Blantyre ➡️ Lilongwe

 It's been a busy week and I haven't had much time alone to reflect and add photos. We drove from Blantyre to Lilongwe for meetings with government officials, home visits with our scholars, and a stop at the Ludzi school. It's a rough road, with miles of unpaved "off-roading" conditions. You can fly (it's like a trip from SLO to LAX) but with three of us, it made more sense to drive.

On our first night in Lilongwe, we attended a reception being put on by one of our foundation partners. It was at the fancy hotel. (The one where Michelle Obama, Melinda French Gates, and Amal Clooney stayed when they were here in November). Mostly it was a networking opportunity, but they had a few performers there who shared several traditional Malawian dances.

After this, the rest of the week was definitely "of the people." If I thought that the road from Blantyre to Lilongwe was off-roading, then I don't know what to call some of the roads we took to reach the remote offices, homes, and schools that we visited. It was like being on Mars or something-- not paved, shaped by flooding waters, and now dry, the bumps and crevasses we crossed were headache-inducing. I thought more than once that I needed to be careful that my tongue not rest between my teeth fearing that one good bump would cause me to bite it off! 

Government buildings for school officials are dilapidated but the people inside are dressed to the nines. It's quite a contrast to be walking through a dark concrete hallway with doors hanging off their hinges, paint peeling, and chairs without cushions surrounded by the sound of women's stiletto heels clip-clopping along the floor, men in suits buttoned up and everyone exuding an air of professionalism.

We are meeting with these folks as part of our process to add new schools and students to AGE Africa's scholarship program. There are wheels to grease in Malawi, and we do it with relationship building. Some orgs have a reputation for paying bribes for access, but that's not the game we play. It takes time, but the authentic trust we have built in the regions we operate is part of the reason AGE Africa has been successful for the last 20 years.

We also visited one of our university scholarship recipients, Luckia. One more year, and she'll graduate from university. When I asked her where she imagined herself in 10 years, she said: "I'll be supporting my family and my grandparents." They are the ones who took her in after her mother abandoned the family and her father died. They sacrificed money for healthcare to pay her school fees and make sure she finished secondary school. University was financially an impossibility for her, but w/ an AGE Africa scholarship, her fees are paid, she has the supplies she needs, she has room and board covered and she can focus on her studies so that she will become the first girl in her village to graduate from college. As we left their home, they came running out to the car with their arms filled with corn on the cob. A gift to us for what AGE Africa has given their granddaughter.

Grandpa on the left, me, Luckia, Concepcion (AGE Africa's ED), and Grandma. In front of their home.

This will be my last bit, I think this post is getting too long. Here's a picture of the girls from Ludzi school. They are all going places, I tell you! Every single one of them has an ambition that is infectious. I wish I could bottle it up and sell it-- I'd be a rich woman!