Excuse my terrible editing, the random video cuts, my hair –
always, the lack of foundation, the occasional neck roll, the fluctuating
accent, the bizarre camera angles, the face and my over-use of the word
‘challenging’.
As she giggled, sat on the floor and played nervously with her feet, I
knew exactly how she felt. Estere had told us her favourite subject at school
was English, but when we asked her a question in a language she didn’t
understand, she only looked away and smiled. I know what it’s like this ‘not
speaking the language’ business, and it’s tough sometimes. Especially with
letters grouped together that my mouth refuses to co-operate with, like ‘Nd’ and ‘Ts’
and ‘bw’ (and no tsunami doesn't count).
food supplements, vaseline & moringa powder.
our fridge. as a daily reminder.
heading to Naocha.
At fourteen years old Estere looks good, healthy. If you didn’t know you
wouldn’t know, just how ill she’s been. And I hesitate to tell her story in the
fear of doing it an injustice, as I only spent 5 maybe 10 minutes in her
presence, as she sat on the floor of her grandparents house, shyly smiling up
at me.
Estere.
And if I haven’t got this message across yet then I am probably the
worlds worst Ambassador, but the HOPE in Orange HOPE is an acronym, and the H
of the HOPE stands for Home Based Care. At many a school and youth group I
would say, “and that’s exactly what it sounds like – we go to those who are too
sick, or too poor to get help otherwise”. And that’s certainly true, but that’s
only the half of it, and really only scratch’s the surface.
kind, passionate, volunteer hands.
saw a chameleon! made my life!
heart melter.
reality.
I feel like this post is all over the place, but it goes a little something like this. SIM Malawi partners with the Africa
Evangelical Church, which has – I believe, something like 180 parishes’ all up.
In the villages where our Home Based Care programs are situated, around 20
volunteers from each parish are chosen and trained up. Once a week these
volunteers go out in teams and visit those in their community who are in the
program and have a certain need.
grand-children of a patient.
Need can mean a lot. Most, but not all are HIV positive. Most, but not
all are on ARV treatment. Some are very sick, some look very well. Some are
children, some are partners, some are grandparents, and some are families.
family photo.
one of the incredible volunteers.
& her munchiken.
from house to house we go.
Once a month the beneficiaries receive supplies; like food supplements,
soap, paracetamol and moringa powder (made from this incredible tree in Malawi
which, if you believe the blurb, contains seven times the Vitamin C in
oranges, four times the calcium and two times the protein in milk, four times the
Vitamin A in carrots, and three times the potassium in bananas – and looks a little
bit like a packaged drug).
kiddo's.
way too adorable to handle.
.
I appreciated all the orange.
& his dancing.
& all the kids!
everything is possible with God!
Each week, those within the program are then visited by one of the incredible volunteers,
who sits with them, chats about how they’re going – provides any additional
medicinal support, like extra vitamins, additional nutrition, that kind of
thing – and then prays, and opens the Bible with them. It’s a way to meet both
physical and spiritual need, to offer encouragement, friendship, love and
support, in the understanding that true, real and everlasting HOPE can only
come through Christ. It’s people in the community reaching people in the
community. It’s tangible, practical, actual love (my beloved Galatians 5:6b!).
But I knew most of that before I came. And then there is Estere.
us.
At 6 years old she’d lost both her parents, and siblings to HIV. Now an
orphan, her health book states she’d been 'chronically ill since birth'.
Flipping through it briefly, it was full – tuberculosis, pneumonia, all sorts
of suffering. She’s 14, and well (relatively speaking) for the first time in
her life. Where at 14, I worried about rare pokemon cards and lip smackers, she
– clearly an incredible fighter, has gone through more then I can possibly
imagine. Shy and beautiful, she has very gentle eyes.
She wasn’t at school that
day because she had to take her monthly trip to the hospital for her cocktail
of HIV medications. She wore a T-shirt branded with the stripes and stars of
the USA.
I met another girl at 13, also in the program yesterday. She looked great
also. And, as Jacky – one of the missionaries here who heads up the HOPE for
AIDS Malawi programs - told me, it’s a shame that I don’t get to stay for
longer, to see the full ‘before and after’ effects that the Home Based Care
program can truly have. I met a young man for example whos entire face, upon
meeting him the first time, was covered in pussy, oozing, bulbous sores. Now,
he’s strong and able to go back to work.
walls & lives within them.
breath-taking.
I met a woman yesterday too, who
showed me the
scars on her arms. A history of a horrible, mystery skin condition that
covered
her entire body and caused her great pain, what they thought at one
point was
leprosy, now simply believed to be just another side effect of having
HIV.
Point being, with care and medication and greatly improved nutrition,
she got
well. There is hope, and healing and goodness; both in this life and the
next
everlasting.
she's a treasure.
the aftermath.
& with some of our wonderful volunteers!!
Reality is though, not every story goes like these. And in a country
where 1 in 7 are infected with the virus, it’s often awful and heart breaking
and real and overwhelming.
We went into one home, armed with nutritional
supplements and Vaseline, to visit Mary, a grandmother, and her 9-11 year old
grand-daughter (at a guess). Mary is, again at a guess, in her 70’s or 80’s,
she is incredibly frail and frighteningly thin. She is weak, exhausted, not
having the energy to pull herself up from the floor. There was great pain and
suffering in her eyes. She'd been vomiting all morning, and said she had no
appetite. Food makes her ill and upsets her stomach, a reality which makes her
increasingly thin, increasingly weak. Her mouth is full of ulcers, perhaps a
cancer, full of swelling either way, and swallowing, let alone talking or
drinking, is almost unbearably painful. And there her beautiful grand-daughter sat by her feet, in
an old worn school uniform, quiet and still – staring at me with those big,
brown eyes. Reality is that her grandmother, although this ill, although this
burdened, is the breadwinner of the family. It’s just the two of them. And by
breadwinner I mean that she has no choice but to make her way to the market
each morning, a feat in and of itself, and beg. There is no one else, there is
no alternative, and it breaks my heart.
please pray.
I too was talking to a doctor from
the UK last night, who is working in the local Government hospital. Not only
was she telling me about the horrendous working conditions, and the complete
absence of necessary medication – like insulin for example – but she asked me
if I, if we, could help. She has three brothers as patients, one in his early
twenties, one in his late teens, and one at school. AIDS orphans, the three of them
have been living together for some time – the oldest, now HIV positive, having been the breadwinner. However his
health has taken a major turn for the worse, and she suspects he has weeks,
maybe less, maybe more, to live. Problem being as part of his sickness he has
become paralyzed from the waist down, and his lower half is covered in large,
awful, un-treatable, weeping sores. He can not care for, let alone move,
himself any longer and thus the second brother now acts as his full time carer.
What then is the future for this family? Does the third brother, just a kid,
come out of school and get a job to feed them all? The doctor asked if we could
put them into our Home Based Care Program. There is so much need.
masterpieces.
This then is the reality of HIV. It too often effects and
kills the working and the strong, the parents, the breadwinners and the very
young and most vulnerable. It casts societies into turmoil, with grandparents
caring for young children, and siblings caring for one another. And in a
country where there is 1 doctor for every 50, 000 people, and where 75% of
hospital beds are taken up by patients with HIV, these types of situations – these
realities, are repeated, tragically, over and over and over again.
over & over & over
again.
My heart is (perhaps understandably?) all over the place this
week. I’ve been on just two morning visits, out of many that happen in several villages all over the place, each and every week here. I have been shocked by
the realities of this awful, living virus. But too, I have been encouraged
immensely by the work of HOPE for AIDs, bringing comfort, help, Truth, prayer
and value to people in need.
beloved.
The H in HOPE, a vital, important, encouraging, life-giving
ministry.
I have so much to be thankful for.
Praise be to
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us
new birth into a living
hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into
an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade – kept in heaven for you,
who through faith are shielded by Gods power until the coming of the salvation
that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 1 Peter 1: 3-5.
My Bible is full. Full like any other, with Truth and beauty, wisdom,
guidance, encouragement, challenges and the living word of God. But full also
with stuff, things of meaning – a documented journey of my love story with the
Big G. Photos, a leaf, outlines of talks, sermon notes, letters, cards, and
hand-scribbled bits of love and other pieces. As I was flipping through it this
morning I found a little something I had prepared in Papua New Guinea. It would
have been for one our ‘sharing sessions’; our mini church services which depending
on the village, had consisted of anything from singing, to full sermon, to
testimonies, to skits and on one memorable occasion – me falling into a human
sized hole. I would have delivered it after great prayer and very little
practice; a little message of encouragement to the village we were in.
told you.
it says 6.
apparently I can't count.
And anyway, something I had said struck out to me. You see, Yesu said
(Matthew 18:20), “for when two or three come together in my name, there am I
with them”. On my team in PNG was a Canadian, a New Zealander, a couple of
Australians, an American, a Scott (is that the right word for someone from
Scotland?) and a Swiss. And there we were in Papua New Guinea, the land of the
unexpected. A total of 7 nations represented, and what I had said was, ‘if
Jesus is present when two or three are gathered in His name, what happens when
seven nations gather?’ and I went on, I’m sure, to make some
profound point about purpose and meaning and the great will of our great God.
Home Based Care program.
& the village we visited.
walking from patient to patient.
& the greatest of these is love.
But I found myself sitting in a room, myself an Australian, with a
couple of Malawians, a Brit, and a man from Ethiopia, discussing HIV, Hope for AIDS, Orange HOPE, culture and about a thousand different sub topics. And it
made me think. I seem to find myself in lots of international situations,
working with different people, from different places – all over the world. I’m
in constant shock about how things can be so different, but equally also – how
they can be so similar. How some things are completely universal. How people
are people. I have best and dear and treasured friends all across this globe. I’ve
always had a thing about accents.
But anyway, we got talking about missions, and one truth stood out to
me. It is not about our abilities, as people or professionals, but our
availability. Missions is a labour of trust, trust in a living, good,
miraculous God.
There is so much need in this world. In each person, on each street, in
each community. Let alone city, country, continent. My own included, plus here.
Everywhere. The harvest is plentiful. And I really do think it comes down to
availability, it’s a heart issue.
village goodness.
snuck the orange HOPE bracelet in
took this by accident.
washing day.
mama.
unposed.
they were giggling at me.
favourite shot so far.
getting my Africa on.
bus n' brick.
A.E.C
How available am I to be used be God in whichever way He wants? Wherever
He wants?
The immigration lady in Johannesburg took my passport before looking at
me, she opened it and beamed in the way that only African women can, radiantly –
with impossibly white teeth. “You’re so pretty!” she said, before looking up at
me.
Which is good, because then everything changed. After 15 hours of
flying, at 1am in the morning my body’s time, no makeup, teeth un-brushed, hair
un-straightened, stressed (as the line had taken almost an hour and I was close
to missing my next and most crucial flight), I was certainly not at my best. I
probably smiled at her with plane breakfast still in my teeth and a bobbie pin
hanging half way down my neck. You could tell, the second she looked up at me,
she’d changed her mind. She honestly even added “in the photo” to her sentence,
before she stamped me into the country, and the continent I guess, and gave me
directions to flight number two.
Lining up in New York and talking to the South African Airways man, I
was ‘that person’ who held up the boarding line by saying that I was going to
Malawi. He told me I didn’t have a visa. I told him I didn’t need one. He told
me, with furrowed brow, that he would need to check. I was right (of course)
but not before a 5 minute hold up, a good 50 people grumbling behind me. The
guy up next asked if I was in the peace core. Because, why else, would you go to
Malawi right? I told him no. And nearly 18 hours later, I stepped off the plane
in Blantyre, into the sun, into the country, into Africa.
Things are exactly as I expected.
This is because I was expecting the unexpected, and had no idea what to
expect in the slightest. Sick of the word expect yet? Sounds odd when you type
it that many times. Like saying waffle over and over. Try it.
But, I have a fantastic house, which is not what I was expecting at all.
I won’t be here too often because I have a fairly structured schedule
(something else I wasn’t expecting), but here I have electricity (albeit
fluctuating). And a double bed. And internet. And a kitchen. And a flushing
toilet. And a heated shower. I have a night guard, but also vegemite toast. I
have shops just down the road, and a washing machine. In many respects this is
more luxurious then dorm life in Seattle.
So far I’ve been to church, met the other missionaries, been food
shopping and tried to sleep off my jetlag. To be fair, I’ve only been here 24
hours.
I’m not really sure how to feel. I’m excited. I’m comfortable. I’m
ready. I’m relieved to be done with flying for a while. I have a feeling this
is all going to go much too quickly. I don’t really know how to process
everything that’s going on in my life, and all that’s going to happen. And I’m
thriving off of a ‘take each day as it comes’ kind of mentality.
Language is hard. I wish I had more of a brain for it.
I need to read my Bible.
I read something today and I don’t know where, but it was about change
being possible. But only through seeking the right answer, for the right
reasons. The answer being Jesus. Yesu Khristu. I can think of a lot of things
in my life, my heart and my attitude that need to change, and I’m ready to find
that answer here, in this place.
