My Favourite Page by Shanon Hannon

Date: 2005, 2007
Location: Malawi
Name: Shannon Hannon


In the summers of 2005 and 2007, I traveled to Malawi with Children of the Nations to work with children affected by HIV and AIDS. We organized camps, sports games, tutored, put together a village library, cooked, helped with house chores, sewed clothes, led devotions at a local village outreach, and spent quality time getting to know children and caretakers at Children of the Nations.

I find myself sighing. A friend of mine told me that we sigh when there is something we want but can't have. I argued at the time, but I think it may be true. I long to walk through Chiwengo village with Msayiwale taking pictures of the landscape, teaching him how to frame a picture, talking about my family at home, talking about fighting between kids here, explaining the "stubble" of hair on my legs. I can hear in my memory the laughter and the joy of the kids as I would play and watch their futbol games; the way Lidson would exaggerate every move when playing goalie, to guarantee an audience, the way little Drew would walk right through the game like he owned the field, confident that he wouldn't get taken out by the players sprinting back and forth, the two puppies born outside the House of Love, Bruce and Chuck (Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris that is) would run wild and bite at our ankles. In one thought I am taken back to that place and wish that

I could just jump back into the moment and relive it again.

One story of a grief counseling session with a group of girls reminds me that God is definitely working through the kids in Malawi. Just knowing that these girls have been through so much abuse, rape, and trauma breaks my heart. It breaks my heart that anyone would have to experience these things, but they have grown so much through their pain and hurt. One of the girls asked, "Where was God when I was being raped?" I struggled with this question as I was listening, and then the girl answered her own question which is amazing in itself. It was not a generic answer, an answer she knew would please or sound right, but it was sincere. She said, "God was with me. He never left me. He would never leave me or forsake me. He was there with me, with tears in His eyes and fire in His heart." I was completely humbled. For an eleven year old girl to know this truth and speak it from her heart, took my breath away.

During our time at one of the houses, an old woman knocked on the door, holding a tiny baby in her arms asking if we could take the baby into our care because she could not care for her any longer. She was the baby's Grandmother and had been caring for baby Bridget for the past month since the baby's parents had passed away. They took her in right away and it was so exciting to be there for her arrival. She is thirteen months old and also very frail. To me, she looked as if she was only a month old. I noticed that she never cried and her eyes would follow people in the room but she would never turn her head. One of the house moms told me that this is because she was too weak and malnourished to turn her head and she had no energy to even cry. I was silenced.

It's hard to tell people about my time in Malawi, I feel like the words can't find their way to my mouth and I'm at a loss. Our ministry and time in Malawi can feel so small when I think of the collection of little things we did. We are just a page in the lives of these kids but they are a favorite page in my life, a page I so often return to, a page that has been worn and well-loved. I am changed and better having known these kids. Life keeps on and I'll think of them everyday and I'll be sad for a while and reminisce with a smile or a tear and pray for the chance to set my feet on Malawian soil again.