriage, medical tests revealed that she had ovarian cysts, and that her fallopian tubes were blocked.

“That was the beginning of one of my worst nightmares — the fear that I would never be a mother. I spent thousands of shillings visiting fertility experts in the hope of getting a child, with no success. The fear of barrenness made me sink into depression, and I lost so much weight.”

Meanwhile, family and friends constantly nagged her, asking when she would begin to reward her husband with children. The pressure took a toll on her marriage.

“My husband began being emotionally and verbally abusive, and with time, the physical abuse started,” she says.

“I remember him once finding me seated outside the house with some friends. Just like that, he picked up a stick and began hitting us with it. My friends ran away, leaving me completely humiliated,” she remembers.

He also expected Roseline to be home whenever he came calling –many times unannounced, even though she went to work.

“He would make erratic appearances, sometimes once a week, other times I would not see him for weeks. One day he came home and when he didn’t find me, he burnt all my clothes. That was the day I knew I had to leave.”

At 27 years, and after only three years of marriage, Roseline walked out, and began the divorce process.

HUMILIATING TAG

“Divorce was yet another humiliating experience. In traditional Luo customs, a divorced woman must have her parents return the entire dowry paid for her. However, if she bore children, then the dowry need not be returned. The whole village witnessed the dowry return, and I thereafter became known as the ‘barren divorcee’.”

A few months later, Roseline reconnected with a childhood friend from her Wagoma village.

“We met in Nairobi, and immediately hit it off. He knew that I could not have children, and that I was divorced, but he did not seem bothered by it.

Two years later, we moved in together, and later, went through the required traditional ceremonies, including paying dowry.

“He treated me well, we had common interests and we enjoyed life together - I was in love. Not only were we life partners, but business partners too – we had a branding business, Onset Designers.”

One morning in March 2008, Roseline’s husband told her he was not feeling well. He complained of a stomachache and kept vomiting. That day, he decided to spend the day at home. When Roseline returned, he seemed better. They watched television and chatted before going to bed.

At about 3pm however, he woke up in immense pain, prompting Roseline to take him to Coptic Hospital. They lived in Lang’ata, Nariobi. That same night, he died. They had been married for almost three years.

His sudden death shocked Roseline to the core.

“He had been in good health - I thought it was a bad dream, from which I would wake up from.”

But the reality hit her when his family began making burial arrangements for her husband. As a widow, she was aware of the traditional practices associated with widowhood in her Luo community.

“Among them was that I was expected to sleep outside –next to my husband’s grave for three nights. I was also expected to shave my head clean. Some also expected me to go without a bath for three months, as well as wear my late husband’s inner wear for three months. I was also supposed to be cleansed, then inherited. The process of cleansing includes having unprotected sex with a stranger,” she says.

Roseline did not believe in these customs, and on the day she travelled upcountry for her husband’s burial, she sought audience with her father-in-law.
“I asked him what he thought of those practices, mentioning that I wasn’t comfortable with them.”

To her relief, her father-in-law, a staunch Christian, doesn’t believe in the outdated traditions either, so she didn’t have to go through any of them.
After returning to Nairobi, life became difficult.

“I was lonely and depressed, lost in grief. I’d lock myself up in the house for days, where food became my only comfort. I gained over 30 kilos in just a few months. When I called my friends, some would tell me not to ask them for money because they were broke, yet I was only calling to have a chat. Some married friends told me that because I was now single, I wasn’t to visit them at their homes any more!”

She knew then that if she did not get help, she would sink deeper into her grief. She thought a widow’s support group would be a good place to seek the solace she was looking for, but she could not find any.

“One day, as I was talking to some of my clients – the branding business was still doing well, and I also imported second hand clothes, I shared my story with them.” One of them turned out to be a widow, and was enthusiastic about starting a support group. They decided to have a meeting at Roseline’s home that weekend, and invited other widows they knew, and asked them to spread word.

Twenty women turned up at her doorstep that day. The meeting was to run from 2pm to 6pm, but the group ended up sharing their experiences deep into the night. Some even spent the night. The main challenge these women had experienced was losing all the property, including money left by their husbands, to their in-laws. Some also talked of physical abuse by in-laws.

The widow tag also came with a lot of stigma. Some were ostracised while others were blamed for the deaths of their husbands.

NEW BEGINNING

It was apparent that there was a great need for a support group, and so Roseline decided that she would host the group every Saturday at her house. That was in 2010.

In 2012, she registered Rona Foundation. As you can guess, the organisation targets bereaved spouses, the main aim being to help them cope with the loss of a partner.

But as she continued to host these women, her mind kept going back to her rural village.

“Today, Wagoma is like a cemetery. Every homestead has one or more graves, and there is a burial every other weekend. Majority of those left behind are women and children – I felt a strong need to start a widow’s centre there,” she says.

Roseline sold her second-hand clothes business, and with the money, headed to Bondo. Her first agenda was to buy land to set up the centre. But she had not anticipated the difficult process that would be.

“I am known in the village as the woman who cannot bear children, and a widow for that matter, it was therefore extremely difficult to get someone to sell me land. After a year of no success, I thought of a different strategy. I involved my brother, fronting him as the one interested in buying land. In less than a month, I had land!”

Wagoma Orphans and Widows Centre is now home to 36 orphans, and has a daily feeding programme for 166 children in the area. Thirty eight of these are on ARVs, so she has to provide a special diet. On weekends, the centre feeds more than 300 children.

“I also started a nursery school at the centre, and enrolled some orphans in a nearby primary school. The school charges 120 shillings per month, per child and I pay for over 100 children.”

The centre also supports more than 60 widows — teaching them how to set up income-generating activities that will help them support themselves. In return, the women prepare meals for the children and help feed the young ones, while the older children wash dishes and clean the centre. Each woman is required to put in at least two hours of work at the centre daily.

“We grow vegetables and keep poultry at the centre, and it is my vision to see it become fully self-sustaining. Right now, I still have to go back to my pocket to keep the centre going,” she says.

The women also help each other out.

“A woman who refuses to be ‘cleansed’ and inherited is often rejected by her relatives. If she is unable to financially support herself, her house will fall apart, yet no one will help her — some of these women’s houses are badly in need of repair. For these, I provide the roofing material, while the other women provide the rest of the building materials. We then, as a group, build her a decent house. So far, we have built houses for 12 widows.”

FAITH AND GOODWILL

But this is not all, every six months, Roseline organises a medical camp at the centre, in collaboration with interested health partners.

“Wagoma village is very remote, and residents are just beginning to understand the importance of family planning, and how to protect themselves from HIV and Aids,” she says.

What is even more impressive about what Roseline has achieved is the fact that she has no outside funding.

“I am yet to receive funding, even though I have written quite a number of proposals to various organisations – I have learnt that genuine help is hard to come by,” she says.

For instance, at one organisation, the contact person told her he would only approve her proposal on condition that she gives him a 50 per cent cut.

In another, she was asked for sexual favours. But she has no intention of going down that route, because, as she points out, she has managed to come this far with just faith, and a little money, so it can only get better.

Would you want to know more about Wagoma Orphans and Widows Centre? Contact Roseline on 0723 238 812 [email protected]
www.ronafoundation.co.ke