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Super Woman
The main reason Tambu came back to America was to ensure
that her children would have access to the best possible public education. My
brother Evans Chirwa who was pursuing a doctoral in Environmental Engineering
at University of Kentucky chose an apartment for the family in a location that
was within a good elementary school district. Ulalo and Kabelo were enrolled at
Southern Elementary School in 1997. And so, Tambu was very involved in their school
lives right from the beginning. She was a volunteer helper in their classrooms.
One day the boys joined a street soccer game. They were so
much better at soccer than all the other kids with whom they were playing. After
seeing what Ulalo and Kabelo were doing with the soccer ball, some parents
encouraged Ulalo and Kabelo to join organized soccer. They registered for the noncompetitive
Lexington Youth Soccer Association (LYSA) in Spring 1998. Even with organized
soccer, the boys were still much better than their teammates. So, they tried
out and were chosen to play select soccer with Lexington Futball League (LFC)
in Fall 2000. Later, Robreen joined the family in Lexington and was also selected for an LFC soccer team.
During school hours, Tambu was volunteering in her sons’
classrooms. After school, the children ate lunch and went to piano lessons at
Ms. Amy’s. From there, she took the boys to soccer practice. She then prepared
dinner for the family and made sure everyone had eaten enough. To end the day,
she made sure the children had done their homework.
The family continued to attend Trinity Baptist Church upon
returning to Lexington. Tambu volunteered for many church causes. A daytime
women’s branch of an international bible study group called Bible Study
Fellowship (BSF) started to meet at Trinity Baptist Church. Tambu started to
attend BSF. She also helped with Meals on Wheels routes delivering meals to
homebound persons.
Tambu’s weekends were filled with many activities and
events. As a soccer mom, she drove to the boys’ competitive games some of which
were hundreds of miles out of town. Another time demander was going to church
twice each Sunday and participating in the many church events. Although there
were many activities that required her attention, Tambu always made time for
herself. She was always a member of a fitness club and regularly attended
aerobics classes. In summer, she took the boys to a swimming pool every
afternoon.
It is important to mention that Tambu had friends who
sometimes gave her a breather from time to time. The Berry’s, who had been
instrumental in Tambu’s settling in Lexington in 1989, have a son named Matthew
who was born about the same year as Kabelo. Matthew’s mother, Karen Berry,
trained as a nurse and was working at Cardinal Hill. Work schedules of nurses
are complicated. This complication worked in favor of both Karen and Tambu. On
off days, Karen would take Ulalo and Kabelo to spend the day with Matthew. On
days when Karen had to work and needed a baby seater for Matthew, Tambu would
have Matthew over to play with Ulalo and Kabelo.
Soccer in America is mostly played by children from middles
and upper economic classes. It was, therefore, difficult for Tambu’s family to
keep up with the financial demands of soccer. But Tambu made sure that the boys
stayed in soccer. There were moments when she overheard some parents gossiping asking,
“why do they continue being involved in soccer”. What the boys lacked in money;
they made up for it on the field. They were good at soccer.
The school age class of BSF was run concurrently with the
men’s evening group. Tambu wanted the boys to start attending BSF. So, she
signed me up for BSF with the intention of having me take the boys to their BSF
class. The boys and I did BSF for seven years from 2002 to 2009. Thus, Tambu
made sure that the family was developing in all the three human facets of body,
soul, and spirit.
Lexington Family
Helen Brown always called before each Thanksgiving,
Christmas, and Easter. She would call on the landline phone and say,
“Hello! This is Helen. We are eating at 1:00 o’clock”.
Helen’s dinner table did not always have the same people.
She always had an eye to identify a close friend who needed company during the
holidays. But Amy and her children Hannah and Sadie as well as Tambu and I with
our children Ulalo and Kabelo were always there. There were times when Helen’s
sister-in-law June and her husband Joe were invited. June and Joe Ritchie’s
daughter Kelly was also sometimes invited. Once in a while, a foreign
missionary who was in the country for the first time would also be invited.
These dinners deepened the cousin relationship between our boys and Amy’s
daughters.
Tambu used to invite Helen Brown, Amy, Hannah, and Sadie to
Ulalo and Kabelo’s birthdays. At these birthdays, Tambu cooked chicken using
her special recipe and served it with sides such as rice and vegetables.
Everybody loved Tambu’s chicken. There was reciprocity in these birthday
invitations as Amy always invited Tambu’s family to Hannah and Sadie’s birthdays.
Leadership
During the six years of 1991 to 1997 when Tambu was back in
Malawi, she had become the defacto leader of the family. Although she was the
youngest in the family, her older siblings valued her decision-making. They
usually went with her final word in matters of parental care or how to relate
with extended family members. This trend continued when she came back to
Lexington. There was very good communication in the family in consultation
about family matters.
In 1999, Trinity Baptist Church was approached to consider
hosting a family seeking asylum from a refugee camp in Congo. The congregation
was divided into pro-immigrant and anti-immigrant camps. Tambu shared the
experiences of her friend Jean Munyabagisha and her husband Leonardo. When the
church members heard Tambu, they were swayed into voting for hosting the
refugee family.
Helping the new immigrant family settle in Lexington was a
lot of work. One of Tambu’s lasting legacies was that she helped the new
immigrant family find an apartment near Henry Clay High School. Subsequent
immigrant families from Congo followed this family resulting in a large
immigrant community in the Henry Clay High School neighborhood. There were many
good soccer players who were children of some of the immigrants. As a result,
the Henry Clay High School soccer team became very good. They went on to win
the Kentucky State Soccer Championship.
Tambu wanted to return to her Presbyterian Christian
tradition. She also wanted to take the children into a more structured
environment as they transitioned into high school age. In 2005, the family
transferred Christian membership to Second Presbyterian Church in downtown
Lexington. One of the criteria that swayed Tambu to join Second Presbyterian
Church was that it was sponsoring an American missionary family in her home
country of Malawi. There were many members of this new church who had been
exposed to the international community. In particular, Jack and Angene Wilson
had a long track record of living in many countries including African ones.
Second Presbyterian Church also had members who had befriended Tambu and I on
the soccer field sidelines. One of the soccer friends who were members of
Second Presbyterian are the Wethall’s. Todd and Holly Wethall and their
children Andrew and Anna became close friends of ours.
Upon joining Second Presbyterian Church, Tambu was
immediately nominated to become a deacon. She was also part of a group that
helped to welcome and settle a new immigrant family from Kazakhstan. This
involved driving members of the immigrant family to different places and events
to help their integration into American life. She volunteered to be part of a
team that went to rural West Virginia to help renovate homes for poor families.
One day, one of the members of the team fell and the team was amazed how Tambu
went into action as if she had medical training.
Tambu’s qualities as a caring leader were on full display on
two mission trips that some members of Second Presbyterian Church made to
Malawi in 2007 and 2010. When in Malawi, Tambu was the organizer, safety
expert, street shopping bargainer, and plain and simple somebody every team
member was listening to and depended on. The only youth member of the team on
the 2007 was Emily Downing. Tambu taught Emily the Malawi traditions of
greeting and socializing with other youth. It was an amazing sight to see!
Most of the members of the 2010 Second Presbyterian Church
mission trip were youth. But there were six accompanying adults. One of the
adults members of the team was Margaret Seiffert. Margaret and Tambu formed a
sisterhood bond on the trip. Further, while in Malawi the team was hosted for
dinner by Catherine, Tambu’s sister, in Blantyre. Catherine and Margaret formed
a sisterhood bond as well.
Bread Winner
The children reached teenage years where they were now
driving and able to be left home alone. They did not need Tambu’s attention 24
hours of the day. Tambu was helped by Julia Thorne to transition her
immigration status to where she could work. Julia Thorne was a longtime friend
who was trained as an immigration lawyer. Julia and her husband John exchanged
dinner invitations with Tambu’s family. With the help of Julia, Tambu returned
to paid work in 2006. She was employed by Aramark who were contracted to
provide catering services at Blackburn Prison in Lexington, Kentucky. Blackburn
is a minimum security prison owned and operated by the government of the state
of Kentucky. She received training on how to safely work in a prison
environment.
In 2008, three of the team members were transferred to the
Aramark group that provided catering services at Fayette County jail also in
Lexington, Kentucky. Fayette County is the geographical district that contains the
city of Lexington. Fayette County jail has a larger prison population and more
tightly secured than Blackburn. Such an environment created more conflicts
between in-mates, prison staff, and contract workers such as those for Aramark.
This was a more challenging work environment where even Aramark team members
turned against each other. Tambu was stressed out working at Aramark.
Tambu was promoted to the position of Assistant Manager.
Some of the Aramark team members had problems with a woman that had a foreign
accent being their boss. But Tambu was very hard working and never called in
sick. This meant they could not find a weakness in her work and professional
conduct to use to undermine her.
Meanwhile, Ulalo went to college at Vanderbilt University in
2009 to study Chemical Engineering. And Kabelo went to Bellarmine University in
2011 to study Music. The home had become an empty nest. This together with how
toxic Aramark at Fayette County jail had become, we (the family) urged Tambu to
resign and go to college.
