Memoirs of That Girl in the Village

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- February 12, 2023

INTRODUCING MZATI WA AFRICA I am sure most of us have heard the saying that young people are tomorrow's leaders! Growing up there was even a song we used to sing, with a chorus that proudly emphasized that we are the leaders of tomorrow . For me, I kept the thought that someday the older folks are going to hand over leadership roles to us when we reach their age. I had thought that in order for one to be a leader one needed to be older, at least maybe 40 years of age. Today the narrative has changed. We know and believe that young people are the leaders now! They are the idea generators. They are the innovators. They possess creativity, the energy that is enough to transform nations and the world. Being the largest demographic on the globe today, young people need platforms for creativity, innovation, and growth. Despite being the game changers , young people everywhere including in Malawi, often face challenges in transitioning from education to work. Unlike in the ye

Arts For Social and Economic Impact

- January 23, 2023

THE CREATIVITY THAT IS ARTS While the Arts have and continue to play an import ant role globally, in curriculums of most Developing Countries in Africa, Arts is undermined. In Malawi, for instance the success of students has mostly been measured by classroom credit hours in other subjects but Arts. My passion for Arts began 20 years ago when I was in primary school. I remember loving music and dance. Among all my friends, I was well known as the dancer. When I was 10 years old, I loved the Congolese genre of music called Rhumba. Rhumba was the music. The beat in rhumba felt like nothing else. I grew up in church. When I was in secondary school, I envied the choir members at our local church. I was curious to know what made the jazzmen and vocalists unique. Why they were able to make music while the rest of us couldn’t? The piano players were always my favorite. Somehow, at the age 15 my ears had already learnt to distinguish a good pianist from a not so good one. My mind ha

Arts Education and Creativity in the Malawian Arts Industry

- September 30, 2022

Creativity in the Malawian Arts Industry I recently wrote a piece about Arts Education and how we can advance Creativity in the Malawian Arts Industry. Arts is one of my passions and I believe that the establishment of arts centres will contribute alot in the sector of Education in Malawi. I partnered with the Arts Education Partnership in Denver to publish this blogpost and it has been published on their website. Please read my blogpost on: https://www.aep-arts.org/arts-education-and-creativity-in-the-malawian-arts-industry Enjoy!

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

- July 12, 2022

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER In most of the communities where I have worked, the importance of educating a girl child is undermined. I remember visiting one school in one of the rural communities in Neno district where standard 8 class had 1 girl as compared to almost 30 boys in the same class. Records showed that the number of girls was high from junior primary and it kept on dropping as the classes went up. In such communities, it is a huge challenge to help girls to stay in school because the norm is when the girls reach puberty, the goal is to get married. For this one girl, it was only a matter of time before she dropped out as well, because being the only girl in class for her has to take a whole lot of courage. We had checked with the headmaster of the school to tell us the major causes of the dropouts. He confirmed that the girls end up getting married. He further said most of them look at their married friends and believe that they are doing well in life than

Dealing with Intergenerational Poverty in Malawi

- July 08, 2022

Intergenerational Poverty in Malawi We can argue that, quite a number of today’s poor children will become tomorrow’s poor adults. Why? Inheritance is of the most common means by which physical property is transferred from one generation to another in Malawi. However, the design of living for poor Malawians is not necessarily passed on from one generation to the next. Poverty is often associated in people’s minds with misery, but for us who are familiar with rural Malawi will understand that poor families accept their slice of poverty with courage and cheer just like in most developing countries. In Malawi, there are families, who are rich today, and yet they come from poor backgrounds. This upward movement, therefore, indicates that the poor in Malawi are capable of taking full advantage of changing circumstances and greater opportunity. It is important for us to understand that poverty hits children the hardest and threatens their most basic rights to survival, health and nutr

UNDER THE MANGO TREE

- February 04, 2022

UNDER THE MANGO TREE Even though I left Kasungu I still have my heart there. Every time I am working, I remember the experiences and lessons from Kasungu. Kasungu has been part of my career growth. Recently, I had the opportunity of working in Kasungu for a few days. As studies have shown that poverty and menstruation are the key factors associated with school attendance among girls, the new organization am working with, under one project distributes menstrual health kits and provides menstrual education to girls in rural schools as a menstrual hygiene intervention to reduce school absenteeism. The experience of going into the rural schools brought back a lot of good memories; the beautiful local Communities, the traditional dances, the Nsima and Local Chicken and those African Child Smiles. As my colleagues and I were on our job for the day at one particular school, there came a group of four girls in their teens. As opposed to all their friends who were present that day, the

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