Nancy Arnwine:
CLASS OF 1974
Lawrence High SchoolClass of 1974
Lawrenceville, NJ
Nancy's Story
Took a long overdue vacation this year. Haven't been on a vacation in around 10 yrs. Spent 2 weeks in The Gambia in W. Africa, the first time I've been out of the US. Went to meet my adopted Gambian family. Had a great time, but the heat was a bit much. Life is much different there compared to here. Stayed at the family compound. They have electricity, but no running water. Every morning the boys would go next door to fill up the big water jugs. No shower & no flush toilet, kinda reminded me of camping when I was a kid. All the food we ate was cooked outside over a wood fire under a mango tree and it was delicious. The people were all very friendly & everyone I met asked me if I was enjoying my visit. The Gambia is a very small and poor country. Making a living there is not easy & there are not that many jobs available. A lot of the people make a living by farming, others run small businesses. Their survival is very dependent on the tourists who come to vacation there every year. I was there pretty late in the season and didn't see many tourists, which was probably good because every place I went, there weren't any crowds. I'm looking forward...Expand for more
to visiting there again, but next time I go it will be between Nov & Feb when the weather is not so hot.
One of the reasons I went to visit was for the inauguration of the well that several of my friends and I donated money to have drilled. It only rains in The Gambia for 3 months out of the year & for the last few years, they haven't gotten the amount of rain that they normally would. A lot of the wells are dug by the local people and not very deep. With the lack of sufficient rainfall, most of these wells have dried up, forcing the people to have to travel long distances to get the water they need everyday for themselves and for their gardens. This is not only backbreaking work, but very time consuming. The well we had drilled will provide good clean water for hundreds of people in the community, and it should never go dry. Being able to meet the people in the community and hearing them express their gratitude for what my friends and I did for them, has made me want to continue to help them as much as I can. The Gambians are good and hardworking people, it makes me feel good to be able to help make some of their lives a little bit better.
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