Donna's Eulogy, with Messages from Martha and Mhizha

Sixteen years ago I went to work in Zimbabwe for a few months on a strategic plan for the Zimbabwe YMCA. Valjean decided it would be a great adventure to visit me for six weeks. In typical Valjean fashion she set about networking to cook up some work she could do in Zimbabwe so she could write off the trip as a business expense. Her plan, as it emerged, was to help me write the plan for the Zimbabwe YMCA and to record the stories of a Shona storyteller and musician (through whom she meet her African family) with the idea that someday she might turn them into children’s books.

I had been in Zimbabwe for a couple of months when Valjean arrived. I had had some time to process the great beauty and many contradictions of Africa and Africans. Valjean stayed in my apartment with me and we shared a bedroom. At night I would be exhausted from working all day and she would want to talk well into the night, processing what she had experienced that day. About a week after she arrived, I was just drifting off to sleep and Valjean bounded up in bed, turned on the light, flung her arms open and yelled “Zimbabwe exclamation point.” “Zimbabwe exclamation point what?” I asked. She replied that was the name of the store she could open on Milwaukee Avenue to sell the things Zimbabweans were making to help them make a decent living.

Although Valjean never opened Zimbabwe! she also never stopped scheming of ways to help the people she met in Zimbabwe. I wasn’t a bit surprised when Giudi found a container of Zimbabwean crafts in Valjean’s garage that she had yet to sell.

All of us know of her African family and the money she raised to help support them. Martha Timbenawo, the mother of her African family, has asked me to read this to you on her behalf.

Firstly I greet you all family and friends of aunty Val. I’m Martha. I knew aunty Val for about 12 years. Aunty took me as her daughter, she always said you are my African daughter, l took aunty as my mother I have really lost a mother and a good friend. Aunty Val loved me and my family very much, sometimes when aunty Val comes I asked myself that aunty Val travelling half way across the world to see us you know she really had true love, when she came to Zimbabwe we lived with her in Mbare its a high density suburb I thought she would say I want to stay in a hotel but she would say I will stay with you here in this house.

What we ate she ate also, she did not even complain aunty Val was full of love. I’m going to miss her. I’ve a daughter and aunty gave her name, she is 9 she will be turning 10 on the 20 of August, she likes to read and write stories she is following aunty footsteps please remember that there’s young Valjean in Zimbabwe.

I want to take this opportunity to thank you all for the support you gave to aunty Val. I really thank you all. I love you all from the bottom of my heart.

The former director of the Zimbabwe YMCA, Mhizha Edmund Chifamba, who became Valjean’s good friend and Shona (the main tribal language in Zimbabwe) teacher wrote this:

“I met Valjean through you almost 16 years ago. Both of you became my very dear friends. Over the years Valjean was always there for me. When I arrived in Chicago from Canada, Valjean was there at the airport to meet me. When I looked for jobs, she helped me with her writing skills to put my resume together, she would say "You are writing for Americans baby." She taught me how to live alone in the West and to navigate my life out of loneliness. The most important thing she taught me was how to network and to be positive. This was always mired in humor, quick wittedness and kindness. Our friendship developed over the years to a level where she counseled me on life issues in America and I guided her on how to be part of her African family. We shared how to read in between lines about American politics and she always consulted me on African political and cultural issues. She was an avid reader and I emulated her for this attribute. We liked some of the same music and good food. I relied on her as a friend. I miss her a lot. I will not be able in words to thank her sufficiently for her friendship, except to say may her soul rest in peace, until we meet again. Valjean learnt quickly one of the Shona profound sayings, "Ndiyani anoziva nzira dzaMwari?" - "Who knows God's ways, but God Himself ?" She repeated this quite often. I know some of what She meant.”

Valjean’s commitment was unwavering and her love felt intensely half way around the world. In addition to this commitment and love and our travel adventures large and small, when I think of Valjean I think of all the great dinners we shared together. From stir-fried caterpillars in Africa to countless dinners as neighbors in Chicago. Many were in restaurants, but the best was when she would call and tell me she had decided to cook. I would arrive at her place tired after work to delicious smells and I would feel so grateful and well taken care of.

I think of her commitment to make the world a better place – from her days as a “video revolutionary” to her work with Freeze Frame to the work she did with the organization I work for, the Delta Institute. Valjean was always happiest at work when she was using her considerable talents to write “deathless prose” about something she cared about. The last piece she wrote for us was called “The World You Wish For, We Work For.” I think that this aptly describes Valjean as well because the world you wish for she worked for.

Finally I think of her commitment to spiritual growth – her meditation practice and how she evolved over the years we were friends to take life in stride and to see all of life’s challenges as “an opportunity to practice.”

Periodically throughout our friendship Valjean would announce that she was back on her “body of a goddess campaign.” As I thought about Valjean’s life I realized that she was really on a much larger campaign – she was really on a “life of a goddess campaign.”

In my opinion, it was a stellar campaign.

~ Donna Ducharme