Imagine ...

One of the villages where we work is about thirty kilometers from the nearest road.  At this time of the year, it is wicked hot with short afternoon rainstorms and flash floods.   Within this village, much like many of the small communities in rural Malawi, life revolves around subsistence farming. 

Many families have a small plot of land.  Their entire year's food supply depends on one crop of corn.  The big rains came in November and December.  Right now, the corn is growing near it's mid to full height.   Harvest in about four to six weeks.  

Most of the families in this village are currently our or nearly out of food.

Generally, they live in small, one room structures with dirt or concrete floors.  Fires are used to cook - inside and outside their home.  Often, cloth thrown over the floor is used as a bed.  It is unusual for an individual to have more than one or two sets of clothes.  Shoes are a luxury.  Days are long.  Women work incredibly hard.  Water is often several kilometers away  Firewood and food are challenges each meal. 

Illness is common.  TB, HIV, Malaria, colds, coughs, and infections of other kinds seem to be daily partners for so, so many of the children and adults we work with.  

Last week, there were several cases of Cholera in this child's village.  A tent with an informal barrier to visitors was established near the tiny health center. 

My impression is that the community drives forward with each day.  There is no expectation that life will be radically different tomorrow.  Despite the hardships, one finds a deep sense of community and the type of joy and curiosity children display all over the world.  Culture and customs are strong.    

If you allow yourself to be touched, your heart is stretched.  One feels the deep sense of the many blessings so many of us experience, the unconscious benefits we hold each day in most of the world.  

Poverty is rough.  Solutions to many of these issues are complex.  Yet, there are bright moments.  In areas such as malnutrition, there are major breakthroughs and a sense of progress.    

I constantly feel humbled and encouraged by the experience of watching the doctors and nurses I am traveling with complete each day's clinic.  They are tireless, hopeful,  and committed.  

Even after screening and supporting three to five hundred children in a five to six hour period, they engage further outreach.  We often transport three to six children to the hospital at the end of a long, exhausting day.  

In Malawi, the caretaker and the child check in to the hospital together.  Often, a mother sleeps under the bed of the child.  The nutritional recovery units are packed.  Kids may need to stay for a week to several weeks to recover from crisis.  The great news is that with support and dense nutritional food supplements such as "Chiponde" (the food developed by the doctor I am working with, Dr. Manary), most children survive and move on to stable health.