Helping: Hamilton or Malawi, CMH Nurse & Husband at Colgate Heed the
Call
(previously published in the Mid-York Weekly)
Gertrude Sindima loves her work as a registered nurse in Community Memorial
Hospital’s Women’s Center (“Helping mothers, and families, through labor
is very rewarding.”) and yet her heart is back home in Malawi, a struggling
East African nation. With her husband Harvey Sindima, a professor of philosophy
at Colgate University and interim pastor for the Cayuga-Sycracuse Area
Presbytery, Gertrude works with a special focus -- to help her countrymen,
especially the children.
Since coming to this country in 1968 to further their educations, the Sindimas
have given unstintingly to better the lives of hundreds and hundreds of
Malawians and now their dream of creating a school is rising out of the
ground. The first building of the Sindima Memorial Institute of Arts and
Technology has been constructed and the foundation laid for a mammoth building
that will house the administration and the department of health sciences.
The school rising from the dust around the small area of N’Deka is named
in honor of Harvey’s late parents, who had the original vision of providing
assistance for those in need through the establishment of the Blantyre
North Relief Project) The Sindimas have built upon their dream, and the
Relief Project , one brick at a time, literally, as the needs have increased
drastically. In addition to providing a regular flow of financial assistance,
the couple travel to Malawi at least once a year and many of those visits
have included brick making.
The hands on approach, and the Sindimas’ relentless determination, led
to a groundbreaking in August of 2005 attended by top Malawian government
officials and several of the orphans the Sindimas support. Plans call for
several more buildings to be constructed, eventually accommodating 2,500
students. The first classes will be for high school students but Gertrude
and Harvey dream of expanding the curriculum beyond the secondary level
to college and want to see a university and even a medical school open.
“The goal is to train people to be self- reliant,” says Gertrude. There
will be courses in the humanities, sciences, fine arts and textile technology
but also instruction for bakers and in furniture making. Included on the
school grounds is one hundred acre irrigated plot that is bearing three
or four crop harvests a year, a tremendous blessing in drought ravaged
Malawi.
Lack of food is only one of the problems facing Malawians. The country
has been inundated with refugees from worse off neighboring countries and
the AIDS epidemic is decimating the population, creating a ghastly number
of orphans. The Sindimas support nearly a thousand children, sending funds
to buy corn, blankets and pay school fees. The couple, who have four children
of their own, has sacrificed in the pursuit of their dream. Harvey sold
his car and Gertrude has postponed taking classes toward her master’s degree
to feed people in dire need. When their work here is done, they plan to
return to their homeland, to teach, to nurse, to write, to lend a hand,
to realize their dream. “We were able to go to school and have good jobs,”
explains Gertrude, “so we have been capable of helping. We want to build
the school so the children can achieve something. We want to help the nation.”
In the meantime, The Sindimas maintain an exhausting schedule, Harvey with
Colgate and his church, Gertrude, known as Trudy to her colleagues, at
the hospital, where she works through the night. “I am happy to be here,”
says Gertrude, who was trained as a nurse midwife in Mawali then earned
her certification to be an RN in New York and eventually her bachelor of
science in nursing from Syracuse University. “Community Memorial is a small
hospital but it does many things for the community and draws people from
all over.” Of course, Gertrude Sindima knows what it means to care for
children. “If all goes well, by the year 2008, we’ll have classes begin.
The children of Malawi, if given an opportunity, they take education seriously.”
Gertrude and Harvey Sindima take providing that opportunity just as seriously.
It is their dream, their hearts’ desire. (Story shared by Community Memorial
Hospital, Hamilton, New York)