Most of my day was rather mundane. In the morning I slashed for about an hour (I still don’t know how those guys do it all day long) before it started to rain. I then went to the Junior Secondary School and covered textbooks for most of the rest of the day. So work-wise, it was a rather humbling day. In the mid-afternoon, one of the national teachers, Lancaster, came by to help me. He teaches Chichewa (one of the national languages of Malawi, along with English) and Bible to the girls. When I told him that I was in medical school, he said that Malawi has a shortage of doctors. This confirms my impressions from my trip to the Mzuzu hospital yesterday. Lancaster has a son who just finished high school with high marks, and he has applied to the one medical training school in the country. Admissions is very competitive which makes sense if there is only one medical school for the nearly 14 million people living here. Still, it’s a tough way to meet the medical demand of the country.
From about 3:30 to 4:45 I played with a bunch of the children at the village playground. Even though my time with the kids has been limited to mostly meals and playtime, they have no reservations about using me as part of the play equipment. That’s something I’ll really miss: tons of kids who want to be around me and play with me just because I’m there. They have a great joy about them, even though they all come from broken homes. But God has used Rafiki to pick up the broken pieces of all these families and put together a beautiful mosaic. I pray that these children and mamas will be real families for each other for the rest of their lives. The need for family doesn’t stop once one reaches the age of 20, 40, 60…
One of the girls from Mama Rose’s house (where I shared in devotions last night) asked me to come back to their table to eat dinner. How could I refuse? They tested me to see if I could remember their names, and I failed miserably. But we went over all of them again, and I think I got it down: Caroline (one of the older girls in the village, with a wise face), Ruth (BIG smiles from a little girl), Fiskane (pronounced fis-KAH-nee), Joseph (who finally gave me a smile tonight!), Judith (perhaps the cutest little girl in the village, although there are a lot of cute children here), Emily (also very young and very sweet), Rachel (didn’t finish her milk), Spencer (5 years old and actually one of the first two children in the village), Christopher (already getting his adult teeth, which he shows often with his smiles), and Ethel. This last girl was the one to invite me back to their table tonight, and she gave me her necklace that she got earlier that day in school. (All of the Standard 1 children received necklaces of yarn with a glow-in-the-dark cross pendant!) She said I could give it back to her tomorrow. I’m glad that I was able to have a little more time with these children. Last night during devotions they all seemed to have a slightly sad quality about them, but tonight they were very cheerful. They especially liked all the funny faces that I make for them—something that has always broken the ice during my time here. Nick DelVillano may be the shining star trumpet-playing uncle, but I make the best funny faces!
The end of my trip has kind of snuck up on me. I only have two more days here, and one of those days will be largely spent packing and buying a few more souvenirs. Lord, in the time I have left, please put a lasting impression of this place and these people on my heart.
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