Stories of People who Inspire Me.

We affectionately call her ‘Chima’ and she said it better than I could: I agree that there is power in stories, I have this platform to share my own stories. A big part of my story is made up of the privileged reality that I share many others’ stories. It is through sharing these stories that many of the wrong ‘single stories’ I carried have been broken down. The single stories about what is development, what is love and the value of business in bringing both these things. I wanted to take a moment to share a few of the stories of people whom inspire me and challenge me. I feel privileged to share life, including the challenges and the successes with these people! This is Chawanangwa Mughogho. Chawa is a Rehabilitation Technician who I work with at Sandi Rehabilitation in Malawi. He is applying and seeking funding to study Occupational Therapy in South Africa, starting January 2015. Chawa has already had to show incredible persistence and investment, simply to embark on the application process. He inspires me with his passion for children and his ability to capture children with his laughter and energy. Chawa’s commitment and passion for helping children with disabilities in Malawi inspires me to believe that God is bringing the healing he promised the world in amazing ways. This is Elizabeth and Emmanuel. Elizabeth moved to Australia a little over 7 years ago as a refugee from Ghana. She was 7 months pregnant with her daughter Blessing. Emmanuel; Blessing’s Father was sent to Canada as a refugee. For over five years these two lived on opposite sides of the planet, yet they persisted in their love. Two weeks before I moved to Malawi, Emmanuel moved  to Australia for the long awaited wedding and to finally be with his family. One of the greatest privileges of my year was flying back to Australia to surprise these guys at their wedding. At their wedding I shared that regardless of whether I am single or married, I know that when I arrive at the pearly gates someday, I will declare “I lacked no experience of love”. I know this because I get to share beautiful stories of love with people like Liz and Emmanuel. This is Jastin Chikuse with his family. Jastin works at my house as the gardener. Jastin inspires me with his passion for learning, his deep care for his family and his drive to contribute positively to the world. Jastin is a trained to run support groups for those wo are HIV positive and he runs trainings for others around organic and sustainable gardening techniques. Jastin is unfailing in his warmth and happiness towards me and generous in inviting me into his life to meet with his family and friends. Jastin is working towards building a new house and hopes to further his knowledge and studies in agriculture and gardening one day. This is Ndawa Lungu. Ndawa and I share a Growth Group (aka bible study) every week. I get the privilege of hearing about and sharing in whats happening in Ndawa’s life. Ndawa owns and runs a company called Idea265, Malawi’s first design studio (http://www.idea265.com). Ndawa is persistent in working towards his dream of having this company successful, despite logistical and economic challenges. But it is not only Ndawa’s business drive that inspires me, it is his heart for God. Ndawa shares regularly and openly at our Growth Group of his journey of what it means to do ‘ethical business’ and ‘business with integrity’.  As another person also on a journey of discerning how God’s Kingdom is coming in private business, it is a privilege and inspiration to share with Ndawa in his journey through this.

To the many people who allow me to share their stories of success and failure- thank you! May we be writing stories together that are always ‘repairing broken dignity’ and revealing the coming Kingdom of God in this broken world.

The many stories of being an Occupational Therapist

New friend: “So, what do you do?”

Me: “Occupational Therapy”

New friend: “So, what does that mean?”

Me: “SIGH”

I have had this conversation many times. Problem is, there is just no single story of what Occupational Therapy is. Like all the best professions, it can’t be explained in a one-liner. And anyway, there is ALWAYS DANGER IN THE SINGLE STORY. If I condense OT down to a single story, you’ll miss the beauty of its diversity and find me getting irritated at you.

The concept behind OCCUPATIONal Therapy that in what we do we find meaning, so we want to help people be able and successful at what they do. I also believe that a good portion of our meaning comes from who we are, who we are becoming and the people around us helping us on that journey.  So if I just tell you about what I do, or what I help other people do, without telling you who helps me to be, what I endeavour to be and help other people be, I’m not telling you the whole story.

This is why I feel the need to convey more than just what I do, but who I endeavour to be as I convey the many stories of this thing called “Occupational Therapy”.

So, in my role at Sandi I find myself helping children be successful at doing their school work or daily activities. This can mean doing educational activities at the table, jumping on the trampoline, cooking or doing a touch-typing course . This also means being a supportive adult, who sees their strengths and helps them see and know their struggles. It means demonstrating being humble in success and persistent in failure. It means being available and present with them and caring and compassionate example.

At Sandi, being an Occupational Therapist, also means partnering with my colleagues to help them successfully do therapy. This means finding the resources and knowledge to know about child development, creating fun activities and building networks. This also means building a supportive and constructive team environment, where individuals can be open about their weaknesses and affirmed in their strengths. This means being realistic and open about my own strengths and weaknesses. This means being a student as well as a teacher. It also means being brave enough to form real relationships with my colleagues, relationships where we impact and inform the people we’re being and becoming.

These colleagues are significant in who I am being and becoming as a person and a therapist. I hope I am a positive factor in their being also.

I have gone through this personal journey, when earlier this year due to elections in Malawi, I was limited in my ability to do anything outside my house. For a week, I stopped the “occupations” of going to work, church, social outings and I discovered that my identity and meaning is not found in those things I do anyway. It is in who I am and who I was created to be. I was gently reminded that Mary sat at Jesus feet while Martha rushed around making preparations, but Jesus commended Mary for her being.

Like our Sandi brochure’s say; being an Occupational Therapist means “assisting clients of all ages and all ranges of abilities to participate in meaningful occupations”. Being an Occupational Therapist for me also means being outrageously generous like my parents, hardworking and compassionate like my colleagues, recklessly hopeful like my housemate, creative, resourceful and inspired like many of my friends and loving like my God.

 

Why there is no single story of my life in Malawi.

My 2014 new years resolution was to blog once a fortnight. Its May, this is my second blog. I’m clearly finding this resolution hard to keep, which got me wondering why I find it so hard.

There are a collection of reasons that I find blogging difficult, including my time limitations and unsureness in the purpose or target audience of this blog. But I recently re-watched this TED talk by Chimamanda Adichie about the ‘Danger of the Single Story’. If you haven’t watched it, I sincerely encourage you to do so before you read on:

Watching this clip reminded me that one of the many reasons that I find blogging hard, particularly blogging about my life in Malawi is because there is no single story that can convey it. Furthermore, I am hesitant to convey any single story to you, at the risk that I will contribute to the culture and practice of the single story of Africa and Malawi that many people have.

My life, work and community here is Malawi is astoundingly diverse. A friend recently stated that in Lilongwe we have no need to travel to see the world because Lilongwe is a cultural melting pot of the world. On any given day I see incredible poverty, but I also see incredible wealth and I see amazing hearts and initiatives that are seeking to bring these both into balance. I also live a contradictingly urbanised life, in a country of which the vast majority of the population live rurally.

As Chimananda talks about in the TED talk, if we only have single stories of people, we are left with little room for other feelings towards them but pity. We regularly do that in our media exposure of Africa and I do not want to be someone who contributes through media to a negative stereo-type that provokes pity. What you may not realise is that the vast majority of my Malawian friends and colleagues are highly educated, driven, remarkable creative and brilliant people. I am daily inspired by their hearts, ingenuity, drive and persistence to create markets and businesses and contribute to their country and the world.

You may have a single story image of what life looks like in Malawi, and I’m guessing if you do, it is wrong. Your single story of Africa might not be as extreme as the friend-of-a-friend who recently asked if we ride Giraffes to work in Malawi. But you might have some concepts or ideas of Africa that are misinformed. So, I dare you, instead of letting the WorldVision adverts and Westernised Media be the exclusive informant of your understanding of Africa, to dare to learn about the brilliant music industry that happens across the African continent. To YouTube, spoken word poems, TED talks and stories from different African people or to read and research the inspirational literature like ‘The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind’ by William Kamkwamba. Or I encourage you to look into the unique and beautiful fashion and textiles industries that happens across the continent or the resourceful and hard-working health industry that is growing, despite the overwhelm on demand placed upon it.

It might be easy for you to believe the single story that I have come to Africa exclusively as a contributor, to help ‘save’ this country. I know this because 6 or so years ago, I believed this single story. But if you do believe that single story you are very wrong. I do endeavour to contribute where I can, and this can include many different things from sharing my knowledge and resources to being the one who does the fast-food run on a Monday night when we all work late. But I receive in ways that far outweigh my giving. I am generously cared for by colleagues and friends and I am inspired by others open, creative sharing. Far more of my time here is spent being the pupil rather than the teacher as I am daily taught amazing new lessons about how reciprocated love works and how the concepts of ‘capacity development’ work best within reciprocated love.

One reason I feel such a need to convey these thoughts and the reason I am so charismatic in sharing this TED talk is that I used to have a single story of ‘Africa’ and of my plan and God has turned it upside down and showed me that I will have many diverse stories, most of which wont fit together nicely in a blog entry. But of these stories of triumph and failure, poverty and wealth, consistency and diversity, the planned and the unexpected. I know that if God is the author and the glory, then the many stories of my life will hopefully contribute to the only single story I hope I tell, which is the one of His coming Kingdom.

Stories of Aid. Stories of Trade.

‘Aid vs trade’. It’s a debate I find myself in often. I remember in my second year of University being given an assignment on the downfalls of aid. I honestly and naively thought there would be little for me to find on the topic and found myself on a sharp learning curve as I delved into books such as ‘Dead Aid’ by Dambisa Moyo and began reading of the “unmitigated political, economic, and humanitarian disaster for most parts of the developing world” that aid has been (Ngozi Okonjo-Iweal TED talk on ‘Aid vs Trade’)

Fast-track forward a few years and I’m here, in the Developing World, dependant on this ‘aid’, yet situated in the private sector. I have journeyed in my experience and opinion on this debate, yet still don’t know where I stand on it. So I set out to do some research, find my single stand-point and quick opinion. I quickly realized that like with every complex debate, a single stand-point or quick opinion is not overly useful or achievable. Because all that did was create for me a single story of aid and of trade. And THERE IS ALWAYS DANGER IN THE SINGLE STORY.

So, I want to encourage you, as I have done to start reading, seeing and learning of the different stories. Read of the terrible failures of aid, read of the millions spent on a sending shoes and shirts to countries with local clothing and footwear industries (http://matadornetwork.com/change/7-worst-international-aid-ideas/).  Also read of the stories of aid initiatives that daily provide starving people with food, orphaned children with homes and unequipped schools with resources. Let me tell you beautiful stories of missionaries, volunteers and locals here, who provide homes for orphans, teach sustainable farming methods and efficient cooking methods, who provide much needed health care at a high quality in an affordable and accessible way. You will see that aid is not exclusively a story of failure, but within aid there are stories of people and initiatives bringing amazing healing.

Trade is also not exempt from having many different stories. I hope you’ve heard of trade initiatives that are destructive of our world, like nestle initiatives to provide nutrition supplements (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestl%C3%A9_boycott), or other giant industries, dominating markets destructively. I recommend reading the ‘ ethical electronics guide’ (www.baptistworldaid.org.au/assets/BehindtheBarcode/Readable-Ethical-Electronics-Guide.pdf) and learn more about where your newest smart phone or tablet was sourced, produced and assembled and learn about the injustice still existing in this market. But do you also hear the stories of trade initiative that are creating industries of integrity and opportunity? Do you hear of small businesses driving sustainable and ethical markets? Do you see the thriving fair trade industry, advocating that we do indeed care about the quality of life for all people involved in produce production? Do you hear of local entrepreneurs creating new industries and driving change in their own countries?

My story of the last 6 months has been one of these, as I have partnered with a private paediatric service (www.sandi-malawi.com) and seen the value and role that high quality, private health services can have in increasing health availability in a country. This experience has taught me is that through locally owned business, empowerment can happen naturally and powerfully, as those businesses own the change that occurs. I have seen and been inspired by my Malawian colleagues who are successfully developing quality business and driving the positive change that is happening in their country. If you’re interested a little more my story of this is told in an article I wrote here: http://www.australianvolunteers.com/volunteer/stories-from-the-field/empowerment-through-business-in-malawi.aspx

I am privileged to share life with workmates, a housemate and a community of people who regularly share these diverse stories of success and failure in aid and trade. I have shelves of books (eg. ‘The World is not Ours to Save’- Tyler Wigg or ‘When Helping Hurts’- or ‘The end of Charity’- Nic Frances), I subscribe to blogs (eg. http://africasacountry.com/) and podcasts (eg. www.developmentdrums.com) where these stories are told and explored. I only touch the tip of the ice berg of the stories. I challenge you to engage with learning more of these stories, I invite you to share stories of your own, before you start making a single story about what is needed anywhere in the world.

I stopped perpetuating a single story and discovered that what is needed for our world, for Africa, for Malawi, for my workplace, for my soul, are many good stories of aid and of trade. Stories of God’s kingdom breaking through in our world. Stories of love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control overflowing. I hope I can be a person who leaves a legacy of many good stores, whether it be classified as ‘aid’ or ‘trade’, because I ascribe not to aid or trade, but to the character and work of the Jesus Christ.

The single story of being a woman

I have written about the dangers of the single story of my life in Africa, I’ve written about the danger of the single story of using Social Media. Now I want to address the single story I wrestle with constantly around the fact that I AM A WOMAN.

 Furthermore, I am a woman who moved on her own to an African country, I am a woman who acts as a manager in her workplace. I am a woman who takes a leadership role in her Bible study group. And recently, I became a woman prepared to say ‘yes’ to preaching in her church.

 When this opportunity to step up in my leadership role and try my hand at teaching arose, I found myself questioning whether I felt it fit into the “woman’s role” in the church. Simultaneously, I was beginning to explore whether I want to study further or pursue business development or continue with my current work position longer term. I also found myself longing for and wondering whether I could maybe choose to invest in the marriage option (though there is still an essential factor missing from this dream for me). As I pondered all these options, I found myself asking what I felt fit into the “woman’s role”.

 But God challenged that through a collection of experiences, one of these being reading the book ‘Jesus Feminist’. That we need to stop asking about roles and start asking about hearts. Because otherwise we continue to walk the dangerous ground of having a single story of women. And THERE IS ALWAYS DANGER IN THE SINGLE STORY.

 I suspect that I have had more conversations about women than the average person.  My desperate hope is that through these conversations I convey to you a humble, kind, joyful, loving and womanly heart. I find it difficult to navigate these conversations. Especially after the ‘f-word’ comes up.

 I find this word tends to either get people clamouring for their high-horse or reaching for stones. I also tend to find these conversation perfect breeding ground for single, dominant and limited stories of women.

When feminism comes up, many people want to tell stories of successful women in leadership to make their point of equality. I am not opposed to this, I love Maggie Thatcher and Mother Teresa as much as the next person, but that again falls into this trap of a single story. Women have conquered and triumphed in leadership. Women have also failed miserably in leadership, moralistically, in their tasks and roles, as parents, as servants, as lovers and as people. And sometimes when these stories come up in the midst of the “f-word conversation”, we quickly fall into the trap of the single story that they failed because they’re women, therefore all women will fail. THERE IS DANGER IN THE SINGLE STORY.

 Therefore, I dare to believe that there is no single story of women, I dare to believe that there is no single ‘role’ for women. Hence, there is no single role for me. I must stop asking what is my role and start asking other questions. So I asked different questions. I asked what has God asked of me, how has God gifted me and how can I show love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. The answer was to ‘say’ yes to preaching from a humble, servant-heart. To say ‘yes’ to opportunities to study further and taking daring and hard leadership roles at church and work and to enjoy the daily opportunities I get to delight in being domestic and invest in children.

I want to thank the women who have gone before me and taught and inspired me in their many different stories. Thanks for your daring leadership, your fearless work approaches, your humble servant hearts. Thanks for your successes that have created opportunity for me to have such roles in this world. Thank you also for being honest and open enough to share your failures with me, that I can also dare to live ‘in the knowledge of grace’ and trust God to lead my heart, in roles far beyond what my limited imagination could dream of.

I hope you’re getting the right picture

My last post was about the danger of the single story. Ironically I then had a conversation about how social media gives us such opportunity to create single stories for ourselves. We all want to present the exciting, together, beautiful story of our lives. We all buy into each others’ mythical cyber lives everyday. I know I do. I also know how hard I work to pick the pictures, posts and stories that create a mythical-looking cyber life for me also.

I want to break-down that myth a little for you.

 

 

I hope you’re getting the right picture. I hope you understand that the pictures holding cute babies, in-front of beautiful backdrops and standing atop mountains all make up about 1% of my life.

 

 

 

I hope you’re getting the right picture. That even though I always look happy and surrounded by people, the pictures I don’t post are the quiet nights I spend at home, sitting with my bible reading the bits that start with “lord, why have you forsaken…..”.

 

 

 

 

I hope you’re getting the right picture. I may be successful at sewing lovely things, mastering new recipes and finishing great books. I haven’t posted the bag of failed crafts that didn’t work out so well for me, or the recipes that I’ll know not to use next time.

 

 

I hope you’re getting the right picture. I get to go out dancing, on road trips and overseas adventures. I also have to drag myself to work on Monday mornings. I also do hours of paperwork and work in an office, too chaotic to think to take pictures most of the time. I also get home some nighst and put my pyjamas on before 7pm. I also sometimes run out of clean clothes at all. I also spend day-after-day seeing the same roads, the same scenery, the same places….and amidst that same scenery I forge deep and meaningful relationships and see beauty everyday!

Don’t be deceived by social media or the lie of a single story. The deep beauty of my life is not captured in the scenic photos or nice posts, its in the beauty of my everyday. The Mondays where empathy for each other flows freely between my workmates and we earnestly pray for energy. The quiet nights when I journal until I’ve emptied my mind just enough to glimpse God’s goodness. The times I get to cook a simple meal for my housemate so that she can eat before we have people over. The beauty is often in the moments when my hair is a mess and my make-up long worn off. When I’m failing miserably to meet any of these expectations of success.

In her book ‘Jesus Feminist’, Sara Bessey describes the Kingdom of God as:

 ‘those moments of transcendence, as if the thin veil between heaven and earth is fluttering in the most normal and ordinary moments of our lives and then we cant breathe for the loveliness of the world and each other and just like that, our souls remember something, we recognize him there’.

I hope you’re getting the right picture. My life IS as good, beautiful, picturesque, fun and full as the pictures tell…..  It is also hard, lonely, sad, challenging and very ordinary. The beauty is that in those amazing moments, and in the mundane, the Kingdom of God is present and coming.

The little joys.

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Getting up to go to work can be a drag some days not matter where in the world you live, but I think its the little joys that make it good. Here are some of the little joys of my work that contribute to me loving it:

Play equipment that looks like this:

Bunnies in the playground:

Getting to wear flips-flops everyday (which Australians know are actually called ‘thongs’)

Having a Malawian lunch cooked for me everyday and sharing it with these lovely ladies.

 

 

A day on the roads of Malawi

I think its true to say that there is never a dull moment on Malawian roads.

Mum and Dad- I’m driving very safely!

ed

Malawian Wedding Fun

On Boxing Day I got to attend the wedding of Judith and John (Judith is my colleague) and I loved it. We dressed up, we threw money and we danced. Then we danced and danced and danced.

Manly Ferry

Something you should know about me is that am proned to homesickness. The stomach-crunching, crippling, cry for hours type of homesickness. It took me a long time to learn to not be ashamed of this. I have been recently thinking about how I have seen God’s strength, building stronger friendships and learning about the depth and complexity of God’s love through these times and I wanted to share that with you.

My friend and a real role model of mine; Mel Cousins recently preached about the book of Psalms in the bible. She specifically spoke about the Psalms of lament. These are the psalms that say things like ‘God, why have you forsaken me’ and ‘deliver me O Lord’.  I have found that I connect with these psalms, particularly when I feel homesick

Mel talked about how these psalms tell a journey and have a structure. They usually start with a mournful expression, then continue with a complaint, then a curse before they bless God. She also said this journey of mourning through lament is fundamental for processing sadness and pain and that they always end with the glory of Gods goodness. Some people may never have experienced a kind of mourning, but we all will.

So, I thought I would share with you some of my mourning about leaving my home, family and friends, but hope that maybe I might share with you some of the strength, power, love and goodness I have and do find in this hard experience.

But, I hear you saying, what does this have to do with the Manly Ferry and the lovely image of my parents and I cruising on a perfect spring day along the Sydney harbour? Because this picture was right before we shared an intensive time of lament. For me the emotional experience of lament is one that I could best describe as a dark cloud descending over me. I sat aboard that ferry and I sobbed for the sadness of the beautiful life I was leaving and the many remarkable family members and friends who make up me. I sobbed for fear of what life in Africa will be like. Then together we acknowledged the goodness of God and blessed Him.

Mum and Dad shared my cry of being forsaken, my complaint of the awfulness of leaving, my cursing of why I would do this and my acknowledgment of the goodness of God in life always. And I was blessed to share my break-down with them.

And, that is why I will always feel fondly towards the Manly Ferry.