A Thousand Words

Happy Feet

Christy — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 18:18:24 +0000

After posting my last blog, I got an e-mail requesting permission to use my photos and text on another blog called Toemail. My first response was to get weirded out that some bizarre foot fetish site wanted to use my photographs. But after doing a little digging on the site and talking to Quillan, one of the coordinators, I discovered that the whole concept behind the blog was deeper than that, and in fact sexual photographs are not welcome.

Our feet represent where we stand, past and present. And the purpose of the Toemail site is to share photos from around the globe and promote good causes while doing so.

So if you’re looking for a unique way to view the world, check out the site. And thanks for the plug, Quillan.

Filed under: Canada, Malawi, Photography, Poverty, Real Life, Travel

Comfort Level

Christy — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 16:50:47 +0000

This post is part of a themed series inspired by theCameraShy challenge. The back story is here.

Week #4: Comfort

Our second week in Malawi, the rains started more regularly. And with it, came a more sobering perspective of Malawian life. We had seen dilapidated rural houses and agonizing poverty, but these take on a whole new magnitude in the rain. Overnight, rickety brick houses turn dangerous and families live a more intense reality than they were living just a day before.

Yet everywhere we went, joyful children stood with their feet in the freezing mud, their toes shrivelled like tiny sausages, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

Because it was.

I sat with one family, whose biggest wish was blankets. And I looked down at my new high-tech trail shoes and fleece-lined waterproof jacket, the backpack on my back filled with bottled water and granola bars. And I was pummelled by the irony.

Everywhere we went, I was struck by the comfort of my life in Canada. I sleep not only off the ground, but in a bed with a duvet and pillows. I put on clean clothes and shoes every morning and I have a selection to choose from. I don’t have to light a fire or keep one going, I turn on my crock pot and it simmers safely all day, giving my family a healthy meal. And I don’t have to concern myself with frivolities like keeping warm – my thermostat takes care of that for me. I blend an assortment of fruit together for a nutritious smoothie breakfast from my cupboard without picking a single piece. I get my milk from a carton in the fridge without having to milk any animal for the privilege of drinking it. I don’t have to pump water or carry it long distances, I walk to almost any room in my house and turn a tap. And that water doesn’t look odd or smell foul or make my kids sick. I power lights without a second thought, and when it rains I don’t have to strategize to keep my family warm enough. We ‘rough it’ camping with more luxury than Africans, just for the fun of it.

But because I don’t have to think about these things, I think about them often. In Canada, we have all the necessities of life covered and most of our other desires as well. So we see comforts here as the things that make our world extra cozy: a steaming latte, a warm bubble bath, a good book. We live in a world of such intense comfort every single day, yet it has become so mundane and commonplace, that we don’t often see it for the miracle that it really is.

Filed under: Canada, Malawi, Photography, Poverty, Real Life, Wealth

Everyn & Stephano

Christy — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 04:35:29 +0000

Last summer, I was approached about child sponsorship by a family of one of my former preschool students. Their girls were so excited that we would be meeting Everyn in person and it was fantastic to be a part of a new sponsorship where the family was so clearly enthused about the step they were taking.

Then my parents, long time sponsors already, with a fridge full of children from around the globe, stepped up to take tiny little round-faced Stephano.

As I looked more carefully at his profile, I realized that Stephano and Everyn had sequential ID numbers and were registered together. And we discovered these two sweet little people bore a huge resemblance to each other and were siblings.

So this visit in Malawi was a tremendous gift. We represented two very different families – one brand new to the sponsorship process and the other seasoned veterans. But they were unified in their commitment to Everyn and Stephano.

The Malawian family was already familiar with heartache: death, illness and intense poverty had already touched them. But our brief appointment brought them what they needed – assurance of commitment and support.

And football. Lots of football.

Everyn and Stephano have eyes that tell long stories of loss. But they have a definite sparkle. I believe that glimmer will grow as they live in the reality of the hope they have for a better future.

Thomas family, Mom & Dad – I am so proud of your commitment to these beautiful children. I would fear for their future if I didn’t know the gravity of the gift you have given them. Their lives will not be easy, but you have ensured them an ally in the fight.

Filed under: Child Sponsorship, Malawi, Poverty, Real Life, World Vision

Child’s Play

Christy — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 16:48:01 +0000

After last week’s grapple to find a suitable response to the photo challenge theme word, this week was simply child’s play.

Week #3: Play Time

Malawian kids astound me with their creativity when it comes to play. When you have no Toys-R-Us to resort to, you make your own fun. Besides “football” (which came up in virtually every conversation!), we encountered some unique ways the children had of entertaining themselves.

One of our first days in Mlonyeni, this little boy was happy to show me his homemade source of entertainment- a discarded bike rim and a stick. He would roll the rim ahead of him, and place a perfectly chosen stick in the natural groove in the top. He ran along beside it and had great control over his speedy projectile.

An innovative teenager I met, made this remarkable car out of wire and tires crafted from the caps of water bottles. It has a completely functional steering mechanism and I can’t imagine the amount of time it must have taken to create this intricate masterpiece.

And if nothing else, amusement can be made by using the playground you have around you – in this case a labyrinth of knots in the trunk of the baubau trees.

There isn’t anything in Malawi that isn’t reused or recycled. How African children play is a testament to their incredible resourcefulness.

Filed under: Creativity, Malawi, Real Life

Finding Something Beautiful

Christy — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 16:36:20 +0000

“If you’re walking on thin ice, you might as well dance.” ~Unknown

It is -46°C with the windchill here today. I’m very thankful for the mild weather we have had up until now, but knowing there is still at least 6 weeks of winter left that could potentially bring more of this bitter weather is a little daunting. So I am desperately trying to find something appealing or celebratory about Canadian winter.

Watching the sunrise through my front window this morning gave me just a little sense of beauty in the middle of the deep freeze.

Filed under: Canada, Photography, Real Life

Common Ground

Christy — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:21:46 +0000

My apologies to all of the e-mail subscribers who got a notification for this post Saturday and arrived here to find an error message. Soon after posting, I realized when we exported the video, it had a nasty sound delay so we had to pull it offline and fix the problem. But here it is with the glitch repaired. Really, I love technology. ~C

One of the miraculous parts of our excursion to Malawi is the way so many people, from all facets of my life, stepped into sponsorship. My high school buddy Brad and his wife Krista live in Alberta. But when Brad contacted me about sponsoring one of our kids, it was clear to me that he had an incredible world view. Since his job involves inspiring students to broaden their horizons, I shouldn’t have been surprised.

The observers Brad was most excited about though, were his two little girls. He saw this as a profound opportunity to show them the difference they could make in the life of a Malawian child. I hope this video contributes to an awareness of the world far beyond their years.

Within seconds of meeting Falida, we were introduced to her bold and courageous heart when she started reciting her poems from school. She is a little spitfire with a sparkle in her eyes that I pray never gets extinguished as she navigates the massive hurdles in her future.

What stood out in this visit was the expansive common ground of the 2 families involved. They were diverse in so many ways, but the fundamentals were identical.

What I like about this video is, it’s a little more linear than some of the ones we’ve created to date. This particular visit had some factors that helped build a fuller picture of a DLC visit. We had duplicate batteries with us that were recharged every night (generator-willing). But during some of the very long days, we were concerned about completing the job set out for us. There were days with long trips into the bush, multiple families to meet, and with incredible battery-sapping heat. So some of our visits were literally fragments of highlights (with continuous silent prayer that they would last the action). So I’m thankful that we got the fullness of the experience in this amazing visit. You can see how far into the wilderness many of these families are, and their great joy that we made the trip.

Thank you Brad, Krista and girls for sponsoring a shining jewel. With you in her corner, I know Falida can take on the world.

Filed under: Canada, Child Sponsorship, Malawi, Poverty, World Vision

Cold

Christy — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:43:00 +0000

Week #2: Cold

I didn’t expect the challenge to throw me a curveball so soon. But when the theme word is ‘cold’, it’s a little daunting to attempt to apply it to a place called where the humidity is 90% at dawn and it was at least 36° Celsius in the shade.

But then I realized that my thinking was too “inside the box”. I needed to be a little more creative. Temperature is the most obvious way to interpret the word, but I think I found something that fits both the photo challenge and my own fresh application I wrote about last week.

Let the record show, I could have gone the easy route and simply posted my little cold-blooded gecko buddy:

But I decided since the point of this exercise is to tell stories as well as profile photos on the theme, I would try another angle.

Cold Reception: The manner in which something, such as a guest or a new idea, is negatively received.

Every day in Malawi, we were greeted with warmth and enthusiasm. Everywhere we went were met with singing, gifts, embraces and grateful words. We were honoured. It is hard to imagine that this was not always the case.

I always falsely assumed that World Vision would be welcomed with open arms in their new communities – that desperate people would be receptive and see their presence as positive. But the truth of the matter is, starts can be slow and the reception, well, chilly.

Some parents in Malawi misunderstood the concept of sponsorship initially. In fact, at one point, the Mposa Project Manager, Dan, had to organize a meeting and explain that sponsorship does not mean that the children were sent away – parents feared enrolling their children in the program meant permanently losing them. Can you even fathom that? With that terrifying prospect, no wonder they were resistant! With all the local dialects to communicate with, this is such delicate work.

The village chiefs often attended our visits in Malawi, and they were also approaching Dan about sponsorship. “Attitudes are Changing.” Dan told me the last day. Dan and I spoke a few days before Christmas and he reaffirmed that our presence indeed made an impact on the Malawian families: “I’m not sweating to get sponsorships,” he told me, “You make my work easier”. One man had quite strenuously refused to sign up his kids for sponsorship. But after our departure from Malawi, he came to Dan himself with a change of heart. He had seen our presence, perceived our true motives, and it was corroborated by the families who were visited.

I read an article recently that questioned whether short-term overseas volunteer projects were worth all the time, money and effort in the long-term. It’s a valid and necessary question. And as someone who has done it twice, it has challenged me. I don’t want to be part of something with little value in the end for the sake of charity or my own ego.

But I have to say, that I am hearing such affirmation of World Vision’s DLC program. Four staff members spoke to me in the last days of our trip about the effect our visit had on the community. As I hugged him goodbye, case worker Gabriel told me “Families ask me, are the sponsors real”? “Your coming assures them it is real.” Dan confirmed. The staff no longer have to justify to people the legitimacy of Canadians who desire to help. As participants in the DLC Program, we validate the process of sponsorship for them, just as these families corroborate it for Canadians who disbelieve.

While World Vision’s reception in Mposa was clearly cold initially, we are very proud to see a symbolic thaw in “The Warm Heart of Africa”. Children in Mposa will have a whole different kind of future thanks to fresh belief in the sponsorship program and their vital sponsors in Canada.

Filed under: Canada, Child Sponsorship, Malawi, Photography, Poverty, World Vision

Unexpected Inspiration

Christy — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 17:04:50 +0000

I have a notebook. It’s full of mindless minutia, slivered shards of Malawi’s stories. Observations. Statistics. Jot notes. Crinkled, dirty pages with scribbles of barely legible detail that would probably be thrown away by an outsider. But to me it is priceless. It got lost once in Malawi and I spent most of a fitful night wracking my brain and begging God to help me find it. How could I do what I was asked to do, effectively tell stories, without the fullness of detail?

But as I leaf through the pages now I wonder, where do I begin? What page? It is all important and meaningful. Since Malawi I’ve been plagued by insomnia. It’s getting better, but I find myself still awakened by force, wrestling with emotions I can rarely give language to. Stories and experiences trapped inside me, screaming to get out without a doorway. And It’s easier to toss, turn or cry frustrated tears than it is to sort my tangled emotional thoughts and or collect the splayed puzzle pieces of memory fragments and form them into words.

Yesterday my friend Sherry posted a link to a website for beginner photographers. On it was a weekly, single word themed challenge to inspire picture-taking. There was something about the simplicity of it that appealed to me. And I got an idea. What if, instead of taking a new picture on the theme, I associated each word with my unwritten tales of Malawi? Maybe that’s what I needed all along – basic, uncluttered inspiration. One theme, one word at a time.

So once a week, I am going to try to match Ingrid’s theme with a photograph and story of Malawi here on the blog. I don’t know if they will all be transferable, but I hope shallowly buried scraps of significance will emerge.

Week #1: New

Trinkets. Dollar store junk of questionable quality. What place does it have in Africa? I struggled with that myself. What good does it really do? I’m learning it has a greater purpose than you might expect.

In itself, it’s true – a cheap, flimsy toy doesn’t solve the problems of the poor. But it does represent something massive in the fight against poverty. Hope. Significance.

We visited Prisca, an absolutely lovely little girl whose lips look like tiny flower petals. She was terrified of me and if I moved near her, she screamed and leaped off her chair. The new ring is a gift from her sponsor. It is cheap and tacky, but that day it was the catalyst for trust. It appealed to her girly side and bridged the gap. By the end of the visit, I could call her my friend.

This rinky dink token doesn’t end hunger or cure HIV. It doesn’t solve the long frantic lines of desperate people who need fuel and line up in blind hope. It doesn’t bring the rain, bring the fertilizer or shorten the long, difficult road Prisca has yet to walk to rise above the challenges of simply being born in Africa.

But it does speak words of affirmation. Someone is thinking about you. You’re beautiful. Worthy of love. Treasured. The best is still to come. Words that may not have been spoken before to a heart as dry as her father’s parched crops.

In Canada, gifts speak words of love to us – invisible yet powerful messages that hearts don’t hear with simple words. And here we even buy ourselves gifts – we impose that value on ourselves. In Africa gifts are rarely given, not for lack of affection, but lack of means. Cheap bubbles, balls, crayons. In a world of anticlimactic upgrades, discarded for most Canadian kids, in Malawi these are a source of joy and a symbol of acceptance.

New is not always better, we’re told. And it’s true. But when it comes to matters of the heart, to the poorest of the poor, new speaks volumes. In a country where everything is re-purposed or handed down out of necessity, it represents the possibility that comes from a friend across the world.

New brings renewal. Fresh dreams, restored optimism, revived faith and regenerated security. That’s a bargain for mere pennies. And that’s why Colin and I spent exorbitant amounts of money to haul seemingly meaningless novelty toys to Malawi.

Because in the right hands, they are the voice of promise. And they are not meaningless at all.

Filed under: Child Sponsorship, Generosity, Malawi, Photography, Poverty, Real Life, World Vision

Resolve

Christy — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 23:50:36 +0000

I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is too much of a daily event for me.
~Anaïs Nin

Every year I seem to go against the flow when it comes to New Years. It seems as though the vast majority of people put such high expectations on the upcoming year – they giddily anticipate greatness and make sweeping, unrealistic changes and expect them to stick. And I can’t subscribe to the idea that Jan 1st is fundamentally different than Dec 31st.

Part of it comes down to how my life began. My parents would often talk about the circumstances surrounding my birth. I was born 2 months early and the doctors told my Dad not to see me, as I wouldn’t survive. With that knowledge, even as a little girl, I felt like I needed to make every day matter. When you feel like every breath you take is a bonus, it changes the intensity with which you live. I’m one of those people that seems like she was just born old and I think that’s why.

I narrowly missed another toe-to-toe with death in 1992 when I was hit by a drunk driver. I remember being up all night in the hospital, being pummelled over and over by the persistent “why’s”. Every inch of that car was obliterated except where I was sitting, so why was I still here? I felt like, once again, I was living on time I never should have had.

Add to that just arriving home from a country plagued by devastating issues, and I suspect that is why I’m crotchety this year about January resolutions. In Malawi, children are trafficked. Gas shortages are rampant. Maize prices have gone down and the rains aren’t coming to help germinate this year’s crop. Billboards in Lilongwe trumpet statistics about child wasting. So I’m struck by how this idea of a new year being better and different because of our own choices is a western luxury. I can’t stop thinking about how our resolve to eat less, exercise more or cut up our credit cards is such an extravagance.

I can’t be a huge proponent of the idea that every year we can start again with a magical life reboot every January 1st. I don’t understand how we can expect a new year’s resolution to succeed if we didn’t care enough about it to do it in December, November and October too. Every day is a new start and so is every minute and every hour. My life experiences have made me long to live a live of character, balance and honesty in every moment, not when we reach a pretty square on the calendar.

I’m not saying don’t bother to change. I’m not saying to avoid bettering yourself. But I’m saying that is just as effectively done in March, July and September. The world needs action today and every day. Live your convictions 12 months of the year and you can avoid the mid January wave of disappointment when well-intentioned resolutions fizzle out. Resolve to make what motivates you evident in your life year round. And keep the needs and wants in life in sharp perspective.

Filed under: Beginnings, Generosity, Malawi, Real Life

The Heart of a Mother

Christy — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 03:23:02 +0000

Between turkey, in-laws, crumpled wads of wrapping paper, cabbage rolls, returns and all the other chaos of Christmas, we managed to complete another child visit video.

This one, from start to finish, practically wrote itself.

A mother’s love is fierce. It doesn’t give up. And it takes a special woman to not only care for the needs of her own child, but take on the needs of another mother. That’s why I’m so very proud of Lee for sponsoring Brian.

A peaceful and joyful new year to you all.

Filed under: Child Sponsorship, Family, Malawi, Poverty, World Vision