Thurs, Jan 22, 2009

So I have not been very good about blogging lately. Sorry.
There are 55 kids at the orphanage presently. I have been working for the last couple of week to register them. I prepared a registration form that we are using for all the kids at the orphanage. We are gathering information on each child such as their name and any other names the go by, their date of birth (40 of the 55 children do not know their birth date, several of them do not even know the year they were born so they guess at how old they really are), health information, current class in school and their guardian’s name, relationship, phone (if available). We are also gathering information on their parents – whether alive or deceased and any health information they have on their parents or their families. We are taking pictures of each child and pictures of them with their sibling, if they are at the orphanage also. Of the 55 kids, we have 11 sibling pairs. I took all of this information and put it, along with the picture of each child and their sibling’s picture into a spreadsheet. (Imagine that!) That took quite a bit of time as I could only register a few kids per day because it took time and they were not all around at the same time. But, we only have one more sibling pair picture to take then we are finished registering all the kids. Yeah!!

I have learned that the definition of “orphan” in Malawi is not the same as the definition we think of. When I think of an orphan, I think of a child with no mother and no father or a child whose parents have relinquished rights to them. That does not appear to be the case here. Most of the children have a living parent but that parent is not able to take care of them. Of the 55 children, we have 10 orphans by our definition. We believe an orphans here is a child in need, whether or not they have a parent – a child whose guardian is not able to care for them.
On a different note, it is avocado season right now so I’ve been purchasing avocados. I made a great salad the other evening with tomatoes, cucumbers and avocados. The price of them is unbelievable. I purchased two avocados at the market yesterday for a total of K100 (71 cents). These avocados are huge and for those of you who know me, you know what I made - guacamole dip. So, I had guac dip for breakfast this morning. It was wonderful.

Have a great day. We are off to see the kids.