From Matt Storer: Trip to India to research possible project to help children that have been forced to work and live in rock quarry as "slaves".

The following are my notes (not edited, just my quick typing of notes) for the first few days of my trip. I hope to send the second set of notes on the details of the project tomorrow.

Tuesday Jan 10 – Background and Goal of Trip to India
Left from Colorado Springs at 8 AM, headed for Chennai, India connecting through Chicago and Frankfurt. Why? Main objective to is visit a project dedicated to saving children from the doom of human trafficking. What does that mean? In general, Human Trafficking is the practice of forcing people to work as slaves and the possible trading/selling them as property to do as the owners wish. In our case, nearly 3,000 children are currently under the ownership of rock quarry owners in the state of Andre Prahdesh, India. My job is to research how they got into this situation, evaluate the local Christians on the ground dedicated to freeing the children and then make the following determination: Is this a legitimate partner and will VisionTrust commit to helping transform the children to live freely and live for God?


Wednesday Jan 11 – Almost to India
Ernie Taylor, CEO and Founder of VisionTrust accompanied me on this journey. We Arrived in Frankfurt on Jan 11 at 5:25 AM, then fly to Chennai (used to be called Madras) at 10:05 AM. 11 hours later, we landed at 11:30 PM. We cleared immigration and then wait another 45 minutes for our six bags to come out. Next task was to get through customs without any issues because Ernie and I had our carts stacked with bags and two carry-ons each. One of our bags had two big “C” chalk marks on it to raise the awareness of the customs guys. We had nearly 300 pounds of school supplies for our children – mostly donated through school supplies drives in the USA. I’ve been praying the whole journey that we can make it safely and with no problems. By the time we made it through the line and got to the official, somehow, miraculously a wet wipe had appeared and cleaning that bag. The man just flagged us on through. Praise the Lord we made it through. Our director, Merwin Joshua, was there to pick us up.


Thursday Jan 12 – Still traveling to Final Destination
Instead of driving another hour to our regular hotel called Breeze Hotel that we use while staying in Chennai, Merwin found one called Mars Hotel, just 15 minutes from the airport. I noticed that Merwin locked the doors of our vehicle as drove through the almost completely unlit neighborhood. By the time we checked and got situated in our rooms, it was almost 2 AM. Ernie and I shared a queen bed (better than a double!). The rate for our room that had warm water and A/C was $72. We needed to stay close to the airport because our wake-up alarms needed to be set for 4:30 AM in order to make the next “in-country” flight from Chennai to Vizag at 7:15 AM.

We flew on SpiceJet airlines for about 90 minutes and landed in Vizag around 9:30 AM. This coastal town, North of Chennai, is a port city with a lot of large shipping containers and industry. We grabbed breakfast at the airport, a #1 combo that had 3 chutneys, a dosa, idly and a Vada. $3. Finally, around 11:30 we grabbed a taxi and headed for the train station. Merwin secured us 3 seats in the A/C car for $4 each. We rode on the train for a little over 2 hours to a town called Kakinada. This is the home town of Praveen, the pastor that leads Christian work in the state and has accepted the responsibility of caring for 330 newly released children for their live of slave labor in several slate quarries. Praveen met us at the station and drove us to our hotel called Royal Park. I highly recommend this place as it is clean, good food and service and affordable. Our rooms were $70. I called it an “oasis” at this point in the trip. About 7 PM Praveen picked us up at the airport and drove us to his father’s house were a couple hundred children are staying with them. Upon arrival, we had a grand welcome by the children and connected with Roland Bergeron (President of Water of Life – he invited us to come and knows Praveen) and Jim Moorhead (Executive Pastor in Austin TX and son of my friend Fenton Moorhead, mission pastor at Brookwood in Greenville, SC). We ALL participated in serving food to each child. These children are from difficult backgrounds, some from quarries but most have been abandoned. We didn’t come to work with this set of children….at this point. We still had another 12 hour drive ahead of us the next day to meet them.

In bed by 10:30 PM after an AWESOME hot shower.


Friday Jan 13 – Twelve more hours by mini-bus to Final Destination
We left the hotel at 9 AM and headed for Kadapa area. We stopped about 2 PM for lunch in a town and ate shrimp curry, mutton roganjosh, nan, pollo fish, dal and rice. Good and HOT spicy. Eat with your right hand. We kept driving for another 6 hours. We arrived at 8 PM in a remote area where Praveen has been able to house about 300 of the children since Christmas. The place had five rooms, each 14’x21’. They gave us one of the rooms to sleep on the floor with woven mats, a towel, sheet and pillow. Very nice. However, this means that each child had about 3.9 square feet to use to sleep and have indoor activities. They graciously served us food around 9:30 PM and then we set up our spaces for bed. Ernie and I each brought a super lightweight cot that you put together. We were glad. That night, the temperature had dropped from mid-80’s to about mid 50’s. A sheet was not quite enough. The children had to be cold too. The Ambien didn’t work for some reason…bummer.


Saturday Jan 14 - Observation, Interviews and Quarry Visit
After being up most of the night, I just laid on my portable cot trying to catch a few more minutes of rest. We were all up and outside by 7 AM or earlier, ready to start our day. The 330 children were up closer to 6 AM as I could hear them in the room next to ours, laughing and talking – it was a pleasant way to wake up. This location, called Johnson Campus, was nearly 60 km from the closest town large enough to have a public high school and closest village is named Buttapalli Village. The property has a borehole (drilled well with casing and a pump), but did not have any toilets. Keep in mind that 330 children plus about 20 pastors and widows equals a lot of human waste. This is a huge problem.

Breakfast was cooked on open fire in large caldrons by several widows volunteering from a nearby village. They were cooking millet and sambar (like a broth with a few chopped veggies).We started serving the children the food around 8:30 AM. After breakfast, we prepared to have about 50 of the older girls meet with us and ask three of them to share their story. Ernie did a great job of having fun first and telling the girls about himself and me, all to get them more comfortable with us. We knew that asking them questions about what had happened to them would be very emotional and difficult. Sunitha Johnson helped us get organized and translated English to Telugu. She currently runs an orphanage for about 60 children, but has recently agreed to help Praveen take care of the 330 children with hopes of doing it full-time.

The first girl we talked with was named Aruna(meaning-sunrise). This 17 year old girl has 3 sisters and 1 brother. Her parents have died. When she was 7 years old, her parents had borrowed money from lenders to help pay for things. The lenders were from a rock quarry, targeting families like Aruna’s, hoping that they can’t repay the 5,000 to 10,000 rupees (typical amounts borrowed equivalent to $98 to $196). The interest is nearly double the amount borrowed and the repayment schedule is three months. If the family can’t repay, then one of the most frequent options is to take one or more of the children and force them to live and work until the debt has been repaid. For Aruna, the debt never seemed to be repaid and she lived in a slate quarry for 10 years. The quarry managers forced her to work from early in the morning until sundown – giving her one bottle per day and one meal per day. She witnessed children and other people working in the quarry suffer horrible deaths by accidents. The children were motivated to work by beatings and of course, other forms of abuse were regular. Ernie asked her what she enjoys now that she is saved from the quarry. She said learning new things, playing, singing and being free. Her favorite food is dal rice.

Imagine the tears from everyone listening….

The next girl was named Dhrakshavalli. She is 14 years old and has 5 sisters. Unlike Aruna, her parents are still alive, but they work in one of the quarries and do not want to raise her. Caught in the cycle of working in the quarries for nearly no wages, she was eventually forced to work to cover her parents debt, just like Aruna’s story. Dhrakshavalli wants to become a teacher. One of the challenges for her, and most of the children, is that they haven’t been to school yet…ever….

The final girl was named Priscilla. This 18 year old has 4 brothers and 1 sister – she being the oldest. She worked in a quarry for 7 years. Again, debts incurred by her parents were collected by taking her. She suffered from one particular manager abusing her at the quarry. Her family lived about 15 km away. So close, but no one would come to rescue her until now. Her village name is Madlikadachudrapadu (yes, try saying that three times fast).

As you might imagine, there stories were super emotional and exhausting for everyone.

After a short break, we spent the next 2 hours talking with Praveen, working out some communication challenges and expectations that we’ve experience over the last couple months and the last few days. The main issue is trust – Praveen is not sure who VisionTrust really is and thinks of his past experience for fraudulent non-profits WHILE our team is trying to verify that facts and determine if Praveen can trusted. This is why we get paid the “big-bucks” right? As the evening moved on, we drove about 40 minutes out to two of the rock quarries where most of the children had been slaves. Now, all of the children at these two locations have been released to Praveen (only paid workers are now there as a result). It really was chilling to see the area, touch the rock and see the crude shelters where the children lived. Then we returned to Johnson Campus and spent the rest of the time playing games with the children and eating dinner. In bed a bit earlier, but another long night loomed.


Sunday Jan 15 – Remote Village Visit
Up again super early, closer to 5:30 for most of us. Walked about 10 minutes to a private spot to use the restroom. Washed up with hot water heated by the widows and brushed my teeth using bottled water. No shower now for a couple days…nor a real toilet ;-) For the next couple hours, we interacted with the children and each other – always learning more about the situation and exploring ideas on how best to care for the children now and long-term. We never ran out of anything to discuss.

We left for a village visit around 9:30 AM. The village, called Banavdei (meaning “Arrow Village”) was about 2 hour drive and is the target of money lenders operated by quarry owners. We needed permission to walk this area and permission to enter the village. One of the reason is that the quarry owners control who comes and goes. They have already made nearly 20 loans that are due by the end of February in this village alone. That means that 20 more children may be taken if they are not repaid. After driving down a dirt road, we parked and then walked another 30 minutes or more. All along the road side were signs of viper snake pits and many animal prints in the dirt. As we entered the village, I saw two bore holes (water wells) and thatch huts. This location appears very similar to the villages I’ve visited in many of the African nations. We were welcomed by a small group of children and adults sitting in the “courtyard” area of a family group of huts fenced in to protect against tigers, bears, wild water buffalo and other animals. As we were sitting down to be formally greeted, I saw several children just stop, pee and go, regardless of location. Most of the children under the age of 8 or so were not wearing pants. The adults seemed to be fairly clean but the children were wild and filthy.

The children and adults sang two songs, then we prayed with the people and Ernie, Merwin and Roland spoke a few words, sharing about Jesus. We had a couple people share their stories. Of note, one man named Caleb said he has been the pastor for the last several years and that he is one of two people that have gone to school from this village. He finished 7th grade. The closest primary school, if I understood this correctly, is about 45 minutes by vehicle. At this point we were invited to eat the lunch that we paid for (meaning we provided funds to feed the group)…serving everyone at the meeting rice and Indian gravy – super spicy. No forks…or napkins…right hand….

People don’t have and therefore do not use pit toilets (latrines). Their homes are made from thatch walls made from bamboo strips, thatch roofs and dirt floors. I spoke to a family named Nagana and learned that in their compound area they have 20 people living in 3 huts (one hut sleeps 12). They build their own houses. These 20 people represent a set of grandparents and 3 families. Each family has about 2 or more goats, however all of the goats are in a group and stay in the compound along with some “free range” chickens. This family said that the main medical problems they face are TB, malaria and Chikungunya (an insect borne disease). Regular meal is based on what the children/young adults find in the forest including rabbit, seeds, berries, leaves and they make millet (a grain).

I prayed over the family before leaving and then they asked me to pray for a baby that was ill and they asked Jim to pray over a baby named Grace whose father just recently died. We left around 4:00 PM and arrived back at Johnson Campus at 6:30 PM.

Why did I visit this place? I wanted to see where the children enslaved come from and learn a little more about their life before the quarry and why their parents take the loans. Why do they take the loans? Mostly as an advance to simply survive in hopes they can repay by selling an animal or something.

Merwin, Ernie and I packed up our things and then we all met for another hour to flush out our next steps being: pray and see what the Lord leads us to do and then contact each other on Monday night. So we said goodbye to the children and adults around 8:30 PM and drove back to Chennai. Arrived at 3:30 AM. LONG drive! Praise God we made it safely as the roads are narrow and have flush with bus traffic, animals and pedestrians. Our driver stayed awake!


Monday Jan 16 – Prayer, Debrief and Decisions
Ernie and I checked into the Breeze Hotel at 3:30 AM and I was delirious at this point - ready for a hot shower and a real bed. I think I stayed in the shower for 20 mins. I crawled into bed a little after 4 AM and slept until 10 AM. My first, real, solid night sleep since leaving home 6 days ago.

After another long hot shower (at this point, you can’t have too many), I started working on documenting my trip up to this point. Throughout the meetings, interviews and observations, I’ve been taking notes and trying to draw conclusions as best as possible. A little after 12 noon, I met with Ernie for a meal at the hotel and then got right back to work on documenting and planning.

By the end of the evening, Praveen and Merwin talked on the phone and we agreed to move forward to work together. We will work on a simple short-term and long-term strategy to make sure that the children’s immediate needs are met and that we have a sustainable and proper solution for them going forward. Now we just need to hammer out the details…now the hard part begins!


Tuesday Jan 17 - Back in Chennai
Today I continued to work on the framework of the new partnership, describing ideas and expectations and drafting a new Ministry Agreement that formalizes expectations of financial accountability, beliefs and management expectations. It is 11:36 PM here. Hopefully these documents will be ready to email to Praveen and friends by Wednesday.

Wednesday Jan 18 - Spend day with Staff and Bishops of ECI
Business meetings with our longtime partner are planned on this day here in India called Evangelical Church of India. VisionTrust has an office, director and staff managing 1600 children in 26 project locations at the moment. Ernie, Merwin and I took the staff out to a great India lunch to say thank you for all of their hard work.

Thursday Jan 19 – Heading Home
Left from The Breeze Hotel at 7:30 PM for the dinner near the airport in Chennai. At 11:30 PM we checked in for our 1:45 AM to Frankfurt on Luftansa, headed for home!

Lise - A Special Girl from Malawi

Taken and edited from Matt Storer's 2011 Malawi trip notes (Nov 29 to Dec 7)

A knock on my door at 7 woke me up. I took the opportunity to shower because the water was available and ate a great breakfast of fried eggs with onions. By 8:15 am Tila and I were I in the Toyota with our driver, Amon who is a Muslim. We drove to the Ngoni tribal area to about 52 km to a community of 21 villages called Katsekera. (Tila is a Malawian who VisionTrust is considering hiring as a program lead for a future project in Malawi. He and I are researching Katsekera as a possible location.)

The drive took two hours on a dirt road through the low mountains where agriculture is the occupation. Corn and Irish potatoes are the main crops. The language spoken by the Ngoni people is called Chichewa – it is also the national language in addition to English. The Ngoni have a history of being heavy beer drinkers and having multiple wives. I found out that one their favorite non-alcoholic drinks is called Tobwa, you guessed it, made from corn. I tried it and don't necessarily recommend it - let's say it is an acquired taste.

My main goal on this trip is to find out the truth about the real needs and challenges faced by children living in one of the poorest and hardest hit with AIDS areas in the world.

One of the places we visited was home to two girls, Eva who is 15 years old and Lise who is 12 years old. Eva dropped out of school in standard 3. Lise is still in standard 6. Eva works in the fields to survive. They eat 2 times per day a meager meal of corn flour or potatoes. I asked Lise what subject in school is the most difficult. She said Math. I agreed ;-0 Then I asked her what subject was her favorite and she said English. Next I asked what she would like to do when she finishes school. She said, “A nurse so I can help people who are sick.” Lise does a lot of the cooking which is a big task as that means she makes the fire and gets the water. Like David, these two children have inherited a garden (land). Most the land is just passed down from generations. I asked who lives next door to them and found out that Eva’s older sister does. She is 23 and has a baby. Her husband left. She dropped out of school at standard 6 when she was a little girl. In addition to this sister, I found out that two aunts also live next door (by the way, Eva and Lise’s home doesn’t have a literal door). One aunt just died (has no husband) and the other aunt has AIDS.

It is a bit painful for me to press on with questions and dig for answers and how things work, especially when so much tragedy is involved. However, isn’t is interesting to discover that there is always more information to learn before drawing conclusions. For example, had I not asked Eva and Lise about other family members (aka who lives next to you), I would not have discovered that she has an older sister living next door, or that the aunt with AIDS and the older sister both have gardens too. And…they don’t work together on the gardens, they each work their own. Wow! When I discovered that they don’t work together, I was shocked. Why not? They need each other so much but in their culture, the norm is to do it separately. We will evaluate this behavior later and challenge them to work as a team to support those who are weaker.

A little about Village Housing:
The homes are small rectangular huts made from homemade clay bricks with either thatch or tin roofs. Most huts in the poor communities have dirt floors. The older style of huts are round. Most of the round huts are for the kitchen or storage or used by the super poor. As an example, Eva and Lise use a round hut that is about 6 feet in diameter – the length of your bed.

P.S. GREAT NEWS!
We will be starting a VisionTrust project in this community this January! More information on the proposed solution can be found in the Malawi Trip Notes 2011 (Dec 1-4). We will need start up funds for a motorcyle, office setup, a solar panel solution for electricity, and funding to support at least 40 children for the first 6 months. Total amount needed is $31,000. If you would like to support this project, go to www.visiontrust.org and click on donate. Then complete the description field with "Malawi Startup". Thanks!

Malawi Trip Notes 2011 (Dec 5-7)

Monday, December 5, 2011

Do you want to know the key to sleeping in an a place that is completely different than what you are used to and in a different time zone? Work super hard all day, pray, read the Word before going to bed and take a sleeping pill. Yep, that is my secret. Seriously speaking, this strategy has really helped me be ready for each new day of making friends and discovering the beauty and uniqueness of the Malawian people living in the villages.

Tila and I were out of the door by 8 am – on our way back to the village area that we were on Saturday. Amon our driver did a great job driving through the fog on the dirt road congested not with vehicles, but women, children, men cows, goats and dogs. The 2 hour drive was different today than on the weekend. People were out working the fields, working hard plowing by hand, planting seed, fertilizing, etc. (I am not a farming so forgive me on the details here). About 30 minutes into the drive, I was in a haze as the road seemed to feel harder on my spine today and the fog made it hard to see out. But then, out of nowhere, to my right a boy about 13 appeared on the edge of the field. He was looking at me, holding his hoe across the back of his neck with the other arm hanging over it. His red scarf was blowing and his eyes seemed to penetrate mine. I was frozen for some reason…then quickly I scrambled to get my camera but the vehicle was moving and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know whether to stop and go back or miss capturing this amazing and beautiful image. By now we had really gotten further down the road and so I gave up the idea of stopping. Why am I noting this? Because, even as I write this, I can see him clearly, the image still moves me.

Eventually we made it to Katsekera. Tila and I were greeted by the chairman of the CBO (Community Based Organization of the surrounding villages) and a few other people. Our goal today was to personally visit the Under 5 Feeding program that had been started by the CBO, then visit the Secondary School (high school) and finally, visit one of the three Primary Schools.

Under 5 Feeding Program
The Under 5 Feeding program is supposed to feed children at-risk of malnourishment 5 days a week and provide some development activity. I wasn’t sure what to expect. As we pulled up to a boarded up square hut, there were about 40 or so children squeezed on the “porch” or, more like stoop, half of them crying and most of them with runny noses. Two women stood next to them and one of them had register (a book that lists the children by name, age, etc and tracks their attendance). Tila and I greeted everyone. I asked to see the book. I quickly noticed that the register was falling apart, as if it had been used so much that it was disintegrating. However, upon closer inspection, Tila and I could see that only 2 weeks of activity have been were recorded (The CBO, with the help of some outside donations for the food, restarted the program in October). At a glance, the attendance checkmarks looked to be about 65%. I asked if the children go inside or stay out on the “porch”. They said, “No.” Then I asked what if it rains, what do you do? They said, “We don’t meet.” Tila and I looked at each other as if were knew what each other was thinking, “really?”. I asked to see the kitchen. The women took us around back to a round “kitchen” hut. I asked what were the specific ingredients in the big iron cooking pot on the ground over a fire. They told me it was corn meal (nsima) mixed with soya beans. For you and me, think grits with a porridge consistency. I asked what other ingredients was in there and what else to they eat. Nothing…and nothing. They were should have had green beans somewhere according to Tila – but we didn’t see them and they didn’t mention them. All in all, this is why Tila and I are planning to shut it down. Then we can open a new concept called a Learning Center at the nearby Primary School for these at-risk children, many who are orphaned. This new program would be run by VisionTrust and be the beginning of a long-term holistic development program that will not only do nutritional support correctly and consistently, but provide early childhood development and spiritual mentoring – all the way through Secondary School (high school).

Secondary School Interview/Visit
From the feeding center, we walked to the Secondary School. I asked Tila if we could “walk” the village so I can get a better feel for the village and get some badly needed exercise. (flights+meetings+driving for hours = very sore body). The school was about a 10 minute walk, just down the hill. We had a gracious welcome and we found ourselves in the headmaster’s office. I am not if I’ve mentioned this yet, but there is no electricity in this community unless provided by some localized source like solar, wind or generator. So, the office and school does not have electricity for lighting or information management on a computer. This little office was crammed with paper records and charts stuck to the walls listing facts about enrollment, who is responsible for what, lessons about seed germination, etc.

Tila and I spent the next 60 minutes quizzing the headmaster, named Mr. Pierce, about everything. He is in his first year at the school and lives with is family in the only teacher housing available. In villages, and some other areas, it is a common perk for teachers to have housing next to the school provided, much like the old days in the US. The pay is not great, so free housing makes up for a lot of lost opportunity. But the biggest reason for housing is that the teacher housing is usually the best in the area compared to the usual hut style buildings with dirt floors and thatch roofs. In other words, the way to attract a decent teacher (or for that matter any teacher), the community needs to provide housing. Most people are trying to get to the bigger cities where there is some infrastructure like electricity, running water and public transportation.

Back to Mr. Pierce. He said they have 150 students and 8 teachers plus one volunteer (18 students to 1 teacher)
Form 1 (9th grade) = 55 (30 boys / 25 girls)
Form 2 (10th grade) = 46 (25 boys / 21 girls)
Form 3 (11th grade) = 27 (15 boys / 12 girls…not sure on this number)
Form 4 (12th grade) = 22 (11 boys / 11 girls) IN 2010, only 8 of 20 students passed national exam for graduation. 1 who failed chose to repeat. The others quit.

Notice the dropout rate from Form 2 to Form 3, almost 50%. One huge reason is that the students must pass the national Junior Certificate exam to continue on in to Form 3.

School starts at 7:30 am breaks at 9:30 for 30 min, then breaks at Noon for 30 min, then finishes at 3:30 pm. The children bring water to school in pails/buckets if they want a drink and bring a snach/lunch. I didn’t get to find out the details, bummer. There will be a water source near the school. I walked down a few minutes to it. It is a “shallow well”, meaning, it is hand dug like a pit latrine, brick up with a cement top and pump (in these case). It is dug out, but nothing else has been done. The school has the cement and bricks to brick up the inside. Then they will wait for Concern Universal to install a hand pump and safe cover (these guys are an NGO contracted with grant money to repair boreholes – deep well with casing and a pump – as well as providing some new shallow wells.). The bummer is each school should have a borehole is possible due to the hygiene and high volume demands. As I inspected the well, I asked does it dry up during the dry months? They said, “Yes” and smiled. While the shallow wells are super cheap to do, they don’t make sense in this case for the reasons that I’ve stated.

Sports, Extra Curricular:
Boys like to play soccer and the girls “net-ball”. For the arts, they only have a variety type show. No music, no choir, no art, no, no, no.

I asked Mr. Pierce what his biggest challenge was. He said, “Having qualified teachers and keeping them.” He is the only one on staff that has a diploma in Education. The other 7 teachers completed Form 4. Three of them are trying to go to school for Education during the breaks between terms. Teachers at this school earn about $80/month compared to bigger city teachers at $150/month (qualified teachers in the city). In addition, he told me that they don’t have the teaching staff or materials for science (no books, lab or lab materials). Then I asked him why does he want to stay at this school so far from anywhere. He said is that he is called to improve education in the villages like this one. Tila asked Mr. Pierce what he likes the most. He said, “The school has a great relationship with the community.” He also told us that his students perform very good in Math and English.

School Funding Sources:
The school is funded from student tuition + Textbook Revolving Fund ($2.50 is once per year to assist with buying text books.). The standard tuition is $10 per term, they attend 3 terms per year. The $10 goes to the following expense:
1) $2.50 goes to Malawi Ministry of Education
2) $2.50 goes to General Purpose Fund (Parent Teacher Organization decides how and where to spend this)
3) $2.50 goes to pay the teacher salary
4) $2.50 goes to Development Fund (No idea where this goes)

In addition, the students must pay for peripheral items like supplies, uniform, and national exam fees, of which there are two:
1) Junior Certificate to go from Form 2 to 3 at a cost of $4
2) Malawi School Certificate of Education (basic high school graduation) to go from Form 4 to 5 and then on to college at a cost of $8

So, on average, a student in Form 1 to Form 4 needs to have approximately $32.50 to $40 + uniforms and stationary + lunch.


Primary School Interview/Visit (this is the central one, closest to the health center)
Tila and I walked from the Secondary School back to the center of the area where one of the Primary Schools is located. This walk took about 20 minutes. I enjoyed this time of seeing things from a different perspective and it gave me a chance to take some pictures as well as interact with some of the children in the area. It also gave me a feel for how long a walk it is to the Secondary School from the other two, more distant, Primary Schools – I bet at least 60 minute walk away or more.

Upon arriving at the Primary School, Tila and I were quickly whisked over into the worst room of all of the rooms at the school complex. It was the school office. Very narrow, dark and the walls were cracking and the roof has many small holes. Like the Secondary School office, this was THE place for all of the paperwork, reports, books and resources. Unlike the Secondary School, we had about 10 people in this meeting, sitting in close quarters. I enjoyed the open atmosphere and smiles. The headmaster of this school was the same gentleman that joined us on Saturday for our Community Based Organization meeting.

Soon we jumped into the details of the school. The complex had 4 buildings with two classes each, for 8 grades (called Standards). The older children had the newest rooms and the youngest had the worst. The community tore down one of the rooms on the end of the oldest building because it was ready to collapse. Honestly, the remaining two classrooms and office (where we were meeting) looked dangerous too. 10 teachers (including the headmaster) teach from 7:30 am to about 4:00 pm. They are trying a pilot schedule mandated by the government to balance the children out to improve the ratio of teachers per class.
1,2,3 got from 7:30 am to Noon and are split into 2 classes each,

Student to teacher ratio is 108 to 1! The classroom sizes are so large in the younger grades that they have to sit on the floor…all day….because you can only fit about 50 students with desks – if you are lucky.

Enrollment:
1080 children, 492 boys and 588 girls.
Standard 1 = 236
Standard 2 = 152
Standard 3 = 165
Standard 4 = 152
Standard 5 = 133
Standard 6 = 107
Standard 7 = 61
Standard 8 = 74
236 are in Standard 1 and 74 are in Standard 8. More than 66% of those who started in first Standard have dropped out by the 8th Standard.

In 2010, total enrollment was 1,487 children, nearly 33% reducation in attendance compared to 2011.
In 2010, 392 were in Standard 1 and 77 were in Standard 8. More than 75% of those who started in first Standard have dropped out by the 8th Standard.

OVERALL, I don’t think we need to guess if we should or shouldn’t work in this area…do you?

Funding:
Opposite from the funding model using by the Secondary School, the Ministry of Education funds the almost all of the costs for the school. The exceptions that we undercover, after over an hour+ of meeting, include a 25 cent stationary fee charged by the Parent Teacher Association for the Development Fund (meaning, they collect money in coordination with the headmaster and spend it on photocopies, extra chalk and other supplies.) This only comes to $270. If they collect it. We discovered that this fee isn’t successfully collected! In addition, the government sends (hopefully at some point in the year they told me) $420 for a total of $690 to buy supplies - for the whole year for the whole school! If the Standard has books for a subject, it an average 6 students to one book.

Each student finishing Standard 8 must take a national exam and pay the school about $3 some-time during the first term to cover the actual exam and extra time spent at school (Standard 8 stays the longest at school in an attempt to get them ready for the exam.)

Students are responsible to pay for the uniform, notebooks, pencils, etc.

Teachers are paid an average of $60 per month directly from the Ministry of Education into their personal bank accounts. The closest bank is back in Ntcheu, 2 hours by car, 52 km away. THIS means that these teachers who make only $60 per month have to spend money to travel to the bank a far way off to get paid. In addition, they have to travel on a business day when the banks are open. THIS means that they close school that day while they go get their money. THIS means in addition to any other holiday, or super bad weather, they will miss close to 12 more days of school because of this government solution. Again, Tila and I short of looked at each when we discovered this and the teachers smiled. Like they know this is not a good idea. But can you do? (I think we can do something!)

Drove all the way back, 4 hours to Lilongwe, the capital and spent the night at ABC, had a great evening with Tila and the Spencer family. Prepared for the next day’s chapel sermon until 11:00 pm.


Tuesday - Wednesday, December 6 & 7, 2011

Tuesday morning up at 6:10 am, breakfast with Tila at the Spencer’s and then I had the privilege teach the chapel sermon at 7:30 pm to a group of around 200-300 college students attending ABC. It was fun and the Lord I believe spoke through me. Amen! Then off to the airport, flying back through Johannesburg, South African, then to Franfurt, Germany, Chicago and finally to Colorado Springs (I am sending this email from Chicago…ready to board the final leg to Colorado).

Glory to God for all things!

Malawi Trip Notes 2011 (Dec 1-4)

Thursday, December 01

I had a big headache that started in Colorado Springs and now I had to get on the third plane from Frankfurt to Johannesburg - it was the second overnight flight on this trip. Before boarding, I asked the gate people to check on my seat. She let me look at her screen and choose one that had the “promise” of no one sitting beside me. After I boarded the plane and they shut the door, I was so happy that the open seat was still there. If you travel on these long flights, you know have valuable that open seat is because I didn’t have someone leaning into me or fighting me for the armrest. Also, I could spread out my work and eventually try to squeeze all 5’8” of me across two seats to sleep. At some point on this 10 hour flight, I feel asleep and woke up without the headache. Praise the Lord!

I only had 75 minutes between this flight and my 4th plane – the final leg to Malawi. I rushed through the airport and made it to my gate just as they were boarding. I arrived in Malawi 34 hours later without my 3 70lb boxes I told you about. Not sure what happened to them – perhaps they never made it out of Colorado Springs. Most likely, they didn’t make the connection in Johannesburg. Steve Spencer, a missionary that runs the African Bible College in Malawi picked me up from the airport and we drove about 20 minutes out to their campus. He and his wife, Marion, were very gracious. We discussed their mission and the history of ABC. Later in the afternoon Steve gave me a walking tour of their school, college, radio station and hospital. This facility is a huge positive for the community and would make for a great potential launching pad for a future VisionTrust ministry office. The guest accommodations are the best I’ve stayed in, very comfortable and have hot water and electric and spacious. The hut I stayed in could sleep four easily. After a little computer work and a quick shower, I walked back to the Spencer’s for dinner and more conversation about what their mission – specifically about their mission with impoverished or orphaned children. Lights out at 11:00 PM.


Friday, December 02

Breakfast at 6:45 am of French toast cooked by Mateo, the cook on staff to help out Steve and Marion. Super good! I enjoyed spending a little time with their children at dinner the night before and at breakfast – made me a bit homesick for my family ;-( Marion’s dad, the founder of ABC asked me to speak in Chapel on coming Tuesday (just before I leave for the airport to go home). I agreed. After chapel service, I met Tila for the first time. It was fun to find him without knowing what he looked like. Then we spent the next 30 minutes preparing to drive South to the mountain area of Ntcheu, about a 2 hour drive. We loaded up on three 5 gallon plastic containers of fuel that Steve had stockpiled for us because there is a massive fuel shortage in the nation. In addition, I borrowed a sleeping bag, pillow and tent just in case we’ll need them and on the way out of town, stopped at a 7 Eleven (I am not joking) for several gallons of drinking water.

Tila and I spent those 2 hours in the car talking about Malawi, his work with children from babies through high school students. By the time we arrived in Ntcheu, I was impressed by the sound thinking, openness and listening ability of Tila. He is the main reason for my trip: To see what he is doing and to see if VisionTrust can provide assistance to do more and do it even better.

Our first stop in Ntcheu was a house Tila rents for himself and 5 teenage boys attending secondary school (high school). The boys are from a community that doesn’t have a good school and are currently on “scholarship” paid by a few Americans to help them be successful. In addition to the five boys, another house is rented to help five young girls complete secondary school. A woman lives with them and is a their caregiver. I did not visit the girls home. (THIS is one dimension of Tila’s work. He has two other components discussed later).

We spent the remainder of the afternoon at Tila’s parents house discussing his work and I explained the mission, strategy and concepts of VisionTrust. Around 1:30 pm we had a sandwich that Marion from ABC packed for us. Tila’s pastor and the pastor’s wife came for a visit and dinner along with all of the boys and girls being cared for by Tila. We enjoyed conversation. The pastor asked me to preach on Sunday. I told him I would pray and then give him an answer on Saturday as I wasn’t sure if I would have time to prepare. We concluded the day with dinner at 9 pm. I washed my face and went to my room and spent the next 2 hours writing my notes and catching up on email that I had downloaded at ABC. I was a bit concerned about not having a mosquito net, so we kept the windows closed and I had sprayed on the spray. Lights out.

About Tila Chikufenji
Tila’s dream as a young man was to be a journalist, but due to certain circumstances, he graduated from Malawi College of Accountancy with an accounting degree. His first job was an accountant with AFROX and then after three years they transferred him to do marketing. After two years in that position, he wanted to do work that helped his nation through community development. The Lord gave him a position at FINCA Malawi where he learned how to do micro-lending. After that, in an effort to further develop his skills, he was contracted to assist doing a GAP ANALYSIS to compare the national education system to the more successful private schools with the end product of making recommendations on how to bridge the gap and improve the national system. Tila is number 8 of 8 children, is 33 years old and engaged to be married next year. He attends the Charismatic Redeemed Pentecostal Church (started in Malawi).

About Engagement/Marriage and Polygamy
I asked Tila about the engagement process. He said that in order for a man to ask a girl to be his wife, the man has to ask the uncle of the girl’s father or mother. Then the uncle discusses it with the girl’s parents and they must all agree. Once they agree, a formal engagement date is set and a party is thrown, usually paid for by the girl’s family. Any time after this engagement is ok for the marriage to take place. The wedding is paid for usually by the man, the girls and a “committee” of ladies that may include family members and friends. In Northern Malawi, dowry is to be paid to the girl’s family, but in Central and Southern Malawi, dowry is not common. I asked him about polygamy. He said that in the North it is still practiced, but not as much in the Central and Southern areas. The exception is Muslims. They may practice it all over.

About Food
The key staple item is corn flour called nsima. Casava is eaten in lower quantities, but mostly at breakfast with the exception that in the North, they may eat it more than corn flour. Traditionally, for those that can afford to eat, they family likes to have breakfast, lunch and dinner. However, for the extreme poor, the people that we want to help, they are lucky to have one meal per day. The planting season starts in late November. The temperature can get as cold as 6 degrees Celsius in their winter which is in June/July.


Saturday, December 03

A knock on my door at 7 woke me up. I took the opportunity to shower because the water was available and ate a great breakfast of fried eggs with onions. By 8:15 am Tila and I were I in the Toyota with our driver, Amon who is a Muslim. We drove to the Ngoni tribal area to about 52 km to a community of 21 villages called Katsekera. The drive took two hours on a dirt road through the low mountains where agriculture is the occupation. Corn and Irish potatoes are the main crops. The language spoken by the Ngoni people is called Chichewa – it is also the national language in addition to English. The Ngoni have a history of being heavy beer drinkers and having multiple wives. I found out that one their favorite non-alcoholic drinks is called Tobwa, you guessed it, made from corn.

We arrived around 10:30 am at one of the three primary schools in the area to meet with the Community Based Organization. This group is comprised of representatives from 14 of the 21 villages. We met until 1:30 pm in one of the classrooms. The Group Village Headman (big chief) sat in the front alongside of the school Head Master, me and Tila. A moderator opened the meeting and we did a lot of greeting and introductions. They asked me to explain who I was and why was I there. I thanked them said I am here in the name of the Lord and that he is the God of truth. I explained openly that I am working with Tila to learn about the goals and needs of the community so through prayer, we may determine if we can provide assistance. Tila and I told them that we are not committing to financially supporting anything, we are doing research. In general, I took the opportunity to share about our primary goal to transform the children to live for God and love people.

Once I was done, the Group Village Headman welcomed me and encouraged Tila and I that we can freely meet with people and do our research. He said please support the children as I see fit and come back to visit (I discovered why he wants me to come back later on in the day. Essentially, he wants me to hold Tila accountable for things we hope to do. By coming back, I can see if they’ve really been done or not. This concept comes from past experiences with NGOs not doing what they are supposed to do). From this point I got to ask them questions about their goals and purpose of their Community Based Organization (CBO). They explained that together, they want to advance their villages by working to improve opportunities and become more self-sustaining. They said they need assistance with the number of orphans in the community as a result of AIDS. In addition, the children in the community have limited access to the secondary school because of fees and the secondary school is very weak in the quality of education. Finally, they said they are committed to work with us ;-) This is VERY cool. I’ve seldom been in poor communities where the community itself is motivated and open. However, this attitude is also misleading in a way because deep inside most of them they just assistance, or resources, or something. Our challenge will be to use what they say against them meaning that we will need to train them to truly believe that they can become responsible for their own outcomes. It will take time and patience. The door is open!

The conversation continued on a specific project that Tila is currently training them on: Savings Group. Here is the background: Using his experience from working in micro-lending, Tila started to challenge the CBO on just how do they plan to become self-sustaining and grow their resources. They concluded that they must start to save money for emergencies and to invest putting them on the trajectory to have access to credit for the purpose of growing economically. The CBO asked Tila and I how we could help them with training and ideas on what to invest in. (This is the SECOND project that Tila is currently working on).

Next I asked them what skills, businesses and goals to they have. Several people attempted to answer my question, but I did not get clear answers initially. I think it is because they wanted to answer the question correctly, meaning, they were trying to guess what I wanted to hear. However, after we pressed a bit and waited, they began to share more. Regarding SKILLS, one man out of 14 villages represented had welding experience and that same man had construction/building experience. I am not 100% sure that he is the only one in the area, but that is how it came out. I asked what skills are needed. This is a trick question designed to come at the issue from another angle to try to uncover information, or the truth. They said they would like to have more welders, carpenters and builders. On to the BUSINESSES in the area. They told me that farming the land was the main business and that for the most part, people either owned their land or rented it. This is super big asset for a poor community! Most communities we work in don’t own much land if any causing a huge challenge to advance economically. That was it for businesses according to them. I couldn’t believe it, so pressed more and then they said a few people have retail storefront (like a corner market) and a few people bake bread. And then again, that was it. This is a tough crowd ;-) On to their GOALs. Again, this is a tough question – but I would hope they would have a few clear goals because the CBO is an organized group trying to advance their community through a savings program. The answers were vague in that they want to improve the HEALTH of the children through supporting the orphans and build CAPACITY, meaning they want to help the community do things that they currently can’t do on their own. I pressed more on this topic and then the Chairman of the CBO shared a common problems that families face with respect to a lack of “capacity”. He said that when the people sell their potato crop, the money they have should be invested in some sustainable business venture so the family can have income over a longer period of time and the cash from the crop isn’t quickly wasted.

Then I asked them to ask me questions. Several were asked, but I only wrote down the following;
1) The school Headmaster asked if we could find a solution to help younger students that are orphaned or destitute earn a living (as they as child-headed households).
2) A village representative asked if we can do a feeding program for all students at the schools.
3) Another representative asked what assurance do they have that we will actually do something. (Tila and I restated that Tila is already doing work, so we’ve already started ;-)
4) Finally, they mentioned the Under 5 years old Nursery Center (Tila’s THIRD project). They observed that it is not consistent in the delivery of food nor does it cover a broad enough territory. What can be done about it?

In summary, I’ve never such a good community meeting. We had a snack at 1:30 pm or so of warm coke and a small doughnut called mandasi. Then we drove to two different child-headed households in two different villages.

David’s home was the first one we came to. He is 15 years old now and takes care of his two brothers and two sisters. He dropped out of school at standard 3.
Brother: Pemphero, 12 years old, in standard 4
Sister: Melida, 10 years old, in standard 4
Brother: Stonard, 8 years old, no schooling
Sister: Yankho, 4 years old, no schooling

Their mother went insane shortly after their father left, the children about been on their own since 2005. The mother moves around the area (which is how the four year old came about) and causes family trouble. David’s grandmother (a widow) lives nearby. His uncle lived next door and helped them but he has passed away. He has other relatives in the area but they aren’t helping. They survive because David works the family land growing potatoes for income and a few vegetables to eat. He also raises rabbits and sell one for $2.50. He is enterprising! Their home is a dirty mess as you might imagine, they have very little. They use a pit latrine and the closest water access is about ¼ mile away. See photos attached.

The next place we visited is home to two girls, Eva who is 15 years old and Lise who is 12 years old. Eva dropped out of school in standard 3. Lise is still in standard 6. Eva works in the fields to survive. They eat 2 times per day a meager meal of corn flour or potatoes. I asked Lise what subject in school is the most difficult. She said Math. I agreed ;-0 Then I asked her what subject was her favorite and she said English. Next I asked what she would like to do when she finishes school. She said, “A nurse so I can help people who are sick.” Lise does a lot of the cooking which is a big task as that means she makes the fire and gets the water. Like David, these two children have inherited a garden (land). Most the land is just passed down from generations. I asked who lives next door to them and found out that Eva’s older sister does. She is 23 and has a baby. Her husband left. She dropped out of school at standard 6 when she was a little girl. In addition to this sister, I found out that two aunts also live next door (by the way, Eva and Lise’s home doesn’t have a literal door). One aunt just died (has no husband) and the other aunt has AIDS.

It is a bit painful for me to press on with questions and dig for answers and how things work, especially when so much tragedy is involved. However, isn’t is interesting to discover that there is always more information to learn before drawing conclusions. For example, had I not asked Eva and Lise about other family members (aka who lives next to you), I would not have discovered that she has an older sister living next door, or that the aunt with AIDS and the older sister both have gardens too. And…they don’t work together on the gardens, they each work their own. Wow! When I discovered that they don’t work together, I was shocked. Why not? They need each other so much but in their culture, the norm is to do it separately. We will evaluate this behavior later and challenge them to work as a team to support those who are weaker.

Visit to “Katsekera Health Center”
The next stop in the Katsekera area was the health center operated by K. Chathyoka. His labeled as a Medical Assistant. He has two other staff that are Midwifery Nurses and leverages a team of 12 volunteers that live in the community and have been trained in community health “surveilence.” They see about 53 patients each (nearly 1,600 per month) and the clinic provides all medicine and services for free, meaning the government uses taxes or international AID money. Overall, I was impressed by the clinic at first but as I dug deeper I discovered that while everything is free, they don’t have access to all of the medicine they need. (This is why USA should stay away from gov’t run health system!). In addition, the staff to people ratio for the community is 3 per 15,905 (compared to the Malawi national average of 3 per 10,000). The clinic refers an average of 45 patients to the closest hospital that is in Ntcheu (52km away, 2 hour drive in private vehicle). The clinic serves 21 villages in the area made up of 2,647 households. The clinic reports that 82% of those households use pit latrines.

The most common issues treated are first malaria, Upper Respiratory Transmission Infections (U.R.T.I.) and diarrheal problems. The clinic is required to test people with malaria symptoms. For worms and shistomyosis (spelling? Parasite that has a symptom of blood in the urine), they are NOT required to test before administering medicine. This is good because we’ve run into issues in Zimbabwe where they require testing but don’t have the tests! This clinic recommends deworming activities and vitamin A for children under 5 two times per year. They are not doing it however. Maternal care is one of the focused services provided including Pre and Postnatal as well as “integrated” care which means they will treat woman for health issues during pregnancy to reduce maternal and newborn death rates. They are equipped to test for TB and treat it with follow up care. Each month, they currently test and average 4 patients with 1 out of 4 being positive. Yes, you got it right, that means that 12 people test positive per year that are seen by clinic.

With respect HIV/AIDS, the have treated 805 patients this year and have 550 on average who come on a regular basis for ARV treatment and consulting. Finally, the clinic has both solar and wind energy. The wind energy solution was donated by the Chinese. They are one of the few locations in the area with a borehole well (drilled with casing and pump).

Amon the drive, Tila and four people from the village left the area around 3 pm. We dropped off the four people at various intervals and made it to Tila’s parents home at 5:15 pm. Long-day! I quickly got a shower because they still had water, worked with Tila on possible ministry concepts that VisionTrust should help with until dinner at 8 PM. After dinner I took notes and did some computer work until 11:30 pm. Super long day!

About Village Housing
The homes are small rectangular huts made from homemade clay bricks with either thatch or tin roofs. Most huts in the poor communities have dirt floors. The older style of huts are round. Most of the round huts are for the kitchen or storage or used by the super poor. As an example, Eva and Lise use a round hut that is about 6 feet in diameter – the length of your bed.


Sunday, December 04

Up at 7:15 am, another quick shower to get the mosquito spray and sweat from the night off of me and wake up! Tila and I enjoyed a bread, instant coffee and a bowl of corn flakes. Then off to his church. We returned home around noon and worked on a ministry design and budget until dinner at 8:30 pm. I tried the corn millet drink – you’ll have to try it yourself to see what it tastes like. I also tried the blackjack which tasted like greens from the South. At 9:15, I returned to my room and began taking more notes and writing out our ideas.

New Program Design Recommendations (6 month pilot commitment with review in June)
Because the existing under 5 program is in one location among 21 villages and is poorly run by the CBO (community based organization), Tila and I recommend that we shut it down and replace it with a Learning Center (early childhood development center/preschool) at each of the three Primary schools. This is better because the under 5 years old children and preschoolers can attend a program that is closer to where they live and reach more children than currently. The Learning Center will start with feeding and basic care due to budget constraints. The program will eventually include preschool learning, Biblical teaching (for little ones), health management (that includes a nutritional meal designed from local products that works, proactive deworming and vitamin A administration.) The center will be a Child Sponsorship funded program starting with 40 of the neediest children at one of the Primary Schools. As we have funding, we will open the second learning center and then the third. Child Sponsorship will work well as the children can grow up in the new ministry system and over time, we can work with them all the way through secondary school – Lord willing. Once the Learning Centers have been operational and are running well, we plan to extend the program into the Primary School grades and eventually into the Secondary School. Tila and I discussed ideas like having the community do a community garden that is designed to support the Learning Centers in some fashion. Perhaps we can introduce new crops/planting techniques and use the garden for demonstration as well…lots of ideas…

Tila will continue to coach and train the CBO on the Savings Program. This program is needed to provide direct training to the community as they seek to become more self-sufficient.

In order to do a great job developing the new Learning Centers and the CBO savings program, Tila will relocate to Katsekera. He is excited to live in the community and believes this is what it will take to be successful. I agree wholeheartedly. Initially, Tila will rent a place and make it his office/house/etc. He will need to make improvements to it including solar power, sanitation, minor repairs, furniture, etc. Within one or two years, we would like to build a “phase 1” residence for him and a future assistant that also has a kitchen, office, living area, simple guest house rooms (one for men and one for women, and indoor bathroom with showers. In “phase 2”, we would like to build a training hall. Tila and I identified that he will need an assistant soon that has formal education degree and experience or early childhood development degree and experience. We also identified that we will need to form a partnership with a church or Christian teachers that can provide assistance with doing the spiritual mentoring.

With respect to the Educational Support program in place today run by Tila that supports 10 Secondary School students, we plan to keep it in place for the current students and then slowly phase it out as the students graduate. We decided that the program is helpful but very expensive and not sustainable.

We agreed to make the next 6 months a pilot, starting in January and then re-evaluating our relationship and progress in June. To get started will we need start-up funding that includes costs to start and run the first Learning Center, the rental house, basic improvements to the rental and an inexpensive motorcycle to give Tila mobility. Tila and I created a budget proposal and are ready to share it with those interested.

In bed early tonight at 11 pm.

Malawi Trip Notes 2011 (Nov 29-30)

Tuesday, Nov 29

My wife Cheryl dropped me off at the Colorado Springs airport 1:45 hour before my scheduled departure for Lilongwe, Malawi. I wrestled three 70 lb boxes out of our Explorer and carried them into the check-in area, one at a time. The folks working at the African Bible College in Malawi got word that I was coming and asked if I would bring several items with me due to the difficulty of international shipment. These boxes took all of my allowed luggage and I was happy that we weren't charged extra. I went outs one more time to say goodbye to my wife of 20 years and grab my things - a backpack and a roller board carry-on. In the last several years, I've had to learn to pack light and take my personal items with me because I seem to be the one left at the luggage carousel waiting for bags that never show. When traveling to remote places in Africa, it is always a good idea to have few creature comforts like clean underwear, flashlight, knife and soap.

My check-in process was not filled with good news. My flight plan was to go from Colorado Springs to Chicago to Frankfurt to Johannesburg to Lilongwe. The united person told me that my flight to Chicago was delayed making the connection for the flight to Frankfurt impossible to catch. Needless to say I was deflated and stressed. I shut my eyes and prayed. God brought to my memory of my 10 year old son, just the night before, giving to God his fears and anxiety and asking God for help. I prayed a similar prayer and a spirit of thankfulness came over me. The United person quickly snagged a seat on a flight to Houston and then another seat from Houston to Frankfurt, allowing me to connect in time to the original plan going on to Johannesburg and then on the Lilongwe.
This process took about 30 minutes and the flight to Houston boarded 30 minutes earlier than my original departure time - meaning I had only 30 minutes ledt to get through security and to the gate. Meanwhile, two of the three 70lb boxes got flagged by TSA. Before I ran to security, I watched them cut open the boxes and proceed to slowly remove each item and then check each item by first cutting the packaging material away.
I mentioned to them that my flight leaves in 30 minutes, could them speed up the process as I can't afford to lose these boxes. This request made them work slower. I asked one worker who was just standing if he could help. His response was "No". Once I saw that one of the boxes was being taped back together, I headed for security fast. I was now down to 20 minutes.

I made it! God is so faithful.

Please pray that the boxes make it completely intact all the to Malawi with me and that all of the items are safe. Also, ease pray that upon arrival in Malawi, the customs officials will let me pass with a of the items with no problems.


Wednesday, Nov 30

Groggy seems to sum up this day for me. After the 9 hours overnight flight, I arrived around 11:30 AM in Frankfurt and don't' fly again until 8:30 PM - another overnight flight about 10 hours. I found my way through the airport to the Lufthansa Business Lounge. Within the first 10 minutes or so, I was able to take a hot shower and get woken up for the day. Counting my blessings...this is one huge blessing. The rest of the day was spent working on email, catching up on scheduling things all the way out through July 2012 and planning the details of things scheduled that are soon to hit my desk like staff the major end of year all-staff meetings in Colorado Springs during the second week of December. I am ready to get to Malawi and begin learning about the country, the people, the children and how God wants to use VisionTrust. ;-)

PRAY LIST for Matt Storer & Scott Couch: Upcoming trip to Liberia

Matt Storer (President) and Scott Couch (Director of Project Management Services) will be traveling to Liberia next week. VisionTrust is currently developing 4 schools at the moment in Liberia, reaching over 700 preschoolers and students with the gospel, regular Bible teaching, education and health. They fly out of the USA on Sept 13, Tuesday and return home on Sept 22, Thursday.

Please pray for the following as their schedule is super full:

1 - Taking 500 backpacks, 2 truck shocks, office supplies and VisionTrust sponsorship materials among other things. Please PRAY that all of the luggage makes it and we don’t have any issues getting through Liberian Customs.

2 – Meeting with ELWA (SIM ministry) asking them if we can take over the operations of their Guest House. It continues to be an issue to house (me) our guests and the place is currently a dump and poorly managed. PRAY that they give us favor to do this. It is a long-shot.

3 – Meeting with Water of Life (well drilling ministry) to build partnership in Liberia to encourage them to drill wells and manage them at our 4 project locations. Pray for quality, heart-felt partnership.

4 – Submitting building plans for a new 17,000sf school building to the Ministry of Planning for approval. This school needs to be get started ASAP. We have almost 500 children attending in the old place. The new place will support up to 900 students, using 2 shifts per day. PRAY for government favor to approve plans quickly and without bribes. We will also be interviewing/hiring a Liberian construction manager and begin materials acquisition. PRAY for a quality person, we will need discernment!

5 - I will personal be life-coaching Robert Sondah, our Director of VisionTrust Liberia to help him manage and develop all areas of his life. Please PRAY that God gives us both wisdom and understanding and the discipline we need to make improvements/changes. Robert is doing a great job…

6 – Evaluating progress on school #3 and #4. Both of these are in early development stages.

The list is longer, but these are the biggies ;-)

Terra Nova

I am excited to have the priviledge of speaking at Terra Nova this weekend. My son Matthew and I went to the Dominican Republic with their first VisionTrust mission team last week to serve orphaned and at-risk children in the community of Comendador (a Haitian border town). We need to sponsor another 20 children in this project this weekend. The $35 per month sponsorship gives every child a nutritional meal each day, attend school, receive medical care and learn about God.

If you are in the Columbus, Ohio area, please come - I would love to see you!

To find out how to get to Terra Nova, click on http://www.terranovacc.com

-Matt Storer, President of VisionTrust