You Are Not Alone

This past year has been full of growth in our personal and business lives. This pandemic has also created new challenges for many people here in the U.S. and around the world. We WERE very excited for Aaron to get to visit Malawi and our partners there before we announced some new projects we are working on. However in life there are always challenges and a whole country closing their borders was an unforeseen roadblock we have encountered. Aaron still plans to travel to Malawi as soon as he is able to. His donation bags are still packed with some wonderful items to give out and he has the money donated specifically for this trip still set aside.

One main goal of ours at Food+Water+Shelter is to be honest and forthcoming with all the things we are doing, spending money on and staying focused on helping Malawians help themselves. We don’t want to be American’s doing work in Malawi, we want to be American’s supporting Malawians to better their futures. To do this we are trying to get grants, loans and donations to Malawian’s who are doing good in their communities.

Young girls in a classroom from YANA.

We have recently begun working with a new partner who is doing some great work in Northern Malawi. Tusaiwe (she says we can call her Tusa) has created multiple organizations under to help the children, women and the elderly in her community. At just 22 years old she is doing big things including a foster home, a school/feeding program, a young mothers program, an empowerment program for boys and girls, a hospitality program, and an eldercare program. All of these programs take time, money and resources to make work. As a young mother herself she is working tirelessly to keep everything running smoothly. We have started supporting Tusa through a small monthly donation to her school/feeding program as well as asking for donations to provide period supplies to the 50 young her girls in her program. YANA (or You Are Not Alone) is the name of her program where she supports babies, young children, teens and the elderly with food, supplies and companionship. We are excited to see where this new partnership takes us and hope to get to meet her in person some day soon.

We are still hoping to raise another $200 for the 50 young ladies who need a Period Care Kit that will include a bucket, reusable pads, underwear, soap, lotion and other small personal care items. Each bucket costs about $12 US dollars to put together. All items will be purchased from craft women and stores in Malawi to support their local economy.

Re-usable Sanitary pad created by a local company.

Please let me know if you have any questions about this project or anything else we have going in Malawi. We pray that Aaron gets to travel soon and complete the things planned from the cancelled June trip.