Playing joyfully with her mates on the open grounds around Mgona feeding shed run by Somebody Cares Ministries, (one of WOW’s strategic partners in Malawi) Prisca, age 6, is unaware that she carries HIV the virus which causes AIDS. Like other vulnerable children she comes every day, Monday to Friday, to receive a hot meal, care and early childhood education at the shed.

With a large, deep and seemingly very slow-healing sore in the neck, Prisca was, a year ago, a very active kid at the feeding shed.  Now with frequent bouts of fever, headaches, rashes and malaria she has been restricted to a quiet and sad life. She is only occasionally lively, as on the day of our visit, when these ailments temporarily subside.

Her low CD counts necessitated her placement on ARV drugs. Prisca’s story is similar to other children in many communities. In Mgona there are ten such children that we have come across, Prisca included.  Some of these children are as young as four years old.

While her nine colleagues are orphans who got the virus from their late parents, Prisca was infected through a blood transfusion.  Her father, mother and three siblings are all HIV negative. Two years ago she was sick and after a hospital visit, was found to be anaemic. The hospital recommended that she be given blood. Unfortunately, she was carelessly given blood that was contaminated with the virus.

With the other ten children at the center, Somebody Cares makes sure that they access their monthly ARV drugs and nutritious take-home food packs. Every month they are taken to the central hospital for treatment and supplies by their guardians/relatives. Somebody Cares meets the cost of transport.

In a place of difficulty and challenge, the courage of these little faces brings both joy and despair. It spurs us on in the fight to educate and care for those who do not yet understand the full impact of HIV/AIDS. It also fuels us to continue to be the voice of the little ones, one like Prisca.

Sophilet, from Mgona, was a 26 year widow and mother of 5 children.  Sophilet and her two year child died last year, both of HIV/AIDS related diseases despite being on ARVs. In the flash of a moment, four beautiful children found themselves without a mother, without hope. WOW's strategic partner, Somebody Cares, is working with hundreds of orphans in Mgona, and are now working to help the Mgona community care for Sophilet's children.

In August of this year, Theresa Malila, director of Somebody Cares, wrote the following poem about Sophilet's children when asked why the children in Malawi do not show emotion the way North American children do.  Please read her poem and feel the reality of what life is like for an orphaned child in Africa....understand why they do not cry.

“I want to cry but I don’t know how

My mother just died and I don’t know why

I have no home and no place to lay my head

These are the thoughts I always dread

I really had no mother, neither did I have a father

My father was taken care of by my mother

We (the 5 children) had to take care of each other

Then we had to take care of our mother

There was no time to grieve

When my mother died there was only fear and relief

Fear, we had nowhere to go

Relief, she would suffer no more

Don’t tell me you are surprised to see no emotions

For we have learned to go through the motions

Because everything in our life is uncertain

Around our hearts we have erected an iron curtain

No one can really comprehend our suffering and pain

As mere children it should surely have rendered us insane

We have survived each day as it comes

For when one of us dies, there is no one to beat the drums

May God our Father

Continue to bless our new mother.

Enoch is a boy that has gone through gruesome experiences for the past ten years. Born on the 26 of June 1993 in Mgona where his parents settled from Dedza District some eighty kilometers east of Lilongwe, the young Enoch was the third out of five children in the family. Their father and mother were said to be loving and caring parents who, though very poor, went all out to see that their five kids were well taken care of. Enoch’s family was struck by disaster barely two years after his birth; his mother died of an HIV/AIDS related disease and his father succumbed to the disease three years later.

Enoch and his four siblings were taken over by their old and poverty-stricken grandmother. Unfortunately, their granny also died (of natural causes) after three years of their stay with her. The five kids were then left in the village without anyone taking proper care of them.  Within three years all of them died save Enoch. The first two were said to have died from hunger and lack of care, the last two from HIV/AIDS but accelerated by improper care and famine. Left alone in the village a couple from a neighbouring village who knew his parents took him back to Mgona to stay with them. The couple, Mr. Augustino and Mrs. Elizabeth Band, had five children of their own and had to carry the burden of caring for Enoch also.

Augustino is a watchman and his wife, Elizabeth, a housewife who, until last year was running a small business; she sold buns and used the profit to feed the family. Augustino’s meagre wages went directly into paying house rent and whatever remained was used to supplement Elizabeth’s income. With this arrangement the family was living relatively ‘comfortably'.  A year ago while Elizabeth was gathering firewood in the bush, a large tree she was cutting fell on her, severely fracturing her left ankle. She spent two months in the hospital and though she got discharged she has still not fully recovered. She has difficulty walking, a situation that brought an abrupt end to her itinerant buns business. She now stays at home, thus making the family dependent on Augustino’s income, which the couple said could not support them through the month after paying the house rent.  

Though the Banda family would want to see Enoch in secondary school, they could not afford the fees. He was to start his secondary education at the beginning of the school year, as he passed the prescribed examinations very well and got selected. But due to lack of fees this did not materialize. Instead he stayed at home helping Elizabeth with the house chores. In the evenings he would go to a local catholic church one kilometer away for choir practice where he is a member of the youth choir group.

Enoch’s case came to light following WOW's request for information on an orphan who has lost successive caregivers (a serial orphan) and was struggling to survive. As we went to find such a child, one of the volunteers that remembered a weeping boy once approached him inquiring if Somebody Cares could help him go to school. Unfortunately the volunteer kept this information for his monthly report. We quickly visited the home of this boy that evening but found him gone to his regular evening choir practice. We had to arrange for another visit before we could find him.

In the house we found the food situation so serious that WOW had to provide food packs for the family immediately. As this is the rainy and hunger season, the family’s main food was pumpkins and other green melons harvested from their backyard garden. These melons are only boiled and eaten. Until we visited and provided them with food packs, these were the family’s breakfast, lunch and dinner for two weeks.

Meanwhile WOW has sent Enoch to one of the nearby private day secondary schools, as it is now too late for him to be admitted into a boarding school.

Surely, Enoch needs assistance in many areas including school fees, clothes, food, counselling and guidance. He is an intelligent boy with determination to get good education one day. His guardians told us he is a boy of good conduct, loving and caring especially toward their children. They said he is a devoted church goer who cannot afford to miss the weekly Sunday service even in the event of heavy rains.

Joining his guardians, Enoch thanked WOW for the visit and food brought. With tears running down his cheeks and vividly shaken, he said he always prayed that God would turn His face toward him one day and his prayer had been answered in our visit.

The widows and people living with HIV/AIDS in Mgona harvested their maize crop this month.  What a harvest!!!  They were so proud of the harvest and went to the fields with songs of praise bringing in the maize!  They are so thankful to the donors in Canada for providing funds for seed and fertilizer. 

Fanny Kenamu’s brother, Frank, who was living with her passed on during the weekend of 13th April.  We were able to console her and contribute toward funeral expenses.  In Malawi, you are unable to bury a body without a casket which costs the equivalent of $50 Canadian.  Fanny works to sell tomatoes for a living and receives about $1 CAD every 3 days, so you can imagine the distress of needing to find funds to pay for a casket.  This is one example of the desperation and extreme pressure that so many like Fanny are under.  WOW is working to help Fanny by learning a new trade that will help her to gain a greater income and provide for others in her family.

The chiefs and pastors in Ngona are on fire for the Lord; they cannot but express how thankful they are for the Word that is bearing much fruit. They have appealed on behalf of the widows that WOW start the IGA (Income Generating Activity) and small businesses account.

During the visit of Richard Brown (Visionledd's International Director for HIV/AIDS) one of the pastors (Rev Ziyaye) stopped us as we were leaving and remarked “God was dead in Ngona, but since Mama Theresa (Director of Somebody Cares, a Visionledd partner in Malawi) came to support the widows and orphans they have seen the face of God, He is now alive in Mgona!

With a remarkable improvement in her health, Fanny Kenamu is now engaged in various community activities. She is one of the members Mgona WOW widows who cultivated a beautiful maize garden, which is now ready for harvest.

Individually, Fanny planted well maintained sweet potato and cassava patches, in her compound garden by her house from which she hopes to supplement her household food requirements when these crops mature. At home, she proudly displays a well kept flower garden by her house. She is so happy and is an encouragement for many other widows who are infected with the HIV/AIDS virus.

Despite bearing the burden of caring for her brother who is on TB treatment, Fanny is a happy lady. ‘The fact that I am now strong enough to carry out activities that bring food to family makes me very happy’. She further said she was looking forward to the IGA training program for the widows in Mgona. She really looks great!!!

Nothing seems to get her down these days; she is always looking for ways of improving her economic status to ensure her children are cared for. Fanny has now demarcated her plot and is renting the front patch to two young men who are operating a carpentry shop; we are now getting the doors and frames from this shop. Her brother, who is also HIV positive, spends some time in the shop. She now receives a little cash income from this source every month.

 Recently, her kitchen collapsed due to heavy rainfall. WOW is currently in the process of preparing to rebuild the kitchen once the rains let up. Is this not the miraculous hand of God!!!!