Chickens for change: a sponsor visits Malawi

Rozi Wightman of Horsham, West Sussex has been a sponsor with Plan for almost 17 years and has sponsored six different children in Malawi, Zimbabwe and Bolivia. In March 2008, Rozi and her husband David traveled to Malawi to visit 11 year-old Christopher for the second time. This is their story. 

"On the morning of our visit, Herbert and Peter from Plan Malawi picked us up at our hotel and took us to the Plan Field Office outside Lilongwe. After a short time chatting there, we set off to see Christopher and his community.

Christopher was on Easter holidays and so he was at home when we arrived. We had a wonderful welcome from his family and it was great to see Christopher again. He looked so smart and so much more confident than last time we were there.

We chatted together for quite a while, with Billy and Herbert from Plan translating. Christopher showed us his school report. He had done so well, coming second in the class out of 194! The wind-up torch we brought as a gift for Christopher seemed to go down well.

After a lovely visit, we set off to see how the new chicken project was doing. When we last visited, David and I decided we would like to do a bit more for the township and came up with the idea of donating money to Plan for a community gift - a chicken shed, able to house 1000 laying hens, together with the birds, food, feeders, etc.

Any profits made from it would be spent on the orphans and other vulnerable children there and food, school-fees, school uniforms and other essentials could be funded. It is hoped that there will also be enough money generated to buy each orphan, all 600 of them, a blanket to keep them warm in the colder weather.

To our surprise and delight, many of the orphaned children and the women helpers greeted us when we arrived at the shed site. And what a welcome they gave us! We were introduced to some of the town¿s elders and then all sat down under a shade to watch the celebrations. I felt like the Queen!

There was wonderful singing from the women, a short play in the Chichewe language, and dancing from the children. There was also some very moving poetry written and read out in English by two of the older boys about the hardships and prejudices experienced by orphans there.

The chicken shed was still under construction but coming along nicely, and project-coordinator Billy hoped it would be up and running by July of this year. He seemed so keen to make it work.

We had the most wonderful day and I know it will not be too long before we return again to see Christopher and hopefully, lots of happy chickens running about laying plenty of eggs!"