Our last few hours in Malawi are always bittersweet, missing our families back home but also leaving our family in Malawi. Beatrice often calls Malawi my second home, and I think she’s right. I look forward to returning to Ohio every time, but I’m always anticipating my next visit to Malawi. Traveling back to Ohio is not an easy journey, especially with COVID restrictions.
DO Diaries: Days Eleven and Twelve
Today we attended a new church in search of a place that Hugo and Bre can call their church home when they move here in July. This time we visited a church on the African Bible College (ABC) Campus. ABC hosts a radio ministry, seminary, and hospital in Lilongwe. In fact, our longtime partner SonSet Solutions helped provide their Christian radio station.
DO Diaries: Day Ten
Today we woke up, and after our usual morning devotions, we headed into the office for the start of the day’s meetings. On the way, we saw a group of kids playing football (aka soccer in the US), and we wanted to get some video footage for a future video.
DO Diaries: Days Eight and Nine
After a quiet, peaceful rest, getting up to an amazing sunrise on Lake Malawi, watching a three-foot long monitor lizard sunbathe near my tent, and eating breakfast, we returned to the mainland shore for a day-long meeting with our team and marketing volunteer from Blantyre.
DO Diaries: Day Seven
Greetings from Malawi! Yesterday I had the opportunity to revisit Chikwangwala community after six months of the LifePump being installed. We had a few purposes to visit, including filming a new, short documentary-style video highlighting the before and after story of a girl named Cecilia, which we’re so excited to share once ready.
DO Diaries: Day Six
Today we started off with a couple meetings at our DO office. The first meeting was with Pastor Gibson, who is a pastor in the southern providence of Malawi and is connected with the ministry Big Life. As DO, we’re continuing to build capacity with our Training of Trainers program and have been in talks with Big Life to train pastors who may be able to connect with communities and help maintain LifePumps in rural areas.
DO Diaries: Day Five
In the morning we attended a local church called “Flood Church.” It was started by a church in San Diego, California. We’re trying to connect Hugo and Bre with a local church, and they were very welcoming. The pastor is Malawian, and there were probably 500 people in the second service. It was a special Sunday, because five people were baptized and there was a celebration with food.
DO Diaries: Day Four
We arrived in the community called Msiyankhuni and talked with many community members including the village headman named Standford Mbewe. This community is quite remote, as we drove for miles from the main road down a dirt path. There were mud and homemade brick homes with grass roofs.
DO Diaries: Day Three
We arrived successfully in Zambia with no issues passing through the border and arrived at the Living Water International office in Chipata. The office just opened up because as of last December. We were greeted by Victor (the office director) and other LWI staff members along with DO’s Moonga.
DO Diaries: Days One and Two
We arrived at our lodge late afternoon in Malawi – exhausted from a long travel from Ohio. There is increased COVID awareness since our last visit in December. Now we needed to produce papers that we were tested within 72 hours of arrival and went through a tent outside to be questioned.