Visit Every City

August 15th, 2023

I enjoy sitting outside in the mornings with a hot cup of coffee. I can hear the village outside beginning to stir as the sun peaks over the top of the fence. The Chapamba family has a beautiful garden that seems to glow in the sunlight. While NYC has a lot of outdoor green space, there’s something special about having a quiet yard to enjoy on a sunny morning when things are still quiet.

I wrote for a while and finished my coffee. Soon enough it was time to actually get ready for the day. We would be heading into Lilongwe with Cephas and George to meet up with Haiton so we could go visit some of our brethren. We stopped at the UCG church hall in Mchesi where one of our vehicles could be left. In front of the hall there are still shops constructed by LifeNets. Juliana, a member of the Church, runs the internet cafe. There’s a security company who rents out a small office. A lady runs a salon next to that. There were patrons coming and going when we stopped by which was really nice to see. It was really great to catch up with Juliana and see her still working hard there.

The neighborhood of Mchesi is almost the same as it was before, especially past the LifeNets shops. We drove through the neighborhood on our way out of town. It was still relatively early and we had a two hour drive ahead of us so we couldn’t stand around and fellowship all morning. We grabbed a few cold drinks from a nearby shop and headed down the road, south along the road that eventually leads to Blantyre (M1).

One evening in 2017, Lena and I had agreed to drive Fraser Nyalubwe home. He assured us it wouldn’t take more than an hour to get there. We figured with that calculation we could drop him off, pick up the goods he had for us, say hello to his wife Jesse, and get back to the tarmac while there would be a little daylight left. We ended up seeing some incredible views of the sun setting just behind Ngala Hill on our way into the village. It was completely dark by the time we arrived so we couldn’t really see the place and it ended up being a very short visit. Somehow we made our way home that evening even though we hadn’t been to the Nyalubwe’s village before.

On the way there this time, I wasn’t driving so I could take photos of the surrounding mountains and fields. We were headed to Cephas’s birthplace, a place he had known well once upon a time. There used to be buses that would venture out along decently maintained dust roads but those days are long gone. Now mostly bicycles and motorcycles (and a couple of cars and trucks) drive to the village.

It was nice to visit for a while with The Nyalubwe family. Jesse is Cephas’s older sister and the head woman of the village. She and Fraser have been experiencing some health trials which have slowed down their lives in some ways recently. It was also nice to see their granddaughter Ivy who was just a small girl when Lena and I first met her. She came to Sabbath services in Lilongwe very often and was always all smiles.

We sat and talked, shared a meal, drank some coffee (Nick and I drank coffee), did some anointing, visited with anther relatives next door, and viewed some of the local wildlife. There’s a certain tree in the village where some very loud birds live. We’re told they make their squawking noise almost all the time, although when the clouds cleared and the sun came out, they quieted down. They are some kind of stork and there are probably 20 of them who inhabit that tree. The bottom of the tree is nearly all white, “painted” by the bird droppings from above, as George had put it.

We drove the two hours back to town and then headed to Area 11 in Lilongwe to visit Mrs. Chipilingu. Along the way Cephas told the Malawian fable of the mountains arguing. One particular mountain wasn’t the biggest but was the loudest since he had a very large mouth. To this day you can see the open smiling mouth of Ngala whose name means Mountain With a Mouth.

Elizabeth Chipilingu has only lived in Lilongwe for a couple of years, but she has lived in Malawi for 59 years. She came here from South Africa where she worked at a nurse. She has lived most of her life in Blantyre, but had to move to Lilongwe after suffering a stroke in 2020 to live with her grandchildren. She does her best to stay positive by reading her Bible, praying for her brethren, and also calling her brethren all over Malawi to encourage them. Mrs. Chipilingu is a wonderful example to all of faith, endurance, and God’s agape love. While we were with her, she gave us some updates on her situation, sharing a story of God’s healing and asking for our prayers — her left side is still weakened from the effects of the stroke although she is able to walk around the house by herself with a cane. While her body has been weakened, her mind remains sharp. She clearly recalls many of the people she’s met who have visited Malawi through the years, and sent her greetings to them.

After leaving Mrs. Chipilingu, we dropped Haiton off at the church hall to collect his vehicle. On our way there we had the pleasure of being stopped in traffic so the swift-moving presidential motorcade could pass through the city streets without interruption. We speculated that more of the country’s roads would be better paved if the president had to drive on them. Maybe buses could again visit the villages near the home of the Nyalubwe family if the president had to pay them a visit. After dropping Haiton off, we headed to the Lilongwe City Mall where there are usually ATMs that can be used even after hours. I always know someone there will try to sell something to me. Lena and I had befriended a few guys who would at least give us a good deal on greeting cards sometimes, but I doubt they are still there selling things. We ended up buying some fresh local strawberries from a young man. They were pretty tasty. We arrived home earlier than we had the night before, but still probably stayed up too late talking around the dinner table.

– Lewis VanAusdle