CORPSAFRICA
  • Home
  • About
    • About us >
      • The Model
      • Human-Centered Design
      • Impact
      • Development Partners
      • Junior CorpsAfrica
    • Team >
      • Staff
      • Board of Directors
      • Advisory Council
    • Work With Us
    • Press
    • Videos
    • Testimonials
    • Contact us
  • Countries
    • Morocco
    • Senegal
    • Malawi
    • Rwanda
    • Ghana
    • Kenya
  • Volunteers
    • Meet the Volunteers >
      • Morocco Volunteers >
        • Group 1 Morocco
        • Group 2 Morocco
        • Group 3 Morocco
        • Group 4 Morocco
        • Group 5 Morocco
        • Group 6 Morocco
      • Malawi Volunteers >
        • Group 1 Malawi
        • Group 2 Malawi
        • Group 3 Malawi
        • Group 4 Malawi
        • Group 5 Malawi
        • Group 6 Malawi
      • Senegal Volunteers >
        • Group 1 Senegal
        • Group 2 Senegal
        • Group 3 Senegal
        • Group 4 Senegal
        • Group 5 Senegal
        • Group 6 Senegal
      • Rwanda Volunteers >
        • Group 1 Rwanda
        • Group 2 Rwanda
        • Group 3 Rwanda
    • Podcast - "My CorpsAfrica Story"
    • Featured Projects >
      • Dzaleka Basketball Court
      • Kitchen Gardens
      • Coronavirus Response
    • Featured Volunteers
    • Alumni Association
    • Apply
  • Events
    • Events >
      • PROJECTing Resilience
    • All Country Conference
  • Blog
  • Donate
    • Donate to CorpsAfrica
    • Pay It Forward Campaign
    • Holbrooke Campaign
    • Corporate Council for CorpsAfrica
    • Planned Giving
    • Amazon Smile

There are No Girls

1/11/2022

3 Comments

 
​Written by CorpsAfrica/Malawi Volunteer Ms. Funani Matemba 

The first month in my community was full of mixed emotions. It was both tiring and interesting. Most community members came to my house to greet and welcome me in the community. I should confess, I have never been greeted by a lot of people like this in a space of a month. I still can't remember most of their faces, let alone their names.

Among these people was a man whom I still remember because of an interesting conversation we had. As I was learning from him about the community, I asked him about the youths and specifically the girls. To my surprise, he answered, “The youths stopped meeting because of Covid-19 and there are no girls in this community.” I laughed because I thought he was trying to be funny, but he was very serious about it. I asked him how this was so, and he explained that most of the girls in the community are married and some are single teenage mothers. I later found out that this is true. On my first meeting with some of the girls, despite being the oldest in the room I felt so young as they all told me that they have babies. There are a lot of girls in my community who dropped out of school and are raising their kids alone in their parent’s homes. Some got married to their fellow teenagers and they are living independently. Some girls want to go back to school. 

Recently I learnt of the death of a teen mother in the community. A huge rock fell on her while trying to mine sand to sell so she could support herself hand her child. This is one example of the struggles these young mothers are facing. This has made me realize that there is more to being a CorpsAfrica Volunteer than facilitating development projects in my community. I hope my service will help to change the plight of some girls in my community as I work to mentor and inspire them to remain in school and have big dreams for their future.
Picture
Some of the girls in my community and myself after our meeting
Picture
Some of the girls during one of our meetings
3 Comments
Tamanda Chateka
1/12/2022 02:53:57 am

Such an eye opening revelation of the unfortunate things happening in our country.

Reply
David Chibaka
2/11/2022 08:24:00 am

This is the reality of life in our rural communities in Malawi. There doesn't seem to be any effort by authoritiesto address such issues.

Funani, the little you can do to assist such girls shall go along way in enhancing the qualify of their life for ever.

Reply
Wilfred Ntengula
2/16/2022 10:52:22 pm

This is really an exciting experience. Covid 19 has really left an impact in the communities more especially the youths. Early pregnancies, early marriages, sexually transmitted infections, depression, and some even lost parents. As an anchor and volunteer, champion the preventive measures for our societies to be healed and thus the 3Ws and creating a demand for vaccines. Myths and misinformation are the greatest barriers but with a good strategy behaviours change is achieved. In the surrounding communities where I work, I managed to convince 460 people who came voluntarily for a jab.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Support
    Welcome
    ​to the CorpsAfrica Volunteer Blog! 
    Get an inside look at the experiences of CorpsAfrica Volunteers in the field.

    Archives

    December 2022
    November 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    August 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016

    RSS Feed

Picture