Day 7 (Friday September 7th)
The next African Enterprise (AE) mission in Malawi will be held in Dowa at the beginning of October 2012. I got the privilege of travelling to Dowa to meet 13 of the pastors and reverends of the area who are collaborating together for the mission in October. However, out of respect for the pastors, Enoch advised me to wear a skirt. On our way to the office, we stopped by his house so that I could borrow a wrapper skirt from his wife Dorothy. When we got to the office we had to wait quite a while for the car (we were down by one as the pick-up truck was in Malingunde with the foxfires for the HIV/Aids program.) While we were waiting, Mrs Nyasulu taught me how to put the wrapper on. It's essentially the same as wrapping a towel around your body!
Finally it was time to go, but Enoch didn't come with us. He had to travel up to Blantyre for the weekend to attend his nephew's wedding. We wouldn't be seeing him again so we had to say our goodbyes then. Enoch had really touched me during the week with his kindness and his big heart so it was hard saying goodbye. Well, off we went with Pastor Abel Sauti-Phiri to Dowa. After I got out the car, I put my wrapper on and we walked down to the house where all the reverends and pastors were waiting for us.
The meeting started off with introductions followed by one of the reverends explaining what missions they have already done, what they are expecting to do and what difficulties they've had such as lack of resources. Then some of the other pastors spoke a bit about the need for protected water in Dowa and expressing their thanks for the shallow wells that Belgium are providing in their area. However, shallow wells, though better, are not as protected as boreholes and require quite a lot of manual labour in actually retrieving the water. They also explained that the villages are very large and up to as many as 400 families would be using one well.
After they had spoken, it was mine and Lynn's turn to say something. I was so thankful that Lynn went first because I had no idea of what to say! I mean here I was, an 18 year-old girl having to say something to 13 esteemed reverends and pastors! Lynn started talking about the various mission trips she's been on but also about the importance of reaching out to the youths of Lilongwe and Dowa by going out to where they are. They have to go out to the nightclubs and pubs to reach out to the youth because they won't come to church. So this was a good point for me to pick up on.
As a teenager myself, I know what it's like to be a young person in today's world. I explained a bit about how the number of Christians in Europe is fading, to the point that out of 90 students in my year group only 5 are Christians. I urged Lynn's point about going out to where the youth are. The youth are the next generation of pastors and reverends so it is very important to reach out to them. When I finished they were all very quiet so I got a bit nervous! However, one of them asked me how do I stay strong in my faith when I am clearly in the minority and there is such a large number of non-Christians? I explained that God had given me the 'gift' of being very stubborn! But that also there are many Christian youths who really struggle and quite a number of my friends had fallen away from God. Lynn likes to say that I preached to the pastors!
After we had shared some refreshments together, we all went our separate ways. Two of the pastors came with us in the car to drive us to a site where one of the shallow wells is to be dug.
We had to park at the edge of the village because the car couldn't go any further. We walked for about 15 minutes and on the way the village chief showed us where they get their current drinking water from. I was horrified! The water was so dirty and unprotected. I was really shocked when I saw that.
We carried on walking up to the site and came to a field that looked very dry. They explained to us that this was where the well was going to be dug. I thought it couldn't be possible because all the crops and weeds looked completely dead so how could there possibly be water here. They explained that the water table in that field was close to the surface so would be perfect for the well. You could see it in the colour of the sand and dust too. It was a lot darker than the other areas around and the plants and leaves growing nearby are green, which is an indication of the water table being closer to the surface. We also got to meet the owner of the field.
After this we got back in the car and drove to another village for lunch. One of the pastors we were with, Pastor Caesar Nkhoma, is the reverend of a baptist church and one of the elders of his church invited us to lunch at his house. They prepared some chicken, rice, Msina and vegetables. The people who live in the villages are very proud of their homes and you can see it in the way that they decorate them. Even though the house was small and quite old, it was filled with nice furniture and various materials. There were curtains hung over the walls to give some colour and to make visitors feel comfortable and at home. They look very homely actually and really personal with all the photos etc. After lunch, it was finally time to start heading home.
It was actually quite a long journey home and the day had also been quite tiring so we couldn't help but fall asleep in the car. We got home quite early, around fourish, and thought that it would be a long evening because there's not much to do. Lynn knitted another scarf (she's knitted so many scarves this week! About one a day!) But we soon got chatting about EVERYTHING so time ended up flying by! We'd eaten so much during the week that we didn't even have dinner! In Malawian culture, they see it as quite rude if you don't eat with them so you always have to eat something, even if it's just one spoonful. But overall it was a really good day. One thing that really stood out and that I still think stands out the most was how poor the village with the well was but how much beauty there was too.
