Madagascar Mission: July 4 Activities

Note from your email administrator, Judy Maritato: thanks to all who participated in today's Zoom! A recap will be included in an upcoming email. 

Hello from Madagascar! This is Josh again, writing after an eventful July 4 in the south. The day before we left, Sue and Simon's son Matthew told me to expect a life-changing trip. I assumed he was right but didn't understand what he meant until yesterday. We'll get to that; but first…

THE LOST LUGGAGE

For those following this saga: This should be the last time I'll need to type those words! We've received word that the two missing bags have arrived in Fort Dauphin and are beingsent by taxi-brousse to Amboasary, where we're working this week. We should see them today. I'm looking forward to wearing different clothes, playing my melodica and Walkman, and (big sigh of relief) having access to my final week of anti-malaria pills. More importantly, we'll be able to distribute the bag of Days For Girls supplies. 

Thank you for your prayers over these bags. They've meant more than you can imagine, and God is good.

Air France has dealt with their mistake pretty well. No complaints from me. To quote a song Lea and I love, "Things happen; that's all they ever do." That said, during the course of our negotiations, it became clear the airline would rather pay us for the contents of the bags than provide ground transport, or any service outside their established routine, to deliver the bags themselves. The bags are traveling two-plus hours from the airport only because over the past 11 years, Sue and Simon have made many friends here, and those friends — and those friends' friends, whom I've never met — are extremely generous with their time. 

Air France's calculation — paying money over being inconvenienced — is aggravating but understandable. I pay for convenience every day. I could learn to seal my own driveway, but every couple years I pay a guy named Dr. Blacktop to do it instead. So I don't blame Air France for offering to pay what to them would be a pittance: $1,000+ for the DfG supplies, and probably a few hundred bucks for my odds and ends. In America and Western Europe, if we have stable incomes, this is simply how we think.

DANCING IN AMBOASARY

On July 4 morning, we drove to the church in Amboasary to meet Rev. Antsa, her husband Dada Liva, the kids whose private education we sponsor, and their families. Education means the world to them, and it's closely linked to their Christian faith. Our translator Fiadanana, a hilarious 23-year-old guy who also oversees the child sponsorship program and does a million other things besides, said as much during our commute. He's a pastor's kid, like me, who for several years walked two hours each way to take English lessons, and now studies agronomy at university. Education allows people to break the cycle of low-wage jobs; to better understand the forces that shape their day-to-day encounters; to reflect on God's Word; and to learn how to keep learning, all their lives.

The morning was abuzz with activity. The Malagasy really know how to do welcoming committees. We were greeted with songs and dancing and ushered into the church, where we sang hymns and prayed. The sponsored children introduced themselves one by one, and then Sue led a Bible study based on English country dancing, which verged on chaos but left everyone laughing and listening. We broke into small groups: the grownups for Bible study, the kids to color and receive the friendship bracelets some of you had made. They LOVED the bracelets.

During the coloring, I met Faniry, the girl my family has sponsored for several years. She shyly joined the group of kids I was coloring with and showed me her page, which was very well executed — inside the lines, different shading techniques, really top-notch coloring. I began working up a polite message for Fiadanana to give her at the close of our visit. God had a different idea.

MEETING FANIRY'S FAMILY

As we were packing up, Fiadanana told me Faniry's family wanted me to visit their house. I made sure we had enough time in our schedule, and then walked with Fiadanana, Faniry, and a group of children a quarter mile or so to the house.

Like the other neighborhood houses, it was a simple wooden structure with a concrete floor and a tin roof. There were at least three rooms. The first contained the remnants of a cooking fire. In the second, a group of adults was seated on straw mats, waiting for me. The children peered in through the windows. I didn't see inside the third room, sectioned off by a sheet of repurposed fabric. Nor did I see any furniture. 

At some point, someone brought out a metal bowl of steaming sweet potatoes and cassava roots and set it in the middle of the mat.

Faniry's father and I exchanged conversation through Fiadanana. Here's the gist:

They were honored that I'd agreed to visit their home without hesitation. 

I was honored to be invited into their home, and I was proud of Faniry for continuing her studies.

They were grateful to be able to send Faniry to school, because it meant she wouldn't have to work in the fields.

I have two children myself, whom I love very much, so I know how much they love Faniry.

At this point Fiadanana and I started breaking apart the roots and eating them. I told them, truthfully, that the potatoes were sweeter than American sweet potatoes, and I explained the Thanksgiving holiday, how families come together to eat sweet potatoes (among other things) and give thanks.

As we finished, I thanked them for their generosity. Unsaid in all this was the depth of that generosity. Along with rice, these roots are the main daily food of the people in the area. When there is drought, as there was this past spring, they often go without the roots. Both Fiadanana and Faniry herself have told me that, without those roots, the children can get so hungry they don't want to attend school. 

I have no idea how many cassava and potatoes the family has on hand now. But to be offered a heaping bowl so close to a time of hardship… I'm still searching for the words to convey how overwhelmed it makes me feel.

Afterwards we shook hands and Fiadanana took our photo outside their home. 

If you sponsor children, whether through this program or another like World Vision, know that it means much more than you can imagine. For less than the price of the stuff in my missing bag — stuff Air France would have happily paid me for, payment I would've grumblingly but readily accepted -— God can use what we have to change lives.

At Faniry's house, I shared a moment I'll never forget with fellow children of God. Our economic inequity is real. Nobody has a solution for it, though we keep trying. But inside that home, the light of God shone through Faniry and her family's generosity. I hope to God it shone through me. And I'm thankful, beyond my ability to express, for the chance to encounter it.

FINAL LUGGAGE UPDATE KNOCK ON WOOD

Our drivers, Armand and Roland, just visited my room with the no-longer-missing bags. I might have too-enthusiastically tried to hug them.