new trio has arrived

So excited that a trio from the Caribbean school arrived last Friday…the new DI’S… That means that I will have three girls working with me at the preschools…two of the girls are from Brazil “Ellen and Alice” and Alice and I share the same birthday…the other girl “Sandra” is from Chile…they all speak in broken-English but they are really sweet and are eager to make a difference while they are here. ..Since they are DI’S that means that they have been studying to come here at their school for the last 6 months and will be here in Malawi for 6 months…it’s always so nice meeting new people from different parts of the world and learning about their culture’s…I LOVE IT!

 

Last week, I was talking to one of the preschool supervisors and he was telling me about an orphanage that he works with that is an hour away from here by bike…I expressed my interest in going to the orphanage and meeting some of the children…so he called and made arrangements for he and I to go this past Sunday…I was very thrilled to finally have some children to give the donated soccer jerseys to... “THANKS to PASSBACK” for donating the soccer jerseys for me to bring to Africa...the jerseys have been sitting in this closet-like thing I have in my room…I look at them every day and have been pondering  for weeks on how I would choose which students at the preschool’s to give them to…I knew choosing a few students from every preschool was going to be challenging and a little unfair for the ones who wouldn’t receive one…so this was going to work-out perfectly…by taking the jerseys to the orphanage I could just give them all to the orphans’ !!

 I invited one of the new DI'S from Brazil "Alice " to accompany me and the supervisor "Shakey" to the orphanage.The bike ride to the orphanage was a little grueling for Alice but, I assured her that in about two weeks she would feel physically comfortable riding to the schools…it took me about two weeks to build-up the endurance to travel to the preschools and to get use to the heat…so we had to stop a few times so she could rest…it was nice though because it allowed the three of us time to chat and, for Shakey and I to get to know Alice better…arriving at the orphanage is an experience I will never forget…there was around 34 kids there ranging from the ages 2 to 17 years old…we were greeted by the three headmen from the three surrounding villages and the headmaster of the orphanage…they were all very kind and wore what looked to be their best suits for this occasion…we then all walked into a school where the orphans’ all  meet every day...after talking to the headmaster he explained to me that the orphanage is currently being built…an organization in Hungary is building the orphanage for the three villages…the orphans are staying with family friends right now until the orphanage is complete…I asked him why they had so many orphans in these three villages? He explained that a lot of the children became orphans when their parents found-out that they were HIV positive…it’s very common for parents in this country to leave their children of any age including newborns when they found-out that they are HIV positive…We met all of the beautiful children and gave them each a jersey…i was very pleased to hear that the majority of the children were in school...we sat and talked with the headmaster for a while and he invited us to return and come to his village…he wanted us to see his village and to arrange a traditional African party for us…he told us we could come and learn some African dances and more about his village’s culture. I told him that we would love too!!