Children. Everywhere.

Wednesday Night: Dinner with New Friends in Lilongwe

We hosted Jane back in September, 2011 and so she wanted to host us for a meal. She lives some distance from Lilongwe, so her daughter Rejoice got to host us for supper. We were picked up at 6:30 by Gift, Jane's youngest son, and taken to Rejoice and George's home where we enjoyed a fantastic meal.

Both George and Rejoice work in community development and are quite politically aware. We visited late into the evening and learned much about Malawi history, politics and their vision for a successful Malawi.

Tuesday/Wednesday: The Tours

Peter Timmerman, the regional director of World Renew here in Malawi, is keen to see sustainable development happen and moreover to see it done very well. As our group went from home to home seeing the goat, pig, seed loan, ecosan latrine, and orphan nursery feeding programs, he urged us to ask evaluative questions to help the recipients, committee members, NRD reps and us see what is working, what isn't, and how things could be improved.

Our first stop was to see goats. Zaak was happy about that. The owner had received a goat in 2010 and now had 10 goats in his little barn above ground. He had repaid the committee with a goat already and was planning to grow his herd to 30. The goats are used as an asset that can be cashed in when there is a need (school fees, an illness, a funeral, etc.). The manure is also used as valuable fertilizer in his field where he can recognize a clear increase in crop yield. We hear this story over and over as we go from home to home whether it is pigs or goats. The owners are proud of their new assets and we see only healthy animals - this is likely due to the fact that each recipient completes a full 5 days of training before getting their pig or goat.

The seed loans are equally impressive. We visit a lady who turned a loan of 2 kg of soy bean seeds into an impressive diversified crop and many times her original loan amount. She easily repaid the loan with 4 kg of seeds which then went into the program and were loaned to two beneficiaries. With profits, she has purchased a radio, paid school fees for her children, and bought a goat. On Wednesday we see what could be the most impressive ground nut (peanut) crop which began with one of our seed loans.

10 cubic feet of rich fertilizer is dig out of this woman's ecosan latrine twice a year. Upon inspection of the ecosan latrine itself, there is no offensive odours and the sealed off hole is completely undetectable. A bag with soil and ash mixed together sits  near the current latrine where one cup of the mixture is sprinkled over waste.

As we tour the various villages, we are greeted in large numbers and even larger songs. Even our guides, the committee members, sing from the back of the pick-up truck the entire day. When the singing dies down, we are seated under a tree before the great crowd of women, children and men. Introductions are exchanged, people clap, and speeches are made. Zaak is 4 for 4 as far as speeches on behalf of our group are concerned. There is genuine enthusiasm for our partnership.

We collapse into our beds after that first day in Kamanzi and head back into the villages on Wednesday morning for more special greetings and tours. Just before lunch at Christina's house (same delicious traditional menu as the previous day) we are presented with a demo from the nursery school which is comprised of orphans, single parent children, and vulnerable children all ages 5 and under. They recite their parts of the body, sing songs, and then go off to eat a vitamin enriched porridge provided by New Hope.

Following the nursery demo, we get a Village Savings and Loan (VSL) demonstration where over a dozen women join together to contribute to an emergency fund, add to their savings and take out loans as needed. Jane says this one is not too impressive since these aren't as dynamic as many that she has seen, but we are asked to probe the VSL members about what their first experience with VSL last year was like. Members talk about how they used their cashed in savings for (school fees, home improvements, some capital investments) and how they used loans. One woman ordered head scarves from town and sold them in the village at a substantial profit - we can spot several women with scarves in the crowd. Another bought fertilizer while another some animals.

Our final stop for the day is at Bornface's village. After all of the formal introductions and clapping and lots of singing and dancing, the local youth class volunteers and youth demonstrate what their weekly get together looks like. There is some teaching and some fun.

We quickly visited Bornface's beautiful family and then made the bumpy trip back to Lilongwe with the sun setting in our rearview mirrors.

Tuesday: The Committee Reports in Kamanzi

On Tuesday morning the four of us meet with leaders from World Renew and Nkhoma Relief and Development at the World Renew office for introductions and a devotional. Heather gets to lead the impromptu devotional - Heather is always prepared to lead a devotional, so if you ever need her to do so, just ask a few minutes ahead of time.

We then drive out to Kamanzi - about 50 minutes west on the highway to Zambia and then about 20 minutes south on a dirt road into the villages. Our drivers are Peter Timmerman, the regional director of WR and Weston, the treasurer of NRD. We are accompanied by Jane Chikakuda whom New Hope met in September 2011.

Along the way, we pass through a couple police check stops, scattered vendors, drying tobacco, fields of maize, and people carrying tall loads of firewood on their bicycles.

Even as our vehicles were driving into the church yard, we hear before seeing the Committee who is administering the community programs. The 10 of them are singing and dancing a welcome to our group from New Hope. Among the great smiles, we immediately recognize our good friends Bornface and Christina who came to Calgary and we are greeted excitedly as we exit the vehicles. We are now together to survey and plan for the future of our partnership.

We spend the next hour or so inside the church along with the local pastor of the Presbyterian church, making formal introductions, hearing reports and asking clarifying questions about what our partnership has done over the past 3-4 years.

The records the Committee has kept are thorough and detailed. Rows mark who, when, and where benefits were distributed and a column shows results. Committee members take turns answering our questions about what they perceive their greatest successes to be, how the programs have grown beyond what our seed money for seed loans, goats, and pigs have provided for, and then about plans for the future.

As a whole we are impressed with the answers we receive and soon realize that they have been waiting for our visit to make plans for the future. The rest of the day, we spend touring the villages to see what transformations have taken place in the community due to our shared vision. We follow Pastor James to his home where we enjoy a tasty lunch of tsima, chicken, goat, greens, rice and pop.

The Ubuntu Ship has landed in Malawi

As we arrived, this was our reception at Kamazu International Airport:

The four of us joined up in Lilongwe airport at midday on April 1st. Heather, Ken and Wendy flew in after a few days in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Zaak flew in from Durban, South Africa where he had spent a week with friends and their mission. Zaak was delayed by about 30 minutes because of a VIP on his plane - the president of Malawi, Joyce Banda. There was a little reception on the tarmac for her. 

It was wonderful to see Nancy Hinga at the airport. Nancy visited New Hope last fall. She drove us to our hotel and visited with us through the afternoon. Peter Timmerman, World Renew regional director, joined us at around 4:30. We learned of his family's recent woes with bed bugs, weevils, and power outages. Together we hammered out our schedule for the next 11 days.

Jane Chikakuda, who visited New Hope 2 falls ago along with members of the committee from Kamanzi, joined us for supper and will be staying at our hotel. She will be our host for much of our time in Malawi.

As for us - because we did our side trips ahead of coming to Lilongwe, we've all gotten through jet lag. We are well rested and ready for a big day of visiting some communities in Kamanzi and the local committee. We will be joining the committee and workers from Nkhoma Relief and Development for a 2 day workshop later this week.

Internet is intermittent and this was written in advance, so things will get posted when they get posted. 

Thanks for following our trip!