Mission of Mercy

Most filmmakers measure their success by box office grosses. Former NewsChannel 5 reporter turned documentarian Barry Simmons counts patients treated. Simmons is the producer, director and writer of Sons of Lwala, a film about two Vanderbilt Medical School students who have built a clinic in their remote Kenyan hometown. Since opening its doors in May of last year, this clinic in Lwala—a village of just 1,500 people, two-and-a-half hours by foot from the nearest hospital—has treated more than 12,000 patients. Not your typical Michael Moore healthcare story.

In 2005, Simmons was an up-and-coming on-camera newsman. His reporting on stories as diverse as the Sundquist-era budget stalemate/government shutdown and a one-legged Appalachian Trail hiker had won him accolades. Try eight regional Emmys, two Edward R. Murrow Awards, and two-time recognition as Tennessee Writer of the Year by the Associated Press. But he was looking for something more.

“I didn’t want to explain to my son someday the work I had done in my early career by pointing to a trophy case,” Simmons says. That’s when he met Milton Ochieng’ (the apostrophe is part of the spelling of his name) in December 2005. By February, Simmons had quit his job at Channel 5, and he was doing research in Lwala with Milton.

It’s easy to see why Milton’s story sparked Simmons’ interest. A boy of humble origins from halfway around the Third World gets a scholarship offer from Dartmouth, but he doesn’t have the $900 for travel to New Hampshire. So the people of Lwala sell chickens, goats and cows to raise the money. In return for their gift, his village neighbors have a simple request: “Don’t forget us.”

Milton doesn’t forget Lwala. He can’t. While he tackles the Ivy League as the hope of his village, his parents both contract and eventually lose their battles against HIV/AIDS, the disease infecting more than 30 percent of their village. It was Milton’s father’s dream to someday have a clinic in Lwala, to treat AIDS and myriad other African health issues. Milton decides to build the clinic. He draws up plans, applies to Vanderbilt Medical School, and starts fund-raising.

Most filmmakers measure their success by box office grosses. Former NewsChannel 5 reporter turned documentarian Barry Simmons counts patients treated. Simmons is the producer, director and writer of Sons of Lwala, a film about two Vanderbilt Medical School students who have built a clinic in their remote Kenyan hometown. Since opening its doors in May of last year, this clinic in Lwala—a village of just 1,500 people, two-and-a-half hours by foot from the nearest hospital—has treated more than 12,000 patients. Not your typical Michael Moore healthcare story.

In 2005, Simmons was an up-and-coming on-camera newsman. His reporting on stories as diverse as the Sundquist-era budget stalemate/government shutdown and a one-legged Appalachian Trail hiker had won him accolades. Try eight regional Emmys, two Edward R. Murrow Awards, and two-time recognition as Tennessee Writer of the Year by the Associated Press. But he was looking for something more.

“I didn’t want to explain to my son someday the work I had done in my early career by pointing to a trophy case,” Simmons says. That’s when he met Milton Ochieng’ (the apostrophe is part of the spelling of his name) in December 2005. By February, Simmons had quit his job at Channel 5, and he was doing research in Lwala with Milton.

It’s easy to see why Milton’s story sparked Simmons’ interest. A boy of humble origins from halfway around the Third World gets a scholarship offer from Dartmouth, but he doesn’t have the $900 for travel to New Hampshire. So the people of Lwala sell chickens, goats and cows to raise the money. In return for their gift, his village neighbors have a simple request: “Don’t forget us.”

Milton doesn’t forget Lwala. He can’t. While he tackles the Ivy League as the hope of his village, his parents both contract and eventually lose their battles against HIV/AIDS, the disease infecting more than 30 percent of their village. It was Milton’s father’s dream to someday have a clinic in Lwala, to treat AIDS and myriad other African health issues. Milton decides to build the clinic. He draws up plans, applies to Vanderbilt Medical School, and starts fund-raising.

The story doesn’t end there. Milton’s younger brother, Fred, follows him to Dartmouth and then Vanderbilt. Their older brother Omondi sacrifices his own education to care for their ailing parents and then oversee the clinic’s construction. A plucky foundation worker, Jena Lee Nardella, cheers them on and brings a crucial influx of cash. And then the cause starts to snowball. Vandy undergrads host fashion-show fundraisers for the cause. The kids Milton and Fred coach in soccer break their piggy banks to donate $45. When the time comes to build the clinic, the Lwalan villagers mix the mortar and lay the bricks themselves.