"Does it ever make you discouraged, when you work so hard in your program, only to see the infection rates stay the same or in some cases go up", I asked Angela, my guide for the day. Angela Chipeta is a young Malawian, enthusiastic about her job as a project coordinator for a Denmark-sponsored program on HIV/AIDS. "No", she replied. "It only makes me want to work harder"!

As Kingston drove us out to the district where her projects were located, I asked her many questions. "Is it that the people don't know about the dangers of HIV and how it is transmitted, or is it that they know but find it hard to make changes in their behavior"? "People know", she said. "You would be surprised! We could stop this vehicle right now and ask the first person that we met to tell us everything that they knew about HIV and AIDS, and you would be amazed at how much information that they would be able to tell you. It is more that people are in denial that anything bad could happen to them. They see their friends and family members sick, they go to the funerals and they feel bad, but the next day they go on with their lives in the usual way".

Change is hard. It is especially hard in Africa, where culture and poverty have such a powerful influence on people's behavior. In some villages where ADRA works, for example, it is considered an "offensive transgression of tradition" for a woman to refuse any man who approaches her for sex. It does not matter if she is married or not, or who is doing the asking, tradition demands that she oblige the request. Some HIV transmission happens even without sex. Even though some village elders will tell you that they have long ago given up initiation rites that have the potential to transmit HIV, when you investigate close enough you discover that the practices are still done. But perhaps the greatest reason that the problem of HIV/AIDS has not gone away in Africa is poverty. Some have even claimed that the real case of AIDS is poverty. People in poverty can know everything about HIV, but still engage in high-risk behavior, either for diversion or as a matter of survival. A disease that has the potential to kill in ten years means nothing to someone who needs something to eat today.

It is because of this that programs that work with HIV/AIDS have begun to change. Today, a good program on AIDS not only does education and awareness about HIV, but also informs about the vital importance of getting tested, living responsibly with HIV, women's rights, support groups, and properly caring for the infected in the village. It also establishes programs that care for the orphans in the village. It provides skills training and small loans to help people break free from the desperation of poverty.

I was delighted to see that Angela's program in Malawi was doing all of these things. The community based organizations that she has organized in the villages, form powerful bodies that influence change. Beyond education, they establish a strong solidarity group that provides advocacy for orphans, widows and gender rights. They encourage people to get tested. They put them in touch with the drugs that are available that will help extend their life, available for free in Malawi. They visit the HIV positive to make sure that they are taking the drugs properly and regularly. They teach how to care for the infected in ways that prevent the infection from spreading to the care giver. They make sure that the orphans of AIDS are protected, cared for and empowered with skills training on top of going to school. During our day it was wonderful to visit two workshops were young people were learning to be tailors and carpenters.



With their skills to keep them busy and self reliant, with their knowledge of HIV and AIDS, with the strength and protection that they can receive from their advocacy groups, and with the guidance of programs like ADRA and workers like Angela, perhaps there is hope after all, in the fight against HIV/AIDS. At the end of the day, I determined that I wanted to be like Angela, and instead of becoming discouraged with the statistics, only be inspired to work harder!

"If it was possible for me to walk to Australia, I would walk there, just so that I could thank the people for all the help that they have brought to our village. But since it is not possible, please take my words to them".

"We used to work huge sections of land and harvest very little, but now that ADRA has come and taught us, we grow our food on small plots of land and harvest very much!"

These were just some of the comments that I heard in the villages today.

When Winston Chikopa met me at my hotel and told me that he would be showing me the SAFARI project I was not sure what to expect. Was ADRA Malawi helping the local people learn how to make money in the tourism industry? Would I be spending the day filming leopards and elephants? Winston quickly set me strait. SAFARI stands for Southern Africa Food security and AIDS Response Initiative, funded by the government of Australia.


Over the years, since ADRA and other Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), have been doing development work, much has been learned about how to conduct successful programs that bring about positive and lasting changes in the lives of poor people. There once was a time when NGOs would drop into a village, drill a well, install a pump and go home patting themselves on the back for doing such a good work. While the new well in a village was an excellent idea and brought with it the potential of improving lives, it often caused new problems and quickly failed. The women of the village suddenly had 5 or 6 extra hours in the day with nothing to do. A big part of their culture had been suddenly removed with nothing to replace it. Within six months the pump may fail and the people would wait for the NGO to come back and fix their pump.

The next time an NGO showed up at the village with a new idea to help the village, the chief may not be so receptive.

The SAFARI program is a perfect example of how far the field of development has come in just 30 years. Today, a well is rarely drilled as a stand alone project. It is usually only one very small component of a large, integrated program of community-based improvements that bring about positive changes in the lives of the people. Today the new well is followed up with latrines, health education, agricultural training, small business management classes, small loans to help people start their own businesses.

Of course the only real way for programs like these to succeed is when the people at the local level are on board. They need to not only agree to be helped, they need to sing on. It is only as the people agree to bring their own assets to the program and form a partnership with the NGO that they will build personal ownership, and then work hard themselves to make sure that the program succeeds.

This is what SAFARI has done. The initiatives of the program are so extensive that the only way it could possibly reach it's goals is to set up an extensive volunteer network in the villages. In each of the 65 villages that SAFARI is working ADRA has worked together with the Headperson (or Chief) of the village to establish community based organizations or CBO's. Five representatives from each village are sent to ADRA workshops where they learn many things that can bring positive improvements to their villages. They learn from the latest research on agriculture on what seeds and methods can bring the greatest harvest from their soils and growing conditions. They learn about the importance of balanced diets and good nutrition. They receive new information on health and sanitation, and what they can do to avoid malaria, diarrhea and other killer diseases. They have open and candid discussions relating to the issues of HIV and AIDS and the importance of every member of the village going in for "Voluntary Counseling and Testing" or VCT. They also teach them ways that they can develop and strengthen the CBO in their village into a powerful co-operative where the resources of the community can come together with the inputs of the SAFARI program to provide a new dynamic association that can benefit everyone in the village, especially the most vulnerable.

The ultimate goal of every responsible development program and NGO is to progressively make it self obsolete. The SAFARI project will work with these 65 villages for a period of five years, at which time it is hoped that the CBO in each village has become so self reliant that they no longer need ADRA's help to continue. Already, after only a year and a half, amazing progress is evident. The maize is high and the death rates are low! One lady told us, with excitement in her voice, how she had made enough money to build a nice new brick house after just one year of growing cabbages, "the ADRA way".

As we entered the last village, members of the local CBO were there waiting for us and as we piled out of our vehicle they greeted us with dancing and singing. In any culture, change can be hard. It can be difficult to lay aside the traditions of your ancestors and adopt the ways of strangers. I applaud the way that these people have been so willing to embrace change, and it was such a pleasure for me to see the excitement and thankfulness in their faces, at the way their lives have improved. Truly, they had something to dance about!

What takes two men to lift but only one woman to walk away with? Answer: a fifty kilogram sack of maize. I was very impressed as I watched these amazing ladies walk away from the ADRA emergency food distribution center with these heavy sacs of corn on their head, often with a baby strapped to their back.

Food distribution is a delicate matter. As development and relief organizations have discovered over the years, the very last thing that you want to do is flood a country with free food. It disrupts the local markets, devastates the income of local farmers, and makes some of the local people dependant on handouts of food. But, there are times when it becomes necessary.

In many parts of Africa there is what is called the "hunger season". This is the time from when last year's harvest has runs out to the time of the next harvest. Depending on how much land a family has, how good the yields have been, and how many mouths there are to feed, this hunger season typically lasts two or three months every year. If the crops fail due to a lack of rain, this hunger season is dramatically increased! If there is a complete failure, as was the case for many families in Malawi last year, it means that without help from the outside, your family would go for about 14 months without food. This is the stuff that famines are made of and how many children can die.

Fortunately for Malawi, aid agencies like ADRA have been monitoring the situation in Malawi and have come to the assistance of hungry people. Since October of last year ADRA has been involved in supplying maize to about 3000 households.

Today it was my privilege to observe that kind of love and service. Kingston picked me up at my hotel and we were then joined by Yetunde Odeyemi, the wife of the country director, and two other ADRA workers. They wanted to show me what it was like in the rural villages so they took me out to observe a distribution that was taking place today in the mountains close to the border of Mozambique. In fact, while we were traveling there we took a road that was the border between the two countries. I don't know if the boarder was in the center of the road or not, but if it was, then Kingston, my driver, was in Mozambique and I was in Malawi as we traveled along!

The vilagers were already waiting as we pulled into the community center of the district. Once we got set up, the people, mostly women, lined up and came through with their ration cards. One by one they filed past, signing and pressing their finger print on a space on their card to show that they had been there to receive this month's rations.

Shortly after this the truck arrived and I watched as the men struggled with the heavy sacs as they took them off the back. In my mind I wondered how the people were going to get the food home. I didn't see any wheel burrows, donkeys, or ox carts. There were a few bicycles lying around, but not enough to help everyone back to their home with the heavy sacs. Well, they will probably divide up the contents into several bags before they go, I thought. But then as the first lady in line got her bag I stood in shock as I watched two men struggle to get the bag on top of her head, only to then see here walk away with the heavy burden, apparently with ease. I could not have imagined it to be possible!

With only about 50 families in the village receiving the rations, the distribution went quick and soon it was all over. But, before we left for Blantyre, the group granted me a special request. I wanted to see a demonstration of how a typical family would use the maize. Obliging my never ending curiosity about the customs and culture of the people in the countries that I visit, they took me to a typical home and I watched as the family prepared the meal in the traditional way.

The end product looked a little thicker then the grits that I eat at home in Collegedale, but in many ways very similar! As there were many mouths to feed and very little in the pot, I did not ask to try a sample.

Waving goodbye we headed back out on the road to make the three hour journey back to Blantyre. As we traveled it began to rain and as it did I noticed the smiles of the people that we passed on the road. No doubt they are happy to stand out in the rain, because it means that this year, the hunger season may not be so long!

I could tell right away that Marcelino believed passionately in the work that he is doing for the poor of Malawi. A native of Portugal, educated in Denmark, Marcelino has come to Malawi to be the project coordinator of a unique food security program that he helped design for the people of Malawi when he worked for ADRA Denmark.

As we drove out to the villages, he began to explain the rational for his approach to food security.

"According to UNICEF", he said, "Children fall into malnutrition under a combination of three factors.


1. The do not have adequate nutritional intake. The parents may be too poor to provide food, crops may have failed, last year's harvest has run out, or they may simply not know enough about enough about nutrition and the importance of balanced diets.
2. Parents in poverty may be so busy with the tasks of daily survival that they may not have the time or energy to prepare regular meals for the children.
3. The various diseases that tend to orbit around poverty, such as diarrhea, can make it very difficult for the body to absorb what little nutrition is given.

These three factors can easily combine to form a 'deadly cocktail' that often take the life of a child. In order to develop a comprehensive food security program you need to come with more then just seeds and a little agricultural instruction. You need to address all of the factors that lead to malnutrition and provide solutions. For example, if the parents are spending most of their day walking great distances to collect water, you need to provide a clean source of water close to their village as part of the food security program. If you see that there are no latrines in the village, you need to include a sanitation component to you food security plan. By freeing up time for food production and preparation, by reducing the incidence of diarrhea with sanitation and a convenient source of pure water you create an environment where families can escape the factors that lead to malnutrition.

Add to this a health education component, agricultural training, special seeds, and nutrition classes on how to ensure a balanced diet for optimal nutrition and you then have an integrated program that we hope will be successful".


Marcelino's enthusiasm was infectious and I was eager to visit one of the villages where his program was being conducted. Before reaching the village we stopped at a regional ADRA office to pick up the local program leader.

Many people in Malawi have unique names that are easy to remember. Blessing, Innocent, Faith, and Cosmos are some of the people that I have met since coming here. But our new passenger's name topped the list for me. Memory grasped my hand and shook it with enthusiasm. Later in the day I asked her about her name. "Do you spell it like the English word memory", I inquired? "Yes", she replied. "It is also the meaning - hard to forget". It suited her. Memory has a dynamic personality with a distinctive, commanding voice. She would act as our translator for the day.



Yoyola is a small village tucked away into a remote area north of Blantyre. The project is targeting 50 families in 48 different villages. By first building a relationship with the chief or headman of the village, and getting his approval and cooperation in the project, ADRA has been able to quickly gain the confidence of the people and they are participating with dedicated interest and enthusiasm. As we pulled into the village and stepped out of the vehicle, we were greeted by a group of women performing a traditional African welcome. Babies strapped to their backs they formed a snaking line that slowly made its way toward us as they clapped their hands and filled the air with a beautiful African song of welcome. I am not sure what the words were but the smiles on their faces told us that they were happy to receive us! After their song, they all took a seat on the ground, while the "dignitaries" sat on chairs under a tree and the speeches began. I don't think that Memory's translation of the villagers words was at all embellished. The expressions in their faces convinced me of their deep felt gratitude for all that ADRA was doing in their village. The chief of the village and others spoke eloquently about the program in a way that convinced me that they not only grateful but had signed on as enthusiastic partners.


Development is all about positive change, and that is clearly happening in the village of Yoyala. As we visited the fields and homes of the people, as I watched them drink in every word the educators said, it was evident that they were embracing the new information that they were receiving from ADRA and it was going to change their lives and the lives of the babies strapped to their back.

The food security program will work in their village for another two and a half years at which time it is hoped that they will become self sufficient in their new knowledge and they will have made changes that will infect other villages in their area to adopt their new practices.


The tee-shirt on one of the volunteers said, "Breaking the evil cycle of food insecurity". With the information, tools, seeds and support that ADRA has brought to these villagers, I believe that this dream will come true for the people of Yoyola. It was hard to say goodbye. I hope that I can one day visit this village again and see the transformation complete, the cycle of hunger forever broken.

Even after eight hours of sleep, I woke up this morning feeling like I had been hit by a freight train. Rapidly repositioning yourself on the planet can do that to you. Some say it is a result of your body trying to get use to a new time zone, where day is night and night is day. Others point to the tremendous dehydration your body goes through in flight- if that is the case I would not want to ever work in the airline industry. Still others say that your body needs to adjust to it's new position, relative to the magnetic poles and other mysterious earth forces. Whatever the cause, jet lag is real, and it is hitting me hard on this trip. Probably being awake for as long as I had been did not help.

I took breakfast at my hotel and then gathered my cameras together for the 8:00AM pickup from the ADRA driver. I spent an hour or so meeting all the staff at the ADRA Malawi office and getting briefed by the country director, Tayo Odeyemi on the impressive program that ADRA is administrating in Malawi. Food security, HIV/AIDS education, water and sanitation, health, mother and child survival, the usual things that ADRA does in so many countries throughout the world. But what was not usual, and what seemed to be the largest program that they were currently managing was emergency food distribution to families suffering from last years drought. With this year's crop not ready yet for at least another month, people are still suffering from the crop failure during last year.

After meeting a few more people and going over a few more plans and details, we were finally out for our day of shooting. Kingston, my driver pointed the ADRA vehicle down a beautiful road that he called the valley of pineapples and bananas. But the first thing that I noticed was the hills that seemed to stretch out forever, all planted in tea. In many of the fields, workers were scattered among the bushes, baskets on their backs, picking tea. They get paid a set amount for every basket that they bring in, but Kingston was not able to tell me how much. I am interested to find out if the pay has improved since the last time that I was in Malawi. At that time, in 1997, tea pickers made about 10 to 12 dollars/month. Not a lot for, back breaking work in the hot sun.

But today's agenda was not the plight of the tea pickers. We were heading out to visit one of the many regions where ADRA Malawi conducts an HIV/AIDS program. While we do not hear too much about HIV and AIDS in Canada and the US, it continues to be a huge problem in many poor countries of the world. Hardest hit is Africa, where HIV infection rates can be as high as 30%, and millions have died leaving a wake of personal devastation for surviving children and family members. HIV and AIDS is so much at the surface of thinking in Africa that it changes the way people have conversations. When you hear someone say, "she's positive" they are probably not talking about an optimistic personality. They are saying that she has tested positive for HIV. One of the most common events in Malawi and most African nations is the funeral. In most cases the person has died of AIDS.

Dominated by the beautiful and massive Mulanje mountain, Thembe, the region we were visited, is rich in agriculture. We stopped at a roadside stand and purchased some of the local product, five pineapples and a couple of bunches of bananas. "Much cheaper here then in Blantyre", Kingston said. I promptly sampled one of the bananas. If you have never eaten a banana freshly picked, you have not really eaten a banana. One of the joys of travel is to sample products in the countries where they are actually grown. The flavors are overwhelming!

At one of our stops we picked up Andiyesa Mhango, the ADRA project director for the HIV/AIDS program for the Thembe district. She would take us out and show us some of the work that ADRA was doing at the local level. Our first stop was to see a program where volunteers from local villages, trained by ADRA, care for those who are sick from their HIV infection. The ADRA training that they receive prepares them to not only treat the various illnesses that a person with HIV is likely to get, but also how to deal with the social and emotional needs of the patient and family members. We picked up two of the village volunteers and proceeded a short distance down the road to stop and meet a "client".

Angela is 10 years old. Her parents and sister died of AIDS when she was about three years old. She is being raised by her grandmother. This brave little girl is a survivor! No one knows precisely when Angela became HIV positive but it probably happened while her parents were still alive. That means that she has been living with this killer virus in her body for at least seven years. When she feels well enough, she attends school and helps her grandmother around the house. When she is sick, she stays at home and rests. The ADRA volunteer workers that come to her house care for her, teach her grandmother all that they know about HIV, and how to care for the rashes and infections. They teach her about the importance of proper diet as well as how to care for Angela without getting infected herself.


With the drugs that Angela is receiving from the Global Fund and National AIDS commission, and the local support that she is receiving from the ADRA program, there is a good chance that she will survive many more years. Hopefully long enough to see the day when a cure is discovered and this horrible disease is eradicated for ever.


From our visit with Angela we went on to the local school where we were treated to a display of AIDS awareness education that ADRA volunteers conduct regularly at all of the schools, churches and village squares in the area. Slowly but surely the word about the dangers of HIV and how it is transmitted are getting through to young people throughout Malawi, thanks in a great part to ADRA.

Our final stop of the day was at a training center for AIDS orphans. This is a huge problem throughout Africa. When parents die from AIDS, what happens to the children? Who protects and works the family plot of land? Who makes sure that there is enough to eat in the house? Who pays for the uniforms, books and school supplies so that the children can stay in school? Who makes sure that the child receives the life skills that they will need to survive? ADRA is addressing this problem by engaging local volunteers to teach the "AIDS orphans", as they are called, income generating skills so that they will eventually be able to become financially independent. Some learn to sew, others learn carpentry, bricklaying, or how to run a small business.


What a wonderful sight it was to see how the local people of Thembe were taking care of their own people who have been hit so hard with this disease. At the shop where we stopped, boys and girls were learning the skill of making clothes, something that will be able to feed them for life!

We made it back to Blantyre about 7:00PM where I collapsed in my small hotel room, but not before cutting up one of the pineapples that we had bought in the market. I don't think that I have ever tasted anything so sweet!

Collegedale, Tennessee is about a two hour drive from Atlanta, Georgia, where I usually begin my international adventures. Traveling on KLM, it was a 8 hour flight to Amsterdam where I changed planes for another 8 hour flight to Nairobi, Kenya. Even though Kenya was not my destination, Nairobi is a good place to get connecting flights to other major centers in Africa. Unfortunately my layover in Nairobi was an awkward 12 hours. Too long to hang around an aging airport yet hardly long enough to be worth the expense involved for the visa, taxis and hotel for the short amount of sleep one would get. By the time I got settled in it would almost be time to make my way back to the airport. I had seen sleeping rooms at this airport the last time I had come through and was hopeful that I may be able to secure one of these rooms. Unfortunately, they were all taken by the time I made it in at 9:00PM and I realized I was going to have to have to do the best I could at whatever I could find in the airport. After making several inquiries, I was delighted when Kenya Airways was kind enough to let me into their "premium lounge", based on my gold member status with one of their partner airlines, Delta. Here I was able to curl up in a corner with out too much danger of any of my gear being stolen while I dozed. I managed to get some sleep in the lounge that is I did until the rowdy group from the 4:00AM flight from Bangkok stormed the room, turned on the lights, and proceeded visiting loudly. There was no sleeping after that.

My thoughts began to turn toward my destination. Malawi has long been called "the warm heart of Africa." It gains that reputation not only from the weather, beautiful scenery, and location in the continent, but also from the friendliness of the people. It has been nearly 10 years since my last visit to Malawi but I still recall the warm reception that I received and the friendly smiles of the people.

Too bad friendliness could not be cashed in for wealth and prosperity. A landlocked country that has been subjected to many years of poor leadership since it's independence in 1964, Malawi is rated as one of the world's 10 poorest countries. The United Nations estimates that 70% of the 12 million population is "nutritionally at risk". Part of that assessment has to do with the fact that the staple food in Malawi is a kind of porridge made from maize (corn). In Collegedale we might call it, "grits". As corn is a crop that can easily fail if the rains are not right, a failed season can be devastating to the people of Malawi. However, beyond the issue of the people's dependence on corn, I believe that a significant message that can also be taken from this UN assessment is that millions of people in Malawi are not able to grow enough food or make enough money to provide themselves and their families with enough food each day to live a healthy life. For at least four or five months out of each year, a large percentage of Malawi goes hungry.

Last year the concerns of the UN were realized when rains failed and the maize crop in large sections of Malawi failed. As a result, many have feared that Malawi is in danger of slipping into a famine, where many people can starve to death. This is one of the reasons ADRA Canada has asked me to visit Malawi, and report back on the situation that I find.

9:00 AM found me sitting on a plane ready to leave for the last leg of my journey. As fate would have it I found myself sitting next to a project director for the Malawi offices of CARE, another organization that is doing relief and development projects around the world. I ask him about the situation in Malawi. He said that it has been a very difficult year, but that they have a lot of hope for this year's growing season. So far, the rains have come, and Malawi is washed in green. I am relieved to hear this good news and look forward to seeing for myself.

Waiting at the airport for me in Lilongwe, Malawi's capitol city, is the assistant ADRA Director, Hewitt Samuel, and Kingston, the driver. They are here to send away visitors from Sweden and to pick me up. It seems that it is not only Canada that has concerns about the situation in Malawi. In the last few months they have received many visitors for various donor offices of ADRA. Throwing my gear into the back of the jeep, I prepare myself mentally for the last four hours of my journey. Blantyre, the industrial and commercial center of Malawi is about a four-hour trip from the Lilongwe airport. It is also where ADRA Malawi has its offices.

As we began our trip I happened to ask in passing if ADRA has any projects near the lake. Malawi has one of the largest lakes in Africa and it is a favorite stop for world travelers. The two other times that I had visited Malawi I had not been able to get up to the lake. This time I want to do my best to see it. No sooner had I expressed my desire then my new friends decided to take a route home that would go by the lake. An hour later we drove into the Dr Livingstone lakeside resort. Apparently this part of Africa was a favorite "stomping ground" of the famous 19th century explorer. The 15 minutes that we spent on the beautiful lakeshore only whetted my appetite. I hope that one day I will be able to go back and spend more time.

Back on the road I took a few shots out the window as we drove. As the sun went down the images became as blurred as I felt. I had been on the road now for 35 hours and been awake for the better part of 45. But, just as I started to feeling sorry for myself I thought of how long it must have taken Dr. Livingstone, and other early explorers of yesteryear to arrive here. I closed my eyes with thankfulness for the convenience and swiftness of modern transportation that can take me from Collegedale to Blantyre in a mater of a couple of days instead of months.

I am looking forward to my visit here and hope that you will stop back here again and travel with me as I explore Malawi and a couple of other interesting destinations on my trip to Africa.