My grandparents had what was known at the time as a 'houseboy.' His name was Joseph and became very close to my family, so close that he named all of his children after us! The photo below shows all of them and I will be looking at tracking them down and finally meeting them after all these years...
My first fundraiser is a bungee jump due to take place on November 1st in Datchet and on the fifth day of fundraising I'm past the £450 mark which is more than I ever expected to raise in total let alone after just a few days.
My aim is to spend a month over in Malawi, if I can raise the money, I'll stay for two and hopefully by the end of it all I wont want to leave. If I go along with my current plan, I'll most likely be working in an orphanage just outside Blantyre, in the south of Malawi.
There are only 22 members of staff and 8 volunteers caring for 350 orphans so they are grossly outnumbered and sadly this is the case for the majority of orphanages and schools in the area.
There are over half a million children in Malawi that have been orphaned by AID and at the end of 2007, an estimated 91,000 children in Malawi were living with HIV.
More than anything this blog will be used to keep everyone up to date with my progress and more importantly, I hope to document the time prior to my departure and write about my experiences on my return.
If you think you can do anything to help, get in touch x
