After a restful first week, this week has picked up the pace a bit! We've had plenty of time to be chatting to Abusa (Pastor) Scrivin about the details of the year, which has been helpful for us to see where the need is and where we can support best within the church. We also visited Noah's Ark orphan care centre, which provides free food/education for 130 kids, with the view of volunteering there for a couple of days to give them some extra support. I'm sure we'll talk more about them in future, but they're doing such a great job loving the local children who are in real need and have real need of support - the preschool has 28 kids, and just one teacher!
Unfortunately, Bekah did miss out on going to Noah's Ark as her tummy has continued to feel grjhnnragjdnlll (but has gained appetite back today - yayy!). A positive from her feeling less than okay, is that we discovered that seeing a GP is incredibly simple. Scrivin had given us the number of a doctor he trusted at a hospital he'd worked at for a while (as HR manager, not a doctor himself), so we gave her a ring on Wednesday morning at around 9am. She said that Bekah could come by any time that morning! So we popped by a couple of hours later, got seen nearly immediately, had a blood test down the hall, got told it was a bacteria bug and prescribed antibiotics we picked up in the room next door. Added bonus is that through adults paying at this hospital, kids who can't afford medical care get it for free - "Adults pay a fee, so that children can walk free".
Side note: Scrivin Kamanga seems to know literally everyone!! Which is great for us, as he's been able to make connections all over the place which will potentially lead to us supporting some other aid work here. To illustrate this, we met an American lady from Oregon on one of the plane stop-offs here and she'd met him a few months earlier. A church friend of ours got speaking to a fellow doctor whilst hiking at the top of a mountain in Rwanda and discovered Scrivin was a mutual friend! The South African couple we live next door to, who are not Christians and not involved with aid work, even realised that they had met Scrivin a few years previously!!
Pensulo
For those unaware, CCC (or Water of Life church) support a village on the outskirts of Blantyre (right in the hills) called Pensulo. This is partly through the presence of a church plant, but also through their Helping Hands ministry which provides aid for the poorest in the community. This is all excellently led by Abusa Allan Nkunule who has made great relationships with so many in the community so he is able to know where the need is and how best to meet it. At the start of the year there was some extreme flooding around South-Eastern Africa which displaced hundreds of thousands of people from their homes - including many from Pensulo. Through Allan, our collection of churches was able to support some of those families affected that were unable to help themselves.
In April I (Ben) had the opportunity to visit Mr and Mrs Kayala from Pensulo Church whose home was partially destroyed by the flooding. They are an elderly couple and were forced to move into a single room which was only protected from the elements by a piece of cloth. And yet they were full of laughter, talking about God's goodness and just exhibiting such a deep joy from Christ that transcended all else. It was wonderful to see them again on Friday, and be greeted with the same wide grins!
The issue with many houses in this area, including Mr and Mrs Kayala's is that they are built with un-baked bricks and sometimes poor foundations, which do not withstand rain particularly well. So this project has built good foundations and used baked bricks so that they withstand future rains. It's fair to say they were pretty chuffed with the new build; Mr Kayala was on fire with making everyone laugh. A couple of choice quotes: "I'm so excited about it I want to move in before it's even finished!" and "it's like a house for a boss!".
Amongst others we also visited the site of one of the worst affected, a guy called Yohane, who we'd been hanging out with the whole day as he is the administrator of Pensulo church. I'll be honest, I was pretty surprised as he'd been so concerned with making sure that others were doing well, I'd assumed he hadn't had any issues with his home. But as you can see from this pic, there are one or two things missing...
Below is the picture of him with the new build in process for him and his family. They'd had to move out and live with a combination of Allan, other friends and relatives over the past year. So understandably he was pretty excited about being able to have a family home again!
Hope you've enjoyed reading!
Love, B&B
P.S. Bekah wants to add that we can hear a very musical cockerel most mornings whose crow sounds like the "woah-oh-oh-oh-oh" bit from 'Treasure' by Bruno Mars...so she's had that going round her head lots recently!
Unfortunately, Bekah did miss out on going to Noah's Ark as her tummy has continued to feel grjhnnragjdnlll (but has gained appetite back today - yayy!). A positive from her feeling less than okay, is that we discovered that seeing a GP is incredibly simple. Scrivin had given us the number of a doctor he trusted at a hospital he'd worked at for a while (as HR manager, not a doctor himself), so we gave her a ring on Wednesday morning at around 9am. She said that Bekah could come by any time that morning! So we popped by a couple of hours later, got seen nearly immediately, had a blood test down the hall, got told it was a bacteria bug and prescribed antibiotics we picked up in the room next door. Added bonus is that through adults paying at this hospital, kids who can't afford medical care get it for free - "Adults pay a fee, so that children can walk free".
Side note: Scrivin Kamanga seems to know literally everyone!! Which is great for us, as he's been able to make connections all over the place which will potentially lead to us supporting some other aid work here. To illustrate this, we met an American lady from Oregon on one of the plane stop-offs here and she'd met him a few months earlier. A church friend of ours got speaking to a fellow doctor whilst hiking at the top of a mountain in Rwanda and discovered Scrivin was a mutual friend! The South African couple we live next door to, who are not Christians and not involved with aid work, even realised that they had met Scrivin a few years previously!!
Pensulo
For those unaware, CCC (or Water of Life church) support a village on the outskirts of Blantyre (right in the hills) called Pensulo. This is partly through the presence of a church plant, but also through their Helping Hands ministry which provides aid for the poorest in the community. This is all excellently led by Abusa Allan Nkunule who has made great relationships with so many in the community so he is able to know where the need is and how best to meet it. At the start of the year there was some extreme flooding around South-Eastern Africa which displaced hundreds of thousands of people from their homes - including many from Pensulo. Through Allan, our collection of churches was able to support some of those families affected that were unable to help themselves.
 |
| Pastor Allan Nkunule (left) with Mrs and Mr Kayala in April 2019 (photo credit to Chris Barton) |
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| Mr Kayala entering his new home |
Amongst others we also visited the site of one of the worst affected, a guy called Yohane, who we'd been hanging out with the whole day as he is the administrator of Pensulo church. I'll be honest, I was pretty surprised as he'd been so concerned with making sure that others were doing well, I'd assumed he hadn't had any issues with his home. But as you can see from this pic, there are one or two things missing...
Below is the picture of him with the new build in process for him and his family. They'd had to move out and live with a combination of Allan, other friends and relatives over the past year. So understandably he was pretty excited about being able to have a family home again!
 |
| Yohane in blue shirt with new home and builders |
Love, B&B
P.S. Bekah wants to add that we can hear a very musical cockerel most mornings whose crow sounds like the "woah-oh-oh-oh-oh" bit from 'Treasure' by Bruno Mars...so she's had that going round her head lots recently!
Great to read what you've been up to - we look forward to hearing how God uses you there. Also, LOVE the detail about the rooster - that's a big tune.
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