Malawi

From Lusaka we flew to Lilongwe, Malawi where we were met by Lackings Banda with a rental car. He led us to our motel where we ended up going to bed without supper because the electricity went out. The next morning we headed for Chisemphere, an extremely poor area, where Sinkhani (health workers) have been working for 17 years. We sat on rickety little benches in the corrugated tin roofed church while we visited and shared in a feast of shima, greens and chicken that they had prepared in the outdoor cooking hut. In spite of their own lack of resources, the Sinkhani pool funds and try to help at least one orphan at a time. They are also each donating 50 Kwacha per month (approximately $.37) into a Sinkhani banking account to pay for an as yet undetermined project. Over the past 3 years they’ve saved over 8,000 Kwacha ($59.00). They shared many stories about the power of Neosporin (as did all of the healthworkers). One of their latest patients was the chief of the village who had a large wound on the top of his foot that they were able to heal with the aid of Neosporin.

From Chisemphere we began the drive to Mzimba. We got within 35 kilometers of our destination when we blew a water hose, the car over heated, and we ended up stranded beside the road. Thank God for cell phones! We called Lackings and he scurried around, found another vehicle and a couple of mechanics, and 6 hours later came to our rescue. In the meantime we locked the car doors, hunkered down to wait, watched the sun go down, the night become pitch black, and lots of men come and go in a nearby ‘store’ that turned out to be the local tavern that sold homemade brew,. When our rescue crew finally arrived, the mechanics couldn’t fix the car on the spot so they ended up towing it to Mzimba. They didn’t have a tow rope – no problem; they just took the seat belts out of the car and made a tow rope! Lackings told us when he learned where we were stranded, he came as fast as possible since we were in an area notorious for robberies and people getting beat up. Very comforting!

The Sinkhani in Mzimba were waiting at the church the next morning to greet us. They too sang the praises of Neosporin. Esther said, “In cold months we make [wood] fires in our homes for cooking. Sometimes the small children are involved in accidents by the fire. The medicine helps so much. Many people come to us to say ‘thank you’.” The Sinkhani continue to volunteer on a weekly basis to weigh babies and teach mothers. Last year they weighed over 26,000 babies! Their big request is for money to buy uniforms. According to them, everyone that works in the health care system has uniforms except them. They calculated the cost and said it would be $121 for fabric and a tailor for the 13 uniforms they would like to have. After 17 years of volunteer work, a $9.30 uniform seems like a reasonable request! We’ll work it into next year’s budget.