By Kami Nguyen

Town Crier Editorial Intern

Los Altos resident taught adults how to read

For 11 years, Los Altos resident Sally McNees lived in West Africa - away from family, friends and all the conveniences she had at home in the United States.

Not everyone is willing to make those sacrifices, but for McNees it was worth it, because in Africa she gave the people something they would never have had - the ability to read.

McNees became a missionary and worked under two organizations, Wycliffe Bible Translators and SIL International.

Her goal was to help people living in Third World countries to read and write in their native language.

But being a missionary was never what McNees expected out of her life.

“My family went to church, but it didn’t make sense to me,” she said. “It was just a social activity. Life is hard at certain points and I felt I wasn’t doing a good job and needed help.”

That was when her friend at work gave her a Bible, she said. After reading it, she felt as if “God had hoped for me.”

It was then she learned more about missionary work overseas.

She began taking courses in linguistics, and in 1990, she decided to go to France to learn French.

In May 1991, she arrived in Africa. She spent the first three months in Burkina Faso for orientation and to learn the native language, Jula. Although French is the national language there, Jula is spoken by 15 million people.

She learned about African life, staying with a local family. She participated in fieldwork and played with the children.

“They were very friendly and people-oriented,” she said. “They welcomed (me) and it was a pleasure for them.”

She then went to the Ivory Coast and stayed in the city of Abidjan for more than a year, working on projects with the community.

In 1994, she went to Bouake, where she began working with an adult literacy program.

McNees taught the adults not only how to read, but also how to do math so they would not be cheated when doing business.

“The villagers would pick cocoa, cotton or coffee crops and go and have it weighed,” she said. “A government official would record in a little notebook how many kilos the product weighed. Many times they would write less than what it weighed and sell those extra (goods) for themselves.”

She said she trained three native people in office work so they could continue working in the program.

“The most rewarding thing is watching an adult person learn to read,” she said. “There are 30-year-olds who never read and had strategies to … hide that.”

For now, McNees said, although she misses the friends she made in Africa, she needs the rest after her “cross-cultural experience.”

She said the thought of retiring in Africa has crossed her mind, because then she could teach and train until she is at an “old, old age.”

For information on Wycliffe, logon to www.wycliffe.org. For more information on SIL International, logon to www.sil.org/sil/.