A home for Christmas

When Meghan Swaby saw a piece of land she inherited, from the will of a deceased neighbour, being cleared for the construction of a new house for her just in time for Christmas, she openly wept.

For two decades, the woman from Warrick district in Cross Keys, Manchester, has been praying for God to provide her with proper shelter.

Swaby’s story is one that may not be unusual to Jamaicans, given that she is a day’s’ worker and a single mother among the lower class in Jamaica. She is also among two million Jamaicans, representing more than two-thirds of the population, who are unable to afford a healthy diet, according to The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022.

The report also stated that some 100,000 Jamaicans were added to that pool in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, up from 1.9 million in 2019.

Swaby has one son, Johnair Taylor, who is 27 years old. He is currently unemployed, but he does a little house cleaning or debushing work once in a while.

Up to November 15, Swaby lived in a broken-down four-bedroom concrete house for which she paid $3,000 each month.

Only one room of the house is habitable, which is the one she slept in. The room where Taylor slept has severely worn zinc on the roof, and tarpaulin had to be placed on it when it rained, just as it did on the day of the build.

Taylor had to set pots and pans to catch the water so she wouldn’t have to put her mattress out in the sun to dry the following day.

“I also suffer from hypertension, fibroids and a cyst around my kidney,” Swaby told The Gleaner, which added more to the stress she bore.

She is on medication for her blood pressure and takes aspirin to prevent heart attacks and strokes.

She also told The Gleaner that her hands also “cramp up and hurt” when she does the washing.

Now she rejoices in the gift of a house for Christmas, which was donated by the Desnoes & Geddes Foundation in partnership with Food For The Poor Jamaica.

“It just come in like one burden come offa mi. When mi just start prepare this land, Malcolm come pass one day and seh to him girlfriend seh, ‘Mi a go help her, inu’ and church people and Malcolm and unu help mi and mek mi reach weh mi de,” the woman said during the construction of the house on November 15.

“Every help weh mi get a stranger and church people help mi,” she said before wiping tears from her eyes.

Dianne Ashton Smith, head of corporate affairs at Red Stripe and director of the Desnoes & Geddes Foundation, said that although it rained on-and-off on November 15, she and 20 volunteers with the Desnoes & Geddes Foundation were determined to get the job done.

“We are so excited to be here. We travelled from Kingston because we know we had to do this for Meghan Swaby and her son,” Ashton Smith said.

“This is what we do at the foundation - impacting lives, enriching communities.”

For Marsha Burrell Rose, marketing and development manager, Food For The Poor Jamaica, more donations are needed to build houses for needy Jamaicans at Christmas and beyond.

“We can’t do this without donations. We are asking for all support as we go into Christmas. Help us so that we can bring joy to families who are in need. We need you, and they need us,” she said.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com

Persons interested in making donations to Food For The Poor Jamaica to build houses for individuals in need this Christmas can make donations online in numerous ways at www.foodforthepoorja.org.