Welcome

Today (Wednesday) we got a small start on our clinic operations. We began the morning with a training for all those who are going to be involved in our clinic. This year we traveled with a much smaller team than normal. Not everyone is ready to travel to Africa yet with the pandemic status. This put us in a position of needing to round out our team with Gap students at COTN. A Gap student is in their year between secondary school and college. They are preparing for college. We also have a few who are in college, but on break. So, we conducted a training to get them up to speed on how to run some of our stations in the clinic such as check in, vitals, growth chart plotting, vision screening, and check out/filing. All of the providers met with the Malawi nurse (Sunga) to go over what they will be doing and how best to support her in her efforts to care for the children. It was good to take the time to make sure we are all on the same page and functioning as a team.

In the afternoon we had the opportunity to go to the COTN center in Mtzilisa and enjoy a welcome program from the children, meet the widows in the widows program, and help serve food to the children in the afternoon feeding program. This gives us a good inside look into how COTN functions and the difference they are making in the villages they work in. It was a lot of fun to play with the kids and watch them dance and play.

The widows program is a place where widows with children can come and learn skills to support themselves. They learn to sew and do handicrafts and bake. They are able to make and sell their goods in order to earn money to take care of their children. We were able to purchase some of what they make. I (Lasaundra) was also honored to be asked to share a short encouragement from God’s Word with the women.

We are excited to get to work in our first clinic tomorrow in the village of Chilombo.