Fountain of Hope

The Republic of Malawi is a vibrant African country with an estimated population of more than 13,900,000. It’s a country of many cultures and many languages, with the official two, English and Chichewa. Lilongwe is its capital, near to Fountain of Hope’s village in Mitundu. It’s a beautiful, storied nation with both sad and hopeful messages for the world.

Culture
Soccer is the most common sport – when without proper balls, the children use knotted plastic bags to kick and score. Music – especially drumming – and dances are a strong part of Malawi’s colourful culture and are celebrated at initiation rites, rituals and marriages. The native tribes of Malawi have a rich tradition of basketry and mask carving. Wood carving and oil painting are also popular in more urban centres – tourists often return home with one or two to keep a piece of the country and their visit with them.

Geography and Weather
Malawi is a landlocked country in southeastern Africa, bordered by Zambia to the northwest, Tanzania to the northeast and Mozambique to the south, southwest and southeast. The Great Rift Valley runs through the country from north to south, and to the east of the valley lies Lake Malawi.

Malawi’s climate is hot in the low-lying areas in the south of the country and temperate in the northern highlands. Between November and April the temperature is warm with equatorial rains and thunderstorms, with the storms reaching their peak in late March. After March, the rainfall rapidly diminishes and from May to September wet mists float from the highlands into the plateaus, with almost no rainfall during these months.

Poverty and Illness
Malawi is among the world’s least developed and most densely populated areas. Sadly, infant mortality rates are high, and life expectancy at birth is only 43.45 years. An estimated 900,000 adults (or 14.2% of the population) and 91,000 children are living with HIV/AIDS. There are approximately 84,000 deaths a year from the disease, and it’s estimated that 250 new people are infected each day. The major decrease in workforce takes a massive financial toll on families, communities and a country already struggling with poverty. The emotional toll is unimaginable.

Malawi is home to 560,000 orphans who have lost their parents to AIDS, and this number is expected to grow. Children who have lost their parents often become leaders of their households and must work or beg to support themselves and their siblings. They must find a way to manage the heavy grief that comes with losing a parent, and many are unable to continue their educations. Often both parents become infected and the children provide the primary care for the second parent to die.

As a result of extreme poverty, there is a very high degree of risk for major infectious diseases, including bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A, typhoid fever, malaria, plague and schistosomiasis. Malawi has been making progress on decreasing child mortality and reducing the incidences of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, but there is a distance for us all to go, much to give, and many hearts to heal.