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?