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Published: July 25th 2016
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After a hearty breakfast, which is a necessity for my malaria medication, I purchased some trinkets from the vendors along the shore of Lake Malawi. I ended up getting several paintings and keychains. I will receive the keychains tomorrow as they are being hand-carved on one side with the names I provided and one of the other side with an animal found in Africa. I am not the greatest at negotiating for lower prices and was trying to purchase items from several of the vendors instead of just one. Before heading to the build site, the team started the morning with a devotion on what it means to be an observer versus a participant. We discussed how we view and interact with those we come into contact with each day, but for this trip the focus was on the people of Malawi. In terms of our work of building homes, would we look at the task as something to "do" for "others" or would we work alongside the builders, families and people in the village as they built two new homes? Would we take the time to get to know the people we work with
as fellow brothers and sisters and be fully present and engaged with them? Yes, we wanted to complete two homes (at least as far as we were able), but we also wanted to build relationships and empower those whom we work together with on the task. This concept serves at the heart of Habitat for Humanity's mission, which is why I love working for the organization. We never give out houses for free. Rather, we equip and walk alongside people as they build their own new homes, communities and hope.
The group of women welcomed us again to the village with song. The way they display hospitality astounds me and wishes that the church and non-profit organizations in America could emulate this radical welcome. Today we broke the group up into teams based on whether or not you traveled on this trip with a family member or were "an orphan." The Orphan Team (which started out as One Family Team) worked on Pelepetuwa's house with Harry while the Family Team worked on Anne's house with Bartholomew. Today we put up the door frames and built scaffolding. We interacted more with
the children. I took a short break in the morning to play soccer with the kids hanging out at the house next to my site. Near the end of the day a group played Duck, Duck, Goose. We ended up calling the latter, Baca, Baca, Goose. Baca means duck. However, goose was too difficult or not part of the general vocabulary so we just kept goose. The younger kids loved playing the game with part of our team. Toward the end of the day we handed out stickers to the kids. We attempted to do only one sticker per child, but they were creative in trying to hide their first sticker so they could get more. At one point Michelle, our fabulous team leader, had to save me when I got overwhelmed with kids wanting stickers. We started taking selfies with the kids. It was quite surprising to realize that the kids tended not to know what they look like as mirrors don't seem to available in the village. The kids could identify all the other kids in the photo but were then amazed when they were pointed out in the photo
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