Aldeia Missanja

I arrived back in Lilongwe via a Sososo Coaches bus after a 3.30 am wake-up for a 4 am shared taxi to Mzuzu, 80 minutes away. The shared taxi ride one of the craziest drives I've had. Crammed. Although I had the front seat. Flat out and driven by a get away merchant. The 30 something chauffeur was juggling his cell phone, fare payments and conversations, between delivery stops of various produce to roadside customers.
Nonetheless I was dropped at the depot at 6am. I was informed the bus was fully booked, but I would be 4th on the waitlist. 4th was good enough, given the prompt departure at 7 am, and the seemingly expected no shows. So after 9 hours I was back in Lilongwe heading to La Luna my previous accommodation. I received a warm welcome from the staff. The next day I was heading out with the World Vision area team to visit the community of Chigodi. This is a spot NZ donors had been supporting for 20 years, I'd been one of them from the early days. In that time my first 2 sponsored kids had become young adults and I'd been matched up with Louice and another child in a second southern region. There's been a bit of drama organising the visit due to unrealistic lead times insisted on by the NZ organisation when I contacted them in August. After talking to the Malawi national office the NZ loop reengaged. It was still touch and go. I indicated that I'd be moving onwards under those circumstances. So a week ago I'd ridden off unwilling to continue the to and fro. I let the local body know I couldn't hang around on the off chance. Things changed. By the next day I'd sent a copy of my passport back to NZ, started a police conviction check and lined up a video screening with a NZ coordinator. All the while I was moving further away from Chigodi. The following Monday I started my journey back to Lilongwe. As Tuesday arrived I was once again up early and ready to go when Christine and Kenny arrived in the World Vision LandCruiser and we set off. It was a full programme visiting a water supply project run off solar powered pumps, a new one stop multi disciplinary health and welfare bureau also dealing with sexual assaults, and a volunteer managed economic development project focused on resilience and growth, starting with a household savings approach to seed loan based opportunities to instigate household based crop and livestock businesses.
All this was a prelude to meeting Louice and his family. I'd been sponsoring him for nearly 8 years. As special moments go this was a foundational one. We spent the next 90 or so minutes together and they showed me how their life had benefitted from the world vision support over that time. Heading back to Lilongwe I reflected on the powerful impact that this programme has made to a very poor rural area. Basic services still don't exist at the household level and the social services we have access to in our lives are vastly superior to what is available in all of Malawi. Nonetheless this was a family who believed they were moving up the ladder, and doing everything they could to build a better life . And achieving that.Read more