Together, With No Flinching — By John Huddle
John Huddle recently traveled to Malawi, Africa on a Villages in Partnership Friendship trip. Read about the life-changing relationships and incredible resilience he experienced firsthand.
A New Journey Begins
Six months after hearing the name “Villages in Partnership” for the first time, I found myself on a flight to Malawi to experience a Villages in Partnership Friendship trip. Irony was smirking because as I was boarding a flight for a “Friendship” Trip, I was fresh off of exiting a beloved nonprofit I served with for fifteen years of epic friendship – fifteen years of marathon running, international travel, building teams and finding and experiencing the deepest friendships of my life. Those friendships will never end, I know…but transition is transition; it is hard; and this “Friendship Trip” came at a moment when my friends felt far away.
Launching Friendships Without Flinching
I boarded the flight and began the long clumsy walk to my seat. At the second cross aisle, I recognized Gayle, a VIP board member and Friendship Trip team member whose face I recognized from her LinkedIn picture. She stood next to Phil, her super-tall husband, and when she saw me her face kind of popped into a surprised smile and she said, “Oh hey!” but before her greeting was done I had nervously and ridiculously already gone in for the hug, with my cross body bag yanking down one arm and my backpack bumping another passenger. Gayle did NOT flinch but gave me a huge hug and smiled again, and then off I went to my seat. No flinching moments like that launch friendships. We would not speak again until the Visa line in Blantyre where her son and daughter (also tall) and husband all discussed a variety of topics, laughed together, clearly liking one another (ha!), and as the small Visa office space filled up with exhausted travelers, I thought, “I’ll just tuck in with this amazing family,” and…they let me…
Hariet’s Story: Unwavering Resilience
The next afternoon, Gayle and I with our friends Abby and Liz, sat at the feet of an amazing woman named Hariet. We learned she was experiencing extreme poverty while supporting four children – on her own. After two years of partnering with VIP, Hariet developed a business raising goats and growing crops. But just as momentum grew, her oldest son, Francis, began to experience constant epileptic seizures. The condition forced him out of school. Hariet didn’t flinch. Francis is big, a teenager, and would need to be transported; so she liquidated resources to secure regular travel to Khanda Health Center. Khanda Health Center is a VIP-developed medical facility serving over 25 villages in Zomba. Medication is free but transportation is costly. It wiped out Hariet’s peanut harvest and her fertilizer budget. But she got Francis to Khanda. And Francis shared that because of his mother’s sacrifice, he has fully recovered!
Hariet now makes bricks to stay afloat – walking two hours one-way to the river to work at a Kiln. And though her partner had left and her resources were depleted, I still saw a fire and a firm strength in Hariet. Her home has a dirt floor but is perfectly kept. She has a malata “metal” roof and her yard is perfectly swept. Her goats are tethered to the tree out front – and she has vision for next year!
Cultivating Hope Together
“Francis has recovered,” she said, “and he is stronger. We will continue the piece work (brick making), while saving for inputs (fertilizer).” The goats will give birth (“kidding”) again, and this time they will hold onto the kids to grow that portion of their business. Again, there are huge challenges ahead, but with Hariet, there is just no flinching. Why??
In her quiet and resolved voice, Hariet noted repeatedly…she knows God is with her family and she is with VIP. She used the word “partner” and “beneficiary” multiple times to capture her relationship with VIP and credited prayer and God’s presence in VIP’s work for the hope she feels. Ruth Mkhola, VIP Malawi’s Health and Nutrition Coordinator, works closely with Hariet’s family. Watching them laugh together, the strength of their friendship was obvious. Community members like Hariet and Francis often face crushing hopelessness. Through Village Implementation Committees, Savings and Loan groups, and Demonstration Farm programs, VIP staff bring tangible hope!
We ended our time with Hariet by presenting gifts and the family warmly received them. Watching Ruth and Hariet and thinking of the connection I already felt with my Friendship Team members, I thought of a statement C.S. Lewis makes in his book The Four Loves: “It is when we are doing things together that friendship springs up—painting, sailing ships, praying, philosophizing, and fighting shoulder to shoulder. Friends look in the same direction.”
Throughout the day at Hariet’s home or later that day with Dorothy Makawa’s family or at the unbelievable Samani irrigation scheme or while I stood on the back of a flatbed truck singing in Chechewa as a group of us traveled to the river to shovel sand for mortar, I saw friendships forming – the love of God guiding people from radically different contexts into friends who look in the same direction. This is what VIP does – VIP cultivates history-changing friendships, with no flinching.
Visit Malawi
Search no further. When I first boarded that plane, I was grieving a significant season of transition into a brand new community, wondering where I could find such meaningful connection again. What I found in Malawi—with Gayle’s family, with Ruth, and sitting on a mat with Hariet—was a reminder that true friendship isn’t lost; it’s waiting for us whenever we choose to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with others.
The opportunity to make a lasting impact and build these life-changing relationships isn’t somewhere down the road—our next VIP Friendship Trips are filling up now. Don’t wait. Step up, join an upcoming trip, and experience what happens when we stop searching and start walking together.
Related Posts
