Phalombe Distribution
Hearing of the floods in Malawi, we at Drop of Compassion felt a need to do our bit in providing Aid to those who had been affected. In Early January between 5th and 20th 2015 there had been torrential rain and cyclone that travelled throughout Malawi. The government has declared a third of the country to be a disaster zone.
Drop of Compassion team had set out to fund raise for the devastation and during the first two weeks we raised over £42k. Omar and myself volunteered to go out there to take part in the distribution of Aid.
Upon on arriving in Malawi, Blantyre the team on the ground was there to receive us. We went to our accomodation to check-in and were told we will meet up later for our itinerary.
Early 5:00am in the morning we left our accommodation to attend the team briefing organized by AMRA (Asian Muslim Relief Aid) on the Palombe aid, this distribution was set to help 1100 families. During the week the area had been assessed and tickets were distributed (the assessment criteria was very thorough in seeing how badly an individual or family was affected). The school where the distribution was happening was a government run school that was given to (AMRA) as the base to provide the aid.
Upon arriving at the base at approximately 8:00am we found the ground to be very muddy and very soft. Some of the volunteers cars had got stuck en-route. The set up of the aid was very organised, we made lines of the buckets filled with mosquito nets, water tablets, utensils. On one side was the truck which contained the food packs that were also included in the aid. When speaking to some of the volunteers they said an aid pack is beneficial because it helps a family to rebuild their lives. An additional contribution of money K3000 (Approximately £5.00) was also given to the families as they handed in their tickets in. We helped in the distribution of the aid, the teams rotated in the different areas to give everyone an opportunity to do different parts of the distribution.
An article about the distribution and the work we carried was publicized in the local media (Nyasa Times).