Baxters in Africa: Helping Hands

In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, there is a volunteer service arm of the Church known as Helping Hands. Several weeks ago, one of our young missionaries, Elder Baker, had been teaching a fellow who taught at The Kamagugu Inclusive School which is a school for handicapped children. In talking with him, Elder Baker discovered the school was in need of grass planted in an area which was to be used as a calming area for austic children when they become over stimulated in the classroom. The school is situated on a very large piece of ground, some of which is in playground. There are many mature trees in some of the outer areas, but it has not actually been landscaped to be thoroughly useable. Elder Baker thought this would be a good service project for him and his companion and the Branch. It was scheduled to happen during the middle part of October. In as much as October had much rain, the days prior to the planting were extremely wet and the Principal called off the project. It was rescheduled for November 11.

Everyone checked the weather and it was determined that this would be a good day to be able to carry out the project. Branch members were reminded to be at the church at 9:00 ready to go to work. We met, passed out the "Helping Hand" vests, had a prayer, and loaded up the cars to drive to Kamagugu, a small area about 15 minutes from the Church.

We met with the Principal and he expressed his gratefulness to us for being willing to come and help plant grass in this area. The Elders unloaded two very large gunny sac type bags of grass plugs, and with our tools in hand, we walked up the path to the area for the planting. I have never seen "grass plugs". They are long root like things with 3-4 shoots of coarse grass coming up on top. The plant reminded me of a strawberry plant which has a long crawling root system, with little shoots coming up every so often. We would dig a trench and lay the long root in the trench, then cover it up with soil. The soil was very fertile and because of all the recent moisture, it was very easy to work with. The difficult part was bending over or kneeling on the ground and then standing up and moving to another area. Even though we were in a shaded area, it was very hot, and got even hotter as the morning went on. As we moved to a lower area without trees, the ground was harder and more difficult to dig in. The sun was becoming hotter because there were no leaves to shade us.

There were about 25 branch members in all, helping. It actually went very fast as we worked in teams, one digging, the other putting in the plugs and covering them over. Like my Mother always said, "Many hands make light work!" Three and half hours later, the last sac was emptied with only a small pile of plugs left to be put in. The Relief Society President had brought "viennas" - hot dogs, and juice for a snack. I added home made snickerdoodles and ice water to add a sweet touch to the day. They had never tasted snickerdoodles before and thought they were "wonderful" and "rather moorish", whatever that means.

The principal came out to inspect the work and was exceedingly happy. He said, "You may think this is not a big thing, but to us it is huge. By January when the students come back from break, it will be all filled in and it will be heaven for those little austic children who just need a calming place to go so they will be able to work again in the classroom"

Though our knees were sore from kneeling, and our backs aching from the stooping and bending, and our faces dripping with sweat from the heat, we were happy to have been of service to the school. We were grateful for the opportunity to serve.

Elder Baker, who spearheaded the project, and Elder Brinkerhoff surveying the area for planting.