A fresh look at Mary’s Meals – and at some dodgy attitudes

Fiona’s mum and sister (Sheila and Jennie) have been out visiting us and staying at our house, while we stay with Davina, our landlady (and good friend and advisor!).  Fiona has been excited for ages about them coming – I dread to think what she’ll be like when they go home today.  They’ve been amazed by Malawi, but it was only after 8 days of being here that we actually visited a Mary’s Meals project.  It was ‘an eye-opener’ – and good for me to see their reaction as if through fresh eyes.  It was necessary too to give them a roundup of opinions on aid.

 To be honest, lots of expats in Malawi are anti-aid.  They think that it’s a handout, or they think that aid gets hoovered up by government, because the current trend among most big donors is to put it into the national government, never to be seen again.  There are lots of good arguments for and against this approach.  But I think a lot of the scepticism is denial – denying that there is a problem of poverty in front of their eyes and that it could and should be addressed.  Doesn’t that denial make life much easier?  Well, not for those who don’t get help as a result of it.

 There is even a basically racist belief that Malawi doesn’t develop because its people are lazy or don’t have the frenzied work ethic of Westerners: they even think that providing basic life-savers like anti-malarials or food will ‘spoil’ people with luxury.  Let me say clearly that almost every single person I have met is hard working (with long hours), uncomplaining, and remarkably tolerant of outsiders taking a dim view of their country.

One observation by expats is that people here don’t seem in a hurry.  But people don’t walk slowly because they’re lazy – they walk slowly in Malawi (and a worldwide survey confirms that people in Blantyre do walk slowly!) because they have miles to walk.  Or they’ve had malaria.  Or life is difficult so why not take your time, especially when you’re not in control of every minute?  These attitudes are sensible here and not crimes of the century, and not reasons to damn every man, woman and child in the country.  Some expats are just irrational – they think that people standing around on the street are being lazy – er, not e.g. waiting for a truck to pick them up?  Or a colleague?  Or any number of quite reasonable reasons to be standing on the street???  Its more telling about our prejudices than anything else.

 There are challenges in the aid world, but I can say, hand on heart, that Mary’s Meals is tackling real problems effectively and efficiently, and that it respects the people that are benefiting from it.  It is certainly not ‘ruining’ people with luxury – just giving them some basics for a chance at a better future.

 Sheila and Jennie, after a fun and thankfully safe, trouble-free trip are leaving with a positive picture of Malawi, and I can’t hope for more than that.  Well, I can! – they are also going home determined to fundraise to support the children they met.