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The Launch of Our Project - an Account of CHARM’s First Visit to Malawi
 Emily Clarke set off for Malawi on 11th March and arrived at Blantyre airport around 15 hours later. Here is her report from the trip.
It was an hour's drive to Mulanje down the M1 – a narrow tarmaced road. Once in Mulanje, we turned off onto a small mud track road and finally into the orphanage. As we pulled up, all the children ran outside and sang a song to welcome me.
The orphanage was much more modern than I had expected. There were three large buildings – an admin block, the chicken block and store and the main orphanage. The centre had cold running water and electricity – a luxury.
Saturday morning I started the day by playing with the children. I soon found myself playing netball – something I hadn’t done in about 15 years. Despite my lack of experience, I surprised myself by scoring three goals!! Playing with the children was fantastic although I did need to concentrate more than a normal game of netball as I had to remember where the invisible lines were and who were on my team as there were no vests!!
In the afternoon the children performed songs and dances for me and a couple of the teenagers acted out a play.
The next morning I chatted with a couple of the children. While breakfast was being prepared, I showed the children a colouring book and some crayons. After being shown how, the children took great joy in colouring the pictures. Gradually more and more children joined the colouring circle. Even boys as old as 15 were happy to sit there and colour.
On Monday, I spent most of the day with Mr Kalulu, our development worker. He signed his employment contract, officially making him an employee of CHARM. Mr Kalulu showed me all the work he had already done. He had spoken with over 400 people about the project and they had already put their names down, sorted themselves into groups and decided who would be the president and secretary in the groups. We wrote a letter to the chairman of each of the 8 orphanages informing them of meetings that would be held to tell the women more about the project.
The first meeting was at the Kumambwa Centre – the centre where I was staying. Around 50 women filled the room and Mr Kalulu addressed them telling them about the project. He then handed over to me. I introduced myself and told them how the project would work. Mr Kalulu translated for me. As this was the main centre, we decided that this should have one of the first loans, so we took a draw to find who would be the first group. The women asked lots of questions and they couldn’t believe that I had actually come. They sang as they were so happy. I filmed them and played it back to them. They were absolutely fascinated to see themselves on film.
In the afternoon, David drove Mr Kalulu and I to the Gulumba Centre for the second meeting. When we arrived the women had lined the street. They were singing for us and they followed the truck up the dirt track and back to the orphanage. They got chairs out for me and Mr Kalulu to sit on. They sat on the floor.
On Wednesday we conducted two more meetings: Namijingo in the morning and Mwamadi in the afternoon. These centres each gave me a ‘tribe name’. Namijingo called me ‘Nagama’ and Mwamadi called me ‘Nambewe’. After the meeting in the afternoon, I presented the children at the Mwamadi orphanage with a football, Frisbee and a cricket set. I had to show them how to use the Frisbee and cricket set. The Frisbee was very easy, but I think I made up some of the rules for cricket!!
We called a meeting on Friday morning to draw which two other centres would receive the loans. One representative from each centre attended the meeting. The names were put in a hat and Namijingo and Kadewere centres were chosen.
Mr Kalulu and I then took a walk to the local primary school. We took a football and a netball for the children. We went into the headmaster's office and almost immediately he took all of the children out of their classes and called a full school assembly, just so I could talk to the children. I presented the two balls to them and they all cheered and sang. They had a tournament that afternoon and the balls were very important to them.
When school resumed, we went into a maths class and an agriculture class and listened to their lessons. The older children got classrooms inside, the younger ones sat outside. Some got benches and a desk, but most of them sat on the floor. There were no resources other than a blackboard and chalk.
When I got back to the orphanage I was interviewed by a journalist who went on to write an article for the Malawian News about CHARM.
On Monday we visited two more centres: Mikoko and Kadewere. We also revisited Namijingo so we could draw for the group to receive the loan. The third and final draw took place at Kadewere.
Tuesday was one of the happiest days for the women. We had a ceremony to give out the loans. The three groups arrived and we spoke to them about how to repay the loans and how to look after their businesses. Each lady then signed a contract – some of whom had never lifted a pen before. We then distributed the money to each of the women. They could not believe it. There was singing and dancing and drum playing. It was such a fantastic atmosphere and everybody was so very, very happy. |
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