Written by CorpsAfrica/Maroc Volunteer Mr. Redwane Hamma

It was 15th December, 2019, I woke early. It was still dark because my country uses summer time. I got dressed quickly then I did my religious obligation. After that, I drank a cup of hot coffee as I always do, and called a taxi to take me to the bus station. After a few minutes, the taxi arrived. I greeted my parents by kissing their heads and got in the taxi. As soon as I arrived at the bus station I got a ticket. Then I put my suitcase in the bottom of the bus and took my seat. The driver comes and rings to passengers to take their seats and the 8 o’clock trip began. My destination is Marrakech but I got down in Inzgen because me and Ali (who is my mate in service) decided to meet there in order to take another bus to Marrakech together. It was a very long trip but fortunately we broke the boredom by talking and we still felt the long trip. We were very tired because it took more than we expected. Finally we arrived to our destination about 8 pm. Without any hesitation we took a taxi to Jamaa El Fena and looked for an appropriate hotel to rest. A few moments later, we went out to take dinner and to withdraw some money, then came back to our room in the hotel that we booked.

The followed morning was 16th December, 2019. We woke up early I took a quick shower then directly we arranged our suitcases then we went out to meet our mate Samba who is an Exchange Volunteer from Senegal. After approximately half an hour our coordinator sent us the location of the place where we met so we joined him right away. It took about five minutes to be there. We found he already booked three seats so we just arranged to put our luggage in the trunk of the taxi, but it was not enough so we just put the rest next to our seats. We didn’t have to wait for the other seats to be full because there were two people already waiting, so the driver started the engine and went to Setti Fadma, which surprised me and we discovered the transportation to our sites. At this time, we didn’t know yet how our sites would look!

We waited more than we expected and no transportation yet. We took breakfast and lunch and we waited more than two hours. Finally the transportation came on our lucky windy day. We did not have a choice to look for better transportation thus we did not refuse to go in. We put our luggage in the back and we got in on the back above some boxes and bottle gases. We spent about two hours to reach Agrd Norton, where Ali is serving. It is the same site where we collected data during pre service training. We decided to go to Samba’s site first. 
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The first house we entered in the village was not our host family, we just enter because the driver who took us knows the owner so he helped us to find a house. The driver and another man went out while we are still setting in this home without knowing our next destination. After a while the driver and the other man came back informing us to go out with them to our host family and where we will stay during our service. It was going to be dark and was also windy and it seems it would snow. We talked for a little bit with our host father, because both of us were tired, we went quickly to sleep. I felt as if I did not sleep enough even I slept all night. I was the first one who woke up then I found the whole village white. I called my friend Samba who said it is his first time to see the snow. 

Written by CorpsAfrica/Malawi Volunteer Ms. Angella Chizimba 

Dear reader, 

I hope you're all well and staying safe considering the circumstances that we are all in. It's hard not to lose the spirit these days. I have been thinking about writing on the cloth face masks topic that has been so popular with this Covid-19 pandemic. I had a very divided opinion on this and the benefits of using them until one of the groups am working with on a Community Lead Development Project made them. This quickly spiraled into making them full time for the care of others in the community. 

Fact is that, you cannot sew face masks without believing in them if you want to stay sane. As weird as this may sound, sewing face masks isn't an easy job. You can spend the whole day on your sewing machine only to come up with 50 masks or less, that’s after spending hours and hours cutting your cotton material.

Wearing a mask, even a makeshift cotton mask, is better that wearing none. In a society where people can wear a disposable mask five times or more, worse enough washing a disposable mask to be reused the next day, makeshift masks is ideal and affordable.  Well, I was so shocked when I saw one of the community members hanging a disposable face mask on a dryer, and after I asked her why she did that, she said "Everyone does this, and you do not expect me to be buying this every single day."  Of course, I shared how makeshift masks are meant to me reused after a good washing but not these disposable masks. I could go endlessly about the benefits of making face masks locally.

There are indeed serious benefits of wearing/making makeshift fabric masks. I have also included some insights from the group I have been working with in making these face masks. Firstly, one lady told me that making face masks helps her to have a get away from the constant feeling of helplessness in a global crisis like this and other issues in the community, we can easily feel overwhelmed and absolutely powerless. Actively doing something gives her a sense of self-empowerment.  You are not stopping the pandemic by making a handful of masks, but being able to help even the tiniest amount makes her feel better. Secondly, active solidarity can really help lift up your mood. Taking part in sewing face masks will make you feel less alone, this has been helpful to me as am usually alone in my house. Thirdly, some of these group members gather small cloth materials to make face-masks for their family members and friends and they receive really great feedback. Whether they wear them or not, but everyone likes a little care. Being a pro-social and helping others reinforces your sense of fulfillment and relatedness to others. 
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Lastly and more importantly, these face masks are offered at a low cost. They are affordable for everyone to buy, everyone's safety is taken at heart and considered. They are easy and can be made from de-stashing and de-cluttering fabric pole. You don't have to necessarily buy new material, we can use old cotton scraps. Let's make the current situation less scary! Making cotton face masks can help people in local communities access them easily and affordably.