Assumptions

Today, there is another voice that you read. Hans wants to share some of his thoughts.


My son once told me that I should not ‘assume’ anything. As in the modern vernacular it may turn out to make an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’. Even after having spent over a year in Africa I still find myself assuming things. One of the most striking is that any kind of planning or thinking that I do might not apply, be relevant, be of concern to or even assist in the assumed progress of Africa. Take for example when we have a Food for Work program which is currently underway. Charts on what is growing where, how much, the time of planting, fertilizing, weeding, and expected harvest seem simple enough to capture on a document that might reflect the goals for the FFW. Life is not a simple straight line. The earth is round. It took mankind even a while to get rid of the flat earth assumption.

So the written, bureaucratic, non-African in some places, is not as easily constructed as one might like. Should it be? We forget the reality of just living, having enough concerns about what will my family eat today or why is my child sick and the hospital so far away or why are the FFW field so distant from my village?

The best way to overcome assumptions of course is to live beside someone or work with someone or dialogue intentionally with someone. Not a perfect method but at least there is a sharing to overcome the mis-understanding that people are either lazy, don’t want to do it, cannot get it, don’t appreciate what you do, are not smart enough, etc!

Village life is different. Distances to and from ‘your’ garden, to the water supply, to any kind of market, to school, to a hospital, even to church are significant. Significant because most of it is done on foot often without shoes. Here we arrive with the large SUV able to move mountains. Drink coca-cola whenever we want. Seem to have an endless supply of money to pay for things like seed, fertilizer, tools, storage facilities, etc. What do they assume about me? There is a challenge to find a middle road, a way to walk together to share and know that we are together or as one villager reflected “you have sympathy with us”. Does God have sympathy with us?

Enjoy some pics of the village life. Take them for what they are. Another person’s life, simple, often struggling, rejoicing and celebrating life just as we do before God’s grace.





The granery where the cobs of maize are kept.



Such a hospitable family who showed us the hard work done in the gardens.



The proud farmers in the soya bean garden.



Maize and relish drying in the sun for future use. The relish is tomatoes and pumpkin leaves.

Dreams of the Poor.

When we first came to Malawi, we were asked “what does poverty look like in Malawi?

We can see the young boys everyday hanging out by the grocery store in their tattered clothing, bare feet and always with their hands stretched out as you come along. Everyday we see the young boy leading the blind man in amongst the traffic also with his hand out. Everyday the same woman with her baby on her back meets us as we walk into town with her hand out, pointing to her baby and gesturing that she needs food. And more women, boys and men, old, young, are all at their own place along our walk into town. Everyday we see the disabled on the ground dragging themselves along as the traffic of cars and people pass by. Yes, this is extreme poverty staring us straight in the face each and everyday. This is what poverty does to many people. Their only way to get a little is to beg for it. They cannot find another way. This has nothing to with self-worth as it only has to do with survival.

Then we go to the villages and where there is singing and dancing when the food aid is brought in. But it is time to have conversations with the beneficiaries. What is your life like? What are your hopes and dreams? Mary’s husband has left to go into the city, never to return leaving his wife and eight children between the ages of six and twenty. When her garden’s harvest runs out she gathers and sells firewood to buy food. Her children cannot go to secondary school even if she has been able to scrape together the school fees because they don’t have proper clothes and have no food. She dreams for her children to get an education and for her family to have enough food all year around.

I meet Sosage who is a widow 58 years old, still has four children at home and five grandchildren from her eldest who has passed away. She too does piecework, gathering and selling firewood to buy food whenever she can. She shares that she would be dead if it wasn’t for the food aid. She shares how weak three of her grandchildren were that she thought they too would die. A kind CDF gave her a blouse to wear and another gave her a chitenja. Her simple dream but a dream it is, is to have food and clothes for her family. When one has so little the dreams seem so little too.

And then there is Margret, a warm, kind woman. She had a job in the city as a home craft worker. She lost it when the new government came in and abolished that department. Not that she was making enough income, not nearly enough. Even with her husband’s small salary as a market fee collector they had a difficult time feeding their six children. And then her husband was killed by a car as he walked along the road one evening. She had no choice but to go back to her village where she was given one and a half acres to farm. Her home is tiny with a grass roof, everyone sleeps on straw mats and four young orphans came to live with the family when her sister died leaving the children alone. Her husband’s village is helping her eldest go to driving school not that they might have a car but that he might be able to become a driver. At times her church is able to provide some funds to allow her two daughters to go to secondary school. What happens during the hunger months? Cooked green bananas and mangoes make up the one daily meal. Food aid was God’s blessing during this difficult time. Margret worries for her children. They must get an education and leave the village. She dreams of a little bigger house with iron sheets for the roof so that eleven people could be a little more comfortable and dry.

Why are the dreams of the poor so difficult to realize?

A Holiday in Cape Town

Because of visa rules we needed to leave Malawi for a while and so we have taken a week and are now in Cape Town, South Africa. What a shock to the system! We know there is poverty and hardship in this country as well but the places we have seen show little of that. The sun shines brilliantly in the blue skies, the mountains are so impressive, the ocean a beautiful turquoise and the history leaves such a powerful story. The shops, the malls, the restaurants, the wine are all so plentiful! It is baffling how this large continent is of such extremes!



But it is a holiday for us and we are enjoying the V&A waterfront, standing at the Cape of Good Hope, going up to the magnificent Table Mountain, enjoying the fine foods and drink. We have learned so much about the difficulties and struggles that apartheid caused and how painful and yet how valiantly the human rights issues has been and still is being fought. We heard the stories when we visited Robben Island from our guide, a former prisoner because of his activism but who still avocates for proper housing, good education, health care for the poor in South Africa.

We are still here for a few days and will continue to explore and become refreshed to continue our work in Malawi.