Abiding in Africa

Endings

2008-08-13T23:31:00.000-07:00

We are leaving Mzuzu today, but we are not yet leaving Malawi. Leaving Mzuzu really marks the end of our time though.

With this in mind, I was hoping to know your thoughts about the blog. There will be a few more entries as we seek to describe the return home. But I would love to hear your impressions. If you don't want to post a comment on the blog send your remarks to fredggarry@aol.com. Even though there is an away message, I will check it.

Hopefully the blog has created an opportunity to follow the events we have experienced this summer. In the next two weeks I wiill try to assess and reflect upon, "what in the world just happened?" Your voice in the midst would help me a great deal.

2008-08-13T23:29:00.000-07:00

The Co-Inciding

I went to the synod offices mindful that my words being a help to Rev. Hara were a long shot and the likelihood that I might offend was more of sure bet ( I would’ve put the odds of the later at 2-1). Fortunately the three men who greeted me (Rev. Nkhoma, Rev. Nyrendo, and Rev. Munthali) know how to handle the less than tactful.

The conversation began with official business. The council of the Presbytery of Northern New York asked me to inquire as to the renewal of our partnership next year. Having been here for two months and watching groups come and go and seeing the way individual churches interact with the synod of Livingstonia versus presbyteries I am convinced that the renewal of our partnership should articulate both directions. Congregations have far more latitude to act while presbyteries carry the gravitas of the “larger church.” Both are good I said.

We also discussed the widows fund and how challenging it is to wed a grassroots effort with the structure of the synod. There were nods around the room. Care needs to be given that this venture doesn’t create confusion in the synod or jeopardize the larger partnership as it grows. Rev. Nyrendo said, “I am glad we are saying this now.” Rev. Nkhoma said, “this has happened before and perhaps by taking care in the beginning we won’t be forced to deal with problems later.”

But the real conversation was when we turned to Rev. Hara. Rev. Nyrendo smiled as I described my concerns. “I am not here to criticize, but to suggest a delay of his transfer so projects can be completed and the widows fund can mature a bit more.” “Yes, I have heard of your concerns,” he said. Two different elders called to complain about your sermon on Sunday.”

After my third apology he smiled again. “There are some people there who love Rev. Hara and some who hate him. If you spoke in favor of him you will necessarily make some people angry.” We all smiled at this and nodded from the collective experience of being pastors.

As we spoke of the decision it was clear from their words that it had been a real struggle, a great debate. What was unanimous was that they all had great respect for Norman. What divided us was that I felt the synod was acting prematurely and they felt they had actually let the situation go on too long. For this reason I don’t think my suggestions will prevail.

And then something was said that just dumbfounded me. “There is a sect in Mzuzu. All of these people who are complaining and threatening are part of sect. We know who they are and what they are doing. It is a complicated matter and needs great care.”

The shock was the coincidence that for the last six months I have been doing research on 1 John, a book that is built around the impact of sects upon the early church. Never in my wildest dreams would I think that my time in Malawi would have been shaped by the same force that shaped the book I was studying. It was the sort of thing that just baffles me. I know it’s the Holy Spirit, but sometimes I would like to have some sort of clue where my life is going before I get there.

Farewell Speeches

For the last four days I have been making farewell speeches. Everyone is convinced here that I will return, but they have said again and again, you don’t realize how hard it is to say goodbye. We will cry they claim.

Part of being a pastor is not letting your emotions overwhelm you. I am not saying you need to be a stoic rock of indifference, but you do need to keep your composure in the midst of very emotional moments. I want to say that I have led hundreds of funerals. There have been many moments where the person being buried was a dear friend. To not have the opportunity to weep in the midst of worship, I believe, is part of the cost and gift you give to others. You create the place for them to feel free, while you yourself do not enter such a place. A pastor creates the opportunity, you hold the door open so to speak.

I didn’t stop being a pastor in Malawi, but I am not a pastor here so to speak. It’s true that I’ve preached almost every Sunday. And when I walk into a room I am very conscious of the expectations and definitions that apply to me. But I am not being a pastor here. My congregation is in Watertown, not Mchengawatua. I have grown very fond of many of the elders in Mchengawatua and was even compelled to attend church business meetings, but at no point did I say to Kathy, “I was going to my office.”

The freedom of being something in between an observer and a leader, a pastor and a guest, somewhere in the midst of this I was no longer the doorman. (On most occasions, though, I was the driver. This was a joke I offered to Rev. Nkhoma’s driver, Owen. “I was the associate minister, but I got a promotion. I am a driver now.” He liked the joke.)

Being somewhere in between was the great gift of the sabbatical. About a week ago it became clear as I felt ready to get back to work. It wasn’t anything pressing; it was renewal. It wasn’t dread or anxiety or a need to leave: it was a readiness to do what I am called to do. This is what the Lily Endowment calls renewal and I think I understand what they mean, or what they intended to offer when they sent me a truck load of money and said, “go to Africa this summer.”

With this renewal beginning to take shape and the freedom of just being in the midst of life having had effect, my farewell speeches became more and more emotional. (Last night Mary Taylor said, “was that a tear I saw?” I said no, but it was.)

Saying farewell, then, is mixed. I am saying goodbye to friends, but I am also saying farewell to a unique time, a gift of time whose value I have seen again and again as immense. In most of my speeches I talk about the difference between being in Malawi for two weeks and being here for two months. The difference is profound. It is the difference between living some place and visiting. While I know that I will visit Malawi again, I am very mindful that my next visit will be based upon having lived here. I look forward to what that will mean.

Mostly though as I say goodbye I am just mindful that a great gift has been given. A time of renewal was given and for that I can’t be thankful enough. As I have said this to my Malawian friends the emotions have been far more complex than I usually allow to linger. I am not sure if that is a normal part of a sabbatical, but I am glad it was a part of mine.

2008-08-11T00:22:00.000-07:00

From the Thrill of Victory . . .

At the end of synod meetings in Malawi there is a palpable tension. The synod meeting is comparable to the national assemblies the Presbyterians have the US. This is the decision making body for the larger church. Yet, in the US the decisions are truly about the larger church. Their decisions and actions may annoy or even dismay the local church, but they don’t have a direction impact.

In Malawi, the synod has a huge reach into the life of a local congregation as they work on an appointment system. Pastors are appointed to churches not called by congregations. Every two years pastors are told if they are staying or going by the “business” committee of the synod. This announcement is literally the last action of a weeklong meeting. After the list of changes are read, there is a hymn, a prayer and some handshaking, but no discussion. If you are moving or staying you find it out at the eleventh hour in the midst of your peers. No warning is given.

Needless to say all the pastors stay to the end. When I have gone to the General Assembly in the US I have never stayed to the end, just can’t do it. And I wouldn’t have been at the end of this one until I knew what was going to be said.

The first name I heard to receive a change was Rev. Gondwe of Bandawe. Gondwe has finished an amazing church, headed up scads of other building projects, and been helpful in our work at Chivumu. But after seven years I had my suspicion that he might be “appointed” somewhere else. Gondwe is heading for Embangweni. This is a kind of lateral move for him in that he will be the “head of station” again as Embangweni is like Bandawe and Ekwendeni. I have never been to Embangweni, but thought, well, now I will.

But then came a name I truly hoped I wouldn’t hear. Rev. Hara. I asked the man behind me what this meant after all the singing was done and he said he has been moved to Karonga. Now being moved from Mzuzu to Karonga is not a “lateral” move. It’s moving from the benefits and comforts of the north’s one city to a border town at the top of the country. When people say Karonga there is a roll of the eyes.

It has taken me most of the last few days, much discussion, and a sermon to get my head around this news. The rumor is that someone called the synod meeting and told the “business” committee they will kill Rev. Hara is he wasn’t relocated. Which, if true, is part of the confusion. Why would church leaders capitulate to such foolishness?

In the next two days I will meet with the synod officials and ask them that question. The new General Secretary and Synod moderator were supposedly opposed to this move. How can they be outdone when they are in charge?

I will know more soon, but for now it is just quite confusing.

The following is the conclusion to the sermon I preached at Mchengatuba on Sunday. It was a bit surreal as I was preaching on the Sunday after the church had heard the news that their pastor was being relocated. It was a kind of farewell on many levels. I began the sermon talking about my experience with conflict in a congregation and how I dealt with it. Essentially I told them that being right, and standing with the truth and friendship are powerful tools in the midst of congregations in conflict. The texts for the sermon were 1Corinthians 13: 4-6 and IJohn 5:1-5.
Being here in Mchengatuba these last two months has been very reminiscent of my second congregation. The factions, the lies, the reluctance to stand and fight, the influence of a few over what they believe is the church: I have seen all these before.
When I encountered them in my second church I made a second mistake that I didn’t fully understand until I was here with you. After four years I left my second church believing that the conflict would never truly end as long as I was there, that I needed to leave for them to have a fresh start, to try again to be a church without taking sides over me. I believed that as long as I was there the conflicts would persist no matter how much I was loved.
Walking with Rev. Hara, your pastor, these last two months I can now see how little I understood the power of love. I must say before you, Norman, and all the congregation, that I am a better pastor and better person watching you live out your faith. Too often I look for answers in books, but I am thankful that for these last two months you have let me see your heart and watch the way you love a church.
The great lesson I have learned, that I failed to see in my second church, is that love will conquer, love will be victorious. But it must persist. When there were lies told about your pastor, when twice a mob surrounded his house, and when some idiot and evil doer called the synod and said they would kill him unless he was removed, transferred, he didn’t give in. He stood firm. He didn’t waver: he kept loving you.
You need to know that. He loves this church as a pastor should: he believes love will conquer. There have been times as I have watched him that I thought I would have done things differently. I would have chastised more openly; I would have given ultimatums to the session; I would have sought more loyalty from elders. Yet as I have watched him what I have come to understand is that love is not chastising; love is not given as an ultimatum; and love doesn’t demand its own way. These were the words of the apostle Paul; for the last two months I have watched them lived out, written upon the heart of your pastor.
The synod has decided to make the same error I made six years ago. They have decided to let a new pastor deal with your conflict. I have heard that he is far more like me than Rev. Hara. He is someone who will push you, confront you, be ready to fight with you. If you had asked me two months ago if this would be the right step for all I would have said yes. But now I know the difference, now I have learned that love is what will create the victory in Mchengatuba. I am humbled to say that I have walked with your pastor and learned this lesson.
We don’t have all the answers. None of us knows what is right for all, the proper definition of the truth that will be satisfy all hearts; no one has the voice that speaks for all with a power transforming all opposition into support. Yet, none of us is incapable of letting love empower us to what is right and true. Love is not a personality or even a purpose: it is the presence of God saving our souls from death unto life.
That your pastor wanted to say that and the lesson was not heard is the tragedy of this day. As I leave I have not lost my faith in you like your pastor has not. He still wants to bring you the victory of love conquering sin and death. For this he is to be commended. But in his commendation you are not to be scolded or shamed. Love is hard to learn, to live. We want to live by what we believe, by power, by strength, by skill. These are the easy paths compared to that of love.
It is fair to say that when his house was mobbed or when elders let lies persist or when even now they wavered at restoring his reputation because of the stupid greed, the sange, of some of you, that you didn’t love him. I am not sure he believes this. It’s hard to be a church; it is a miracle for a church to be a place of love, a house where love brings the victory. It is much easier for the strong to get their way, for the pushy to make their demands, for the greedy to get what they want (much more than what is fair or right). It is hard to even imagine what a church would be that is defined by love. To be a church where love is the victory: that is the intent of your pastor; that is what is being taken from you.
I was sent on a sabbatical to learn how to abide. It was quickly apparent to me that abiding was not what I thought it was. I thought abiding was about being free from concern; abiding was about being in a kind of immovable peace, settled in joy. Abiding I was quick to learn was not about the absence of conflict; it was about finding peace in midst of it. Abiding was not about staying put, but being willing to venture, to risk, to be cast out, even set adrift in life. Living for 9 weeks in Malawi I have learned what it means to truly give up my life, to put aside my comfort and security. I must say some of it I enjoyed, and some of it I fought and resisted.
But the greatest lesson of abiding has come from watching your pastor. To abide in love is what I found in him. To abide in love means you resist the easy victory of truth; you are patient when justice would have been more to the point; you abide in the chaos so that love has time to overcome. This is what Jesus meant when he said abide in me. Abide in love. Let love be victorious. It would seem that the synod is not as patient, not as ready to risk as Jesus calls us to be. I know I wasn’t, but thanks to Rev. Hara, I now am. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Kathy writes

2008-08-04T12:54:00.000-07:00

It’s been a good day in Mzuzu. We are in countdown mode. We have been here for eight weeks so far and this week will be our last full week here. This Sunday will be our last Sunday in Mchengatuba where Fred has been made Rev. Hara’s “associate minister.” Suddenly we have gone from gaping amounts of time to fill to only one week to wrap up loose ends and leave Mzuzu by next Thursday.

Fred shared with you about visiting the widow who had their houses roofed for them by Mark Purcell when he was here visiting the end of July. We had a great afternoon touring the different houses in the dambo last Thursday. At the 1st house we went to Laura asked if they had bednets (if you remember the dambo is the free low lying ground that is overrun with mosquitoes during the rainy season). At each of the six houses we found than none of them had bednets and at three of the houses the widows said they didn’t have a bed but would like a blanket. How do you even fathom such a thing? No bed, no blanket, but ever so grateful to now have a solid roof over their heads. They were so thankful to us and I wished so much that Mark could see the joy and hope he has brought them.

The next day Sam and Grace went to work finding the best deals on wooden beds and mattresses. By Saturday, the carpenters they had contracted with had completed three of the beds (three quarter size) and we picked them up. After loading all three on the top of Jodi’s van we headed into town to purchase mattresses. After getting them rolled up and stuffed into the car with the 9 of us (sans Fred who was on top of a mountain a couple hours away observing a synod election) we carefully drove to the dambo.

As we started out Sam said, “We will have to go the back way so we don’t get stopped for overloading.” I thought O.K. that sound about right. We arrived without incidence and were able to deliver the beds to the widows who had no idea we were going to get them for them. It was a very good day.

That was Saturday. Today, Monday, we did our shopping in the market, finally, found the phone company, purchased some more blankets, renewed Laura’s, Beka’s, and Zoe’s visa, found a warehouse to buy porridge for the dogs, and delivered the rest of the things for the widows to Sam and Grace. Almost as an afterthought Grace handed me a folded envelope. I asked her, “What’s this?”. It was Ruth’s passport and visa. Ahh! Finally. I didn’t think I was ever going to hold that in my hand! Then Grace tells me that they’ve stamped it for an unprecedented two year period. Unbelievable. We are awed and stunned . . . and very, very excited.

What will tomorrow bring?

2008-08-04T12:24:00.000-07:00

2008-08-04T12:11:00.000-07:00

The Synod Meeting
Being in Livingstonia always has the weight of history. It is a historical place as it was the site where Dr. Robert Laws developed a mission station that introduced not only Christianity to the Ngoni people but also modern medicine (as it was modern in the 1880s), building and architectural innovations that must have seemed like magic for people who were living in caves at the time.

I am seated in his church and it has the feeling of a cathedral. There is a stained glass window, tall windows and cut stone arch ways. It is impressive for Malawi today, I can’t imagine what it looked like 100 years ago. The reason for my visit would be just as hard to imagine for the people of Dr. Laws time. I am here as a visitor to the Synod of Livingstonia which is the northern region of the Presbyterian Church in Malawi. There are 600,000 adult members and the churches of the synod are community centers offering not only worship, but public health, primary education, and opportunity for development as well as justice.

You get a sense of what Jesus meant by the mustard seed. Laws cast some seeds that truly took hold. Yet the people who came after him, the Malawian pastors, elders, deacons (the churches) kept casting seeds.

My day here began with a worship service that was unique. In a sense it was just like any worship service that opens a denominational meeting, but at this one the sermon was powerful. It was a call to be salt and light, but why we should be such was so much more than the usual sermons I hear at Presbyterian meetings where the preacher tries to give a lecture on good manners and professional conduct with Christian overtones. This morning I was told to be salt and light because this is how we will bring salvation to the world.

From there though the meeting went down hill. At least in terms of an American perspective. There was formality after protocol after recognition. My thought was, this is too much of a cultural divide for me to span as I can barely handle a bit of this in the US. This went on for an hour.

And then something great happened: people stood up and said, this is going on too long. We have to get to business or we will never get out of here. This was the first two hours of a weeklong meeting. It may be that cell phones and text messaging have had an immediate impact upon the Malawian pastors, or it may just be people truly had business and didn’t want to see it cast adrift by a spirit of minutia.

Perhaps the real reason was the pastors were recognizing the significance of their meetings and what is at stake. It is clear in Malawi that pastors are beginning to see their role and what may happen in their country in the next year as tantamount to its future. There is a feeling in the air that decisions here are not just church matters, but Malawian matters; there is a sense of momentum that now is a time of great importance.

Its hard to tell if that is the impact of being in Livingstonia or just a lovely coincidence that a meeting of historical importance is happening here. Time will tell.

The Swan Song
Big meetings make me nervous. A few people around a table hashing things out is where my comfort level begins and ends. Get everybody together, you are likely to get a lot of foolishness and folks putting on airs.

The Synod of Livingstonia has 600,000 adult members, a bunch of presbyteries, and more churches than you shake a stick at. So the idea that you get together all the ministers and vote on things they consider significant . . . well, its fair to say there might be some dry parts.

I was there for two reasons. The first one was guilt. I was sick for the presbytery meeting and Rev. Hara was a bit embarrassed that his “associate pastor” was absent. So I told him I would be at the synod meeting for the big introduction day and I would drive. As none of the pastors have cars this was a big offer. I figured he would use this to his advantage and he did. There were six other passengers by the time we left Mzuzu and he was pleased as punch to be the one offering rides.

The other reason was Rev. Nkhoma. I have spent a fair amount of time with him and he never disappoints. Perhaps I am just an easy sell for a man who knows a lot of history (and lived it) but it’s fair to say that being with him these two months as he ends his career in ministry was a rare and unique privilege.

On the opening day of the Synod meeting (which lasts a week) Rev. Nkhoma was making his swan song, he was retiring officially and his replacement was to be voted in immediately. If that sounds a bit odd, the living out didn’t stray far from this mark.

I’ve already described the events that led up to his time of farewell but let me just give a brief recap: a lot of posturing, minutia and wrangling, a good sermon, tea, and lunch. When he was finally given the floor people were ready for something good. He delivered.

His speech was easily an hour long and was written out in single spaced pages that seemed to never end. (The moderator after it was over said, “that was a good speech, long, but good.”) It was long, but it needed to be to capture 20 years of being a leader of the synod. He literally started at the beginning and talked about the good the bad and the beneficial. There wasn’t a lot of ugly.

The theme of his speech was a passage from Genesis where Jacob meets Esau while returning home and says, I crossed this river with just a staff and now I am returning with two companies. Rev. Nkhoma tried to make clear that he felt as if his experience these last 20 years has left him like Jacob, amazed by the blessing he received.

His speech often felt like a catalogue of blessings. As he spoke I kept waiting for him to mention Chivumu and he never did. He started to wrap it up and I felt a little sad. This as “our” project and after listing all the rest this one was conspicuous for by its absence. And then he said, “now I can depart. I have a full primary school in my home village.” Last line . . . I got choked up.

But then he did something that got everyone a bit emotional: he rolled on the ground. He walked off the chancel, leaving the microphone behind, and said with a shaking voice, I want to express my gratitude to you in my culture. In the Tonga tradition the supreme act of thanks is roll at the feet of your benefactor. Before the hundreds of pastors and hundreds of elders, the media, the choirs, the students of the college, Rev. Nkhoma got down on the floor of the church and rolled back and forth. He said, “I want to thank you for what you have given me.”

This was one big meeting I am was glad not to miss.

Phase Three Joy

I’ve had four bottles of maple syrup sitting on our counter for a month. They were supposed to be for the ambassador, but we forgot them when we went to apply for Ruth’s visa. My intention was to say thanks for helping with the choir last year. It was a good intention that just didn’t seem to happen.

This morning, with the french toast, I let the kids open one as we were out of powdered sugar. Well, I thought, three is just as good as four, kind of.

Part of my willingness to share was that I had already made the decision of offering them with a letter explaining our intentions with Ruth to the consular instead of the ambassador. The consular, the assistant consular that is, dealt with her visa application and went out of his way to help, even staying later than the office is supposed to be open.

I’ve described my exchange with him and how happy we were at the outcome in an earlier blog. We asked for twenty four months knowing it was a kind of wish dream and were told that such a request was actually against the law, as the visa can only be a year. That we would be given a valid visa for Ruth to come to the US was more than enough no matter the length I told him.

Today Grace dropped off Ruth’s visa. Sam’s dad was in Lilongwe and we finally got the I-20 to the consulate so they could “seal” it. Part of the visa process is that there are no clear descriptions of the rules or requirements. It often feels like a hazing process and to some extent it is. So when Kathy said she had her visa in hand I kind of shrugged it off.

But then she said, “I knew it. Someone wrote 24 months on the I-20 and I wondered if that meant the visa would be for 24 months.” I looked at her visa and sure enough it was valid until July 22 of 2010. I just stared at it in unbelief.

I am still a bit in shock. A two-year visa. That changes so many things. First it saves almost $5,000 a year. Most important though we would rather bring Grace here to visit Ruth than fly Ruth out, and then struggle to get here back going through the whole visa process each year. With a two year visa we’ve been given a much different process. If by some chance we can renew this visa in the states then Ruth can visit Malawi in the next four years when it works best not when the paperwork needs to be filed.

I’ve pretty sure I will not let the kids open another bottle of maple syrup. The assistant consular who assured me he couldn’t give a two year visa and then provided one is worthy of a little thanks. I just hope he likes pancakes.

2008-08-02T11:47:00.000-07:00

2008-07-31T12:22:00.000-07:00

Sange #9
I went for a hair shaving today. Grace knew an expert and told Sam the directions. Leaving her house I was uneasy. I felt like we were being sent into a strange world. Neither Sam or I knew who or what this expert was going to be. This was the only time I have ever hesitated with Grace.

Reaching the shop it didn’t sit well. This was a beauty salon, not a barbershop. Fortunately the expert was out; she was at a funeral. Had she been in I would have been forced to sit like a carnival exhibit. The ladies in the shop had already given many glances my way suggesting this was not the place big white men should wander.

Sam knew of another shop so we headed off. Walking into this shop it was much of the same only a little less high end and there were two men working there. All of the clients gave the same look as the other shop, but the stylists started a conversation with Sam. They knew where I should go; I should go see Peter.

Sam knew Peter and was excited to find out he too was an expert in cutting white people’s hair. “You see it’s easy for us. They just shave it off. But with you it’s more complicated.” Being a hairdresser’s son I thought, you don’t know the half of it.

It turns out Peter was more than ready for the challenge my hair had become after three months without a trim, let alone a cut. I kept hearing him say “hair shaving” in my head as Peter started working. He started as he should with the sides and then the back. With this done his rate of speed dropped dramatically. It was now left with the top and I could tell by his technique that “expert” may be a bit of a stretch. So I turned to Peter and said, “lets just take it all down.” With that we were back at normal speed and confidence.

As Peter lowered my ears Sam chatted him up with gossip and helped himself to their razors to trim his aspiring goatee. “Florence,” he said, “she works next door.” I knew Florence was a hairdresser and that she worked in this general location, but I was surprised and amused to think she was just next door. Florence and Chimwemwe have proved the real hold outs in the youth choir. Almost all the others have come to Rev. Hara’s house to apologize. Anthony hasn’t, but I don’t think that will last; Lusaka came with two others to apologize but had to take a call before the apologizing started. Florence and Chimwemwe, though, flat out refused.

“She ran off when she saw us coming,” Sam said. I guess Florence has a habit of running when things get dicey. The image is both funny and sad. “I went next door and asked about her and they said she just left. She knew we were here.”

With my hair ready to pass boot camp inspection, I gave Peter a generous tip and told him he was indeed an expert.

After lunch Sam and I came back to Peter’s shop with my camera. I wanted a picture of Peter. It was a moment to remember. With the picture done, Florence appeared. She said hello and shook my hand. “I thought I saw you before,” she said. “Are there a lot of mzungu that get their hair cut here?”, I asked. She laughed. “Have you spoken with Rev. Hara?” “Yah, three days ago.” With a little more awkward chitchat done I thanked her and walked away.

Later in the day I spoke with Rev. Hara to see if what Florence said was true. It was not. That was my suspicion, or my expectation. Yet, I still don’t understand it. How can truth be so fluid in such a small place? I mean I can’t even get my hair cut in a town of a quarter of million folks without running into one of the fifteen choir members. What sort of world is this that no one believes anyone can just not tell the truth? I would expect truth telling to be tantamount here.

In a moment like this I feel like quite a novice, quite a beginner. I have experienced lies before. Seen people lie to themselves and others. And I know the words of Shakespeare, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive. Standing outside of the “hair shaving” shops I felt the dizziness and disorientation a fly must feel in an intricate web.

Extreme Dambo Makeover Edition
I felt like I was in a strange version of extreme home makeover.

I loaded up the ambulance with Kathy, Laura, Zoe, Sam and Rev. Hara and we headed for the dambo. Our purpose was to visit all the houses that received new roofs thanks to the Widow’s Fund and Mark Purcell. We visited six houses altogether and each one had it own surreal quality.

The first house was a kind of showcase. It turns out the widows fund built the whole house. When we arrived the widow came and hugged everyone and there was a lot of “tawonga chomeni” (thank you, thank you so much). We toured the house and thought it was quite nice compared to the other houses we had visited. (Later we would come to find out this widow was the victim of greedy in laws and had lived on a different social level before this. It showed.)

As we were leaving the first house Laura said, “does she have bed nets?” I was not used to offering things, leaving this in the hands of the Malawians it never occurred to me. Of course they didn’t. I asked the widow if she and her six children would use them she said yes. So Kathy got out her small notepad and wrote six bed nets.

At the next house we could see that the house, while improved with the roof was still a bit on the rough side. There were no windows, the chambuzi was a scary sight, and the gaps below the roof were sometimes a foot deep. “What would it take to finish this house?,” I asked Sam. He spoke to the widow: bricks for the gaps and glass for the windows. We tossed in bed nets and a concrete slap for the chambuzi. I handed her 1,000 kwatcha to start her on the purchase of glass for the windows and this was a nice moment.

At the third house we found out that bed nets would be a bit of problem as she and her four grandchildren don’t have any beds. They sleep on the dirt floor. How much are beds? We found this question coming up again in the next three houses. In the last one the widow was willing to forego a bed if she could just have a blanket. (Weeping here is fine.)

The fourth house was when the whole extreme hovel makeover took hold. When I found out she didn’t have a chambuzi, that she just went in the bushes, something just snapped. “If we built a chambuzi,” I said, “where would she want it?” Sam liked this question. After we handed her 500 kwatcha for bricks and mortar and labor to fill the gaps beneath the roof Sam said, “after you leave she is going to dance then cry.”

When we were at the next house, which was literally the next house, we could hear shouting. We looked back and the widow was indeed dancing. Then she did something I have never really gotten used to: she rolled on the ground at our feet. This is a Tonga custom to express extreme gratitude. It is definitely extreme.

The last house a safety code nightmare. It was small, not just in terms of square feet, but also in proportion. The doorframe couldn’t have been more than five feet high. The widow wasn’t much more than four feet and her grandchildren were all small so this was not a problem for them. Here too we tried to find out what it would take to finish off the houses to get them a moment where the widows felt done. I don’t think we provided more than $100 to each, but it was as if it were $100,000.
The roof for each house cost about $500 so our “finishing” touches were nowhere near as substantial. But there was something in the flourish, the lottery win, the dream. Sometimes when I have watched our version of extreme home makeover the extravagance is a bit much. Yet, with our widows today I felt like extravagance was the point. It was supposed to be big moment.

It is a sobering moment, though, when a blanket is a really big moment and a bed is just too much to even hope for.

2008-07-29T08:13:00.000-07:00

2008-07-29T08:06:00.000-07:00

2008-07-29T07:57:00.000-07:00

2008-07-29T05:46:00.000-07:00

To Get a Visa

After the choir sang their last concert in Bennington, Vermont we went for a walk the next morning. There is a great obelisk with a view of the surrounding valleys Scott Barton said we needed to see. As we walked the sidewalks lined with homes older than Christianity in Malawi I got the sense that our young friends were more enraptured by the size of the homes than their history or architectural style.

As their time in the U.S. was winding down, Kathy, Grace, and I were discussing a new, very large endeavor: bringing her daughter Ruth to the U.S. to live with us. Kathy had made this offer to Grace in Lake Clear a few days earlier and had spoken to me about it. We had already offered to fund Ruth to go to high school in Malawi. When Kathy found out that she was not living at home given the persistent harassment of her uncles to clean Grace out yet again, she said, “she should just come and live with us.”

With the challenge of bringing 15 Malawians to the U.S. very fresh in my mind, I tried to explain to both of them that this may take some time, it may not work the first time, and it will be even more complicated in that it will involve schools, medical insurance, and lots of luck with the consulate given Ruth’s age, she had just turned nine.

One year later, after many phone calls, meetings, forms, and long waits the assistant consular of the U.S. to Malawi said, “Mr. Garry, we can’t by law give Ruth a two-year visa, I can only grant one year.” Hence without a lot of fanfare, a great dream was realized. Later that evening at dinner I asked Ruth, “so do you still want to come to the U.S.?” Having lived with us for the last month she laughed and said, “yes” with a sense of determination.

Our first visit to the consulate on Monday was not as fruitful. They didn’t say no, but they didn’t say yes. They said, we need more information. What they really wanted was financial records from Kathy and I that would prove we could fund such a venture. As the consular looked over our documents what bothered him was that we had some money in our accounts. It was recent money was the problem.

Coming to Malawi was funded by the Lily Foundation. Before we left I deposited all the funds that were remaining after the plane tickets, shots, pills, and passports were secured (everyone also got a pair of sandals). Let’s just say, Lily was generous so there was a lump sum deposited just before our departure. He wanted to know about this money. Why would someone coming to Africa to bring back a 10 year old girl suddenly have an infusion of cash?

He was wondering if Ruth was a victim of human trafficking and if I was a kind of modern slave trader. It was at that moment I wished I was wearing my collar and had asked the congressman to draft a letter describing who we are, that I was a known entity in a town, in a church. All he had was a note I drafted on plain white paper and our bank statements.

“What do you do?” he asked. “I am the senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Watertown.” Now he had documents in front of him saying that, and I had said as much at least three times in the last five minutes. But he wanted to see if I kept giving the same answer. Finally he said, “how long do you intend to support Ruth’s education in the U.S.?”

This I could tell was a sticky wicket. If I said, “forever” did I mean to suggest that once she was there we would just ignore the residency issues and requirements; if I said for “this year” then our relationship wasn’t as secure as I had suggested in responses. What I said was, “it is our intent to continue to support her education in the U.S. for as long as we can secure valid visas.”

He liked that answer. “We are closing so we can’t process the visa today, but you can pick it up tomorrow.” I thought about saying, “we will be on safari,” but I thought better. “That will be fine.”

Phase three of the sabbatical seems like it is beginning. The struggle of abiding is giving way to the joy.

Another Roof

When we pulled up to the boat launch for Mvuu Camp the park ranger who was there last year walked over and re-introduced himself. He remembered not only that I came to Mvuu last year, but the people in my group, that I was a pastor, and that it was a different time of the year from when I visited before.

It took about two minutes to get the reason for his conversation. In addition to being a park ranger, he was . . . wait for it . . . an elder in a local congregation and, surprise of surprises, they were building a new sanctuary. “It’s not far,” he said upping the ante.

Now I’ve learned to trust these moments in Malawi. Let them be what they are. If you can stop by, stop by. But also realize that if you agree to a “visit” it may morph into a big deal and a few hours.

My first impulse was to say, “we are on safari,” and to suggest perhaps another time would be better. But there would be no other time, there just wouldn’t be.

To boot, he described his struggle the last year. As he was doing rhinosceros research a branch swung into his truck and literally stuck in his eye. “They sent me for surgery in Blantyre. I am better, but still not all right.” The not all right part was keeping him on limited duty and off the big program and excitement that had been his life. I told Kathy later, this was the clincher for me.

She was not very excited that instead of going directly for lunch, we were headed for a the ambiguity of a meet and greet. It was past 12 and in Malawi you get into the rhythm of three meals with no snacking in between, so she was afraid the troops would revolt if they needed to sit through a two hour long tea service where they were being told again and again how they are “most welcome” and “self-service, please”.

It was indeed a short drive from the boat launch to the church. And true to form there was a very large sanctuary next to a smaller one. The newer one lacked a floor, roof, trusses, windows, and doors. This the elder explained had taken two years. But now they lacked the funds for the rest.

This is a common sight around Malawi. It looks like a build has caught on fire and left a shell, only there was no fire, it was just that there was no money. Given the quality of the soil, clay to make bricks is out everyone’s front door, so walls are not a problem. But the cash to purchase the iron sheets for a roof or the holy grail, iron trusses, this is a big problem. Doors, windows, pews, and a floor are pretty easy to find. But the remaining two items (roof and trusses) are the real cost of construction, which for this church would be about $15,000.

All of this I understood going in. What is still hard to fathom, no matter how many times you do this, is to be seen as a big bucket of money. This was a church in another region from where I work, an elder I spoke to casually once a year ago, but maybe, just maybe, I might just write a check. It could happen.

When the pastor finally came out from his lunch, he was “out” when we arrived, he was just as crestfallen when I described the impression the people in the North would have if I started building churches in the South. Their sadness lasted for about thirty seconds and then it turned to laughter as they did try to imagine it. “I think they would say, ‘we have a few more churches to build up here.’” The North, indeed, has many churches without trusses and iron sheets for a roof.

To this the pastor offered a great comment. “You see we have a problem here with the Muslims. They are growing and if our growth is not as swift they take advantage and ridicule us. It looks like we are not faithful.”

I’ve sat through a lot of church meetings, especially in the mid-West, were a local congregation and its quick growth has been a topic of conversation. There is a kind of envy, but also strange reassurance. “At least someone is doing something right.”

Listening to the pastor I tried to imagine what it would like for the “other” church to be Muslim. And it’s not Muslim in the sense of the great umbrella of American spiritual diversity. It’s Muslim in the form of political consequence, the loss of your daughters to marriage, the potential of radical influences that seem to be brimming in sub-Saharan Africa. That’s a different kind of “other.”

Mvuu Camp
I was nervous driving to Liwonde. We have talked so much and been excited for so long about going on safari at Mvuu. Sometimes the build up can make the actual experience seem like a shadow of what was expected. After all the wait, what if all the animals in the national park had a freak disappearance on our day of safari? I could see the guide shrug his shoulders and say, “the hippos were here yesterday.”

To get to Mvuu you drive south from Lilongwe about three hours. The road is hilly with lots of mountain curves. You are stepping into yet another climate of Malawi. The villages here are built in the valleys and they look like small worlds unto themselves.

Once you reach Liwonde, there are people waiting by the side of the Shire River who know your name and all have matching khaki clothes. Matching clothes is a big deal here. It means something very significant. In the U.S. where people chafe at the idea of uniforms, here it means you are part of something big. And more importantly, you are gainfully employed.

As we loaded onto the riverboat my fears were there again. I knew we would see hippos, but if they could just see one elephant, then the pressure would be off for the rest of the time. We were about fifteen minutes on the water heading north on the Shire when we spotted three elephants getting a drink. We pulled to within twenty yards and all the cameras came out. Five minutes later we were looking at a herd, and then a few minutes after that a large elephant with a broken tusk eating grass at the rivers edge. And then the hippos and the crocodiles started. They glom together and provide an intriguing contrast. The hippos are smooth and round, the crocs are jagged and long.

Unlike previous visits in April where all you saw of the hippos was the top of their heads, in July they were up and walking around the shore, lumbering slowly. The hippos didn’t move if we came up close, but the crocs did. They are less excited about being photographed. Each time they dove into the river and swam past the boat, Ruth asked, “will they come into the boat?” In all we easily encountered two dozen on the way to the camp and her question never ceased. It was clear that safari was more than sightseeing in her mind.

Upon arrival we enjoyed the fine dining the camp provides and everyone was taken aback by the décor of the chalets and just the atmosphere. After lunch and a swim we headed into the bush for a game drive. We were looking for rhinos and zebra but found only antelope, impala, and elephant. In the night drive, we were lucky enough to spot a civet, jackal, and a white tailed mongoose amongst the waterbuck and the wild boar.

Yet, the real “safari” moment came upon our return just after dinner. Everyone was exhausted after a day of so many sights and I was quick to wave off the guide as he offered to escort us to our chalets. “I know the way,” I said, “and we have a torch.” “No,” he said, “the elephants have taken to walking through the chalets at night, it’s better I go with you.”

Coming around the corner I was getting impatient with his speed and when he stopped on the path maybe twenty yards from where we wanted to go, he said, “there is a large elephant eating in front of Chalet #5.” This was Laura and Beka’s room. And the elephant was literally straddling their porch. We took a vote and this was the most popular moment of the safari.

Later that night Kathy and I were awaken by an elephant eating right outside our window. It was a racket beyond imagination. Still half asleep I started to get up so to shoo it away. Luckily I woke up a bit more so as to remember, the elephant may not take to being shooed.

The next morning Kathy, Beka, Laura and I joined our guide Duncan for a six o’clock bird walk into the bush. As was the case last year, this is a highlight for me. The birds in Africa are shocking in their variety and omnipresence. Everywhere you turn there is an intriguing bird to spot and watch.

After our boat safari we headed out a bit before twelve. We sped down the Shire at a clip. As we did herds of elephants walked in the marshy grasses and hippos and crocs lined all available muddy spots. We watched fish eagles and kingfishers dive into the water. By that point no one needed to stop as we were flush with so many sights. Sometimes the reality is even more than the hype.

Mark Purcell Goes to the DamboOn Saturday we made the drive from Lilongwe to Bandawe. Mark Purcell was ending his trip to Malawi with a few days at the lakeshore and we were to join him. We pulled in around 3:30 and the stress of the drive just evaporated. Oh, the lakeshore.

Mark and his sons, Andrew and James, arrived in Malawi a week before. They spent a few days in Lilongwe seeing the crisis nursery, a few days at Mvuu seeing the elephants, and then four days in Mzuzu being led by Sam and Grace. I gave some suggestions as to where they might lead the Purcells, but it was not necessary.

When we met up at the Chinteche Inn James and Andrew were still excited about the day before. Grace took them to a DPP rally where she was the focus. “So your Dad made a political speech,” I declared. They both smiled and said, “yeah, he did.” “Never thought you’d see that did you?” They both shook their heads and continued to smile.

As we all unwound a bit the details of Mark’s time in Mzuzu started to unfold. They pretty much jettisoned all the sightseeing and got to work. Mark, like the eight ladies from Watertown and Canton, was a bit bothered that we had purchased iron sheets for the widows of the dambo but had yet to get any of them installed. So instead of touring he jumped into inspection mode and then set about hiring contractors. All the ladies of the dambo now have new roofs installed.

One house though was not salvageable. This problem led to negotiations to purchase a few acres on the outskirts of Mchengatuba so this one can, as Mark put it, “just have a whole new house.” I am not sure that dambo has ever seen a day like this one before: the day Mark Purcell came to town.

I spoke with Sam later about the land in question and we believe we can get it for under a thousand, probably around $700. “There will be enough room,” Sam said, “for at least ten houses.” All the teenagers starting tossing around names for this new village. I think “Graceland” is the one everyone agreed to.

Word travels fast in Malawi and its not just the omnipresence of cell phones. “Maurice is insisting that you eat dinner at his house when you return to Mzuzu.” This is the Deputy General Secretary. “He wants you to have dinner with Father Andrew.” We both smiled at this. Such a dinner means the gears of the political machine are starting to turn. I laughed and said, “of course I will have dinner with Maurice.”

I want to say it took Mark Purcell about ten minutes to figure out how much joy can be had in Malawi. The possibilities, the people, the rate at which significant change can occur are truly a lot of fun. I tried to stress to him how we need to get to work on the U.S. side. The church is still the umbrella for the widow’s fund, but we need to formalize it as a nonprofit. We also need to form a board and get everyone on the same page.

When I told him I don’t want the U.S. board to be the decision makers, he smiled. “No, the people here should be making the decisions.” With that I could see he really got the beauty of being a friend of Malawi. It’s about creating the possibility of something and getting out of the way. The women of the dambo are very glad Mark gets it.

O Gondwe
I had an epiphany Sunday morning. I wish it had come as I was listening to a sermon or enjoying the sound of the waves beating the shore of Lake Malawi, but alas, it was not. The epiphany came when the church elders invited me into the vestry, saying, “bring your case with you.”

Most pastors here carry a leather briefcase which holds their bible. My gut told me, they are going to ask me to preach.

Inside one of the elders started with apologies. “Rev. Gondwe is in Lilongwe. He didn’t tell us you were coming. All of our ladies and most of our people are at another prayer house this morning at a fundraiser.” The picture went from bad to worse when he said, “we have voted that since you are here you should take the service.”

I have preached with a few hours notice, but only in Malawi have I experienced the pleasure of a few minutes notice. They took pity on me and made one of the elders do all the logistics and keep the service flowing. Had this been my first trip to Malawi I would have refused. Now though I know better and I just smiled and said, absolutely I will.

As the service got started I tried to craft a message in my mind. I took the passage the elder was going to preach and figured the congregation and I would just “listen” to it together as if it were the first time for both of us, which was true.

The elements of the service were as free flowing and bizarre as usual. A staff member from the synod was in attendance and had brought a nice mirror for the church. I was directed to pray over the mirror and give it a blessing. Later Mark Purcell told me he was duly impressed that not only did I do it, but had something cogent to say. I told him I have blessed a lot of things, but this was the first mirror. (I also told him boats are my favorite to bless as it’s always followed by a party.)

During the offering came the epiphany. Had I done my sabbatical at the lakeshore how I had intended, this would have been my lot. All of a sudden the image of Norman Hara came to mind. For six weeks I have worked with him and spent time with him and never did I feel dumped upon or used. In fact, it has been just the opposite. He has made sure that my time in Mchengatuba is not grunt work or that my presence is an excuse for him to let me take over.

I knew in an instant that had I come to the lakeshore for the nine weeks I would have been working all the time. This would have been very problematic given the intention of my sabbatical. In Mchengatuba I haven’t been working; I have been abiding. Sometimes the abiding has been bitter like the night we met with the choir; sometimes the abiding has been joyful like the moment Sam and I walked the dambo. Be it hard or happy it has been abiding.

Staring out at the congregration and remembering the words of the elders, “he didn’t tell us you were coming,” I thought, “Gondwe, Gondwe.” One Sunday was annoying. Nine would have not been any fun at all. What abiding reveals never ceases to amazes me.

Chinteche
We stayed an extra day at Chinteche on the lakeshore. It hit us: the fatigue and the motion and the change and the sense of being gone. When I asked if there was room for another night, there must have been something in my voice, because the manager seemed pleased to say, “yes.” I was pleased as well. We needed another day of being on the beach, eating delicious food, and enjoying the sound of the waves at night. The weight bringing the exhaustion wasn’t one thing; it was a moment of too many things.

I’ve tried to balance the two intentions of the sabbatical. The first intention was to learn more of Malawi than can be achieved in a two-week visit. This is my fourth time in Malawi and at this point I have exceeded the amount of time spent in the last three trips combined. I have now been around long enough that the rhythm of life is coming into focus; the friendships made in the past are being tempered by real life; and, most importantly, a complex culture is coming into view in ways I scarcely could have imagined.

This has proven rather straightforward. I imagine it may have been forfeit if I had withdrawn, hiding myself away behind the gates of the McGill house. Yet, except for a few days of illness and two days of exegetical work on I John, I have made sure to be in the midst of people and places so I know more than a kind of cursory impression. The secret it would seem to ethnology is the same as being a pastor: show up, be in the midst, and listen.

The second intention of the sabbatical has not proven as easy. Bringing my family into nine weeks of Malawi so they can share this part of my life has not been as obvious as amateur anthropology. With their suitcases came our life together; with their passports came emerging identities and complex relationships.

It’s fair to say, I am a better pastor than parent, a better preacher than a husband. In this I am well within the experience of many men I’ve met. Deferring attention because there is more work to be done; being absent is excused as part of the job. Being together in such a different place, being part of every step and dust up has been a bit of a surprise. It wasn’t part of the sabbatical I asked the Lily Foundation to provide and First Pres to support. Yet, in some ways it has been even more revelatory than being immersed in a different culture. This “part” has made many things very transparent.

Anthropologist might call this a “liminal” experience. Liminal is when we are taken to the edges, the edge of meaning where we can see ourselves and our life in a way that is profound and insightful. Another anthropologist might call my ramblings about our time in Malawi as “thick.” Thick in the sense that there are so many layers we are sifting through, so many parts of our life being exposed at one moment, it is rich and all too clear.

Being so exposed, so transparent can be just a bit on the taxing side. There was the drama of trying to be a family in a new house, a new city, a new country, and a new continent. That was a bit of a stretch. Add to this the absence of all the creature comforts like friends, phones that work, television, and a newspaper that is delivered to my door at 4:00 am so I can read it at 4:30 each morning (not to mention a second newspaper that comes in the mail that I can read over dinner until Kathy chastises me). I’ve whined enough about driving that it need not be explained here, but I now long to drive on paved roads where there are no chickens, goats, bicycles, or children darting about. Each one of these has uncovered or revealed something in us, in me.

We’ve talked for a few weeks now trying to imagine if it would have been easier if we would have done this or that. Yet, the conclusion we seem to reach is that nine weeks in Africa is a kind of challenge that has proven as enlightening as taxing. There was some heavy lifting that just is what it is.

So an extra day at the Chinteche Inn was, shall we say, a very good idea. It was a great idea because we are not done yet. We are only 2/3 of the way through our time. That there will be more insights, more moments of “ahahs,” and more times where I stop and say, “I didn’t see that before” is pretty much a guarantee. Be that as it may, it is good to just be on the lakeshore for another day and rest a bit before the next round. Seeing this much of life is a gift, an extravagant indulgence that surprises me each time I think of it. It also comes with a heavy dose of emotional baggage.

2008-07-22T01:47:00.000-07:00

2008-07-22T01:26:00.000-07:00

Sange #7
Preaching in Bandawe is always an adventure. Rev. Gondwe doesn’t stand on a lot of protocol in terms of order. If you are taking the service he pretty much throws you in. So I was prepared for nothing being prepared when arrived to preach on Sunday.

Some might consider the lack of preparation Malawians bring to their life a kind of laziness, or at least a lack of appreciation for details. There is some of that. Malawians will be quick to castigate each other for being lazy. When I hear this I know I am in another culture. “Lazy” in America is a pretty serious accusation. We work hard to use it sparingly and restricting it to a specific event. A second grader may be told that their lack of effort on a project was “lazy”, but if that teacher were to tell a parent their child is lazy, there may be some sparks.

Yet it is nothing for a Malawian to chastise a colleague for being lazy, for a pastor to exhort a congregation not to be lazy, and I have read in the national press calls by the President for the people to rise above laziness. I can’t imagine President Bush suggesting the rebound of our economy hinges upon our ability to not be lazy.

My text for the morning was John 15, the Abide in Me passage. The sermon emerging from this passage had two purposes. The first was to explain why I didn’t come to the lakeshore for my sabbatical. There had already been some confusion when I appeared in June. Bandawe was for all intents and purposes the place where I felt at home. Why wouldn’t I come home if I were going to live for 10 weeks in Malawi?

Abiding I explained is about not being at home, its about losing your home or giving it up: it is about being displaced. The Holy Spirit told me, I said, if you want to understand abiding you need to go to Mchengatuba. As this was the promise I made to my home congregation (I will spend the summer learning what it means to abide), I felt bound to follow the direction. At this point I interjected the story of Jonah saying this is where I wanted to be. All the Malawians needed was the reference and they got the point. When I told them I was a bit nervous when I get too close to the lake as the fish are quite large, they really laughed.

The second point of the sermon was what I learned about abiding in Mchengatuba; I learned about sange. Working from the theory that in Bandawe there is a greater sense of community and deeper family relationships that keep sange more at bay, I told the congregation that most likely sange was not a problem here. There was a lot of chatter as I continued. (Perhaps there is not as much community as I thought.)

As the service was winding down, Gondwe went to the lectern and gave an impromtu sermonette about sange. In fact he said sange is not a problem in this congregation, but it is a huge problem in the presbytery. Again the ladies from Northern New York were being given a glimpse of Malawi you don’t see on safari. Gondwe went into great detail about his experience of sange.

After the service two men from the church approached me as we waited for lunch. They wanted to expand my understanding of sange. “You see, we’ve heard about Mchengatuba. It happens,” he said, “because people believe they will get rich if they go to the U.S. They believe they will come back with pockets full of money and extravagant gifts. And when they don’t their friends and family believe they are holding things back from them.”

With this the wires started to cross. One of the parts I truly admire in this culture is that if you have something you share it. There are no “leftovers” here. If you come into some money, you don’t save it, you help others. Some might suggest the down side of this is that it erodes initiative. The sense of dependence doesn’t work well with the motivation necessary to succeed, say, in business or in a career. A shop owner who “shares” all their goods is quickly out of business.

Yet the person who does work and does succeed and saves money in this culture becomes a kind of cultural deviant. And so in Mchengatuba as someone succeeds and they don’t simply “share” but save or invest, they are in a cultural sense out of step, or in moral categories, doing what is wrong.

Now the picture of a twenty year old who concocts a story about a second check from the U.S. and seeks to claim money given to the church has some clarity. They were supposed to come back rich. If they don’t get some money some place no one will believe them when they say, they don’t have any thing to share. And the idea that someone’s success is only a real blessing when it’s shared.

Sange #8
It was about responsibility, Rev. Nkhoma said.

Linda Potter asked him to explain how someone like Grace, a professional with tons of connections who is now running for parliament, was still without the leverage necessary to keep her in-laws from cleaning her out. How will this end was Linda’s point.

Rev. Nkhoma never ceases to amaze me how he can clarify a cultural issue using history and how Malawi has changed in the last thirty years.

“Before the cash economy,” he said, “a man had a hoe, an ax, maybe a canoe or some nets. These were his ‘possessions.’ This is what he used to provide food for his family. When he died and his brother came to take them, he was saying, in essence, ‘I will uses these to provide for you as your husband did.’ Taking the possessions were a promise that he would be responsible for his sister in law and his nieces and nephews. He would use the hoe to bring them a harvest; he would use the canoe to bring them fish. In taking them he was keeping them alive and now seeing them as his own. It was about responsibility.”

In the last twenty years, arguably, Malawi has moved more and more from a purely subsistence economy, where cash was very scarce, to a cash based economy. People are still very much involved with subsistence, but with an ever present element of supplementing their income.

The first three weeks we were in Malawi, Sam kept apologizing for the absence of his mother. She is in Msimba. What she was doing was bringing in their crops. They live in an urban place with everyone looking for work, but they also have crops in a field in their home village. The crops are brought in to feed their family through the year, but you can’t live on nsima. You need more. In Mchengatuba that means you need cash.

Cash, while it is becoming more and more a part of the culture, is still hard to come by. You may need to send your husband to South Africa to work; you may need to pick tea at abysmal wages; you can try your hand at “business.” With any luck you will succeed. With success comes cash and with cash comes stuff. It is not uncommon to find a television in a Malawian home. It only gets the one free channel of bizarre public television but it’s on all day. It’s not uncommon with success for someone to have furniture in their living room, a stereo. They have stuff.

I will never forget being in a home in Kabwanda. It was a mud house with mud floors and rough openings for windows. There was no furniture. Everyone slept on the floor. But in the corner was a television and a stereo run off a car battery. The husband was in South Africa.

Now, when a husband dies (which is very common for the men coming back from South Africa; you can get a job there, but you will most likely become infected with HIV/AIDS as well), when a husband dies, his brother doesn’t come to take on his job in South Africa, he comes for his stereo. When a brother dies who had a good job in a city, his brothers don’t come for his hoe and his canoe, but the dining room set.

Sange, when coupled with a cash economy, quickly eliminated the role of responsibility that came with the collections of a brother’s possessions. The only problem is that the widow is now just left without anything. And if sange is really in play, she is left homeless as the husband’s family takes over his house and kicks out his wife and children.

It’s hard to say when this became a norm. I want to say I am just scratching the surface of a huge cultural shift. Hopefully this is a bad phase, a cultural crisis that will find a resolution. I hope.

Phase Three

As August is closing in our time has started to take on shape.

The first three weeks, phase one, were a kind of crash course, bronchitis fueled, struggle. There were a number of moments where Kathy and I wondered if a sabbatical where I explored my interest in the ancient near east or Italian food may have been more “sabbath” like.

Sitting at the American Embassy yesterday we rehashed this. The intent of the trip was to deepen my understanding of Malawi and it’s culture so our mission work would have greater clarity and purpose, but also for my family to share this direction. If we are going to keep working with the Malawians, especially raise a Malawian child, we need to understand what this means as a family.

In phase one, I don’t believe we achieved these objectives. What we encountered in the first three weeks was what it meant for Americans to live in Malawi. The McGills offered this picture in spades. They made clear all the hidden costs, the web of decorum and protocol that defines a culture that cannot begin a meeting on time, and the many of the dangers. A part of me wonders if we were too informed. Sometimes ignorance is bliss. Yet, I am glad we had these pictures as the success is much sweeter each time we navigate the dangers.

Phase one was also just really, really stressful. Driving in Malawi is not something you come to enjoy in a few weeks. Just last night as we drove from Lilongwe to Mzuzu the car in front us had to dodge a violent brawl and then a nearly run over a drunken man who staggered into oncoming traffic. That’s just the extra fun of one drive. The usual subjects of stress (livestock, bikes, tobacco trucks, pedestrians, children playing, potholes that are crater like) are just part of getting from here to there.

Phase two was about being hosts. The ladies from New York arrived with our “girls”. All of sudden we had two groups we were keeping track of. Laura, Zoe, Beka, and Chelsea had one schedule and the widow’s group had another. They all did great and were a blessing, but all of sudden we were interpreting Malawi to others instead of trying to understand for ourselves.

In this we did learn a great deal about what it means for us to do mission in Malawi. And my family has now had a profound experience. The fellowship of friends from home also diffused some of the stress of immersion. It was during this time that “sange” started to emerge. I truly don’t believe I would have ever begun to understand this complex layer of Malawian culture on a two week visit. It came first as a warning from the McGills, “sange is a big problem here.” And then it came like a tidal wave, a kind of cathartic eruption in the village of Mchengatuba.

And now we are heading into the last phase. What it will hold is starting to emerge. It seems as if we are finally ready to just enjoy the people and the places. Our guard isn’t completely down, but we are heading into the fruit of abiding. Jesus said in John 15 “abide in me.” He said this on the night of arrest; he said this to people just before he was crucified. And John wrote this to Christians who were being expelled from their church home and thrown into the chaos of being displaced. Yet, John 15:11 says, I say this to you so my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.” This to me is the other side of abiding.

I am not sure what form this may take, but it seems to be the theme of phase three. Abiding is about being displaced, and enduring, and trusting in the midst of chaos; yet, it is also the mysterious way in which joy is to emerge. Again, abiding is word that doesn’t disappoint. There is a reason John chose this image as a way of defining the church. As I look to understand what it means for the church to be in mission, abiding seems to provide a powerful answer.

2008-07-20T13:07:00.000-07:00

The Opportunity Bank Came to Mchengatuba.

I am still trying to convince myself this happened. When Linda Potter wrote me months ago and said she would like to hook up with the folks from the Opportunity Bank when she is in Malawi, I thought, that will be nice. Futile, but nice.

In the last few years I have become a bit jaded about any preexisting organization. I don’t want to sound like a paranoid, on the fringe protester, but I have lost a bit of confidence in the “institution.” If I am not growing it, making it from scratch, or doing it myself, why bother? This has become my question after trying to start with the larger group, the denomination, the established folk. So the idea of trying to bring in an established bank into our fledgling widows organization sounded like recipe for frustration.

In the last too weeks of working with them the experience has been anything but. In fact things have really got cooking was a whole lot of progress and wonderful . . . well . . . opportunities. The first bit of progress was that the local Roman Catholic priest who heads up the benevolence ministries of the diocese said he would love to come with the staff member who works in Mchengatuba for a meeting with the Opportunity Bank and our Widows Organiztion. And the local Presbyterian pastor said, “I don’t know the priest but I would like to meet him.” They were both really excited about the Opportunity Bank coming out to Mchengatuba; and at the end of the meeting they both agreed to work with us.

When we actually all sat down with the branch manager and the loan officer (Wilson and Peter) the excitement continued. The more we talked about setting up a local committee that would seek out and screen potential micro credit clients, and this committee would recommend projects to a widows organization board, and this board would have the choice of offering an endorsement to the bank made everyone excited. “And the bank is not bound,” I said, “to make loans simply because we endorse them, but simply sees our approval as a recommendation.” There were lots of nods around the living room of Grace Chiumia.

A little more than a year ago Grace and I were sitting in the living room of Jim and Jodi McGill where we negotiated the first step of the “widows fund” as it was then called. Grace was quick to suggest micro lending and everyone said, too soon, too early. I still believe that was the case. The biggest reason we gave Grace then not to rush into micro credit is that you don’t want to be a bank.

Yesterday that is exactly what I said to the folks from the Opportunity Bank. “I don’t want to be you; I am pastor; I don’t want to be a banker.” But I would love for the some of the funds that have been donated to help widows in Malawi be utilized as micro credit loans. They are eager for a chance to move out of extreme poverty and a micro loan has proven a very effective tool to do just that.

After our quasi board meeting, Wilson and Peter met with two groups of widows and discussed the potential of one selling beans in the market and another selling poultry in Mchengatuba. I am not sure of the outcome of these discussions, but I do know what came of their meeting with Grace and her business partner, Sam Chirwa, to discuss the next step for the preschool they have opened: pre-approved. That was a great sign given that we have not yet deposited any money in the Opportunity Bank.

When I am wrong I tend to be really wrong. How great it has been to be really wrong about this one.

The Malawian Lens

Linda Potter is a “mama molesia.” In the U.S. she is a life coach, a business woman, a Christian, a mother of three, Mike’s wife and much more. But in Malawi, she is “mama molesia” (the pastor’s wife).

Being a pastor’s wife in sub-Saharan Africa carries an enormous amount of weight and responsibility. A pastor’s house, or manse, is part conference center, part vestry, part city hall/dining hall, and, when it’s not being used for these, a home run by the mama molesia. Most families in Malawi have between six to eight children. Add to this being a pastor means you have a steady job with an income so you are obliged to raise nephews, nieces, and grandchildren in addition to your own.

I am not sure if Linda would let it go uncontested in the U.S. that she is “just the pastor’s wife.” In fact most people in Canton who know her wouldn’t let that stand, but in Malawi, “mama molesia” is enough said. The crowd always ooohs when her title is given.

It is a safe guess that Linda, and her seven travel companions from Northern New York, weren’t ready for the way they would be interpreted as they sought to interpret the fledgling widow’s fund that was begun in Watertown in 2006. Yet again and again I have watched them see themselves through the lens of Malawian eyes.

“Mzungu” is the most common title they each have received. Mzungu is the word for “white person.” At the village of Mzenga as they listened to political speeches for an upcoming parliament seat, their white skin was mentioned numerous times as a kind of shocking occurrence. That white people would come to Mzenga was hard to fathom. With my family and the ladies altogether, we equaled 15 mzungu. One or two would have brought the village; fifteen brought people from all 32 areas of this remote nook of Africa.

To be seen as an honored guest, to be as someone who needs a seat on the dais, to be praised as a kind of wonder of the world is to be seen through a different lens than these ladies are use accustomed. (Later that day, a persistent comment was, “now we know what it means to be hounded by the paparazzi.)

Yet, perhaps the most profound and new way of being seen was to be seen as the one who can bring about a new world.

During the rally, a young person was invited to give a list of grievances. It was a moment to make a pitch to the visitors. The young man chosen to speak made two requests: they need an ambulance and they need a high school. You can’t walk to any hospital and many kids are walking more than five miles to school each way. Now the first one is approximately $50,000. I know as First Presbyterian in Watertown “topped up” the funding for one this year. A secondary school . . . I want to say is somewhere between $75,000 - $200,000. (That’s quite a bargain for an entire school when you remember your last levy and what it bought.)

I am not sure if the ladies from Watertown and Canton fully understood that they were being asked to fund these projects, but in fact, that is exactly what was happening. They were seen as the ones who can bring these things to Mzenga.

The longer I spend time in Malawi the more this interpretation challenges me. My first response is to laugh when I think of how little chance there is that I could just write a check for $50,000 let alone four times that amount. Yet, the real challenge of these kinds of requests is the knowledge that “we” can bring this about if we chose. If we believe it is the right thing to do, we could very easily transform Mzenga with an ambulance or a school. It is really far within the realm of the possible.

I hope at some point each one of the ladies from Watertown and Canton will begin to see themselves as the Malawians see them. They are hope; they are someone you can ask to change the world. And this world looks a lot different when you realize what a difference you could make if you chose to try. It doesn’t look easy, but it does look doable. At least one young man in Mzenga truly hopes they see the world the way he does.

DPP Oye!

The district political leader shouted, DPP oye!
And the crowd responded, “Oye!”
“Dpp, oye!” he charged them again.
“Oye!”
And then he introduced the candidate, “Grace Chiumia, oye!”
“Oye!” They answered with a frenzy.

The ladies from Northern New York (Heather White, Rita Gefell, Rene Waterbury, and Liz Bonisteel of Watertown; Linda Potter, Vicky McClean, Katrina Hebb, and Ellen Grayson of Canton) had strayed a bit from the standard tourist path. Malawi often presents these “alternative” tours and a political rally supporting their friend Grace Chiumia for a seat in parliament is definitely off the beaten path most visitors trod in the warm heart of Africa.

In March of this year Grace came to Watertown and Canton to prepare the ladies for the trip to Malawi in July. The purpose of their trip was to interpret the widow’s organization Grace has developed with our funds. Upon her arrival in the North Country she was quick to broach an issue with me: with how I would feel about her running for parliament? Would I see this as a good thing?

Her face lit as I said, “you are the sort of person Malawi needs to build the future. Do you need me to make speeches? I will do it.” We laughed at this, but I wasn’t joking. I had all confidence that during my sabbatical, at some point, I would be saying, “vote for Grace” to a crowd of Malawians.

True to form, after a two hour drive into the bush and with all the introductions made to the few thousand people who had gathered on the football “pitch” in Mzenga; after all the people went wild seeing my wife, daughters, and the “ladies” from New York wrapped in chintengis (bright cloth worn as a skirt) imprinted with the face of the president of Malawi, I began my speech.

I asked if the people could help me understand the politics of Malawi. Were there politicians here who liked to hear their voice? Were their politicians who lined their pockets? Were their politicians who just like to sleep instead of work? To each query the Malawians gave a tentative “yes.” They didn’t know exactly where I was going with this. Should they tell the visitor their real interpretations?

Finally I said, are their politicians who will work hard, not make promises they can’t keep, and give their life so others would see a better future? Before they could answer I said, “look no further here is one.”

I explained my relationship to Grace and her selflessness. But what truly needed to be said was spoken before all the speeches: she is someone who brings the unimaginable- a whole band of Americans to a remote village; she delivers a group of American’s to Mzenga of all places, a group whose only motive was to help the most vulnerable in their midst the widows. That is gold in Malawi. I am pretty sure I really didn’t need to stump, but there would have been great confusion had I not spoken. No matter. Malawians love speeches. And if the truth be told I would do it again, and most likely will. “Vote for Grace; vote for Grace!” I said before I sat back down.

The frenzy of the thousands, the five different speeches, the dancing, the singing, the dramas, were just a bit different for the visitor. This was not a church event; this was not a business meeting: this was a rally. Again and again I spied our “ladies” and my family; their eyes were wide.

As we left the rally, it was clear that we were in a different place. The van with the ladies was bedecked with three boys would had jumped on the bumper for a ride. As we drove away through the dispersing crowed they kept shouting in Tonga, “Grace has already won; Grace has already won.” This I hope is a true prediction of the vote count. Yet, as bizarre as the scene was for the ladies, as much as they might have wondered what other world they had stumbled into, it was clear they were a part of the hoped for victory, a part of something amazing.

“DPP, oye!”

What do you like most about Malawi?

That was Katrina Hebb’s question to me as we drove out of Mzenga in the rain through the tea plantation.

I thought and thought and thought and finally said, “I’ve never thought of it; I’ve never asked myself that question.”

Now if she had asked what are the things you like about Malawi . . . no problem. Beer is cheaper than water. People say yes and no when answering one question in the same breath. The lakeshore. The way a conversation is a kind of expectation and an art. I love that being in a hurry is really distressing to people. Although it has taken awhile to learn how to enjoy it, I find great pleasure that all plans are tentative and subject to great delays and postponement with non chalance.

This list can go on and on. But what was the one thing I like the most? The dirt road was very slick so I needed to watch where I was going, but soon the answer came to me. “What I like the most is that you can change things, make a difference and its not Herculean, its not beyond everyone’s imagination. You can build an entire school for a fraction of the cost of a house in the U.S.” In fact a school is about the cost of a luxury car, maybe a little less.

My visits to Malawi and this thing I like the most has come with a cost. Now, as I go about my day and face the choices of life I am presented with a question carved in relief from the extreme poverty of Africa: do you really need this? The answer is most often “no.” I don’t need new golf clubs; I want them, but I don’t need them. I don’t need more clothes; I need to give away more than half of what I already have. I certainly don’t need a twenty dollar bottle of Le Crema pinot noir. (Well that is unless I am making the petit peas and pepper bacon carbonara. Paradox always has a place where wine is concerned.)

The tension of this question is a result of counting kwatcha. The exchange rate in Malawi right now is 140MK/1US. A bottle of beer is 50MK- thirty-five cents. A night at a beach resort with breakfast included 3,500MK or $25. I bought a lovely wooden bowl today for $10. Something like this would sell for $50 in the US or more. My point is that a daily part of life in Malawi for an American is to count kwatcha. Usually your are left with an impression: it can’t cost that little.

The glory of the bargain, though, wears off when I realize I pay each of our staff less than $50 per month for full-time employment. All of sudden the bowl which I got for a steal represents nearly a week’s wage. I think of what I earn a week and consider “would I buy a bowl for that?”

I wouldn’t but I am starting to think I don’t want to buy an athletic field for a high school for a million dollars either. I balked when the wood carver started the bowl at twenty dollars. “Please, please,” I said, “be reasonable.” Such a price is gouging; it was. Yet, what about Chivumu Primary school and their desire for a “football pitch” (soccer field)? Would I balk if they needed $1,000? No. Would I wonder if they could get it cheaper or if they really need it? No. $1,000 is doable, a great investment in a community.

Counting kwatcha has given rise to what I love most about Malawi: you can make a difference here for under a million. You can build an entire school for under $50,000. You can build dormitories, auditoriums, churches for something close. The annual cost for the malaria program at Ekwendeni is less than $4000.

It’s not the bargain that has the greatest appeal; it’s how it reminds me and inspires me to do something. “You can do it” is what I hear so often in Malawi. That the Holy Spirit says this to me is like the bottle of pinot noir, quite a paradox.

Abiding in Malawi is powerful. It upsets the apple cart in ways that need upsetting. We need to see our opulence and our decadence as unacceptable. Unacceptable not because someone else could use our money or needs our stuff or can be helped if we just didn’t buy $50,000 cars. We need to see it as a choice on our part. Can we make a better choice?

2008-07-16T12:37:00.000-07:00

2008-07-16T02:50:00.000-07:00

2008-07-16T02:46:00.000-07:00

Sange #6

I think the Holy Spirit has made a crack in the wall of “sange” surrounding Mchengatuba.

The first came at Mestard’s house. Mestard, Grace has told me again and again, is one of the “good ones.” On Sunday night the ladies from Canton and Watertown gathered at his house for a dinner. While they were eating the head choir director of Mchengatuba showed up.

In short order he set out on an hour long speech of repentance. It was tearful, impassioned, and full of promises that he had seen the error of his way. He was not a member of the choir that came to the US but he had stood in solidarity with those who had told the lies. Now, after the sermons, he said, he has seen the falsity and he is ready to repent.

One hour is a lot of repentance.

The second crack in the wall came from Timothy. He called Grace’s house about midnight and said, he was sorry. He should have told the truth, and now he will. Grace told him not to bother her. If he wants to confess he should go to Rev. Hara and tell him he is sorry. I was proud to be her friend when she told me this.

While all of this was transpiring three other developments were afoot. The first was that I had Sam take me to Florance’s house. Her sister was out in the yard doing laundry. Fortunately I had our daughter Laura bring me business cards when she came. “Can you give this to Flora,” I said. “Tell, her, I came by.”

Next we did the same at Seke’s house. He too wasn’t in. His siblings told me they would give him the card. When I repeated the instruction the boy with card flashed his eyes at me to say, “I speak English, you Mzungu.” At Lusako’s no one answered the door even though people were home. I left the business card in the crack in the door.

They worked well. A special meeting was called and gathered at Lusako’s house. Here Ephriam, Florance, Seke, and Lusako met to discuss the cards and the invitation. All of the choir was invited to meet at the church at 5:30 tomorrow night. The cards, the invitation, the presence of the ladies from New York. The speculation here ran rather wild. I know because there was an inside source and well . . . Lusako lives right next door to Grace. Malawi!

These developments also prompted a few more threatening e-mails to Grace. She was in “trouble”. We heard about the trouble quickly. Florance convinced one of the mothers whose child attends the preschool opened by Sam that the school was in fact an orphanage I funded. Her tuition payments was a big scam. Orphans go there because of donors. Her child was being seen as an orphan. It worked. The mother pulled her child out immediately.

It seems the cracks in sange have yet to reach the core. There may need to be more.

The Showdown

In July of 2007 fifteen Malawians came and electrified Presbyterian churches in the North Country. They sang twenty concerts and twice with the 100+ voices of the Northern Choral Society.

I will never forget the concert at First Presbyterian in Watertown. The evening was electric and wild and culminated in a conga line that transformed our rather pristine sanctuary.

Most of the choir members were young men and women in their late teens or early twenties. In their home church of Mchengatuba they are know as the “praise team.” It didn’t take long before they were part of our homes and hearts.

One parishioner came to me in tears near the end of their tour. “I was frustrated with you,” she said. “We made a place for them to sleep at the church, but again and again they were sleeping in people’s homes. I didn’t understand until they were with us. They are our kids now. They are part of family.” Her words were true then and now.

This was the rationale I gave to the General Secretary of the Synod of Livingstonia upon my arrival in June. “I need to visit them all in their homes because the people of the North Country would never fathom that I came here, spent two months in their hometown, and didn’t go to say hello. They just will not understand.”

I had to make this argument with a sense of gravity and necessity. It was a tough sell. What sounded so simple was actually very complex.

Upon their return one of the choir members concocted a story that Rev. Hara, their pastor who came on the choir tour to New York, was given $12,000, which he was supposed to split between the choir members. Now back in Malawi, she claimed, he had pocketed their money.

Before they left the U.S., there were signs that a couple of choir members were looking for an angle on the funds that were donated at their concerts. Twice I had to explain to them that each one of them had received in the form of a plane ticket, accommodations, food, excursions, and gifts more than $4000 each. I tried to reiterate to them my pledge to the U.S. Ambassador to Malawi that I would not pay them money as that would break the condition of their visa. I conveyed to them my pledge to the customs officials in New York that in charging for the Northern Choral concerts I was not hiring the choir.

I have been in Mzuzu now for one month and I have seen every member of the choir still living in Mchengatuba (Wezi, Ephriam, and Kondwani have moved away). But I have not fulfilled my intention of visiting everyone in their homes. And the reason is very simple: a home visit could be fuel for the fire.

The fire culminated at two moments. The first was a mob. Sam Chirwa showed me the size of the crowd that surrounded Rev. Hara’s house when Florence Mahoney offer the lie: he has taken our $12,000. The space where the mob had surrounded their home would easily accommodate a few thousand people. When I tried to imagine what it would be like to have my house surrounded by a few thousand angry people the danger started to emerge. The second was a demonstration. Florence and Chimwemwe led the charge of a second mob to their house, this time taking the furniture from the manse and throwing it on the lawn. Telling the Hara’s they must leave. So the idea of simply stopping by for a pastoral call carried with it some danger.

There is a powerful force in Malawi and it’s called, “sange.” In English it comes close to envy, jealousy, and greed. Yet it is a kind of hatred that fuels the most bizarre acts. Mchengatuba, I have discovered, struggles mightily with “sange.” With very little effort “sange” took a lie and nearly ruined lives.

That the people who have perpetuated this tale often sit in the front pews of the church on Sunday morning should offer a glimpse of how powerful it is.

In the last month, I have spoken on this issue numerous times to gatherings of church members as well as preaching on the topic twice. I have been forthright with the elders of the church that I am here to make matters better not worse, but at some point we need to sit down face to face. This lie involves my word as well. (Although, I don’t put my “suffering” anywhere near what the Hara’s have endured.)

I know the truth as do thousands of people in Northern New York. Many people know how hard it was to pay for all the expenses and how surprised everyone was that there was money left over after the choir tour was done. And it was printed in The Watertown Daily Times that all the proceeds were for the building of a new sanctuary in Mchengatuba. That is the simple truth.

Tonight we are all supposed to sit down together. All the choir members have been invited with the elders and deacons of the church for a chat. I am not sure who will show up. I am not sure if this invitation will help or not. I do know I have one month left to dig deep down on this one. The ones who told the lies, the ones who let the lies be heard as truth, and the ones who told the truth are all quite clear. What is not clear is this: what will the community believe? Sange is really, really powerful.

My sabbatical theme is abiding. Abiding, at first, conjured images of a happy place, finding a peaceful way of living. After quite a bit of reflection it has come clear to me that I am indeed abiding in the midst of this “sange.” And even though “abiding in sange” is neither happy or peaceful it is close to what Jesus was calling his disciples to do. It is close when you realize he said “abide in me” on the night before his betrayal, arrest, and then crucifixion. I think I am getting close to what he meant by “abiding”.

When the dust settled

When the dust settled the issue that rose to the top wasn’t the lie seven of the choir members told about the Reverend stealing money; it wasn’t the rumors about what was said in the U.S.; it wasn’t the sad state of the choir after all they had been given, how they had squandered an enormous blessing by clouding it with falsity; it wasn’t even the fact that all their foolishness had culminated in two mobs and denigrated the character of many with lies; when the dust settled, it was that all of this has been going on for a year.

The elders of the Mchengatuba Church were crestfallen, embarrassed, and angry the more the choir members tried to explain their “confusion.” The story was that in the U.S. I gave Rev. Hara two checks: one for $10,000 for the church and another for $12,000 for the choir members to split. Ephraim gave the longest, most carefully crafted excuse. He said that I had confused them by talking about money; they were Malawian and they don’t understand such things; they didn’t fully understand what money I was talking about. I reiterated my claim, “did I tell you on two occasions that no money was to go to you; money can only go to the church?” I went one by one with each concurring. To Ephraim, I again made him confirm this and I said, “it is one thing to say, ‘we misunderstood’, it is quite another to accuse your pastor of stealing $12,000.”

Most of the talking during our meeting was from the elders. All of the choir members who are still in Mchengatuba were there, including the two who didn’t corroborate the lie (Fatuma and Mestard). There were a few comments by the choir members. Mostly though, they were there to listen.

Perhaps the most intriguing moment was when Chimwemwe’s father, an elder, spoke. Now this is a man who has orchestrated not just a few rumors and accusations against the minister and was the “adult” supervision hatching the plan to throw all of Rev. Hara’s furniture on the lawn. He spoke for about ten minutes suggesting that he had taken the role of peacekeeper, trying to reconcile the choir to Rev. Hara. His most bizarre claim was that the choir had incurred great expense on their trip to the U.S. so it was fitting that they would need funds to recover those costs. No one believed him.

I asked the choir “who paid for your plane ticket?” “You did,” they said in unison. We went through the list of all potential expenses and each garnered the same response. Finally I said, “the only expense that was to be your part was the visa application. That was what you offered to pay. Who paid for that?” “You did.” (When we got to the food and clothing issue the ladies from Watertown suggested the costs were more than money. The choir knew what this meant: the care, the kindness, the hospitality. I knew then I didn’t need to conjure guilt in the choir members who had caused trouble. Just looking at Liz Bonisteel who did their laundry for three weeks was all it took for most.)

All together the meeting lasted nearly three hours. Once it had been established that no funds were to ever go to the choir and that they had heard this twice, explicitly, the real issue rose to the fore: how long the elders had let this go on. The last hour was mostly speeches they offered promising to resolve this once and for good. “It is wrong that we have waited until you are here to finish this. This has became a black cloud on our church. We have let this become our reputation.”

One of the last elders to speak gave a rather heartrending appeal that now I was seeing Malawi. This is who Malawians are, he said. “No,” I countered, “this what people do when they fail. It is nothing more.”

Just prior to this speech, Seke stood and spoke. He said, this problem has turned a good thing into a bad thing. The trip to the U.S. was like a dream and now we have spoiled it. For this he said, I apologize. His apology was not accepted. “Before you apologize to us, you must apologize to the Reverend,” was the sentiment of all. He said nothing more.

This was Rev. Hara’s cue. Here was a man leading his seventh church, the clerk of his presbytery, father of eight, an unblemished record in his profession. When things got crazy and the lie was spread and the synod was asked to remove him, they stood by him. “If we remove the pastor, we will close the church,” was the answer from the church’s hierarchy. No more requests were made for his departure.

At the end of the meeting I did see the real Malawi. After all the shouting and speeches, empassioned pleas to move on, to be better than this, or as one elder said, “pass the test” everyone shook hands. Even Chimwemwe’s father came and shook my hand and said, “thank you.” Now I have all confidence that this man will continue to cause all sorts of trouble. It will take more than $10,000 and a few months of an American pastor walking around to change his heart. But here he was shaking hands as if we can all work together. That, I have come to see, is Malawi. This is a village. There is really no place to hide and the long dance of being people who are a church will go on.

One of the meanings of abiding is part of our slang, “I just can’t stand it.” To stand something is to abide in it. I was humbled with how little I wanted to stand for, how little foolishness I was willing to abide. Some might contend the absence of money creates the inability to live private lives so the Malawians must abide with each other. I don’t believe this. I believe, for good or for ill, they are a community. At the end everyone shakes hands.

2008-07-13T09:07:00.000-07:00

The Bank

The Opportunity International Bank is there for people who are living in extreme poverty. It’s their motto, their purpose. In spite of this I was suspicious. Malawians I had spoken to expressed disdain that the rates were too high the terms too short for them.

We went to the Mzuzu Branch which has been up and running for the last four months. The location of the bank is wonderful: it’s right in the heart of the business district of the town, not far from the central market. It was as if they were saying, we want to be in the middle of everything, where the people are.

This was the exterior. The interior seemed to argue the opposite. There was a tiny waiting room with one window to a teller. One chair in the waiting room didn’t suggest a homey feel. In fact, it suggested you won’t be here for long so don’t get comfortable.

True to form we were not there for long. Linda Potter, Katrina Hebb, Rita Gefell, and Heather White and I were whisked from room to room until we came to land in the big conference center. (Maybe that’s the point. Once inside, you are made to feel like you are really in.)

The ladies were there representing the Widow’s Fund; I was there to offer interpretations. It takes a while to learn the nuances of a Malawian negotiation. For instance, a Malawian will say yes and agree to things they have absolutely no desire to agree to or to offer, but it is more polite to say yes. Usually it takes about three stabs at an issue, coming at it from different angles, before you can be sure that what is being said is what is really meant. It may sound strange or untruthful, but it is not intended to be.

We were greeted by Wilson and Peter, the branch manager and the lead loan officer. We offered general chitchat for a time. The conversation was staying in the “this is what we are here to do” category, so I decided to up the ante a bit. “This is what we are looking for: we would like to develop a relationship with groups or individuals whose business has a positive impact on widows or empowers widows to move out of extreme poverty. We would like to invest between 5-10k annually for loans that would have a more generous rate than you are offering and with longer terms. Our funds would be more of a first step for widows, a kind of venture capital. We would like you to work with them and our organization so we don’t reinvent the wheel of micro finance.”

I told Linda Potter later that this was the point I thought we would be given a polite invitation to leave. Most organizations work hard to establish a focus and a set of goals, and Opportunity Bank is very much in this ilk. They are there for the establishment of small businesses that need a short term loan to improve their business. That they do this without real collateral or the markers a traditional bank likes to see, and that they offer business training with their loans that far outweighs the value they receive in debt service is what makes them a radical and promising element. But they are not there for the person who just wants some money or for the people who are just getting started. And that, unfortunately, is where our widows can be found.

I told Linda, “this is when I thought they would start talking about their goals and giving us a sense of ‘if you want to work with us this is what we offer,’ but they said the opposite.” They did. They said, we want to work with you.

Now it could be that we are taking all the risk and they are getting a very nice screening of future clients, but such things are not always enticing enough for a company to work outside their box. “And the widows of Mchengatuba are outside the box,” I told Peter and Wilson at the end of our meeting.

Leaving the meeting Wilson offered to come and meet our groups we have identified as potential “clients” for micro lending. This was big- he wanted to come to come to Mchengatuba and meet the widows- this was probably the biggest step we have seen with the fund so far. I love being wrong when its something like this. And I was wrong.

Later that evening Sam Chirwa told me, “I don’t think they would have invited Grace and me to the big conference room.” “Partnership, Sam. Partnership seems to open doors.” He smiled.

Micro lending sounds glorious until you start to walk through places like Mchengatuba and you see the complexity of extreme poverty. When I met with the women who want to open a chicken and egg business they were very transparent about the dangers that would arise. Getting along with each other, profit sharing, securing their merchandise from the constant threat of theft, and on and on. Despite this, though, they are hungry for a chance.

And their chance is $700 U.S. for two years. This is what we will try to develop for them next week. The interest rate is yet to be determined, but it will be lower than the 12% for four months the Opportunity Bank would have offered them. It may not sound like a lot, but it represents two years of income for the average Malawian. Take your annual salary, double it, and think about trying to repay it in four months. That’s daunting.

Sange #5
I was excited when Katrina volunteered to preach. In four years of doing this, she is the first layperson who said, “preach? I’ll do it.” That was nice.

What was better was her sermon. She preached like a Malawian and then in pure revival fashion had them demonstrate their understanding of the sermon with an act of devotion. She asked Rev. Hara if she could stay. He said yes.

Katrina took the Tambuka service and I took the English one. The English service is shorter and more staid. I wanted her to experience the pure chaos that is Tambuka worship. My hunch was that she would blend; I think its one of the few guesses I’ve made lately that panned out. She told me, “I’ve preached six times before and it always takes me like 20 hours to prepare.” I just grinned and gave a Malawian grunt, “uhhh.”

I had shared with the Widow’s Group the experience with “sange” and how it is so pervasive in Malawian culture. There is a sense of wanting others to fall who have gained so to equalize them, return them to their place in misery with everyone else. Mchengatuba, I theorized, seems unique as there are so many layers here for sange to take hold.

The passages I selected for the early service were the story of Cain and Abel (Genesis Six) and the reflection of I John on the passage (I John 3:11-17). It was my intent to suggest that Mchengatuba could mirror John experience of being cast from the synagogue when they move to their new sanctuary. “My hope for you is that when you leave this sanctuary you leave all the sange here.”

Katrina took the same passages and preached a metaphor of planting seeds and caterpillars to butterflies. At one point she said, “do you have butterflies here?” I leaned over to Rev. Hara and said, “isn’t Malawi known as the ‘Butterfly Capital of the World?’” He nodded. Unless it was rhetorical she had stumbled onto a deep point of contract.

At the end of my sermon a choir jumped up and sang a “sange” anthem; at the end of Katrina’s they were waiting with a kind of reggae jumping “sange” song. Needless to say the message connected. A part of me had been reluctant to preach repentance here. The voice inside my head said, “who are you?” At the end of the services there was a new voice that said, “isn’t the voice of the stranger revealing?”

After the first service Lusako made a point to come up to me and say thanks for the message. Man, Malawi never disappoints in the keeping you on your toes.

After the second service we had lunch at the manse. During the time of speech making I made a point to say, it’s time for some visits, visits that may not be pleasant. “I’ve learned through Malawi that important things can come from hard ones. Grace was cleaned out and from this a widows fund was born; I was going to spend my sabbatical in Chivumu on the lakeshore, but when I heard of all the troubles that were coming to Grace and Rev. Hara I came to Mchengatuba and I am glad I did.”
In the same way sange, which is bad and evil and destructive has unwittingly created a door to enter the heart of this hard scrabble shanty town which is blessed and cursed with a young church.

Timing is Everything

In the early ‘90s as Banda was divesting himself of power as a 30 year dictator, Dr. Fred and Nella Stone came to Malawi. They came at just the right time.

In 2005 I made my first trip to Malawi. This was beginning of Bingu’s presidency and hopefully the first of two terms. It was a hard time to come to Malawi as it was reeling from three solid years of drought and ten years of mismanagement by Muwezi. Each year as I have returned it was as if the country has been healed, reawakened, made to live again. As Bob Dylan said, “I can’t help it if I’m lucky.”

One of my side projects this summer has been to scout the lay of the land for the presbytery of Northern New York as they are set to reestablish their partnership with the Synod of Livingstonia in 2009. A few days ago it hit me, the presbytery just never got a good break. And it was nothing more than timing. They started with a joint business venture that went bust and tried to develop their partnership with the North at a time when politically, economically, socially, and even physically Malawi was at it’s lowest ebb. They came at just the wrong time.

In 2003, I heard Rev. Nkhoma preach in Peru, New York. His message was very simple, things are getting very crazy. The Libyians are trying to steal the election and Muwezi is trying to rewrite the constitution to be another Banda, but this time turn Malawi into the kind of place we see in The Sudan. Not good.

Sitting in the pew I distinctly remember thinking, “are you out of your mind? A small presbytery in Northern New York is going to wade into an African presidential election to thwart the designs of radical Islam? Not a chance.” I’ve said before and will say again, I am now ready to say, do you need me to campaign, give money, politic? I am ready for all the above. What a difference five years and four trips to Malawi has made.

In 2009 the Presbytery of Northern New York will send a group to “discern” whether or not to renew its partnership with the Synod of Livingstonia. This could be the best of times or the worst of times. The determining factor will be how much it wants to help the North fight off the influence of radical Islam in Africa and who the new General Secretary will be. But if it comes unprepared to stand in solidarity with the challenge Libya and others represents, its overtures will be met as nothing more than cash. And you want to be much more than cash here. You do.

At the home of Mr. Mkandawire this became flesh. “We pray for you since 9/11.” This is good, but what is better is the Malawians in the North do more than pray. They work to protect their country from becoming the place where the next terrorist cell emerges. That’s a lot of hard work.

Next summer the presbytery of Northern New York will send a group to “discern.” I hope when they come they have a good idea of the stakes. For in 2009 the stakes will be high.

The stakes are so high I will encourage my congregation and others in the presbytery who are deeply invested in Malawi to negotiate partnership agreements of their own. The reason: an organization that meets four times a year with spotty attendance of its members might not be prepared to move as quickly and as intentionally as our “partners” might need. This will not prove popular on the U.S. side, but so be it. For me it’s a question of timing. Now is not the time for bureaucratic slow play. I believe Malawi will grow and human rights will prosper and people in extreme poverty will rise beyond it with democracy. In 2009 Malawi will choose if this is the course it will take. What a time to be in the midst. In such a moment its good to remember: timing is everything.

2008-07-11T06:14:00.000-07:00

2008-07-11T06:08:00.000-07:00

2008-07-11T06:05:00.000-07:00

2008-07-11T06:01:00.000-07:00

July 11

2008-07-11T05:57:00.000-07:00

It was my third trip to Kabwanda.

Two years ago Grace took us out to see this remote village as way of understanding the way the hospital must go to the people in order to combat malaria. Two hours into the bush and the car getting stuck in a ravine let me see the reason hospital must go to the people.

Kabwanda, once you get there, is lovely. They have a nice school, maize mill, and a church under construction. (They have the iron sheets and trusses so it’s just a matter of time. There pastor just died so the matter may be a bit complicated.) The newest addition to Kabwanda was the construction of a clinic. Grace turned to me and said, “you built this.” By “you” she meant America. “I don’t take credit for the federal government,” I said, “but I will pass on your sentiments.”

The latest loss, other than the pastor, is the headmaster, Kenneth. Kenneth has been reassigned and there is a new man. Where Kenneth was very down to earth and personable, the new man headmaster is reserved and somewhat formal. Formal seems a bit strange in Kabwanda.

We traveled out with the widow’s group from the US. Upon our arrival hundreds of children surrounded the cars. One kid caught my eye: he was wearing a small box as a hat. Malawians carry every thing on their head, so a box on someone’s head wasn’t strange. What was strange was that the box was turned upside down.

After the tour of the new clinic where everyone enjoyed the sight of the weighing station for infants we headed back to the school for a time of song and dance.

We opened up with speeches of course. The Canton ladies have the speeches down. Katrina, especially, gets right into the spirit and seems to enjoy the give and take. (Although they all turned a bit ashen when they were told the “sermon” time is awaiting them on Sunday.)

After the speeches there were poems and women’s dances. Almost all the ladies at one point or another were brought into the circle to dance with the women of the village. The drummers would slow between each song and then pick up a new rhythm, this rhythm would be matched with a new step. There would be a moment of chaos as our ladies would look for a leader to follow as the new direction started.

The highlight of the dancing though was the Ngoni dances we had learned to enjoy from the choir. The boys came out in the warrior dress and started singing the chants that, at least for me, seem ever in my head. Rev. Hara jumped in and joined the boys and kept perfect pace.

As we were driving away Laura reminded me of what Grace told her last year. Half of Kabwanda has HIV/AIDS. “It’s crazy to see the happiness with the dancing and the singing and know what they are facing.”

Sange #4

I field tested a theory tonight. We were at Sam’s house for dinner. His father and I were deep into an hour long discussion regarding the church and my time there when we drifted into the visits and the question of “sange.”

After he affirmed the depth of the challenge and spoke about how it related to our recent challenges with the choir, I asked him this. “It seems that Mchengatuba is unique in that when I go to the bush, like Kabwanda it’s ‘same, same, same.’ When I go to the neighborhood where the McGills are at it is ‘same, same, same.’ But here in Mchengatuba there is a lot of difference. There are some with very little, some with a little more, and then some with a good deal more. Do you think that makes sange more powerful here?

Yes. It is more powerful here.

The conversation then drifted back to the church and its dynamic. The church like the village itself is complex. It is a young congregation, but it has a seasoned pastor. Rev. Hara served six congregations before this one and he was not swayed as easily as some would have thought.

Mr. Chirwa related a session meeting where some of his detractors aired their grievances (mainly that he wouldn’t give them the roof money). “When they were done,” and at this point Sam’s dad offered the dialogue in a great impression of Rev. Hara, “I’ve very much enjoyed your talking. You talk and talk and talk.” I can see Norman saying just this.

“People are always surprised when someone stands their ground.” Mr. Chirwa’s eye got a bit bigger. “Yes. Yes, they were surprised.”

He went on to describe the conversations Norman has related to him regarding our time. Norman and I have spoken about the way you must see the church as not your own, but at the same time stand firm for what you believe is right. Doing what is right for the church is not always popular or serves the interests of people who feel entitled that some part of the church be theirs to control or be to their benefit.

And then I brought it full circle with the choir. “I don’t believe the choir was the reason for the problems,” I said. “I believe they uncovered problems that were already there.”

“Yes. They were already there.”

“That is why I must visit every family.” He nodded in agreement. It would be very easy for the sange that swept some of the choir members after their return could fall back on them in spades. In Malawi, envy is not just wanting what someone else has it is wishing them harm because they have you want.

Talking with Mr. Chirwa my fear that has lingered without a name came to the fore. I was afraid that a juvenile mistake on their behalf would bear the brunt of mistakes much more profound. At the end of our conversation this is where we lingered. And I think this is what made him believe what I said when I promised to keep working with Mchengatuba. “The choir was door, not an end. We need to keep working together, to build a partnership. It wasn’t the intent of the choir, but their foolishness has actually brought us together in deep way.”

Whatever happens I am finding sange to be quite a window.

An Abiding Thought

A wise man once described grief as relearning the world. Well, no one has died- that is the good news, but I feel like I am relearning the world.

When you move to a new town you need to learn the roads and major thoroughways and what not. Here I needed to learn how to drive. I’ve got the roads down. There are not that many. I am even learning the spider web of Mchengatuba and in our drive out to Kabwanda I was proud that I remembered the way. It’s not directions I needed to learn, its how to drive in the midst of madness.

Tonight I told Mr. Chirwa, I am getting the intersection after the dambo down. “You need to watch the bike taxis to see if they are going to look before turning. That’s the key.” He smiled in a way that said I was actually learning. But it’s not just the bikes, it’s the people, and if you are driving in the afternoon, it’s the kids getting out of school. A little later it’s the people getting out of work. And then at six it’s all the people coming home late from work because they went shopping. Ten o’clock in the morning is the safest time to drive. Other than that, you are on your own.

Shopping here for Kathy is not just finding the right store; it’s learning a whole other way of finding what a family of nine needs. I love the central market, but that’s because I take my camera not a shopping list. Add to this she isn’t shopping for what she will make, but what Mr. Nyasula needs. It’s not a list really, but a whole new relationship with food and commerce and people.

I love the fact that Mr. Nyasula makes tea whenever I carry in the teapot. I’ve actually dreamed that at some point in my life this would be the case: hot beverages would just be made for me all day long- although in the dream it was with coffee, but that doesn’t matter. Yet, even this perk is balanced by putting together the butter sandwiches and tea for the watchman at night. It is the easiest thing in the world, but it just changes the way I end an evening. For twenty one years my day was done when children are tucked in. Now it’s not done until I take three tea bags and put them in an orange plastic cup with a spoon. Again, it doesn’t seem like much, but it is a kind of relearning, recalibrating. I end my day with a man over a small charcoal fire who more often than not refers to me as “master.” (Yeah, that one is as weird as it sounds.)

The more I have reflected upon I John and what he meant by abiding in Christ, the more I am convinced that he was calling upon early Christians to relearn their world. They were being thrown out of the synagogue by people they thought they knew, hated for proclaiming a message of love, and trying desperately to understand what it meant that Jesus was alive after he died. These three changed everything. With them they lost their culture, their safety, and any semblance of an order.

Abiding, by its definition, is trying to rest in a foreign place. Abiding isn’t about being at home, but finding the sense of home when you are lost, traveling, or otherwise displaced. To abide is to be at peace when you are a stranger or estranged.

I wish I could say this is why I chose to come to Malawi, but its not. I thought abiding was about not leaving home. Trying to find the opposite I stumbled into what it actually is. This is what I have come to call the Holy Spirit: finding your way home while being lost the whole way. Stumbling into this place we have lost our culture, often times the feeling of ease which is what we feel when we are safe, and any notion of order.

This is where the people were at when John was speaking and he said, abide in God. I asked God that I would understand what abiding means. You must be careful for what you wish.

Now here is the good news. Abiding is for a time. That is the really crazy insight that has took hold this week. Abiding in God is not forever. When John records Jesus as saying, abide in me, he isn’t saying move in and stay. He is staying weather the storm in me, find refuge in me; pitch a tent, but don’t build a house.

The writer of Ecclesiastes says, the eternal has been put inside of us, but we don’t understand it. I read “I abide in me” and sense it was Jesus I immediately jumped to forever. What is eternal is tough to grasp and where it can be found is tough to find.

Abiding is all about getting through the problem. Each of us has had a moment where you needed help and then you say, “I am fine now, I can do the rest.” Abiding is the moment where you needed the help; it’s not the rest.

We can recast the words of Jesus in John to be this: when you need to abide, abide in me. This is what we implore our friends, if you need something, call me.

And this is where abiding starts to become clear and really dicey. It ceases to be a kind of “serenity now” place we just find, or a kind of magic power to endure. It’s all about friendship. And it’s about trust.

When people lose the ones they love the weight of the loss is poignant in friendship and trust. When you have defined the world with someone, through someone, and then you lose that person, you need people to help you relearn the world. In the end you will need people who will help you abide in the midst of grief and come out on the other side. Without being too reductionary: you need a friend you can trust. If you read John 14-18 you find a lot about friendship and trust being spoken by someone who would die in 24 hours.

2008-07-09T23:55:00.000-07:00

Ode to a Presbytery
One way of looking at my recent bout with the flu is to say it was an act of mercy. I have a friend in Jesus. And any friend of mine knows that I would rather have a fever and body aches than attend a presbytery meeting. My flu arrived a few hours after Rev. Hara called to tell me I was “most welcome” at the weeklong presbytery meeting that was just getting started.

I have to admit I blanched. Presbytery meetings in the U.S. are a day long event. There is a couple hours of driving, a somewhat misguided worship service, some hoo ha, two hours of mind numbing reports, lunch, two more hours of mind numbing reports with a little debate thrown in, and then the drive home. Never, except once, have I walked away and said, man I would like to do that again.

So when I thought about seven days of this, God who is merciful and just and a friend to the weak and heavyladen took pity on me a poor presbyter and said, abide with me. (I have had a whole new take on abiding once I considered that Jesus said, abide in me hours before he was to be beaten and crucified; in a way it’s like inviting someone into a hurricane: “come and be with me in the eye of the storm.”) With the flu I kind of had an excuse.

As it turned out it wasn’t as solid as I thought it would be. The newly elected moderator, with whom I shared lunch on Sunday, was less than effusive given my weeklong absence. The other pastors were not as upset. Perhaps there was some sange there.

What I showed up for was the closing worship service. Rev. Hara called to suggest this was the least I could do. He was right. I told our crew this would be a short service as it starts at eight. The only part I got right was that it started at 8. It finally limped across the finish line at 11:45.

This is part of Malawi and usually I don’t mind the hour upon hour of worship, but I did this time. It was a presbytery service. I kept saying over and over again to myself: impossible, impossible; it’s just impossible. The mind numbing power of the presbytery could even overcome the vibrancy and freedom of Malawian worship.

Gone was the fun and dancing. There were no jokes. There was a solid 30 minutes of announcements and an hour of introductions and posturing. And the sermon was without shouting or even a story. It all just went on and on and on. All I could think was: why is it that when you put a group of ministers together it just gets dull?

It shouldn’t be. I’ve met these fellows and there are some wild cards in the mix. This could have been a service of power and vivacity. Instead it just hung there like wet clothes out to dry.

I don’t know why but it is dull, presbytery that is. It’s dull and misguided and prone to suck the life out of even the most hearty of Christians. I am sure that not every moment with Jesus on shore of Galilee were wild and crazy, but I have to think they were a good deal more exciting than a presbytery meeting. Mostly I just can’t see Jesus saying, that is what I was looking for.

The good news is that its just not uptight, WASP America. Even the Malawians crash and burn on this one.

The Streets
I’ve been taking my camera with me when Kathy goes shopping. When she heads into Tutlas or the Northern Trading Company I stay outside and get some “snaps.”

Our camera has a good zoom so I can stay in a rather innocuous place and take pictures without people knowing. Not that they mind. One group of four fellows spied me and started waving. Then they arranged themselves in a classic “group shot.” After taking their picture I walked across the street and showed them the picture. They pushed each other out of the way to look. These were men in their twenties.

The hardest part of taking these kind of photos is that the street never stops. Cars, bikes, people carrying things, people milling about it all just keeps flowing. In the U.S., I could look at a downtown street and maybe have a few minutes between people. Here its like someone put the street on rapid speed.

As I took more of these photos recently, I noticed the advertising strategies of most shops. Most shops painted on their walls that they have lots of stuff for cheap. High end, the best, executive, none of these made the walls. Unless it was high end executive stuff at the best prices.

Mostly though what I could see was the way a culture is much more verbal when its on foot. There were cars on the streets, but the pedestrians and bikes far out number them. What is more is that people stop as they walk and chat. There is a kind of fellowship to the street which is lost in the American culture of the car.

Sange #1
O God Bless our land of Malawi,
Keep it land of peace
Put down each and every enemy,
Hunger, disease, envy.

There are moments, Kierkegaard argued, where we are rendered “transparent.”

At the National Service of Worship Kathy and I attended on Saturday we were singing along with a number of traditional hymns such as “What a Friend we have in Jesus.” There were even two anthems that were performed where we knew the words. One small choir (read less than twenty which is more like an ensemble in Malawi) gave the Battle Hymn of the Republic a go. They sounded like there were 100 voices. One of the last choirs, again not large, did Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus. It was shocking and received a standing ovation. Standing ovations in Malawi are silent. The crowd just simply stood and then quickly sat, but you could tell that this was huge.

Yet the song that was most inspiring to me was the national anthem, Malawi’s that is. There are three stanzas. The middle stanza is a bit weak in my opinion and the third reiterates much of the first, but all this is made up in the first line. “O God Bless our land of Malawi,/Keep it land of peace/ Put down each and every enemy.” And then the last part, the list of enemies: “hunger, disease, and envy.” Hunger and disease . . . okay. But envy? Asking God to keep them from envy is the opening line of their national anthem. That is a pretty transparent moment.

I was forewarned of this in a way as our missionary hosts and guides; both reiterated how big “sange” is here. Both Jim and Jodi McGill said, envy is a huge problem here. It wasn’t that they said, “and it’s even in the national anthem, but there it is. Try to imagine that after our rockets red glare and banner waving Francis Scott Key had suggested that the War of 1812 would hopefully free us from the enemy of “envy”.

It could be that America is such a land of opulence that envy doesn’t really have a great foothold. Perhaps we could put something in our national anthem about greed or corruption, but that doesn’t really strike true for me. Maybe something about the perils of indifference dashing the sacrifice of those who came before us- that wouldn’t be bad.

But envy? What do you do with a national anthem whose first line is a call to overcome envy? I don’t know, but this is the sort of question I hoped would come to me here. It’s not something you can pick up in a two-week visit. People gussy up too much for that. We’ve been here a month and I can begin to see the “sange,” the envy. Yet it is a puzzle for me.

One of goals here was to engage in ethnographic work. Ethnography is when you study people in their culture by being in it. It’s field work in a sense, but it’s not like I am walking around measuring things. Ethnography is where you try to jump from the outside in and see what you see. I believe it is done best when don’t come with a question. In other words, had I come to observe funeral rituals for the tacit theology which they embody I would have come with a serious amount of baggage and thus questions. I don’t bring those where envy is concerned.

Now that I have a question my hope is to ask it for a while. “Tell me what sange means.” There are more subtle ways of getting to the point, but the thing with ethnography is that you are supposed to let the question shape itself as you go. The second person I speak to may be approached with a different question, one that is less blunt. But maybe not if that is what worked.

I am, needless to say, intrigued. Envy in the national anthem. Man that is pretty out there.

Sange #2

For the last week Rev. Hara and I have been driving around Mchengatuba and paying impromtu visits on elders and church leaders. Two days ago we visisted the house of a master mason who is helping to supervise the work on the church. He wasn’t home but his wife took our arrival as a direction to make tea.

A neighbor, “Fumu”, stepped in for the missing husband and was flush with speeches and even a sermon. Fumu is an elder, a carpenter, and quite a talker. At one point in his sermon he was venturing into the entire history of the Exodus as an illustration.

As we sat Fumu was quick to describe his take on the whole choir scenario. He is now part of the tide praising and extolling Rev. Hara for beating back the greed of a few. Halfway through the conversation tea arrived and I took advantage of the silence to get in a question.

“I heard your national anthem on Saturday. It was quite lovely, but there was one line I really didn’t understand.” I recited the opening lines from memory which brought him great delight and then I said, “keep us from hunger, disease, and envy. What is this ‘envy?”

“Ah,” he said, “that is a big problem in our nation.”

“As big as hunger and disease?”

“Bigger. Hunger and disease they beat the body, but envy destroys the soul.”

I pretty much got out of the way for the next thirty minutes. “Sange” held the room. Fumu, Rev. Hara, and the matron of the house each took turns describing the wiles of Sange. At its apex was when Fumu launched into the Exodus sermon. At first I didn’t see the connection. Slaves in the desert grumbling about Moses relates to the Malawian culture and its struggles with envy how? I didn’t press him as Rev. Hara cut him off and patted his shoulder. This sermon though would come clearer the next day.

What was clear that day was that sange is not just wanting what someone has it is wishing them harm, delighting in their downfall, or rumoring that their fortune is somehow evil. Illustration after illustration showed how difficult it is to “get ahead” [their words] without someone wanting to drag you down [my words]. What was also clear was that with sange it won’t be hard to get some to talk.

As we left Fumu offered to ride along with us and show us the way out of “Area Four.” Halfway to the manse Fumu confessed. “This is my first time in Land Rover. I’ve only driven in Land Cruisers and I’ve always wanted to know what a Land Rover is like.”

“Don’t let your neighbors see you,” I said, “they may be jealous.”

Sange #3
I was late and I had a Malawian excuse. We took Dave to the local clinic for a check, as his cough doesn’t seem to want to leave and his ears were hurting.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “we went to the clinic and time has just gotten away.”

“Can you come?”

“Yes. Yes, I will come.”

It would seem the impromtu visits have given way to the Malawian “sit and chat.” A sit and chat is when the Mzungu comes to visit one person, but there are about twenty folks who generally have an agenda.

This sit and chat was a group of women from Area 9 and the agenda was chickens. They wanted 100,000 mkw to start a chicken and egg farm. The banks they said are too high with their interest and the duration of the loans are too short. (In the airport the advertised rate for a mortgate is 23%. I would guess that is to preferred lenders. Mchengatuba doesn’t have much that banks would prefer.)

For the next half hour, we roughed together a business plan. Who will buy these chickens? What will be your monthly income versus expenses? How much debt service can you handle? The conversation went round and round. At one point it turned into a kind of debt auction. Can you pay 1000 mkw a month for a loan . . . two thousand . . . three . . . four? That is when women started squinting their eyes trying to see if could go over four. No.

Then the food came out. They had prepared a meal for Rev. Hara and me. While we were washing our hands he asked them, “what is the national anthem?” They all strarted to sing the first stanza. After the clapping he said, “tell me, what does it mean?”

Most of the women focused on the notion of freedom from fear and then we got to enemies: hunger, disease, and envy. Rev. Hara was quick to get them to focus on sange. Why is that there, he queried.

The answer of one woman explained the sermon of Fumu yesterday. Freedom from sange was the only way to be a people and being one people was the only way to keep all enemies away. If people are free from sange then they will be willing to protect their neighbor- stand together. As she was speaking I was thinking of the people in the Exodus experience and how little they could find a common voice except to complain, how being a slave had reduced them to the lowest common denominator of humanity, and the idea of being something more was beyond them. Sounds a lot like Malawi.

From this esoteric level the conversation went down to the neighborhood experience. Each of the women were quick to describe how sange was a part of life. It was a force in their midst. “Are you afraid when something good happens to you that people will be envious?” I thought they would say yes, which is closer to the American culture of trying to refrain from ostentation. But there answer was something close to: how can you hide something good? Here everyone knows everything anyway.

A few weeks ago I preached on the story of Jacob at Bethel and how he was there as a fugitive who had stolen the blessing of his brother. Little did I know then this story could have been a kind of parable of the people. Now the story was starting to take on a different meaning. As the women were talking I couldn’t help but seeing in their words neighbors and extended family literally trying to steal the blessings. And then one women made it literal: people come and steal what is good.

Sange then comes in spiritual and not so spiritual forms.

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I made my first solo drive on Thursday.

Around eleven in the morning I headed for Lilongwe. Our daughters and niece were flying in with the widow’s group from Johannesburg at 2:00 on Friday. I was fighting the flu so I drove down a day early rather than do the roundtrip in one day.

Kathy booked me a room at “Area 3.” “Area 3,” I contested, “is the name of a place not a residence. It’s like calling a hotel ‘Watertown.’” “That is the name of it,” she said with a look that said “you are looking for normal, now?”

Sure enough after the 4 and half hour drive I went to the Baptist Guest House in Area 3 and asked the gatekeeper, “where is a place called ‘Area 3?’” He pointed around the corner.

Like most guest houses in Malawi it is nice but basic. At guest houses they don’t use levels like the hotels. Malawian hotels provide lots of options. For instance at Korea Garden (a favorite haunt) there is: premier, executive, gold, silver, and bronze. I have stayed in every level but premier, but some day. . . .

The next morning after breakfast I spent a few hours doing blog stuff at a local café in a strip mall. It’s a Lilongwe thing. Someone, it would seem, from California has sold them a basic set of blue prints for an anchor store and set of shops. As only architecture can I forgot I was in Africa after about an hour of drinking coffee from a press pot and hooking up to the internet with a wireless account with my laptop.

Next came a mature move: I fueled up with diesel even though I had more than enough to make it back to Mzuzu. Jodi McGill kept saying after each time she bought something, “when you see things you will need you buy them because you never know when they will be there again.” Well, the North is now out of diesel until maybe Tuesday so I am very happy that I got the unneeded fuel on Friday.

At the airport I hooked up with Sam and Grace who were there to greet the ladies. They had a painting done in their honor, welcoming the “Queens of the US” sporting some handsome elephants. You got to love Malawi at moments like these.

Being an hour early we headed to the “viewing deck.” There we found countless school children there for a field trip of watching three flights take off and land in three hours. Lilongwe is not JFK.

When the flight was more than ten minutes late I slapped my knees and said, “that’s enough for me. If it’s going to be this late I’m going to leave.” As I stood up Grace started to panic a bit. I shouldn’t take pleasure in being the Ugly American but I do.

The South African flight carrying our “cargo” arrived but alas most of their luggage did not. Standing in a crazy “queue” with the fatigue of intercontinental travel and wondering what this all means is not the best “how to you do” but it’s not a bag introduction to Africa. Smooth and flawless is not applied very often here.

Once outside customs with hugs and photos taken we started the loading process. A few days ago we had a custom rack built for the McGills van so all the ladies luggage would fit. With the missing bags we were actually able to haul all the goods that arrived.

Beka, our niece, and Zoe, our youngest daughter, had the happy glow of standing in Malawi for the first time. It also didn’t hurt that they were one of the fortunate who got their luggage. I wish I had been allotted a bit more time to appreciate watching the two of them and the other ladies try to process the assault on the senses that is landing in Africa, but no sooner was the van packed that we waived goodbye to the widow’s group and hit the road for our five hour drive.

Given that it was now four o’clock didn’t bode well. That meant a fair portion of our drive would be in the dark. Heading out my only hope was that the holiday weekend would include time off for tobacco trucks. While that is nice thought I am sure the reason the road was somewhat empty was because almost every gas station in the central and northern regions was out of fuel. Hence we made it home in record time and with maybe a half dozen tobacco trucks altogether.

As we drove Grace took some calls from Sam who is driving the ladies group. No luggage was now compounded with a mistake in their accommodations. I have all confidence there was a moment of “now what?” Yet, as it turned out, a Hanukah miracle occurred and their hotel of choice Korean Gardens who had no room for them a month ago now-miraculously- had plenty of room. (Maybe another benefit of the fuel shortage.)

Calling them today I heard lots of cackles and laughter. They spent the day at the Crisis Nursery in Lilongwe and there were “many tears” according to Liz Bonisteel. Tomorrow they depart for the Shire River and a day of safari. It will be an intriguing way to start their journey. “You will get two radically different pictures of Malawi,” I told Linda Potter on the phone.

As we settle in today up north it was nice to see Kathy with her “girls” as Ethan, Dave, and I just don’t provide the kind of conversation which satisfies. Chelsea and Zoe also were quick to bond and now share a room. Mostly though it feels like we are into “phase two” of the sabbatical.

Abiding is much more complicated than I figured. Fuel shortages and presidential prayer services were not “in the cards” I had envisioned. But nothing about abiding has been what I thought it would be. But at least it’s consistent.

July Sixth is Malawian Independence Day.

The country is 44 years old- or young. With only three presidents to date, a handful of paved roads, and an economy in the world’s bottom five its hard to know which ones defines it better.

Each year at this time the current president spends the holiday in one of the three regions. We were lucky as his rotation fell to the North this year. Rev. Nkhoma kept rattling off something about an ecumenical service and how we needed to be here on Saturday.

What he was talking about was the equivalent of the President’s Prayer breakfast- although there was no buffet in sight. In essence, the President was coming to Mzuzu for the weekend and a key event was a worship service headed up by none other than . . . Rev. Nkhoma.

Kathy and I arrived at Mzuzu University around 9:30 for the 10 o’clock service. We drove right past all the armed guards and reporters. Parking the car we kept being directed toward “the Hall.” Soon enough we were seated in a large hall that looked like a big event was about to happen. You could easily pick out the dozens of security guards. They were buff and looked very well fed.

Walking in the draped door a man rearranged some seats so Kathy and I could sit down along the “red carpet.” (It was actually red.) In a matter of minutes I was having a Malawi moment. The fellow who helped us find our chairs was a kind of head of communications and publicity for the government. After the polite exchanges recognizing that we were the only white people out of 10,000 I was being given a fascinating description of how the freedom of the press has developed since Banda’s time.

It turns out the President after Banda, Mulawezi (1994-2003), wasn’t ready for journalists to actually transcribe his comments. After reporting the details of one speech where Mulawezi told all the civil servants “join my party or lose your job” the fellow sitting next to me was encouraged to leave the country. I use the term “encourage” loosely. He only returned two years ago after eight years in Senegal. (I forgot to mention he went to high school in Long Island and college in LA.)

About this point in the conversation we could start to hear the shouts. The throng of people lining the road into university were shouting and singing. President Bingu was in the house.

The more than three hour service that followed was a bit more of a choir extravaganza and preach-off than “presidential” event. And I must say that is okay by me. Yes, it was a bit long, but the idea that the president was there to listen to the more than a dozen choirs and three different sermons in as many languages was something that sparked my imagination: what does it mean to lead such a people?

Kathy kept saying over and over, “I can’t believe the President of Malawi was just right there.” And he was. He walked right next to us and gave us an eye lift “hey, how you doin’” kind of look. And I must admit that when the introductions were being made I had a bit of pause when our names were mentioned as honored guests.

After all the singing and praying was done we ran into Rev. Nkhoma in the parking lot- read open field. He was beaming and reiterated our need to be at the big rally at the football stadium tomorrow. “We will be there,” I said enjoying the swirl of chaos that is Malawi.

Yet the real benefit of all this hoopla and hours of prayer and song is that Mzuzu got a paint job. We have lines on the streets! If its not moving in Mzuzu, it has a coat of white paint. Some people don’t like this kind of spruce up arguing it should just be that way. I am not one. Whatever reason it takes to get the lines going down the middle of the all too narrow roads is a good enough reason for me.

Mzuzu Market

The central market of Mzuzu is what I imagine the complex tunnel systems the Viet Cong used if the top were take off. A spider web at least has an obvious pattern. This is a tightly woven set of low slung wooden shanties that hold everything you need but may not be brave enough to purchase.

I have purposely not taken Kathy to the meat and fresh fish market that can be reached by a twist in the shops, a kind of wrong turn. The first time I wandered in there I almost lost my lunch. It was not just the smell; it was the squishy ground and bloody aprons and the meat and seafood almost ready to fall off the slimy tables. I wondered when Jodi McGill, who took Kathy into just about every shop, bakery and grocery in the whole town didn’t take Kathy back there if such a place was just better left unsaid.

Outside of this wrong turn, the central market has a strange beauty. Walking through it this afternoon I smiled considering my delight in just being there. The stacks of produce, the shoes hanging all in a row, the heaps of dried fish, and, my favorite, the chaos of the entrance with its blaring music and deals being made by “traders.” The open area in the entrance, a kind of plaza, is like the Sam’s Club section. Here bulk is being offered.

Carrying a camera felt a bit intrusive. I wanted pictures, but this was life not a photo shoot or a tourist attraction. But then the calls went out. “Take me.” The digital camera ever proves a joy here as I just turn the camera around and the shop keepers smile and say “thank you.”

One of the small fish mongers asked that I not turn my photo of his shop into a “cartoon.” I still don’t know exactly what that means. When I showed him the photo of his fish in a can he seemed satisfied that this was not “cartoon” material.

My favorite though was a woman who wanted her picture taken as did her husband, but she didn’t know how to pose. After asking me to take her picture she just kept working.

Leaving the market with our bounty of vegetables, eggs, fruit, and two more dried twig brooms for Mr. Mpala, our groundskeeper, I felt like we had our store for the coming storm. Walking to the car the fellow with a very dirty rag who moves the dirt around on your car while you shop was just finishing. I gave him fifty kwatcha (thirty cents) and he was happy. So was I.

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This Just In . . .

“Tumalisye Ndovi dead”

“China sends medical team”

“Couples urged to be faithful”

“The leaf that brings foreign exchange”

“Archbishop Tutu urges Zimbabwe intervention”

“Anglican forms global network”

These were the headlines in The Guardian for July 1st. The motto of the paper is: safeguarding democracy and human rights.” Let’s see how they did.

Tumalisye Ndovi was the former Police Commissioner and was slated for a cabinet position by the current president. He was born in Karonga (the north), attended all levels of education ultimately achieving a law degree.

His recent nomination for a government post was stymied on charges that he committed fraud while acting as the head of an anti-fraud department of the government. He left a wife and three daughters. He died of malaria.

After a historic visit by President Binju to Beijing “cementing” the relationship between China and Malawi, China promised to help ease the dearth of physicians for their newest diplomatic ally. They have sent a team of seven: two physicians and five “specialists.” This is just the first team, the Health Department assured the readers.

“However, both the ministry and the Chinese Embassy could not indicate the time when the other team would be arriving and the total number of experts China will provide to Malawi.”

The Malawi Interfaith AIDS Association (MIAA) announced a plan to increase fidelity among couples to prevent HIV and AIDS infections. The plan is to promote a three-pronged approach: abstinence, faithfulness, and condoms.

“Any religious person knows that our bodies are the Temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in it,” claimed Robert Ngaiyaye. “People need to follow God’s law. The Bible says thou shall not commit adultery and the Koran says thou not go near adultery. If Christians and Moslems will follow that Malawi will have faithful families.”

Tobacco prices are plummeting. At the opening of the annual auction tobacco bales were at $11. By the end of the week prices were as low as $1 per bale. The Guardian reporter Frazer Potani suggests the volatility was all a ploy. The opening prices motivated the farmers to bring in their tobacco and once in line to sell, the prices plummeted. Greed and corruption were the main culprits.

Given this volatility the tobacco market is starting to crack. While this might be welcome news in Washington D.C. or the Hague, in Malawi tobacco accounts for 70% of employment and that much or more of its export income.

“Some time back being a tobacco grower was a pride, but now those days are gone because we are spending huge sums of money annual to take care of tobacco right from the nursery beds to farms . . . [all the way to the] Auction Floors,” claimed Samson Chiputula the head of one of 150,000 tobacco farms in Malawi. “I am the sole bread winner and due to the poor prices on offer I have been struggling for the past four years and depending on borrowing money from others. As I am talking to you the people from whom I had borrowed money are on my neck.”

The UN needs to invade Zimbabwe is the call of Desmond Tutu. Zimbabwe, once the pride of Africa, is now bereft with runaway inflation, rampant corruption, confiscation of property from any non-African, and open voting fraud after brutal oppression of any political opposition.

Putting his call in more direct terms Desmond Tutu said of the UN, “If you were to have a unanimous voice, saying quite clearly to Mugabe . . . you are illegitimate and we will not recognize your administration in any shape or form – I think that would be a very, very powerful signal and would really strengthen the hand of the international community.”

President Robert Mugabe, speaking at funeral, expressed pleasure that the latest polling results show him sweeping to a resounding victory.

Meeting in Jerusalem “traditionalist” Anglicans formed a global network that no longer recognizes the Archbishop of Canterbury as their head citing the bishop’s complete failure to discipline the US churches over the ordination of Gene Robinson.

The BBC reported that “the existence of a separate shadow communion is likely to have a profound impact on Anglican churches all over the world.”

In summation: a highly educated government official dies of a treatable disease, an emerging superpower can spare two doctors, a desperate plea for people to stop having extramarital sex, a 1000% decrease in the price of the nation’s one export commodity, complete lawlessness of a neighboring country where once again the UN will act with its Rwanda strategy, and the idea that Africa might be used by Western countries to advance their own theological ends. I believe the Guardian has lived up to its part of the bargain safeguarding democracy and human rights. Have we?

Ode to an Ambulance

Part of my sabbatical experience was to look behind the curtain a bit at Malawi. There has been some of this before, but not a lot can be seen two weeks. We’ve been here now almost four and the curtain has opened a bit wider.

The view has been made possible by a deal gone awry. In February I was contacted by Jodi McGill with a great offer: if First Pres would give $5000 that would “top up” the funds needed for a new ambulance. The donation would be reciprocated by allowing us use of it during the months of my sabbatical.

The ambulance was supposed to be ready in April. Well, April turned to May and May to June. When we arrived we were told it would be just a few more days and someone would drive it up for us. Well those few days turned into four weeks.

Now the vehicle is ready but wait “you can’t have it yet” said Mr. Luhana. Mr. Luhana and I have been arguing on the phone now for three solid days. Each time his story changes a bit; each time I sense the glow of “feel at home, be at home” is wearing off.

On our last conversation Mr. Luhana expressed his disgust that a $5000 donation would be worthy of such use, that more funds were needed to equip the vehicle for its intended use, and that it must be inspected before I would ever see it.

Again and again I reiterated to Mr. Luhana that while all of these things may be true they were not part of the original agreement. “I am not aware of any original agreement,” he claimed insinuating I was making all of this up.

“We need to help each other” was his other claim. To which I kept reiterating, “I have helped you already. I’ve secured $5000 US to fund the vehicle. What is lacking is your help to me.”

At this point I went up the food chain- Mr. Mwara. This is the man who has taken Paul Mkhandawire’s post and while he seems like a very nice man he also seems a bit out of touch. The two crates of medicine we brought from the US were still in his office as was the orthopedic surgical kit meant to go to Blantyre. “I am not sure what these crates are,” he said pointing to them. “Well, let me tell you . . .” I said.

Later the next day Mr. Mwara called to say he found the source of the ambulance problems. The deal was struck between Jodi and a Mr. Bandawe (who is on holiday) and while Mr. Bandawe claims his management team knew of it, it would seem the nuances of the deal eluded them. “That is fine, but will I have the vehicle tomorrow?”

As I am writing this it is “tomorrow”. I have made it clear to all parties involved that I need the ambulance to transport my family from the airport and to do this I need to depart no later than noon today. It’s 9:00 and my phone has not yet rung. O ambulance, will you ever appear?

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Kathy Writes
July 1, 2008
I think we’re reaching the end of the honeymoon glow. We’ve just hit the 3 week mark and our time in Malawi is becoming real life. Things are marching along to their own beat and I’m feeling out of sync. While the McGills were here things ran at 110 kph (which is very fast considering the shape of the Malawian roads). Now that we are on Garry “Summertime” things are slow and nebulous. Everyday Ethan asks “what are going to do today?” And everyday I say the same thing . . . we have no plan (well Fred has the whole aiding thing going on, but I have no real plan). The only “plan” I had was that the boys would go to school and now that has ended. Ruth has been with us since Friday and we are all doing really well together. So far she is the one still going to school and if the consulate appointment goes well this week she will probably stop after Wednesday.

Life at the house here is quiet. I’m trying to find my place, which is difficult. I was very excited about the cook, the housekeeper, and the gardener aspect but now after three weeks I’m ready to take back my role. I love gardening and I get satisfaction out of the whole cleaning-organizing thing. And laundry, I find the whole washing and folding part therapeutic. I still don’t miss the cooking but I do miss something about it. Maybe the feeling of freedom- I feel like an interloper (though our cook, Dada Nyasulu, is very gracious and wanting to help).

There is a strange guilt to being here in the house while people are working. On one hand they really need the salary you pay them and if they didn’t work for you they would have to find other employment. Yet, I’m here and I have no sabbatical “job” other than to see and experience Malawi, which we are. We have gone on safari, been to the lakeshore, dined at people’s homes, attended a prayer house dedication, been to Mchengatuba church each Sunday but there is still a lot of down time.

What is my role? That is the question.

Fred Writes
Chambo and Chips

There is something very good about the lakeshore. Sitting on the veranda of our bungalo, listening to the waves, the fisherman started beating their canoes to tell the people in the surrounding villages that the catch of the day has arrived. Children herd cattle along the beach while little Dave wades in the water. All of this while I sip tea and listen to Bob Dylan.

It’s about a two hour drive from Mzuzu to Bandawe. We have the boys, Chelsea Schultz, and Ruth Chiumia with us. Chelsea is the daughter of Chris who met Jim McGill in grad school. About two months before our departure, Chelsea sent us an email asking if she could spend some time at the house while we were there. Her father was coming to Africa for some geological work and the timing worked well. We said, “jump in.”

Ruth Chiumia is Grace’s daughter. Ruth is ten and a delight. When we arrived at the lake I asked her if she had been to Bandawe before. No. Had she been to the lake before? No. Is this the first time you’ve seen the lake? Yes. How can you be a Malawian and never have seen the lake? She didn’t know what to say and Kathy gave me a glance that suggested I can blunder in any culture I find myself.

Not long after I finished my second cup of tea Rev. Gondwe came by to say hello. It took us about fifteen minutes of chit chat to get down to business. There would be three Sundays I will be in Bandawe, but only two at his church. This seemed fine to him.

I explained the groups people who will be coming and their purpose. At first I suggested that the widow’s group use this time to simply process their experience, but Gondwe had other plans. “In fact we have a widow’s organization.” The widows are running two pre-schools and are now developing an effort to combat AIDS. “The drugs,” he said, “they are making people believe they are fixed and can do what they want.” “The drugs” are the antiretrovirols we are pumping into Malawi. Every story I hear about them says they are much more a curse than a blessing.

This was the second time though that AIDS and widows were connected. “We are losing a lot of people. Pastors are doing three, four funerals a week.” These are young people they are losing and the young people are leaving widows and orphans. Now the connection to AIDS seemed a bit clearer.

And then we shifted gears and spoke of politics- church politics. Rev. Nkhoma is retiring in August and the selection of his successor is just a bit of a topic.

As we spoke I couldn’t help but feel the lakeshore winning. Perhaps that is why I love it here so much. After each challenge we would look around and smile as if to say, yes but at least there is a lovely breeze as the sun is setting and here we are enjoying the veranda.

Yet, the best moment of the lakeshore is in an order: chambo and chips. This is fish and french fries. Chambo is the mainstay fish of lake Malawi. It tastes a bit like bass. The chips taste like chips. There is a moment at the end of the movie the Blues Brothers where John Candy’s character asks the law enforcement officers with him, “orange whip? Orange whip? Orange whip?” When we drove up to Sambani our first order of business was to order, “chambo chips or chicken and chips?” The first go round there was only one other taker beside myself for the fish. By six o’clock and dinner hour the number had leapt to six “chambo and chips.” There is something lovely about the lakeshore.

I am supposed to be walking in Africa, but instead I’m driving. In fact I am driving more in Malawi than I do in Watertown. This might be a good thing if I enjoyed driving, but alas, I do not.

Today, though, we were sans vehicle. There was a strange calm that came over me. This came as a surprise as while I do not like to drive I don’t like not having the option more.

True to form about 1:00 as I realized that I could just sit for a time (read nap) on sabbatical, the phone rang. It was David’s school and he was faining a stomach ache. So off I walked. Less than half way there I was spotted by Mr. Myungu.

I had been warned about him by Jodi McGill and given strict instructions that he was not allowed in the gate. A few hundred yards with him by my side I got the reason: he never stopped talking; I mean never. He had a plethora of health problems that all needed to be handled before he returned to gainful employment in a month’s time. I thought, man, that’s a pretty good line.

He slipped a bit when he said, I can tell that you are the sort of person who will help me. “You can tell that by just looking at me,” I said with an incredulous lilt. Soon and very soon I bid him farewell.

Halfway home with David in tow I began to feel really good. It wasn’t the walking, though, it was the seeing. What I love about Malawi is how life is just out there for everyone to see. The people walking, the vendors selling, the cyclists peddling, random people just seated on the side of the road.

So inspired was I that I decided to press my luck and walk into town to use the internet (our phone lines have been down for five days). As Kathy I walked down to the market area there was a weight being lifted.

I know I have been cranky, I said. But the driving here is just unnerving. The people are darting everywhere, the bikes swerve and the oncoming traffic always look like they are trying to clip you. You never know what is going to happen. I am frustrated because I can’t just gawk the way I have before. With a driver I was free to just look around. Driving myself I can’t take my eyes off the road for a second.

The more we talked about this the more it came clear: if I am going to be here this long and have Malawi be something more than a few week tour I am going to lose the joy of just watching from the van. Then the walking came clear. Walking wasn’t to meditate as it is in the states; walking was for seeing and enjoying the stream of bizarre images that I have come to love in Malawi.

“I must confess a real love for the chaos here,” I said to Kathy. “I love the way everything just kind of blends into a bit of madness, but its everyday life at the same time.

Later that day as the sun was waning we walked the central market in search of fruit and vegetables. As the vendors were closing down and hawking the remains as fast as they could and others were closing down their shops and people like us were trying to get out before darkness fell I was happy again. We drove down as the car was returned and the children needed a moment out. But walking the market in the swirl of fishmongers shouting closing prices while I carried two dozen eggs in an open flat trying not to trip on the muddy, twisted paths that divide the shops I thought: how good is this?

Mzuzu has become a bit small.

When Kathy questioned the logic of walking the two miles into town down hill and then walking those same two miles up hill I said, someone will pick us up. Indeed before we left the market area we were flush with people who could have given us rides.

I meet people all the time who have heard about our time in Mzuzu. Now I know I stick out. Yet there are more white people in Mzuzu than when I usually visit. Malawi during June, July, and August has a fair amount of tourism now.

The tourist are easy to spot and I have already begun to look at them with a bit intolerance. “They ain’t from around here.”

It does help when you preach in front of thousands of people and have the ability to go from place to place that comes a car. You need to remember that the overwhelming majority of Malawians do not have a vehicle. They walk, they hope for rides, they pay seat on mini-buses.

During our church service in Bandawe on Sunday I was approached by a Scottish missionary who said, you must be Fred. I’m David. I think they want us to move our vehicles. Later as we chatted during the service it was clear that even though I was more than an hour and half away Mzuzu was a bit small.

Without sounding too terribly romantic, that is the good part about it. Mzuzu lacks the slow, ponderous life of a village, but it also has something close to a grocery store; Mzuzu is not a physically attractive city as it a bit of ramshackle feel, but the streets are paved; Mzuzu is not big enough to require more than twenty minutes of driving to see the highlights, but in twenty minutes time you will most likely encounter someone who offers tea, a meal, or just a lovely converation.

Outside of the central market Gabriel spotted us. We were driving the McGill’s van and you would be amazed by how many people approach us on account of this vehicle. Gabriel was one of Jodi’s long-term projects. He is a schizophrenic who tries to cope by self-medication. Gabriel was looking for recognition from me: if you are driving the van, you need to know me. What I really knew at this moment was that Gabriel was lit.

I told him I cannot help you right now, but you will find me again. I said this to him as he stood in front of the door to the van blocking the entrance. The chances are good I will help you but not right now and not while you are blocking the door. He got the hint and took off.

On both accounts I was very serious: now is not a good time and you will find me again. Gabriel will find me no matter what vehicle I am driving because Mzuzu is just a bit small. It’s still a place were people know one another and people are known.

It does help that I am driving a rather distinctive van (the McGills much to their credit have purchased a mini-van that is ready for the African bush). Yet, even when I was walking the same thing happened. I was seen and called to by friends and acquaintances.
I am always surprised by how much people crave privacy and anonymity and yet at the same time have their entire lives on the internet (like a blog). There is a deep contradiction here. It is as if we want to be free from the Gabriels yet live in a place that is a bit small.

Pottery for one and all
The beach at Nkotakota is magnificent. The sand is pure and the waves are about twenty feet away breaking on the shore with a roar. Tea has just come.

Ruth and David have rolled up their pants and are tempting the fate of Lake Malawi. David has no fear of a two hour ride damp from losing the battle of inching closer and closer to the waves; I am not sure Ruth knows the inevitable claim her compatriot will make: “I didn’t try to get wet.”

We are here to buy pottery. Nkotakota is famous for the mugs and plates and pitchers. They are not famous enough, though, for Kathy and I not to argue. Throughout our marriage few things have divided us. On the whole we are two bookish people who enjoy conversation on a long drive, movies with a point, and the power of silence. For the most part this has made our life very harmonious. But there are three maybe four things that definitely divide us: I am salt, she is sugar; I am prone to names with flair, she to names that will not leave a scar; and in terms of china patterns there is no way to describe our differences except to say there is no place of agreement. There isn’t even room for compromise our tastes are so different.

I left the pottery factory to watch the children and my parting words were “get what you want.” This was after Kathy had made clear how much she had compromised already.

I know people may think this is rather mundane and even bordering on the profane given where we are and what we are doing, but in fact, that is the whole point of the sabbatical here: to see the mundane to be a family here.

Believe it or not people in Malawi have marriages wherein disagreements of patterns or furnishings or purchases occur on a regular basis. I’ve heard it in the small talk, or the comments made as husband and wives step into an awkward moment. I’ve seen it on their faces as they describe one another. It turns out marriage is marriage no matter what your longitude or latitude.

Finding our place in the mundane here was a great hope. It took about three weeks and a ceramic dutch oven to achieve. Of course there will be more to the sabbatical. Yet, this is really what the Malawians plead each time you are with them: feel at home, be at home. For me home is the mundane.

David succumbed to fate as I wrote this. He didn’t anticipate the water being as high behind him as it was in front of him so he sat down in the water. He then proceeded to cover himself in sand as a way of drying off I believe. Ruth, to her credit, remains all dry save her feet and ankles. The more time they spend together I wonder who will influence whom. Yet that is the fun of a life together, the joy of the mundane.

The Hijack

In 2004, First Presbyterian voted to make a three-year commitment to the village of Chivumu. The funds that were given were to be used to build a school.

In 2005 a group of eight were sent from First Pres to Malawi for a visit to the school site and meet the people who were heading up the effort.

Upon our arrival in Chivumu it was clear: this was a great project and the people working on it could be trusted. Key to the project was the leadership of the local pastor, the traditional authority chief, the village headmen, elders of the church, and the leadership of the larger church. Needless to say we felt we were part of community project.

In 2006, I returned with a group from the Presbytery of Northern New York to view the progress. In less than a year one block (two classrooms in one building) was complete and a second was well on its way. Although our time in the village was brief the connections of our last visit were significant and intact. During the time of speeches, one of the chiefs stood and gave an impassioned sermon. In his conclusion he declared that the children of Chivumu were now my children, and that a father will fulfill the needs of his children. I took the words to heart.

In 2007, we were able to see not only the two new blocks completed but also the arrival of the desks funded by the YMCA. It was a shocking transformation from the original stick huts with grass roofs that had been the Chivumu school.

On this visit, we were joined by the Rev. Nkhoma who is the general secretary of the Synod of Livingstonia. Rev. Nkhoma was the driving force behind the project and the one who insured that funds coming to Chivumu went to Chivumu. This can be a nebulous guarantee in Malawi.

Gathered under a tree the speeches carried on as usual, but this time there were plans. A fourth block was called for, thus completing a classroom for all grades, a small office and teachers’ lounge, and a house for the headmaster. Although these seemed a bit grandiose at first, I have come to see these future plans as essential for the development of the school.

In February, the Outreach Council of First Pres. voted to continue the funding of the school with $5000 for 2008. My recommendation was that we keep contributing this substantial yet modest amount each year until the school is complete.

Yesterday, we toured the grounds of Chivumu. It was a real delight to introduce Kathy to the people who have become a part of my heart. True to form the foundation of the fourth block is complete and the masons will now start working on the walls. Our 2008 contribution is reaching its intended purpose.

Each time a block goes up it is an elaborate process. The traditional authority chief must be asked if a building can be constructed on “his land”, the church must be consulted to see if such an investment is consistent with the larger picture of need, and the villagers themselves must be inspired to make the bricks and volunteer to help in the construction. To bring this all about in a timely fashion a building committee is ever busy.

Despite the progress of the fourth block we were there to visit the opening of yet another building on the school grounds. Rev. Nkhoma has been busy this last year seeking support for a “prayer house” and a series of “sky loos” to be installed on the school grounds. His efforts were successful and now there is a lovely church and a series of high end toilets. The construction of the prayer house on the school grounds with the toilets was brilliant. Already the impact is being seen. The villagers now see the school as a place for them as well. The most profound impact is that Chivumu now boasts a preschool for orphans. The prayer house doubles as a center durig the week. This will provide a service to the village that is hard to imagine in the U.S.

In the States childcare is mostly about convenience, work opportunities, or simply socialization for a young child. For Malawi, childcare is a question of life and death. The orphans who come to free childcare receive porridge and modest early education, but what the village receives is a respite from the impact of AIDS. The orphans who are fed and taught are straining the daily lives of extended families to a breaking point. The preschool provides a break that makes all the difference in the world.

At another point, I will describe the actual service of dedication for prayer house itself-which moved freely between bizarre and profound. Yet, the moment that seemed most bizarre had an impact upon the school. A date had been set for July 18th for the widows group to come and present gifts to the children and it seemed right that we have a service of dedication, recognizing the amazing work that has transformed Chivumu when they were present. Despite knowing this, the guest preacher and moderator of the synod decided that he would dedicate not only the prayer house, but the school as well- since he was here.

All of sudden there were looks of consternation. Quiet pleading with him persisted, but he had made up his mind and he in essence had the floor. So after the three and half-hour worship service dedicating the prayer house, an impromptu three and half minute service was led by the moderator to dedicate the school. A random piece of quartz was dragged over and as he handed it to me pictures were taken to suggest this was “the corner stone.”

As he walked away I turned to the headmaster Frasier and said, “you need to keep this some place safe as we know what an important rock it is.” His smile told me he appreciated the humor as he took the special stone from me.

I have no concern about credit, recognition, or even the plaques Malawians are so devoted to placing to honor their donors. I would much rather the praise go to God, Nadia Boudia, and the villagers who gave of their time. Yet I did mind the “hijacking.” I mind because it is not the sort of partnership of which I want to be a part.

Politics in Malawi is profoundly challenging arena. I have blundered in them again and again. Yet in each blunder I find something good. I will look, but so far, I haven’t found the good in our three-minute rock ceremony.

The newest plan for the school is a “football field.” In the states we would call this a soccer field. I have shared with the headmaster that Chivumu needs to have not only the best classrooms in the Chinteche area but also the best field complete with uniforms and good “footballs.” What we need, I told him, is a YMCA director coordinating good competition so not only does one community gather to Chivumu, but all the communities. The best part of this is that I’ve started to say, “we.”

2008-06-27T01:07:00.000-07:00

How to make poop pay
Sitting in the McGill home is always an adventure. The people who come and go here are ever on the cusp of one public health crisis or another. It is not uncommon to find a visitor walking in describing a water system, malaria coordination, and, today, sanitation.

Steven, known as the “Bog Man”, dropped by this morning and within a few moments I was lured into the latest hope: turning human waste from latrines into fertilizer. Jim McGill, who works primarily on water and a recent convert to what a pit latrine can do to combat amebic dysentery, was quick to hand me a book to peruse. It’s title, “What does your poo tell you?

All of this was over lunch- very tasty- with Kate from Water for People and an engineer, Anthony. I first heard about the pit latrines three years ago, but only last year did I encounter the idea that you could use human waste as a fertilizer. (If this makes you squeamish don’t worry your plumbing is in doors). This year though the conversation about sanitation and latrines has reached an important stage: income generating.

These are the wires of mission work in Malawi: public health and entrepreneurialism. When you cross these two, things really start to happen. Three years ago the conversation was a modest hope of selling subsidized toilets to folks here in the north. The benefits of these “outhouses” is monumental, yet the value is unforeseen by most. They can free families from a persistent, curable disease that often goes untreated is the claim, but freedom is not always an easy concept to grasp by those who live without its power.

The path to freedom in this instance is very steep. To see freedom from dysentery, a village needs 70% of its households to have gone from poor hygiene practice to healthy practice. 70% would then be the “tipping point” toward eliminating one of the big four in any village.

The big four are malaria, HIV/AIDS, dysentery, and malnutrition. Ever before all discussions seems to be a kind of cart and horse, chicken and egg debate. Which one first? Which one is the priority? Yet, no matter what the priority it is the presence or absence of power- which actually determines the pecking order. So it seems you start everywhere hoping one will take.

The recent conversation around latrines is trying to cross the wires of mission in Malawi: how can you take a public health issue and turn a modest profit? How can someone be motivated to make a significant change in their life without a very concrete benefit? In other words, how do you make poop pay? Because without this the chances of generating the social power of 70% is near hopeless. In a country where everyone is ready to sell something as the only means of generating cash, finding something to sell is a great motivator.

Yet, how in the world can you convince someone to collect their feces to sell, let alone find a buyer?

Easier than it would seem. Malawians are primarily farmers who want to see results. Hence they are not sold so much on concepts or ideas as they are on yields- think cash. If you add fertilizer made from feces, your tomatoes grow bigger. If you spray diluted urine on your corn, they start grow faster and produce more maize. More crops mean something to sell. Something that will create more things to sell is valuable. So the proof is there, but now comes the risk.

To do this right, everyone must have a fair share of the enterprise. In other words, the people who make the toilets (masons), the people who promote the toilets (Bog Man et al), and the people who use the toilets, should each have a share of the risk involved. This is much slower way of bringing public health to a village, but it is the right way. Each one of these three need to have a share in the success or failure of the enterprise. Success in this instance would be the sale of manure made in a “sky loo” by a farmer. The risk of the promoters comes in subsidies and guarantees. No one would be motivated to risk any of these if there were not cooperation by all three.

Undercutting this effort is the other form of public health effort, headed up primarily by UNICEF. This effort is best categorized as the big “give away.” The benefit of this method is that it builds confidence in the west that something is happening now. This is a huge benefit when the word crisis gets bandied about. Yet, in the end, this method undercuts any market formation. Why would you buy something you can get for free? And no NGO is willing to give everyone everything. While more people may get a sanitary toilet quicker than in the entrepreneurial model, there is great evidence to show there is no sustainable impact nor the relationship that is necessary for such an innovation to impact long held habits and beliefs.

The greatest difference though is one of power. In the UN based model the power stays with the West. We determine the number, we determine the distribution, and we determine the price. In essence we hold all the cards. Who has the power is the question I have learned to ask when working with Malawi. If I hold the power over others, then I have taken away something more precious than what I hoped to offer. This question must be asked more and more as we get involved with Malawi or any country racked with extreme poverty. For to give help but keep the power, ultimately dissolves as fast as it appears. If you give people power, though, the change goes deep. And so the question remains, how do you make poop pay?

2008-06-27T01:03:00.000-07:00

2008-06-27T00:59:00.000-07:00

2008-06-27T00:56:00.000-07:00

I preached the early service- the English service.
The current sanctuary of Mchengatuba is a long mud hut with a low slung roof. The only other part of the building is a “vestry” directly behind chancel. Were it not for the thousands who can gather here on any given Sunday, the building would be a truly sad moment.

As the choirs warmed up the early arrivals, I sat in the tight windowless vestry with twelve elders. They were scrambling to figure out what hymns should go with I John 4:7. “We are saved” I said,” because God loved us first.” “Mercy,” I said, “is the theme of the sermon.” This prompted some ideas from the paperback hymnal they all carried, their names penned to the top. The church doesn’t stock these.

Next came the discussion of choirs. For this service there would be five choirs. The week prior, when I took part in a joint English-Tambuka service, there were twelve. So it was clear to me: I was the warm up band for the big show at 10:00.

With some hymns everyone could sing we all entered through the back door. At this point there were about 300 people (an hour later, when I was given the pulpit it would be three times this many). Malawians don’t come to church at a certain time. And they don’t worry about sitting still. Later in the service one of the members of the “adult choir” sang with a baby on her back. When the baby started to cry someone simply came and took the child. The song was never interrupted, the mother never lost her rhythm in the dance.

Today was a big Sunday. My presence at the church last week had spurred the elders to a point of decision: they would stand with the pastor and deal harshly with the members of the youth choir who had caused problems. While I wanted this for Norman, I was still not convinced that so many of them were to blame for trying to extort money (my hunch is that there were at least two parents who were more at fault than their children). But I don’t know this for sure.

So I preached mercy. I told the story of Jacob at Bethel, how the man who was blessed and given a vision of a wonderful life was not such a great guy at that moment. When God came to him at Bethel, Jacob was a liar, a thief, and a man on the run. He was everything we would not want to bless. Again and again I came back to the theme that before Jacob was a good man, before he was something God treated him like he was everything. That’s been my experience of mercy.

Later that night forty of the elders, and more importantly the district leaders from all but two of the area churches gathered to discuss my time in Mchengatuba. The gathering was Norman’s moment of restoration and it felt like it. The tide was turning. As each elder rose to introduce themselves a giddiness filled the air. It may just be the knowledge that a great meal was moments away, but it felt like something more.

After the meal the first person to give a speech was the session clerk. His words were well chosen and, while he spoke from notes, it was clear that his heart had been poured onto the page. As is often the case in Malawi, he showed how much he had listened to my sermon by offering it again, but in a new context. Here he said we all make mistakes, let’s begin again with mercy.

The evening wound up soon after as both Norman and I didn’t impose a pastoral discourse to the clerk’s speech. He truly spoke enough for all. And he said it well.

Yet as the final words were offered, I was sad. I was sad because this was not just a gathering of a church; it was a gathering of a community. More than half the people in Mchengatuba are Presbyterians and thus members of the church. The other half of the people are Roman Catholics. I was sad because I knew this kind of gathering was unprecedented. What an amazing opportunity for community, for people to gather and discuss. As we drove away I could see this still going on and I wondered why it was so hard for people in any place to be together and see what life has in store for them.

I am glad the tide is turning in Mchengatuba. I hope it rises high.

How to make poop pay
Sitting in the McGill home is always an adventure. The people who come and go here are ever on the cusp of one public health crisis or another. It is not uncommon to find a visitor walking in describing a water system, malaria coordination, and, today, sanitation.

Chimbuzi Blues

Jim McGill was excited. He wanted to show me a “spread sheet.” I’ve grown accustomed to what excites Jim and it may need a bit of translation. This is a man who spends his day talking water tables and latrine distribution strategies. What excites him may or may not hit your radar. Part of the translation is to find a sense of what it means to change the world.

In the U.S., we live in a world that has been made for us. Pioneers, inventors, city planners, founders, benefactors, and federal programs have created a safe place where the lights light, the toilets flush, the traffic flows, and, for us in Northern New York, the snow gets plowed. Where and how all of this came to be is a mystery to most of us. Try to imagine for just a moment how you would bring water to your home. Take away the water lines, the spigots, the sinks: how would you get water if none of these things were there. This is where Jim McGill comes in.

Village after village in Malawi are still living without accessible clean water. Let’s take away the convenience of the water flowing to a particular home. That’s a “pipe” dream in the literal sense. Just having drinkable water, water that is not brackish, or polluted by livestock and people trudging to and from it. Jim brings two options: shallow wells or bore holes. The first costs approximately $350, the second nearly $6,000. Lucky are the villages where shallow wells are possible for in a land of extreme poverty, the former is so out of reach you can imagine how likely a bore hole would be.

Through the last twenty years, Jim has worked to bring water to Malawi. He does this with a quiet presence and echoes of a southern drawl. His day often consists more in politics and problem solving with folks from the government, from the church, and, then, there are the local chiefs and headman than it does with actual water. It turns out that people are an essential aspect to water.

Funds find their way to Jim from as humble a source as you and me and from as grand and large an organization as the World Bank. It is this organization that has funded a new direction for him. Partnering with a group called, Water for People, Jim is helping to compliment clean water with sanitation. Clean water and sanitation go together. I say this as someone who needed to learn it. As far as I knew these things have always been there.

In most Malawian villages though good sanitation (i.e., a proper toilet and waste system) is not a reality. What is a reality is dysentery. Dysentery is what I would call the Chimbuzi Blues. Chimbuzi is the word for toilet in Tumbuka. Bad chimbuzis are just a part of life. And they bring with them a terrible, wasting scourge that robs Malawians of health on a daily basis.

It’s hard to imagine why anyone would not want a proper toilet, but it’s not a priority for most folks here. Enter Jim McGill and his spreadsheet. Jim and his partner, Stephen, have worked together a scheme whereby the toilet is sold by a local agent; this agent contracts with a mason; and then the new owner of an elevated latrine is responsible to hand over the human waste to be used as fertilizer. The spread sheet magically tells you how many agents need to sell “x” number of “chimbuzis” and how much profit could be made if the fertilizer goes for “y.”

After a number of years of simply trying to sell toilets, the effort is being ramped up to include more parties. Essentially, they are looking for the right catalyst. By introducing more parties and more possibilities they may just find the tipping point: the place that energizes the consumers to buy a toilet. It turns out changing the world isn’t just telling people how to live or what they need. It’s more like a long awkward dance lesson that stumbles and steps on toes until “voila” you’re dancing. It’s hard to tell what it will be, but it will be.

At home in Watertown I know the benefits of a toilet after living in places where there are none. After many a Mexico Mission where the port-o-potties are a not for the faint of heart or in the bush of Africa where the “loo” is often the second bush to the left, I always return home thankful for the most creature of comforts. Yet, I also return determined to support people like Jim.

He is the man who came before. He is the one who brings a standard of life to Malawi that someday, God willing, they will assume is just a part of life. Someday Malawians will wonder where water comes from and be unable to tell you where the “waste plant” can be found. On that day, their children will, like ours, be needing someone answer: what is dysentery? Then the Chimbuzi blues will be a folk tune, not a popular tune.

Steven, known as the “Bog Man”, dropped by this morning and within a few moments I was lured into the latest hope: turning human waste from latrines into fertilizer. Jim McGill, who works primarily on water and a recent convert to what a pit latrine can do to combat amebic dysentery, was quick to hand me a book to peruse. It’s title, “What does your poo tell you?

All of this was over lunch- very tasty- with Kate from Water for People and an engineer, Anthony. I first heard about the pit latrines three years ago, but only last year did I encounter the idea that you could use human waste as a fertilizer. (If this makes you squeamish don’t worry your plumbing is in doors). This year though the conversation about sanitation and latrines has reached an important stage: income generating.

These are the wires of mission work in Malawi: public health and entrepreneurialism. When you cross these two, things really start to happen. Three years ago the conversation was a modest hope of selling subsidized toilets to folks here in the north. The benefits of these “outhouses” is monumental, yet the value is unforeseen by most. They can free families from a persistent, curable disease that often goes untreated is the claim, but freedom is not always an easy concept to grasp by those who live without its power.

The path to freedom in this instance is very steep. To see freedom from dysentery, a village needs 70% of its households to have gone from poor hygiene practice to healthy practice. 70% would then be the “tipping point” toward eliminating one of the big four in any village.

The big four are malaria, HIV/AIDS, dysentery, and malnutrition. Ever before all discussions seems to be a kind of cart and horse, chicken and egg debate. Which one first? Which one is the priority? Yet, no matter what the priority it is the presence or absence of power- which actually determines the pecking order. So it seems you start everywhere hoping one will take.

The recent conversation around latrines is trying to cross the wires of mission in Malawi: how can you take a public health issue and turn a modest profit? How can someone be motivated to make a significant change in their life without a very concrete benefit? In other words, how do you make poop pay? Because without this the chances of generating the social power of 70% is near hopeless. In a country where everyone is ready to sell something as the only means of generating cash, finding something to sell is a great motivator.

Yet, how in the world can you convince someone to collect their feces to sell, let alone find a buyer?

Easier than it would seem. Malawians are primarily farmers who want to see results. Hence they are not sold so much on concepts or ideas as they are on yields- think cash. If you add fertilizer made from feces, your tomatoes grow bigger. If you spray diluted urine on your corn, they start grow faster and produce more maize. More crops mean something to sell. Something that will create more things to sell is valuable. So the proof is there, but now comes the risk.

To do this right, everyone must have a fair share of the enterprise. In other words, the people who make the toilets (masons), the people who promote the toilets (Bog Man et al), and the people who use the toilets, should each have a share of the risk involved. This is much slower way of bringing public health to a village, but it is the right way. Each one of these three need to have a share in the success or failure of the enterprise. Success in this instance would be the sale of manure made in a “sky loo” by a farmer. The risk of the promoters comes in subsidies and guarantees. No one would be motivated to risk any of these if there were not cooperation by all three.

Undercutting this effort is the other form of public health effort, headed up primarily by UNICEF. This effort is best categorized as the big “give away.” The benefit of this method is that it builds confidence in the west that something is happening now. This is a huge benefit when the word crisis gets bandied about. Yet, in the end, this method undercuts any market formation. Why would you buy something you can get for free? And no NGO is willing to give everyone everything. While more people may get a sanitary toilet quicker than in the entrepreneurial model, there is great evidence to show there is no sustainable impact nor the relationship that is necessary for such an innovation to impact long held habits and beliefs.

The greatest difference though is one of power. In the UN based model the power stays with the West. We determine the number, we determine the distribution, and we determine the price. In essence we hold all the cards. Who has the power is the question I have learned to ask when working with Malawi. If I hold the power over others, then I have taken away something more precious than what I hoped to offer. This question must be asked more and more as we get involved with Malawi or any country racked with extreme poverty. For to give help but keep the power, ultimately dissolves as fast as it appears. If you give people power, though, the change goes deep. And so the question remains, how do you make poop pay?

2008-06-27T00:43:00.000-07:00

“You can’t go to Africa and not go on safari.”
This was my claim three years ago and it still holds. Africa, no matter how desperate the poverty, no matter how bizarre the situation you step into, is a physically overwhelming place. Malawi is a part of Africa that definitely doesn’t disappoint. And our drive on Tuesday was all this and more.

To get to Nyika you drive up M1 to the Rumphi exit and take a left. This road winds around a river and leads to the end of the tarmac just beyond the city itself. Rumphi is more of a trading center for many villages. It has the feel of a western town with all of its life on the street itself. Driving a car through the throngs and vendors, the trucks and bicycles is not for the faint of heart.

On my first visit to Nyika the roads beyond Rumphi were so bad that I held my breath as we got onto the dirt road with 110 km to go. Yet, the road kept getting better and better. Rumor is a uranium mine is up and running and the improvement of this road may be part of the deal. Good road or not you definitely knew you were headed into the bush.

60 km in you start to gain altitude; the bush gives way to forest; and with each bend in the road you get a glimpse of the mountain range you are now a part of. And then, with about 20 km left, you reach the plateau and grasslands begin. The grass lands, or as Kathy called them, “hoof and horn mesa” remembering the zoo of our childhood, the grasslands are what make Nyika special.

(Just before this change, something of great surprise occurred. A leopard walked across the road and stopped on the side to look at us. It was young- about the size of a Labrador- and its coat was a glossy black. Its spots were amazing. The guide at the park said, “you were very lucky.”

The camp at Nyika is a series of chalets with deep fireplaces. I start with the fireplaces as a way to say: it was very cold at night. We were given a cook who prepared all our meals on a wood burning stove and schlepped in the tree trunks he stacked in the fireplace to burn through the night.

Not long after we arrived and checked in Ethan and I took off down a path. The manager assured us we were free to walk or drive on all the paths/roads in the park. Within five minutes we spotted our first roan antellope, and then an eland, and then Zebra, and then gazelle. Soon we were talking in the hushed tones of experienced safari guides doing a documentary.

The next day we spent three hours driving the trails and seeing small herds of these animals. We would stop to watch the zebra play or listen to the gazelle give off their warning whistle. Dave and Ethan argued over whether they were seeing an eland or an antelope until they realized that waterbuck have a black mask around their eyes and eland do not.

The evenings at the chalet were “camp” like. We huddled around the fire until its intensity forced us to move the furniture further and further away. On our third day we drove out and enjoyed the scenery more as we were not looking for the camp, but just noticing the park itself. Almost to the park gate we were given a parting gift, large baboons darted along the road and ran through the trees.

I know some people feel guilty going on safari as they feel called to Africa to help, but what a missed opportunity. It would be like going to someone’s house when they have prepared a great meal and saying, “I’m fasting.” Africa is this wondrous, shocking, grand place. Most people, if they are so lucky to go, will only go once. If ever you find yourself in Africa, make sure to take a day to see what God has made.

“You can eat the fish.”Tuesday was a bittersweet day. We had just spent nearly two weeks with the McGill family and now they were departing for the U.S. to spend a year on “itineration.”

The sweet part was the hope we have for them and us. We hope the year in the U.S. will be a time of renewed connections, perhaps some joy, and a time to find new directions. PCUSA missionaries are on a 4/1 schedule: four years in the field and one year at home. “The four years is easier for you than the one,” I said to Jim McGill. He smiled. “I would do another four years sooner than a year of public speaking.”

The itineration year is hard on some missionaries. Speaking about clean water is not Jim McGill’s idea of making a difference; bringing clean water is. He comes by this honestly. His father was a missionary, a physician, and Dr. McGill’s speeches at home were notorious for the obvious pain they brought him. “Jim has gotten a lot better,” was Jodi summation hoping to encourage her husband that there were a few more miles to go in perfecting his “interpretive” year at home.

Almost five years ago Jim McGill came to Watertown on his last itineration. It was shall we say without fanfare or impact. That we would send two people to work on shallow wells in 2007 and now three in 2008 and in the course fund many projects is more a testament to spending time with him and the program he helped to create than a “dog and pony show.”

Yet I hope this year will prove intriguing. Jim will be speaking not only to clean water, but sanitation. For many people the project he is developing will add a whole different dimension to the world of sub-Saharan Africa, extreme poverty, and missions. A shallow well impacts about 250 people and changes a village. That’s the bonus of working with water: big impact on a lot of people. With sanitation, we are talking household to household. This is really hard work. Yet, I wonder how readily folks in the U.S. will understand just how daunting and needed this effort is. Will they get the need for toilets? I am not sure which one will be harder: bringing a sanitary life to villagers or convincing people back home to care.

When Jodi spoke of a year of itineration it was a whole other universe. She spoke of schools and doctors and friendships. She will be called to do as much of the public speaking as Jim, only she never speaks of it as a burden. Perhaps it is teaching nursing students everyday that has opened up in her a deep conviction that conveying their experience in Malawi can make a difference too.

The bitter part, which they both lamented, is the idea of putting their life on hold for a year. Yes, they will be a family; yes, there will be benefits to being in the U.S. (the power stays on all the time in Atlanta); and, yes, a year away will give them a renewed vision and connection to how they are part of the church sending missionaries. But it is also a year away. Spending three months on sabbatical has brought this very clear to me. Benefits, but also challenges.

For us the bitter is that we enjoyed the learning process and conversations with them. “You are terrible for my husband,” was Jodi’s remark after yet another conversation had delayed Jim from helping with bedtime. “Not that he’s not to blame too. He loves conversation.”

It was wonderful learning the ins and outs of running a house in Mzuzu. There is a plethora of tasks and people the McGills keep employed, helped in time of need, or just walking the straight and narrow. “It’s a lot of work being you,” I told Jodi, quoting a line from a Richard Russo novel. We could have benefited from their presence here during the summer and perhaps the conversations would have evolved more slowly.

Yet, that was not to be. Now we are on our own. Well, that is a bit of stretch. We are surrounded by a caring staff, other missionaries who have been alerted to our green status, and many friends we’ve made in the last few years.

As Jim and Jodi were loading the van and double checking a house they wouldn’t see for a year, they each came to me and said, “oh, and you can eat the fish.” The fish in question were small, fishtank size jobbies that had been caught in a nearby creek. After each offer I said thanks. I am still wondering if eating these fish is kind of hazing for newbies. I am pretty sure I am not going to eat the fish. My plan will be to tell the same to Paul and Darlene Heller as we depart. That, I am sure, will guarantee the fish will be alive a year from now when the McGills return.
There was a funeral so most of Mchengatuba was empty. Sam Chirwa kept apologizing for the absence of people. “They are all at the church.”

“Do all the people know the person who died?”
“No. This is just the custom. When someone dies you go to the funeral.” And then in a moment that would have made Yogi Berra proud, “people are worried that if they don’t go to the funerals no one will come to theirs.”

He also kept apologizing for the “short cuts.” The only way I can describe walking through Mchengatuba once you get off the main road is a spider web of backyards and front yards and back alleys.

Our destination was the “dambo.” A “dambo is low point or valley. In Malawi this is the cheapest land as it comes with the added bonus of being mosquito infested. Halfway to the dambo we came upon a school as it was letting out. My son Ethan and I became the object of an impromptu song. All the children started a chorus of “mzungu, mzungu” and danced from side to side. “mzungu, mzungu” menas “white person, white person.”

The shouts of a few children calling mzungu in remote villages is something I’ve grown accustomed to Malawi. Yet, Mchengatuba is a “suburb” of a city close to a quarter million so the idea that these children had never seen a white person is impossible. I turned to Sam and said, “not many white people come to the dambo.” “No. White people don’t come to the dambo.”

A remnant of the school children followed us until I took out the camera, took a picture, and turned the digital screen so they could see their images. As soon as they saw themselves they erupted in glee and then ran back the way they came.

With the children gone and a few more steps taken we were now surrounded by old women, “gogos.” These “gogos” were very excited to see us. They had been given iron sheets for roofing by Sam. But Sam had made it clear: these iron sheets were not from him, they were from Watertown. “This is Fred Garry,” he declared, “from Watertown.” The shouts of glee were again over seeing an image, but this time it was seeing someone from the place that gave the iron sheets.

Iron sheets are big in Malawi. With iron sheets for a roof your mud hut will last longer and will not collapse during the rainy season. The first widow, Mpini, shook my hand repeatedly and said, “towonga chomeni,” thank you very much. She lived in the smallest hut I’ve seen so far in Africa. It was more than small; it was more like an enclosure than a home. In this abode she kept her six grandchildren alive. I am not sure it is much more than that.

Sam then took us to another widows home. “This house collapsed in the rainy season,” he said. “Mestard lives next door and that is how we came to know of her.” Mestard, like Sam, was a member of the choir who came to the North Country last July. The iron sheets, though, were not part of choir practice. The sheets come from monies donated in Watertown in December of 2006. Sam has made it a priority for us to insure that those funds go to help the poorest of the poor.

Looking at the widow’s house, the iron sheets, and the people I thought this is much like my walk to the dambo itself. It’s filled with twists and turns, moments of life and death that somehow bring people together.

As I abide in Malawi in a lovely home high on a hill (nambo in Tambuka) it is clear to me that my life is very permanent. My home and church are not in danger when the rains come. To abide in a place is to remain for a time along the way. My life is being punctuated by a time of abiding. To abide in Mpini’s house, to be her grandchild is to live a life that is somehow always abiding, dwelling in the impermanence and fragility. As you read this know that Mpini is praying for you and giving thanks for the people of Watertown.

2008-06-21T11:02:00.002-07:00

Sam's House

2008-06-21T11:02:00.001-07:00

Sam Chirwa is a man of many schemes. In the US scheme has a negative connotation, it suggests someone who is trying to do something underhanded. In Malawi, scheme means plan. And Sam has got a lot of plans.

At last count: he’s running a bus service, opened a combination nursery, pre-K, and early elementary school, and in his off hours he’s chasing down candidates to be helped by our widow’s fund. I am pretty sure there are other schemes, but Sam has gotten to know Americans well enough that you don’t let them see how much you really have to do in Malawi to get ahead.

His bus service primarily caters to children going to private schools. He drives in a car he got “second hand.” Second may be more of metaphor as I would place Sam’s hand as more like six or seventh. This didn’t stop me from bumming a ride with him a few days ago. Half way up a hill there was a problem. “It’s the wiring,” he said. “It has a hard time going up hill with the headlights on.”

The type of school he started is common in Malawi. Small, private schools dot the city of Mzuzu. What seems unusual is its tuition scheme and hiring practice. Widow’s grandchildren go for free and two widow’s have been hired to run the kitchen. As the children arrive at seven and stay until five food is a big concern. He has hired three young men to do the instruction. One of them I know is an orphan himself.

The last scheme is what I had come to Mchengatuba to see today: the widows. Sam and Grace have spent the last year listening to people, taking recommendations, and doing interviews to find what I would call the most vulnerable people on earth. The widows they found live in houses not quite worthy of the title hut, raising many grand children, and somehow staying alive.

These are the folks who can’t make the nominal school fees, whose diet consists of maize mush. They are the ones I think of when people put out a spread for us to eat. Sam led Ethan and I through a series of yards and side streets, past the house where someone had died and the body was being prepared for burial, and then through a marsh to an area just above it. This was the “dambo.” The dambo is the lowest part of the valley, the cheapest of the cheap real estate.

I asked Sam if it was cheap because it flooded. He said, “No. It doesn’t flood. It is infested with mosquitoes.”

In short order we were with some of the widows who had received iron sheets. Most of the widows were not at home as a funeral was in process. The ones that remained were most gracious and kind to thank us for the iron sheets. Iron sheets are big in Malawi. They are the difference between a house that makes it through the rainy season or one that doesn’t. Sam and Grace had tracked down the ones who needed help the most and worked with them to insure that the iron sheets would create a better house for them.

After meeting the widows we wound our way back through the alleys and back yards and side streets to his house. He had prepared rice and tea for us to share. Sitting in his living room I was struck by its comparative opulence. Sam’s house, while in Mchengatuba, was far from the dambo. It was strange to think that such a distance could be seen in such proximity.

As we ate the rice and tea I spied a silver frame on the entertainment center. On the consul was a silver frame with two pictures. One had Sam standing next to Lorraine Revelle and another had him standing next to Liz Bonisteel. While Sam has been in Liz’s house many times and I was there when Lorraine did her great work with choir, I was still surprised to see them. It was as if the distance of continents disappeared. It was strange to think that in Sam’s house I felt closer to Watertown than I did the dambo just a few hundred yards away.

In a few weeks four women from Canton and four from Watertown will walk the same circuitous path that leads from Sam’s house to the dambo. It’s hard to know what they will see or what they will think. I hope they will find a sense of solidarity and understanding with the widows I cannot. In a real sense I am not allowed to see and know these things. Being a white pastor in Malawi means the widows will only see me as a kind of apparition.

Kathy writes

2008-06-19T07:18:00.000-07:00

What a fun day yesterday! In the morning when I went with Jodi to drop off the boys at school, I met the Headmaster and his wife, some teachers, and two students from M.I.T. who had come to install sixteen computers at the school. The MIT students were very friendly and we chatted for a little bit and introduced ourselves. I met Justin and then a girl whose name is unpronounceable to me. Jodi asked her what kind of name it was and she said, Turkish. So off we went yakking it up about Turkey and where she had grown up and where I had visited when we were there last Fall. Ends up when her family moved to the U.S. they ended up in Albany (NY, of course). For how vast this world is, it always amazes me how there is also such a connectedness and things are so interrelated.

A few hours later a group of women met at an Indian restaurant for a goodbye lunch for Jodi’s friend who is moving back to England at the end of the month. It was such a fun eclectic group. The women were from Ireland, India, French Canada, England, Malawi, and then the two of us from the U.S. with Jodi being an ex-patriot (her term, not mine). It was really wonderful to be part of their group and listen to what their life in Malawi is like. I really love my life at home, but it’s amazing and I’m so glad to be living a totally different one for a short time.

The Handshake

2008-06-19T03:18:00.000-07:00

We have seen with our own eyes . . . we have touched with our own hands. 1John 1.1

I am growing convinced that no one in Mchengtuba thought they would see me again.

When the choir returned last August, triumphant and filled to overflowing with gifts, there must have been a Vegas moment: what happened there, stays there. Because the story some of the members concocted and the foolishness that prevailed can only be carried on by people believing there is no one who can challenge them. Well . . . so much for that theory.

There is another possibility that any attempt to redirct the donation to build the church into personal hands could have transpired before I returned and then it would have been too late. Malawi is a tough place to get a refund.

At first glance the confusion, the awkwardness, the greed is why many people don’t want to get involved with places of extreme poverty. The missionaries, the church leaders, and even the ex-patriots don’t like to expose visitors too much to this. For this reason it is rare to hear them complain, to speak ill. Like the curtain in the Wizard of Oz, you don’t want the folks from Kansas seeing any of this.

It’s not that I like awkward moments, but for me, that’s life. And when you are talking about Malawi real life has a funny way of intruding on a regular basis. A part of me doesn’t trust a situation until I know the broken parts and the less than desirable aspects.

Speaking with Jim and Jodi McGill about this it was clear not everyone is as flexible and more importantly not everyone continues their support once they know the potential pitfalls of working with extreme poverty.

All right, not everyone gets this. And a big part of me wants to be just as careful not to offend. Another part says, Do you really believe you are going to make a difference in a context like this, facing daunting challenges like these and all will be nice? You can’t just say “this is Africa” every time something goes South, but easy . . . here? No.

As I walked around Mchengatuba Tuesday there was a common look on the faces of the people I met: I can’t believe you are here. On some level this is because Mchengatuba is not rife with American guests. This is a hard scrabble set of streets. Most of Mzuzu is just as poor, but Mchengatuba seems to have an edge. The people smile as I pass, the children yell, Mzungu, just as in other neighborhoods, but there is something different.

Shaking hands had a whole different meaning here. It was what John said, “we have seen . . . we have touched.” It was as if this meant a whole other level of support. I am starting to believe that people figured if there was conflict, if there was a problem, no way would he come here. Another theory gone.

I want to say that is what called to me. Conflict, challenge, Holy Spirit: don’t these things go together?

2008-06-19T03:13:00.000-07:00

2008-06-19T03:04:00.000-07:00

2008-06-19T03:00:00.000-07:00

2008-06-19T02:40:00.000-07:00

Kathy writes "school days"

2008-06-19T02:38:00.001-07:00

June 18

Well I think we’ve proven what we always guessed . . . we probably would have been the first family on the wagon train group on the Oregon Trail to bite the dust. Fred got sick the day after we landed and I got sick six days later (and we actually have food, shelter, and several layers of clothing).

Though I have to say one thing I didn’t anticipate was no heating. I assumed there was no air conditioning but somehow I never factored in the lack of a heater (we do have a water heater though).

Besides this minor glitch we are adjusting pretty well I’d say. The boys started school this week. Monday was a holiday- sort of. They call it Freedom Day but then the government changed the day they celebrate it and everyone was very confused whether it was a holiday or not. Most of the banks and businesses were open but some schools were closed.

Tuesday, David started school and enjoyed it but thought the grade they put him (standard 4) was a little too challenging. It would be the equivalent of 3rd grade except it is in the middle fo the year as they start in January. The encouraging part about it is that he has the best teacher in the school. Ethan started on Wednesday and is going to be an in 1 day and out student. He thought recess was too long- 30 minutes of “football” and an one and half hour of lunch and recess, and classroom time was too slow and kids just shouted out answers. He seemed to find this disconcerting. My thought was there are only nine students wouldn’t that lead to a somewhat informal discussion?

Final assessment- Ethan . . . no school; David . . . loving it and making friends (his teacher had them jumping to see who could come closest to touching the classroom ceiling- David and a girl named Hydra were the finalists with David winning. Now he’s telling me they arm wrestled too). You can see how David might fit into this scenario.

2008-06-19T01:21:00.000-07:00

2008-06-19T01:15:00.000-07:00

Fatuma's House

2008-06-18T06:28:00.000-07:00

I went for a walk yesterday through Mchengatuba. This is the ramshackle “suburb” of Malawi’s most major northern city, Mzuzu. There are approximately 5000 folks living along the rutted dirt road that crisscrosses the clusters of small homes.

The homes are very modest. While all are benefit to city water lines, sewer lines are not yet a reality. There is electricity, which I’ve come to find out is more of an episodic utility. (There is no power on Sundays for instance.)

Walking with me were two of the members of the choir that came and toured the North Country last summer. Sam Chirwa and Rev. Norman Hara were my escorts. I felt like a foreign correspondent walking through an exotic location as I queried them about what it means to live in Mchengatuba. The road we walked had no sign to name it. You could hear choirs practicing in various houses. Cars drove on whatever side had the least potholes.

We walked past “the bishop’s house”. And then a few doors down we came to Grace Chiumia’s house. Inside her front yard a new choir called “Revival” was practicing. Two members from the choir that came to us were now members of this one. Mestard, the smiling, ever happy young man was one. He came right over and shook my hand again and again. He seemed to want to communicate with his hands as his English was never very good. The other member was Fatuma came and shook my hand as well. Fatuma was the youngest member of the original choir yet displayed a level of maturity beyond her years.

The Revival choir was bid to make an offering. “Make it a really good one,” I said. In short order they exploded into a dancing, swirling, Tambuka songfest. It was a really good one. The translation was called for by Rev. Hara. A young man named, Happy said, “this song means: if we fail to trust in the Lord it opens the door for the devil to do us harm.”

Although it wasn’t planned, I knew Fatuma’s house was a few doors down, so I asked if I could meet her parents. She said, of course, and went off to warn them.

Now joined by Mestard, Sam, Rev. Hara and I headed down to Fatuma’s house. It turned out only her father, Mr. Mkandawire, was home but we were greeted warmly and bid to take a seat. I started in. “I have come to thank you for giving us your daughter, for intrusting her care to us last summer. She and her friends did a great work in the North Country of New York and we are all very proud of her. Many families in America see her as their daughter now.”

Mr. Mkandawire sat with a stoic look as I offered my pleasantries. When it was his turn to speak he said, “yes, Fatuma has returned much different. Now when she prays there is substance to her words.”

What happened next threw me a bit. My intent this summer is to ask each choir member, what has their time in the US come to mean to them? Yet each time I asked Fatuma a question, others gave the answers for her. She was left to nod her approval or twist her face into an expression that said not quite. The only thing she actually got in was that Niagara falls was great.

Later that night I would ask our missionary hosts if this was an anomaly or what they would expect. Actually I asked if this was because Fatuma was young or a woman. They said, “both.” At the moment of the conversation though I didn’t know how to take her inability to speak for herself.

A part of me just wants to call it sexism that kept Fatuma quiet. And in Malawi there a culture that devalues women in ways that seems shocking to a Westerner. But I have been here enough to know that is way too simplistic.

Fatuma’s silence was not what I wanted, yet as I walked away I remembered what her father said about the change he noted in her: when she prays her words have a quality that is significant. So does he value her voice in places of eternal value?

You can look to the humble dwelling of the Mkhadawire family and write off the parts of life here that are “less” as just a lack of “development.” You can until you realize that Mr. Mkhandawire is an electrical engineer who is spending his retirement offering his services to his country trying to pioneer renewable energy sources.

Abiding in Mchengatuba wont be dull.

Whatever happened to the luggage?

2008-06-17T23:47:00.000-07:00

For three days our luggage sat in Nairobi. We were assured by the harried woman at the Kenya Airways transfer desk that our luggage was going to Malawi as we flew to Tanzania. I took a breath to ask another question but knew it was futile. There are no assurances with luggage and when your luggage ventures into Africa the lack of assurance borders on the wish dream.

In Lilongwe on the second day without luggage sitting in the Kenya Airways office the extremely polite official came with a gleam in his eye. “We have discovered the problem, sir. The woman who told you she would see to your luggage, this woman she did not. So your luggage, it is in the airport waiting to come to Malawi.”

“Can we invite it come?” I asked. “Yes. Yes. We will do that.” And sure enough this invitation was accepted and our seven bags were sent to Lilongwe. Making our second trip out to the airport everyone was a bit cranky in the car. It’s about a forty minute drive out into the bush to reach the Kinsasha International Airport. There are maybe four or five arrivals a piece per day. You can tell it’s arrival time when all the taxi drivers stand near the door; you can tell it’s departure time when there are people standing at the counters to check bags.

We arrived in between these two windows so the airport had the feeling of a large coffee break. (I should be correct here: tea break). No one at Kenya Air knew what we were talking about so I just headed for the baggage area. Of course this was the first time someone stopped me when I walked back through customs. Verging on a bit of old-clothes-fatigue I bristled as I followed the police officer back to Kenya Airways where we were asked to wait for the baggage master.

The baggage master then took us right back to where we were only this time the police officer was gone. As we rounded the corner David let out a shout, “there they are!” And sure enough there were our seven bags all safe and accounted for. Yet, what David didn’t know was that the battle was only half won. Getting your bags is a minor victory as many visitors to Malawi have not so fortunate. So I didn’t challenge his glee. But I knew the second hurdle was before us: the customs agent.

Usually when I travel the customs agent is not a problem. The trinkets and souveniers I’ve bought in Israel or Turkey, Scotland or the Netherlands are of absolutely no interest to the customs agents at JFK. But when traveling to Malawi the tens of thousands of dollars of undeclared medical supplies and equipment . . . well it could very easily be of interest. There could be hefty duties; there could be hassles; there could be the dreaded “detainment.”

Seated beside our bags was this guardian of the nation. She was at her station so to speak, but she was not being very vigilant. In fact, she was on her cell phone and wouldn’t make eye contact. The baggage master went and retrieved the necessary documents for late luggage and after we signed it the customs agent could feel our stare. Still without looking up she waved us forward.

Now I should be happy that all the luggage arrived and that nothing was taken or confiscated or duty imposed, but I wasn’t. I had collared up. Always in the past my clergy collar had been the key to working our way through customs without any hassles. And here I was collared up and not even a glance. I hate to admit it but I wanted something for the effort.

Sunday Morning

2008-06-17T23:35:00.000-07:00

On Sunday morning we arrived at Mchengatuba for tea at 8:00 am. Really though we were there for a preview, for a review, for a time get the story straight. Norman walked me through his version. He highlighted the way the choir were quick to claim that the money given to pay for the roof of the church was indeed theirs.

For the past year, Norman and his wife Jennifer have suffered in various and sundry ways because of the attempt made on behalf of some of the choir members to capture some of the funds raised during their tour of the North Country. The stories they told, the rumors they mongered, and the, well, the lies took a toll. Rocks have been thrown through Harra’s windows and then last month Chimwemwe’s father came with some men and took the Harra’s furniture out of their living room and threw it onto the front lawn saying, “we are throwing you out.”
The police were called in to address the malay and ultimately they arrested Chemwemwe’s father and the others. (They were released the next day, but it was all in the papers.)

Listening to the foolishness that had transpired I couldn’t help but wonder how God endures us. How often he laments the choice of a church to bring the redemption of his son to the world.

I made it clear what I was going to say and then during the church service I offered the same with a twist. The twist was a the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand. I said, after all the offerings were taken and all the bills were paid it was just like the loaves and the fishes, there were leftovers.

What was interesting was that before the church service many of the choir members came and greeted me. Afterward only Anthony. I am still not convinced Anthony understands a great deal. Anthony is consistent with many Malawians who were most likely malnourished as children. There is only a certain level or critical thinking possible for him and many others.

Afterwards we gathered in Norman and Jennifer’s home to share a meal. There was a palpable sense of relief in the air. It was as if a corner had been turned. I didn’t share this feeling.

My unease came from seeing Chemwemwe’s father seated in the first row of pews during the worship service. That is a bold man. Something tells me my explanation to the congregation may have garnered some support for Rev. Harra, but the real battle was yet to come. It may just be my imagination, but people like that are hard to beat. There was a look on his face that said, let us see what tomorrow brings.

Kathy noted this as well: during the service, Lusaka came over to him, knelt down and spoke something to him. Now people come and go during a Tambuka service all the time. So it wasn’t odd that someone walked through the worship service to say something to someone. It was odd that he did so with this man on this Sunday.

I hope for the day when I can sit with both Lusako’s and Chemwemwe’s families and listen to what they have made of all we gave to their children. It will be interesting to hear how they justify what they have done and said. Something tells me it will also be sad.

Saturday and Sunday, June 14 and 15

2008-06-16T05:17:00.000-07:00

There are three basic rules to driving in Malawi: don’t drive at night, keep to the left, and watch out for tobacco trucks.

The last rule is probably the most important, especially if rule number one is not being followed. Each year beginning in April the tobacco harvest calls for the resurrection of the most decrepit, slap dash, large trucks you can imagine. They are only used for a short time each year so maintenance is not a high priority. With such a lack of attention, the trucks are terribly prone to breaking down on the windy, mountainous M1 that is Malawi’s main artery for commerce.

When a tobacco truck breaks down the driver puts branches on the road to warn oncoming traffic that there is a semitruck occupying the entire lane ahead. The only problem is that you can’t see these branches at night. Were it one or two on the road a driver could use caution, but these trucks litter the highway. I imagine the drivers don’t base their delivery time on the distance, but on the number of breakdowns to be expected.

Yet, rule number one is really made problematic not by tobacco truck but by the sheer darkness that cloaks the land at 6:00 pm. As you might expect 6:00 is a bit too early for life to stop so the highway has plenty of people, bicycles, livestock, vendors, and the occasional oncoming car- the last actually helps determine what obstacles are forthcoming if they cut off their high beams.

“Keep to the left” is a rule because the British hoodwinked yet another country into buying automobiles with the steering wheel on the wrong side. I was trying to follow this rule yesterday and learned the hard way that there are caveats. Caveat #1: Don’t keep too far to the left, especially when said leftside leads down to a gorge and certain death.

Now I was trying to avoid a rut in the dirt road that would have some geographers willing to apply the title canyon, but it was my fault that I steered too clear. All of a sudden people in the back yelled, “stop, stop.” There was enough panic in their voice to suggest that this was not to take a picture. They were on the side that was heading for the gorge; their panic was well deserved.

Everyone quickly piled out of the car so I could attempt to steer away from the ditch without endangering more people unnecessarily. The owner of the vehicle, Jim McGill, sauntered to my side, sized up my situation, and said, “welcome to Africa.” His wife began to take pictures . . . and then my wife did as well. Twenty minutes of rock placing, pushing and heaving left us no closer. At this point Jim tried his hand by backing up the vehicle. Within a few seconds the Land Rover surpassed precarious and now reached perilous.

Just when I thought it couldn’t get more stressful the village we were coming to visit surrounded us and begged us to come as they had been awaiting our arrival for quite awhile. At this moment Jim made a decision: I would go on to make the speeches and receive the gifts; he would stay back and see if he could get the Land Rover back on the road.

I don’t remember a lot of what came next. It was rather surreal as the van was surrounded by women singing and dancing, older women trilling who led us to a row of rather annoyed village headmen. Within thirty minutes, though, the dancing and singing and speech making had to be cut short due to darkness. There was no electricity or running water in the village.

And then came the wait. While we waited, a meal was served that by African standards was a feast. I am glad to say that I thought about “abiding”; I must confess I wondered if I would be a good person to abide in Africa. Just when there was enough self loathing to have effect, I heard something. You could just barely make out some shouting. The shouting kept getting louder and louder until you could make out a chant of victory and then the headlights of the Land Rover broke the darkness of the village. It was the Land Rover filled to overflowing with very excited men.

It turned out a truck happened down this dirt road in the middle of the bush. Of course the driver knew Jim and was glad to pull him out. Arriving with Jim and the villagers were all the people who had been in the Land Rover with Kathy and I. They were happy the car was free, but now they were nervous.

It took a few moments to discern their concern: Jim McGill was just crazy enough to let me try to drive back through the bush in the dark after my less than stellar performance. And true to form he was quick to ask, “are you ready for the drive back?” “I thought about it,” I said. “I am going to be here 10 weeks. I need to face it and not run.” He was the only person who liked my decision.

The people I drove in with were not excited about driving two hours home in the dark in the bush with me at the wheel. Yet, after all the proper speeches of thanks were offered, we all piled in. The first step was to go through the gulch/canyon/place of my earlier failure. As I drove past the ditch the car was quiet. As we made our way through the tea plantation that abuts the village, the car was quiet. When we were neared the end of the dirt road, the chatter began. People relaxed a little. Everyone one relaxed except for me and Mr. Chirwa.

Sitting shotgun, Mr. Chirwa gave me good advice as we drove and there was a quiet message not to let down so soon. He knew that reaching the tarmac was half the challenge. Navigating the rough dirt road in the bush was hard, but driving on a Malawian highway at night was just plain dangerous. With each curve, each passing car, each branch in the road I could sense Mr. Chirwa was not going to let down. He kept his eye on me and the road and offered the foreknowledge of someone who had made this drive countless times. And then, reaching Mzuzu, he leaned closer and said something that was a gift, “See how the air changes. We are near the city.” I took this to mean: while I passed the test, I needed to stay in my current occupation.

After we dropped everyone off at their respective homes it was just Kathy and a sleeping son for the short drive back to the house. She expressed her relief that we made it. I said, “I couldn’t just give up. I needed to try.”

Abiding in Africa seems to render you transparent quickly. While I might have let a fear linger for a time in the U.S., here it is dangerous. In Watertown, I could have avoided a problem like this for quite some time; in the bush, there is a sense of now or never. I need to drive the car; I need to learn; I can’t abide in Africa and be driven everywhere. It is not real life, nor is it in the budget.

As I walked to church this morning I thought: one of the key parts of my sabbatical attempt to abide is walking. Walking is not driving. A part of me wanted to ask, “did I really need to drive out?” It may just be the vestige of testosterone I have left, but my thought was, “yes. You can’t abide in fear. It’s not a question of transportation, but being in a place. Be here.”

So often I hear people speak about their life and it is clear that they are completely disconnected from the place they live. Televisions, computers, a nice house, cell phones they all help to fashion a world of our own. We live in a place without being in it. I don’t think that is even remotely possible in Africa. I have a cell phone here; I am living in a nice house; and, I can get on line (just not as fast). Yet, what I can’t do is live in these. I can’t abide in them here. You can’t remove yourself with these.

Abiding in Africa seems to be about other people and being a person with others. It is certainly not about things or money or a sense of self-fulfillment that is often attempted with these. I know it seems a bit mundane, but I never thought abiding meant people. Jesus says, “Abide in me”. I never thought abiding would mean people. Abiding me, yes. Abiding in faith, yes. Abiding in a place, yes. Yet Jesus was a person. It just never seemed likely abiding would mean people.

Standing by the driver’s side door and seeing the looks on the faces of the people I was going to drive home, I thought, you have their life in your hands. I don’t think this when I drive people around Watertown. Before we left one of the people in our car offered a prayer. I can’t remember wanting a prayer more. I wanted to abide in that prayer.
The greatest challenge of preaching is that it is for all to hear.

The sense we make of something with a friend or a spouse, the outrage we shout with a cadre of similar minded folks, even the vanities we express to ourselves to stave of the vagaries of life, all of these can be spoken without recrimination. Words flow from our lips like a river in early spring. Yet words from the pulpit, they are different.

From the beginning of my sermon writing I took to a manuscript. On numerous occasions I have flirted with the idea of preaching extemporaneously, a few members have even expressed such a desire for me- although I suspect it is to fuel an image of a prior pastor of for the hope of novelty. I have kept to a manuscript for one reason: to be sure of what I am saying from the pulpit.

Having a fertile imagination and a dexterous mind, I don’t lack the ability to speak “off the cuff.” I can do it; I just choose to force myself into the discipline of the manuscript. “O for an iron pen,” Jeremiah lamented. A pen that could transcribe events with the depth they deserve. The manuscript to me is the iron pen. Or like Habakkuk, write it down, write it down plainly for all to see. These visions and inspirations that arise out of scripture have such power, such intensity when seen in full, they demand a response as carved and crafted.

In all of their power and intensity they are also more than can be contained. Who knows where the spirit blows? Perhaps I am just not as bold as I need to be, but I would rather abide with caution in all this powerful meaning for a time and emerged with a careful accounting of what the spirit wrought, than simply wade in and see what happens.

Being in Africa I see the manuscript as a great luxury. There are no manuscripts in Malawi. There are no bulletins here. The hymnals are brought by the congregants if they are fortunate enough to have them. The instruments of the church are stomping feet, clapping hands, and the voice. On Sunday there were twelve choirs who sang. They didn’t know when or if they would sing. Some choirs were called upon to offer an anthem while people were processing, some sang while children came and went at their feet, and one choir was joined by other choir members who delighted in the opportunity to sing a song not often heard.

Imagine someone rising out of the congregation in your home church and just joining the choir half way through the anthem.

The pastor who offered the sermon on Sunday, one Rev. R.V. Banda, led them in a rousing, rollicking shout fest for twenty minutes. The people laughed and trilled and shouted on cue. He used no notes, but he knew what he was going to say. His sermon was part drama, part dance, and began with a solo completed by the congregation. The best I could make out of his sermon was that we don’t let the Holy Spirit cure our soul while all the while we hope he will cure our body; our spiritual ills are left unattended, while our physical ails are spoken with great clarity.

Before he gave his sermon I spoke to the congregation. My mission was twofold. I needed to address why I was here and what I believed about the infamous “roof money.” Last year we sent the Malawian youth choir home with $10,000 to pay for a roof on their new sanctuary. Upon arrival a controversy broke out led by some families of the choir that the money was actually for each member and not the church. That I explained this to each choir member clearly and with no uncertain terms before they departed and then to have this arise has been a great disappointment.

Yet, what was disappointing for me was dangerous for Rev. Harra, the pastor of the church. Arriving with a check made out to the Synod, not the church, helped, but it didn’t forestall a group to harass him for the money. My job on Sunday was to say, “I am the one to whom you need to speak. I am the one who knows what transpired. I will be here for ten weeks.”

As I spoke I watched one of the choir members put her head into her lap. It goes without saying that had I come for one or two Sundays, my presence could have been twisted to fit the foolishness that had prevailed. Ten Sundays . . . not so much.

I thought about writing out what I hoped to say, to publish it as it were. But that seemed so out of place. So I just rose and told the story of the choir to the 1000 or so folks who had come out to worship. I didn’t castigate or shame, I didn’t scorch any earth: I simply said, it cost 4 million Malawian Kwatcha to bring the choir and when it was all said and done there was monies left over. A decision was made to give this money, not to individuals, but to the church. (I also explained that had I done the former I would have been violating the restrictions of their visitor visa.)

Before and after I spoke there was a palpable sense of chaos in the sanctuary. It was more than randomness. I can’t imagine putting everything that was in this service into a worship service in America. There were some wild moments as well as some bizarre ones- a five minute talk was given by a guest who would return in two weeks to provide basic health exams for all the members for a cost of 15 cents.

The service was also three hours. Children came and went; mothers pulled out a breast laden with milk to feed their babies; conversations occurred without hushed voices; the offering lasted nearly forty minutes as special attention needed to be given to the members who paid their tithe in grain or fruit or stalks of sugar cane. When an elderly woman walked down the aisle near the end of the offering with ten-foot stalks of sugar cane on her head I realized why such offering came after those with money: it would be dangerous for those in front and behind her.

In some ways I feel I have chosen to abide in chaos by coming to Malawi. Yet, I can’t help but wonder if what I have been given is an opportunity to learn, truly, what it means to abide while there is chaos all about.

The manuscript for me is like an anchor in the storm of thoughts and images. It is the way I abide in the pulpit. Here though this anchor doesn’t reach bottom.

First Days

2008-06-11T03:25:00.000-07:00

June 8th Fred Wrote:

I’m very glad we had a long lay over in Amsterdam on the way to Malawi. I think I learned more about children in that eight hour period than any other stretch of parenting.

It turns out that international travel is quite a stretch for young children. They find it challenging to see the danger, the need to be on guard, and to keep moving at a clip.

My first clue was when Dave, our youngest, kept weighing himself at the check in counter. He just sat down on the scale and was delighted that he was over the weight limit for our bag. Did he think I would really put him in a bag as I had threatened? That should have been a clear sign that my other experiences of international travel were not going to apply here.

Mind you I have seen Dave do many things like this and many things much more challenging than this. Yet I have never seen him be a precocious kid while engaged in international travel. Most situations are a kind of one and out where folks think, kids will be kids. It’s not an incident. Just move on; things can be smoothed over. But that is not the scenario with international travel that is relentless and hectic.

When we hit JFK the “can we’s” began. Can we get Dunkin Donuts, can we get pizza? Dave doesn’t realize you have to take care what you eat before three days of hard travel as it can come back to haunt you in small airplane bathrooms.

Yet, the kicker for me was when he dove under the belt at the security check line to pick up the change the folks in their right mind had left on the floor because the juggernaut of frustrated semi-undressed folks being harassed by their failure to pull out their laptop or take of those all too dangerous shoes. They weren’t going to slow down a line of thousand for fifty cents. Now, Dave, Dave didn’t think of any of those things so down went.

This picture, along with an emerging album full, presented an interpretation: international travel has too many options for children. That was the conclusion I came to after eight hours with them from Syracuse to Amsterdam. There are too many shops, too many people, too many gates, and way, way too many things that catch their attention and off they go. All Dave needs is a general direction and away he goes. Kathy and I tried our best mantra on him, if you are in the lead then you must be the dad.

Much to his credit he did start to listen. Although the first twenty times we said this he seemed non-plussed. He would give me a look that said, hey I’m a dog on a walk with one of those long leads what do you expect? I actually believe my children are able to reason on this level. What they can’t do at eight and twelve is find Amsterdam an exciting experience to just walk around and people watch. And Amsterdam is filled with interesting people. (Neither one of the boys seemed all too concerned about the women in their underwear in the windows, but their mother was.)

The big moment though began before we even left the driveway at our house. There was the usual grousing over who was going to sit where for the hour long drive to Syracuse. It hit me like a ton of bricks, you guys are going to be in airports, taxis, trains, and any other mode of transportation for the next three days so we can cross an ocean, a sea, and two continents. How in the world are you going to make it if you fight over what seat in the van for an hour?

The big moment was: they are not prepared for international travel. To go so far, so fast, you need to let go of any concerns about seats, placements, creature comforts. Two red eyes in a row with an eight hour lay over in Amsterdam is not going to be endured if you are not able to take a seat for an hour drive.

But how can you prepare them for such things? You can’t. But now we know, take lots of snacks, keep buying water as if there is an impending natural disaster, and try to explain to them that they are now on the edge. An airport like JFK or Schiphol in Amsterdam is not a place for a leisurely outing as the world is merging into one frenetic horde at each gate. Languages, cultures, and creeds are blurring at an amazing speed and pace. Children are not made for this pace. Yet, I wonder, are we?

“Sunday, June 8th Kathy wrote

I think I have found my people (though I never knew they were missing). Sitting on the plane on the way to Amsterdam I looked around and it seemed as if everyone around me was fair skinned, blond haired, and blue eyed. I felt so at home!
Amsterdam…what an interesting city. We took a 2 story train to Amsterdam Central and emerged in the city center. What amazing sites! All of the old buildings were made out of bricks and there were canals everywhere. Somehow I missed the memo that Amsterdam was full of canals and hundreds of bicycles. It took quite a while for us to get used to looking for bikes when crossing the street. We were almost run over several times. They zipped around quickly and didn’t seem to stop (even for red lights). Speaking of red lights, we had a very interesting walk going to see Anne Frank’s house. We took a shortcut through a small side street where we encountered some “window dressing”. Somehow neither of the boys seemed to notice the scantily clad women sitting in the windows, but I sure got the feeling that not too many families choose that route on their sightseeing. I don’t know David’s excuse for not noticing (he notices everything), but I can guess Ethan’s was the fact that he threw up on someone’s front stoop 5 minutes later (Amsterdam’s Burger King chicken nuggets didn’t go down well). After borrowing a hose from a houseboat and letting Ethan sit a minute we made our way to the Frank house. It was really a great stop- the content and sobriety level were a little over David’s head, but Ethan really appreciated it. It was after this point that Fred had exhausted his navigational abilities and we wandered the rest of the afternoon in various circles. Regardless of not achieving our intended destinations, we went into some beautiful churches and walked many lovely tree lined canals and felt very, very happy with everything we saw.

On June 9th Fred wrote:

Being flexible is a big factor in short term missions. The mantra is: it’s not a mission if there’s not a problem.

At first blush this sounds like an excuse for poor planning, but it is the reality of too many plans converging into one. With so many factors, so many aspects one or more of them are bound to go south, hit a snag, or just prove impractical.

Take bags for instance. When we travel internationally for study or vacation my bag is filled with my stuff. On a mission, my bag is filled with medical supplies, a thousand toothbrushes, and fifty ties to be given as gifts to chiefs and headmen. All of sudden my luggage is not my stuff, but a cargo container.

With Africa this becomes even more complex in that I tell people to travel light and then I push the limit of the weight requirement and number of bags each person is allotted. I do this as they are allowed one personal bag- which has many items that are not personally theirs- and one group bag. Each one is filled to the weight limit and then a little more.

The group bag is usually a hard plastic bin that can be zip corded shut to insure it wont be easily rifled through or burst open in transit. This 50 lb bin is not a problem until you have eight of them or six of them or four of them depending upon the size of your group. The problem arises when you need to check into a hotel for an overnight. Do you take the containers with you- neither fun or easy after a red eye? Do you trust the fellow at the Nairobi airport who says, “I’ll watch them?” Do you leave someone at the airport to sleep with the luggage? I have never seen a volunteer for this one.

Another problem with these bins are the airlines. Thousands and thousands of airtravel can unravel if you fly British Airlines, stay overnight in Nairobi, and then try to finish your travel on Kenya Airways. The problem lies in that BA doesn’t have a working relationship with KA like KLM or AirFrance. And you need a working relationship to get your bags which were packed according to international travel onto a domestic flight and not pay hundreds of dollars in freight charges.

Yet, on this last trip, the baggage problem needing flexibility was all my own. I forgot one at the house. It was a plastic bin filled with gifts, a thirty pound power source for our missionary family host, and little things like our emergency medical kit.

At the Syracuse airport we realized the oversight when we told the folks at Jet Blue we had “eight” bags when in fact we had seven. A quick call was made to Watertown. There was an hour before the jet would be “sealed” and the TSA wouldn’t accept any more bags. A “volunteer” set off at a furious pace.

It got even more complicated that Jet Blue didn’t have another flight going to JFK until Monday morning when we would be in Nairobi. The airlines are fussy about your bags flying with you (they are not as fussy about you not flying with you with your bags).

Long story short our plastic bin arrived at Syracuse five minutes after the plane was “sealed.” I begged, pleaded, played the missionary card but to no avail. Even though I saw the baggage guys stand around our plane with the cargo doors open for the next twenty minutes, those were the rules.

It may sound strange, but I struggled to be flexible to accept the rules. I wanted the rules to be flexible like a mission trip is supposed to be. Now I know one traveler’s needs shouldn’t trump a plane full of folks- but we took off ten minutes early from Syracuse and landed 35 minutes early in JFK- does there seem to be a bit of wiggle room there? Does to me.

“That is the rule, sir, there is nothing I can do,” was what the young man said to me over and over again. I wanted to say, “but we are going to Africa for three months where ‘the rules’ are not as inflexible.” I wanted to say, “hey, TIA (this is Africa) man.” He didn’t get the memo about being flexible.

Now, the bin will arrive three weeks hence. It will all be fine. The presents Kathy had picked out so carefully will be as duly received then as they would have been had they been presented walking in the door. We know that. Still I moped all the way to JFK.

As I did I heard myself say, “it’s not a mission, if there’s not a problem.”

On June 9th Kathy wrote,

On our second red eye in a row, David and I fell asleep before the plane took off from Amsterdam. At some point in the middle of the night I woke up and looked at Ethan across the aisle to check on him, he waved and continued on watching National Treasure (did I mention middle of the night??). Fred was some ten rows up torturing people with his snoring and sandalless feet. I went back to sleep and woke up in Nairobi. We stumbled off the plane onto a tram and went into the terminal to find out that they had rerouted us. Instead of going from Nairobi to Lilongwe, we went from Nairobi to Tanzania to Blantyre to Lilongwe. When we finally arrived in LLW our luggage was shockingly M.I.A. We did however find a lady from Nairobi who had wanted to go to Blantyre and they flew her to LLW (Is it possible they gave her one of our tickets??).
Tuesday, June 10th-I love Africa! It smells like Mexico with it’s dry heat and small brush burning fires. Even the flowers are similar to Southern California and Mexico- bouganvillea, verbena, poinsettia, vinca, oleander, and more. I don’t know how many pictures I took at the airport today while we were there checking on the missing luggage.
We ate Mediterranean pizza for lunch and hotdogs and Lay’s spring onion and sour cream potato chips for dinner with apple slices. Not a big stretch on the food front, but we are still in the capital.
Tuesday evening-Rumor has it that they have found our luggage in Nairobi and it will be on the 12:20pm flight tomorrow (Wed.).We have not seen our bags since Saturday. This might be a stretch for you to imagine, but on the last leg of our trip to LLW I was sitting between Fred and another man and there was an earthy smell about our row. I was hoping it was one of them but, alas, it was not. I am becoming Malawian. This may seem odd but this was actually one of my goals- to see what it looks like to become more natural (I’m not in any way ready to give up my razor and I wouldn’t mind a curling iron or blow dryer to curl my bangs under though). Baby steps. We’ve just started our 10 weeks.

On June 10th Fred wrote,

“Why did you sell me a ticket if there is no seat?”

This was the frantic question asked again and again by ten people as they formed a small mob around one of the Kenya Airlines desks in Nairobi. With each paltry response they groaned as one. And then when the woman behind the desk said the next available flight was in two days, well, they went a bit crazy.

Such a minor mob would be enough to cause a scene in any US airport, but there were four other stations at the transfer desk and each one had their own. I was part of a such a fracas at the other end. I was told there would be a seat for me on another airline going to another city than my destination. With the shouts and groans of the folks trying to fly to Mumbasa, my confidence level that we would find yet another drama in our new destination of Blantyre seemed high.

Another level of anxiety for me was our luggage. KLM refused to check past Nairobi as that would exceed the maximum number of hours they felt obliged to handle it. The woman at the desk at JFK assured me with a condescending glance that of course my luggage would be fine. There was an air of “we do this all the time.” Something in my gut told me you don’t really know the chaos you cause all the time.

Sure enough its two days since we’ve landed in Malawi and Kenya Air has now determined that our luggage should be somewhere at the Nairobi Airport. The official in Lilongwe described the next step as a “physical search.” A part of me wanted to say, well, good because metaphysical is out of the question where luggage is concerned.

The goodnews is that we made it to Lilongwe even if our luggage has not. A big part of me keeps praying that the bins with all the medical equip arrive. The pittance Kenya Airline will give us if the bags are lost can buy some new clothes- it will not cover the near $70,000 of medical supplies and equipment in the group bags. Being stylish in Malawi is not a major concern; an orthopedic surgical kit ready for an autoclave.

I have always had splendid luck on airlines and for all intents and purposes I still do. But I have the room to be flexible, the cash to cover unexpected expenses, and a hefty amount of arrogance that stranding me for too long will be in no ones best interest. This all came clear when I met my Malawian counter parts from Nairobi. We converged in the Kenya airlines office in Lilongwe. They were being told a bus would be provided to them; I was being told my luggage would be found, “no problem, sir.”

They repeated the question of the Mumbassa people to me, only with a lilt of disillusion rather than outrage. “I thought when I bought a ticket that meant I was given a seat.” They were ready to blame technology; they were sure it was the computer’s fault. I gave a bit more cynical view. “Maybe someone offered to pay more for your seat and the people at the airport said, “that will be fine.” That is exactly what I believe Air France did with my ticket. I base this belief by the incredulous look of the man at the transfer desk at JFK. I told him my flight had been cancled to Paris and his eyes suggested part pity and part disgust with such naivete.

With the current status of airlines and their all too public woes I am beginning to wonder if buying a ticket with any of them is more akin to buying a lottery ticket. It is as if I am buying a metaphysical ticket, the ideal of a ticket, that may materialize in some form, in some way, at some time. That is about a good a spin on this as I can muster.

On June 11 Kathy wrote: Two interesting things happened last night. The first occurred when I went to brush my teeth. I flipped on the light (which was an improvement from the night before when we had no electricity) and swore I saw something scurrying across the floor. I thought that maybe I had imagined it. Within a few seconds the biggest cockroach you’ve ever seen comes creeping out from under a towel David had left on the floor. There are two choices at this point- I chose to suppress the scream because in the end this will save me a lot of grief from not having to deal with two freaked out young boys. I decided I had one shot to smash it with a 5 liter water bottle, I, of course, missed making a loud smashing noise. I said, “Oops”, and no one ever asked what the big noise was. I thought this was odd until I remembered the night before that Fred had broken a louvered window slat trying to kill a mosquito in the bathroom and I hadn’t noticed that until I saw the broken glass the next morning. What sort of insect will we find tonight??
The second odd thing that happened was that while I was laying awake with insomnia (a very RARE thing for me), David started singing in French while asleep. Does anyone else find it strange that my 8 year old American son is singing a French song from a movie set in India while sleeping in Malawi, Africa?
Right now the boys are out playing soccer with the security gate guard’s children, Sarah, and Frederick, and most likely arguing over terminology. Ethan insists that while we are here he is going to refer to Soccer and the soccer ball as “Football”. This is very bothersome to Dave as we are not African. Besides this small glitch, they are getting along very well except for when David climbs the bunk bed ladder and stares at Ethan while he’s trying to read.

Abiding #1
The idea of a sabbatical was never appealing to me. I had envisioned a sabbatical as one of two things: holing myself away to write and then writing nothing as I would lose the rhythm of life, or, going into some sort of monastery like setting seeking some sort of solitude. Perhaps the former would have proven untrue; perhaps life has a way of following you no matter where you land. Perhaps I could have been successful in terms of writing, but monastic silence? Not a chance.

A good friend of mine did that as part of a sabbatical. I mentioned to him the likelihood that monks would have communicated to me my need to leave after a few too many failures to be silent. He said, “yeah, you wouldn’t have lasted.” So the image of a sabbatical loomed as either frustration or failure.

So why in the world would I take my wife, four of my five children, and a niece across continents and large bodies of water to experience frustration and failure with me?

It all began with a question of abiding. Abiding became an image, a question, a dream. At first the image was of staying put, of digging in. I have surpassed the length of time I have stayed in any church- we tend to be four and out. Yet, where I was ready for change, for a new challenge in the past, in Watertown I felt like I was just getting started. Abiding, then, became a question of can I stay put? If I learn to abide will I remain?

I began the sabbatical process over a year ago by exploring the way the word abiding occurs in the Bible. In both the Old and New Testaments “abiding” has a very practical meaning of lodging, resting for a time during a journey, or simply being in the midst of. Yet, surrounding these basic meanings is a theological dream. There are echoes in the Old Testament of a God as vision and glory that comes and remains upon the tent of meeting; there are stories of angels coming to “lodge” for a time. The new testament has these images as well, but it also has an author and two long sections that treat abiding in a way that is much more than all the rest.

John, whoever he may be, the one who wrote a gospel and three epistles, treated abiding as a whole new idea, a whole new way of being. For him it wasn’t staying put for a time, it was coming to be in God. This new way of being, though, as it was written by John, is ever cryptic and illusive. Jesus tells his disciples to “abide” in him without any example, without any explanation. Most importantly, he tells his disciples to abide in him hours before he is crucified. This was a great challenge to my earliest notions of abiding. How can abiding be a kind of digging in, staying put, enfolding oneself into a community if Jesus told his disciples to do this in a town that was not their own, in an hour of great turmoil, and just before he left them? What sort of abiding is that?

It was with great lament that my hope and dream of abiding was nothing what John had intended to convey. In fact he offered a picture that was contradictory, even repudiating the desire to stay put. For that reason I decided to explore abiding for what John intended, not what I sought to arrange in terms of my life in ministry.

From this point on “abiding” took on a life of its own. Abiding has become more a sense of being present; its finding peace in work and rest; its knowing I am in God and God is in me no matter where I find myself.

The conclusion to a sermon on abiding

2008-05-31T19:05:00.000-07:00

When I set out to take a sabbatical there were two reasons. The first was a lot of what Walker Percy wrote about: there was a moment where I fell through the ventilation shaft and landed in green house with a mentally ill woman who helped me get my strength back. Except it wasn’t a woman it was a elderly physician with a peculiar need to laugh out loud who took me to Africa and enjoyed watching my world get turned upside down. Having slept with Fred Stone for three weeks, beginning each day by seeing him and wondering if he was still breathing I think I might have preferred . . . well, let’s leave that one alone. But the effect was the same.
My world was shaken, the fantasies I nurtured where contradicted; the life I had crafted was being stripped by one village full of suffering people after another. Having returned to this again and again my ability to use the old definitions were slipping away, what Eliot called the old dispensations were no longer satisfying. Mostly though I was being grounded. When I shared that with Kathy it became transparent that if such change were to happen, we would need to see it together. The life I had crafted had a few aspects were she was shall we say a part. So the sabbatical is intended to be a moment where we try to make sense of the world where there are giants afoot.
Yet, the bigger theme, and bigger question is one of abiding. As I shared with you before I had come to believe that abiding meant staying put, digging in, remaining in a place for the long haul. The quiet intent was to use the sabbatical to explore a theme that would let me stay in a church more than five years- or to simply stay anywhere more than five years. My intent was to reflect upon the charge of Jesus to abide as a means of finding the secrets of staying put. Much to my chagrin all the exegesis I have done suggests that abiding has nothing to do with digging in or staying put, but everything to do with being faithful in the midst of change, being true, finding peace in a fluid world.
Don Klug spoke the truth to me the other day and I didn’t want to hear it. A good elder does this for pastors. They do other things as well, but what he said was: this is a different church from when you came. What I didn’t want to hear is that I had changed it. I am still a bit nervous about that. I want to say that the church changes and grows, is pruned or made other by the power of God, not me. But that is a lot of the fear of the promise land. What if the fears of the Israelites was not that it was going to be hard, but that they would be the ones to mess it up, make the promise land less than promising?
This is the great thing about living a life in your head, letting your ideals percolate and rumble about for decades. They are free and safe from reality, from, well, real life. Abiding it seems has a lot to say to this when we realize that Jesus is calling his disciples to abide in him the day before he is crucified, the day before he dies, he tells his disciples to live in him. Abiding is not so much a safe zone. Jesus says abide in me and then twenty four hours later he is being crucified; that’s a hard thing to abide.
Deep within the notion of abiding there seems to be a kind of grounding that is more than simply sticking around or staying put. I am growing to believe that what Kierkegaard called being transparently grounded in God is what it means to abide. But what do we do with a God who is so terribly earthy, so broken, so fragile? It’s great to abide in Jesus if he is some kind of transcendent ideal that doesn’t change and holds the key to all the promises of life. He makes all the promises as he is being crucified.
My hope is that 10 weeks in Africa with my family will shed some light on this. People in Malawi are quite often abiding in as much joy as they are suffering. I am still not sure how that can be.
Today marks the culmination of more than a year of preparation to see and ask these questions. I know I go with your blessings and your prayers. And for this I thank you.
Two weeks ago we took all our children and their special friends out to lunch. After the food had come and gone and the check arrived and was satisfied, our youngest, Dave, turned to me and slapped his legs and said, “so, are we good to go here?” I smiled and looked at him and said, “yes, we are good to go.” Amen.

ending to begin

2008-05-28T18:09:00.000-07:00

As the time draws closer to 13 weeks of sabbatical I am finding how difficult it is to end everything for a time.

Having left for no more than three weeks in the past 14 years of ministry, the idea of leaving for 13 is dramatic.

Projects have all been put on pause; I am no longer in the loop; my life is to be put on hold.

Yet the idea of sabbatical is just that. Stop what you are doing for a time. Wait. And then begin a new. Ending to begin.

Abiding is not doing nothing

2008-05-20T17:56:00.000-07:00

On June 7th my wife, Kathy, and I will take our two youngest children to Africa. A month later our youngest daughter and a niece will follow, and then two weeks later our eldest daughter. Altogether we will be in the city of Mzuzu for 10 weeks. The time will be spent walking, sitting, dancing, singing, and praying.

The intent of each will be to see what it means to abide; what does it mean to be with others in a place without looking beyond, without preparing for the next step.

My intent in seeking such a time of rest and exploration was to understand how to be in a place without looking beyond it. To abide. The more I have prepared, though, the more I have found that to abide doesn't mean to be still, or even to be in just one place. It seems to mean that wherever you are, be there.

I chose Africa, and Malawi and particular, because when I have been there I felt it was hard to think beyond it.

How much malerone can you take?

2008-05-19T07:45:00.000-07:00

Perhaps the most sobering moment when I prepare for Africa is buying the malaria drugs. They are tough on my system, but also a moment of pause when I remember that Africa is hard on your health.

Spending three weeks asking people about malaria in Malawi two years ago has made it a pit more than hypothetical; seeing a once healthy child one year and then permanently disable the next made it personal. Yet, malaria is just a part of life in sub-Saharan Africa.

I saw this when trying to suggest to a gathering of teachers that a vaccine could wipe out malaria in their lifetime. "Impossible" one teacher said and then gave me a scolding glance to suggest such thoughts are better left unsaid.

Having my children take anti-malaria drugs, sleep under a bed net and have maxi deet sprayed on their clothes is something that ever reminds me of the power and blessings of the west. A bed net, maybe, is what is available to a Malawian child.

2008-05-07T10:37:00.000-07:00

In May of 2007 after a congregational vote approving the possibility, I sent an application to the Lily Endowment for a sabbatical grant. The Lily Endowment provides up to $45000 to help pastors step away for a time of no less than three months, but no more than four. The question they ask of the pastors making application is simple: what will make your heart sing?

For the last three years I have been going to Malawi, Africa. The first trip was to inaugurate a school project; the second trip was a fact finding mission regarding malaria; and the third was to secure the visas for a youth choir who came to the US last summer. Although the trips were never more than three weeks the impact of the time in Malawi linger far longer.

When I applied to the Lily Foundation I tried to convey that this impact was so significant it was becoming a challenge to interpret it to my family. They watched me throw out most of my clothes, vow to never buy shoes again, and take to grunting when asked a question. I have worked through most of these odd moments with a some grace. (I am wearing a new pair of shoes and plan to recycle my old ones.) Yet I came to feel I couldn't keep going with these experiences unless they were shared.

Fortunately for me the Lily Foundation said: here is a lot of money to take your family to Africa. We don't all go at the same time, and one of our children has opted out, and a niece has jumped in, and it will mean different things to each one, but the hope is that it will be something I can share with them instead of describe to them.

What I ask

2008-05-06T08:21:00.000-07:00

Getting ready to leave for Africa means having coffee and tea in Panera while we try to figure out who will feed the dog for the three months, who will cut the grass, and who will open the mail?

People are wishing us well now in case they don't see us before we depart. These well wishers are making our departure more and more a reality.

I've tried to suggest to people that panic is a necessary part of leaving a life behind for three months; but somehow panic is not necessarily the only part.