Farewell to Malawi...For Now

We’ll be leaving Malawi in two weeks so it seems like a good time to share our parting thoughts on our 6-month stay here. It’s going to be very difficult to sum up our activities and feelings. It seems like each day has brought out a different emotion in us and I’m not sure we even know how to make sense of it all, let alone capture it in our blog. But that’s not to say we won’t try.

We came to Malawi with high hopes for growing Goods for Good and are happy to report that we’ve accomplished so much. Goods for Good is now operating on the ground in Malawi as a registered NGO with the stamp of approval from the Ministry of Women & Child Development and we’re in the process of hiring our first Malawian employee. More importantly, in addition to our ongoing support at St. Mary’s, we now have partnerships in place that, over the next couple of years, will expand the number of orphans and vulnerable children we reach in Malawi to over 30,000.

What we believe is special about these new partnerships is that although each will reach the orphans and vulnerable children in a different way, they all match our goods with trained caregivers and teachers to improve the children’s lives.

Through our partnership with Consol Homes we’ll be working with a Malawian organization that practically invented the idea of formalizing the training of caregivers.

By working with Consol Homes we’ll be able to put our clothing, blankets and educational materials directly into the hands of people who are trained to maximize their uses. Consol Homes has programs for nursery school and primary school children as well as extensive psycho-social support programs. Our stay here has really emphasized the need to couple emotional support with material support as the majority of children we are working with are traumatized and severely affected by tragedy in their home lives. We believe our partnership with Consol Homes will enhance the sustainability and effectiveness of their work with thousands of orphans and vulnerable children. (To learn more about them log on to their website www.consolhomes.org they are pretty great.)



Our second exciting partnership is with Africare and in January we will be distributing school materials to extremely under resourced school children. Africare is working with some of the most disadvantaged schools in Malawi to provide basic sanitation services where there is currently none. All of the schools Africare is working with were in danger of being shut down by the Ministry of Health because of the absence of any sanitation facilities. Goods for Good will support Africare’s infrastructure initiative by providing school materials to improve the learning environment. The first provision will be 2 pens per term to each student at theses schools. We’ll then follow up this distribution with what we’re calling a “Supplies Closet”. We piloted the Supplies Closet filled with markers, crayons, poster board and other assorted materials at St. Mathias during our stay and saw first hand what a difference it makes both in quality of lessons and teacher morale. Many teachers have over 100 students and absolutely no materials, they often have to ask students to bring in trash from home to use as paper for class lessons. This combination of no materials and hundred of students drastically affects the learning environment and morale of the teachers. We’re excited to have the chance to improve the learning environment and lessons for dozens of teachers and thousands of students.

Finally, we have our pilot program at Tiyambe Nawo Community Based Organization (CBO), where we are working directly in the community, partnering with them to meet a variety of their needs.


We’ll be providing goods to the orphans and vulnerable children, continuing to train the caregivers and committee and will be overseeing the construction of a new center for the hundreds of orphans under their care. Our work with Tiyambe Nawo is very personal. We meet with the community regularly to hear about what they are doing, learn about their needs and discuss how together we can best address those needs. These discussions not only help us improve our work with Tiyambe Nawo, but also build our own knowledge base on how to improve our services with all of our partners. On a more personal note we also get so much inspiration from this community, despite the poverty and incredibly difficult circumstances many of them live in, they are so enthusiastic and dedicated to the children.

Our experience in Malawi has certainly been unforgettable. We’ve had moments of elation and times of tremendous despair. The things that are most memorable to us are the children and the dedication of those committed to improving the lives of the children.


Whether you’re in school, the village or just passing by on the road, you will always see a smiling, waving child. When you’ve spent as much hands-on time with the children as we have you can’t help but look into the future and wonder where these children will be down the road. Once you start thinking about their future, and seeing how difficult the road ahead is, you can’t turn away from doing everything you can to make that road easier.

It is amazing to have the opportunity to work with Malawians who have dedicated themselves so completely to these children. Mr. Banda and Mr. Mkhota at St. Mathias, Mr. and Mrs. Chapomba from Consol Homes, the Committee at Tiyambe Nawo, the Sisters at St. Mary’s and the dozens of other volunteers, chiefs, community leaders and teachers we have met along the way are all an inspiration to us. Their commitment to the children is something you can only believe if you see it first-hand. Each one of these people make our work possible because with their dedication and our assistance we can improve the future of thousands of Malawian children.


Thank you for keeping up with our experience and make sure to check www.goodsforgoodinternational.org to see how our work in Malawi and Liberia continues to grow. Zikomo Kwambiri!!