Well, we are in our last 5 days here in Malawi. Can't believe it is already time to go home. We still don't have a court date for the adoption petition, but our attorney has sent an "urgency" letter to the court and is really trying to get us the court date as soon as possible. Right now, it looks like Jeff will have to stay for 1-2 weeks to finish up everything and bring Linda home.

The building construction is still progressing. Jeff is trying to have all the materials bought before he leaves so that it will be easier to get everything done in a timely manner. The board for Noah's Ark Orphan Care Center has also had meetings with the owner of some land adjacent to the building site. There is a possibility that they may be able to buy the land. If they are able to buy the land, then this will give them room to build a Maize Mill, have a chicken farm, a vegetable garden, etc. The Maize Mill will be able to serve the community there as there is not one nearby. The chicken farm and the garden will be to teach the children and also to help support the Center.

The well in Meteketa is close to being finished. We were hoping to have pictures of final product before we go home, but may have to get them from Pastor Chisale a little later.

Pastor Nancy has taken in more kids now and we have 49 children coming to the Center. There are now 8 (I think) pre-school age children. Pastor Nancy met with the City Assembly and the Assoc. of Pre-Schools and there is training for her to complete to start the Pre-school. She will start that training on Monday and it goes for 13-14 days from 8am-4pm. She is in the process of finding someone to be at the house to supervise the children during those days while she is gone. She will take the training and then will be able to train any other teachers or helpers that she will need to have the pre-school running.

We are missing everyone at home and look forward to seeing everyone, but are not enjoying having to say goodbye to the friends here!

The social welfare agent was out all last week at his home village, so the paperwork was not able to be signed last week. We spoke to the attorney last Friday and she had already talked to him about our case and he had agreed to sign the petition when she brings it to him today. We will call later this afternoon to get an update. Otherwise, just waiting...

Last Thursday, we were able to go out to Meteketa (the other Orphan Care Center here in Malawi right now) and take 57 blankets for the kids there. Not all of the kids were able to be there as they are on holiday from school and some go to their home villages to be with family during the holidays. We were able to hand out over 30 blankets, though, when we went. It is a blessing knowing that these kids will be warm at night now.

Yesterday we went back out to Meteketa and Pastor Chisale took us to 2 other churches in the general area to meet the people there. Jeff spoke in each of the churches and the people we met were all very welcoming. There was a raging fire that came within 50 yards of the first church as we started the service, so that was a little distracting. But, they were able to put the fire out and no one got hurt!! At the 2nd village, after the church service, they fed us our lunch (which was very good) and then we went back to Meteketa to pick up the rice bags we had bought for the Orphan Care Center in Blantyre. We took back 10 bags of rice (for a lot cheaper than what they would have cost in Blantyre), so this was a big blessing. We left 3 bags there in Meteketa (approx. 70 kgs/bag). All of the money for this rice was money that was given by the high school students at Faith High School.

Also, yesterday, we were able to see the company drilling the well in Meteketa. They had started drilling on Saturday and had already hit water before we left Meteketa yesterday. Hopefully, the cement and everything will be completed in the next couple of days on the well.

The director wasn't in the Social Welfare office the last 2 days, so our paperwork is supposed to go to their office today for signatures and then hopefully to the court to get a date. Linda is back in school for now and having fun with her friends.

In the last 2 weeks, we have had 7 more children begin coming to the Orphan Care Center for food, so now there are 45 children. Most of the new children are of the Preschool age. Yesterday we had 2 grandmothers (sisters) come for help. They have 8 children whom they are caring for and all of the parents have died from Aids. The grandmothers carry sand and water one bucket at a time for very little money to try to make enough to feed these kids. We are able to help them with 4 of the children right now. 2 of the other children that have come are also being taken care of by their grandmother.

One of the night watchmen at the Orphan Care center just came 2 nights ago and let us know that his 5 year old child had died from Malaria!

We will be signing the affidavits today along with Pastor Nancy at the attorney's office. From there, the paperwork will go to the social welfare office on Monday, hopefully. Then, it will go to court (if needed).

We were able to get each of the children here in Blantyre blankets and we will be buying blankets for all the children in Metaketa hopefully next week to take to them.

Downpayment on the well in Metaketa has been made, so hopefully that will begin soon. We will go out there and get pictures as the work progresses.

We have set up a Paypal account in case anyone would like to use that to donate towards our adoption. You just go to paypal.com and put in our email address (ryaljs@yahoo.com) and then follow the instructions.

Linda's mom came into town yesterday and we all met with the attorney yesterday afternoon. Linda's mom agreed to the adoption and signed the consent form yesterday at the meeting. The next step is for some affidavits to be signed by us, and the directors of the orphan care center that Linda has been staying at. Then, all of the paperwork will go to the Social Welfare agency for approval. After that it will go to court (if it will need to go to court at all). The attorney has agreed to do all they can to try to get this completed so that we can all leave on schedule on August 26th.

Jeff will be going today to get estimates on the supplies for the next step in the building project and from there we will see what we can accomplish on the building while we are here.

Also, we have gotten the quotes for the well in Metaketa, so know we will be scheduling the time for this to be done fairly quickly.

Well we meet with Linda's mother and she agreed adoption was in Linda's best interest!!!! She should come next Monday to meet with our attorney.

This week has been another busy week so far. On Monday we were able to go to Nchala where another Noah's Ark Orphan Care Center will be started. The church there has already started helping 8 orphan children themselves along with others being helped in their homes. It was a blessing to be there. While we were there, we were served lunch - which was a big sacrifice for them as they have very little in that village. On our way home from Nchala, we were able to go on a game preserve that was free for us. We were excited to see 5 giraffes at one point and at least 2-3 others while we were driving.

Some of the team members have been challenged to adopt children. Some have been challenged to sponsor students for the university. Christopher (the pastor's son) was able to visit colleges yesterday with a team member and they are ready to accept him as soon as he brings in his paperwork from his schooling.

Right now, the rest of the team is a Majete Game Preserve. I am sure they are having a wonderful time and being able to see many animals. This is the same preserve where we went last year.

On Monday evening, we had a good meeting with our attorney. Our attorney now has all of our paperwork and we will be meeting with Linda's guardians as soon as possible. That is our next step.

Metaketa

On Wednesday, we were able to go out to a small village about 2 hours from Blantyre. It is called Metaketa in the Zomba district. The pastor there, Pastor Chisale, has started their 2nd Noah's Ark Orphan Care Center there in Malawi. As a group, we were able to play some games with the children. Maggie taught them the Hokey Pokey, and Duck, duck, goose (but it was chicken, chicken, goat), and many other songs and games. The Noah's Ark Orphan Care children performed for us and showed off how much they have learned. A couple children read some speaches and showed off how good their English was. Christopher (the pastor's son) had them sing a few songs and it was beautiful. The people in the church there even performed for us along with people from the surrounding areas that came for our visit. It was very touching that there were so many to come from far places to see us.

Today we have had a full, exciting day so far. This morning we were able to set up the 2 computers that were donated to the Orphan Care Center. Thank you Lewis & Knopf!! They are set up in the sitting room so as soon as the kids came home from school they were so excited. This is the only place anywhere around there with computers for the orphan children, so this is very special. 2 of the older boys who go to school in the afternoon, were there after we set them up and we got a Typing learning CD installed. They worked on that for at least 2-3 hours and are doing very well already. This is going to be a great help for the kids to learn typing skills and much more. One of the team members that came, Brian, brought many phonics, math, and other teaching games for the children. This is so wonderful!

In Malawi

Well, we arrived in Malawi yesterday (Monday) afternoon and were greeted with many people at the airport and the church. We had dinner and then tried to settle in a little. This morning we were able to go to the school with some of the children and see the assembly before they start classes. Then we went into the Preschool room and did the Hokey Pokey with the children. It was a lot of fun to see the kids doing the Hokey Pokey. This afternoon we were able to take everyone to the building site.
Just so that everyone knows, there is another blog that the rest of our team will be posting on. It is giveagoodday.blogspot.com in case you would like to see the posts there as well.

TODAY!!

Well, we leave today. In fact just 2 1/2 more hours and we leave for the airport. We are all very excited and none of us slept very well last night. Hopefully that means we will all be able to sleep on the plane. Detroit to Atlanta and then Atlanta to Johannesburg. We will overnight in Johannesburg and then fly to Malawi on Monday morning.

Thanks to everyone for their support and encouragement as we have been preparing for this trip. We appreciate everyone's help. May God bless your summer!

NOT SOON ENOUGH

Just five weeks until we leave!!!! We are so ready to leave now. We have seven other team members going with us to serve : ) They are engineers, pastors, teachers, journalists, and social workers. Anyone can serve and we are so thankful for their willingness to give of themselves. We are still raising funds to build the second phase of the orphan care center so if you are interested in donating please call me at 8109198796. Jeff

Getting Ready to GO

We are going to be back in Malawi July 5th for two months this time. We are very excited to go and serve the beautiful people of Malawi. We will once again be overseeing the second building phase of the orphan care center. We also will be taking funds to dig a well in Zomba district. Sara will be teaching the older girls secretarial skills. We are taking two computers with us. Annamarie will work with the younger students on there reading. We are in the fundraising phase of this endeavor. If you would be interested in investing in our work you can contact me at 810-919-8796

Jeff