Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach him to fish, and he eats for life.

My first week at work has been full. I am working at the Partnership office, which consists of five people. We have an office within the larger office of the country office. Our organization, DAPP Malawi, has lots going on in Malawi. Our job in the partnership office is to find funds (for instance grants) to support the programs, both internationally and domestically. There are a lot of organizations that we already partner with, so part of the work is keeping good relationships and showing them the work we are doing so they continue to support us. As you may know, grants are given for an allotted amount of time, so there is always the work of reapplying or find new sources when the current ones run out.

To do my job well, I need to learn a lot about each project which is exciting. In our office, we have our project leaders, Augustus & Enock, and then the partnership officers: Joanes, Tebogo, and myself. Luckily for me, Joanes & Tebogo are also new, so we are going to pay extensive visits to each project over the next month.

We have six types of projects. The two that I am responsible for both deal with HIV/AIDS: HOPE and TCE. I am the most interested in these projects so I am delighted it worked out this way. I am even hoping to use my counseling background in some way, perhaps for training.
But before I get ahead of myself...This week we had some special events which included HOPE and TCE. It made my first week pretty exciting.

The events were initiated by a company called Kiwi. They make shoe polish as well as other products. In the U.S. they are called Sara Lee (but they do not make cakes here!) Kiwi/Sara Lee celebrated their 100Th anniversary in 2006, and since they make the most money in Africa, they decided to donate 100,000 shoes to people in Africa. They partnered with Camper shoe company to do this. They had gone to a number of African countries and this week it was our turn. So they hooked up with our organization to find the people they would donate to. So we choose some villages/areas that have orphans and others that are served by HOPE or TCE.
From Thursday to Saturday, we went to five different areas. (It has also been a great way for me to see the areas surrounding Blantyre). Our entourage consisted of: from Spain, a Kiwi employee, a Camper employee and two people from Humana Spain (one of our sister organizations), a Kiwi employee from Tanzania, my boss Enock, other various DAPP employees, TCE Field Officers, DIs (people like myself, here from various countries to work for a short time) working with TCE, District Officials, Chiefs, a Minister of Education and TV and newspaper reporters. In each village, there are were hundreds of people sitting waiting for us. When we came they sang and danced. There were speeches by people from each organization, as well as the chief. At one village, we heard testimonies from two women who are living positively with HIV/AIDS.

I should also explain a little about the projects. I will do HOPE at another time. TCE stands for Total Control of the Epidemic. The southern African countries are the worst hit with HIV/AIDS in the world. In Malawi, 14% of the adult population are HIV positive. Part of the problem is that there is are stigmas against talking about HIV/AIDS, getting tested, etc. So TCE employs field officers to go door to door and have a personal, educational conversation about HIV/AIDS with each person. The whole country is divided up...into districts, then areas....each field officer is responsible for 2,000 people and they have three years to reach every one of them. TCE does other things in the community...creates resource centers, offers testing or organizes mobile testing if they do not a facility, counseling, income generating projects, etc. etc.

That is just a snapshot...I realize this entry is already so long but there is so much to explain! So, it was great to hear the women who gave their testimonies. They said the field officer encouraged them to get tested. Both were positive, but through counseling they realized that life is not over. They learned to live positively and are healthy now. One talked about being on ARVs. They both encouraged everyone to get tested. The chief also talked about how he was the first one in the village to get tested because chiefs must lead by example. He also talked about how they have modified their traditions if they were contributing to the spread of HIV/AIDS.
I could say more but...

So the shoes. The shoes were a little sad because we didn't have a lot of children sizes. It was also overwhelming, because the shoes were in a pile on the ground and the villagers were around us, and we were trying to find shoes to fit them. They were called by names, and so the intention was to be orderly, and while it could have been much worse it still felt chaotic. It was also difficult as a lot of villagers do not speak english (or perhaps were too shy to do so? this was suggested to me) so it was hard to figure out what they wanted, if the shoes were too big or too small...though in some instances you can tell of course...

When I think back to when I first got interested in this kind of work, I can see the layers of understanding and knowledge that form over time. When I see others, like the people from Spain who aren't in this line of work, and are in fact for profit, but maybe still feel some compassion for those that are suffering in the world...or guilt... I have to wonder if we do things like this to feel better about ourselves. So we can dust the African ground off our hands and feet and say I did something good today. But we didn't teach them anything, we didn't do anything to undo the systems that have created this mess. So I didn't cry or feel massively touched by the experience. Mostly it was a learning experience to add to my growth, my widening understanding.

I am happy to be working with an organization who understands this. We aren't about handouts, we are about empowering people. For instance, I think the knowledge about HIV/AIDS has empowered people. I'll end here and include some beautiful pictures from the places we visited.