An Invitation to the Dinner
Last year while teaching a Social Studies class at Andiamo Secondary School, I had to share with the students the meaning of “Dilemma” and to give some examples of dilemmas. Among the examples I failed to give was the one many Malawians will face this year.
Many will have to choose between paying for medicine and die because of the complication of taking drugs on an empty stomach or to buy food and die of the curable ailments because they opted for food. How I wish I gave this example of a dilemma that we face now!
The media report that the food situation in Malawi is from “bad to worse”. Quoting the latest Oxfam report on the food situation in the country, The Nation of Tuesday, 12 January 2016 reports that, “at least two million people will struggle to find enough food for the survival at the household level”. The November report titled Entering Unchartered Waters: El Nino and the Threat to Food Security Reads:
“Floods followed by drought have cut Malawi’s maize production by more than a quarter. Between two and three million people may face food crises by February.”
Why am I sharing with you all this? It is because you care. In the gatherings like this before, where you eat the food that the peasants of Italy ate, you have shared your love for us. Through gatherings like this, you have, with your contributions helped to treat over 70,000 patients in 2015 and most of whom are children.
It is through a gathering like this that a dilemma explained above would be avoided. We therefore join hands with you on 29 January in Bergamo for the “Poor Dinner” as we put our drops of love together forming an ocean of solidarity for our Comfort Community Hospital in Balaka, MALAWI. Your presence means a lot.
By Patrick