One of my projects while I’m in Malawi is to design simple furniture for the orphan care center in Namitete. I’ll also work with local carpenters to get the pieces built.

Malawi has very few orphanages; instead, the focus is on orphan care centers (OCCs). Most orphans live with members of their families, usually an uncle, aunt, or grandmother. OCCs take care of the orphans from morning until evening, providing them with food, activities, and in the case of younger children, pre-school.

The orphan care center in Namitete opened in 2006; the buildings are new and well-built. Unfortunately, with no furniture and little organization, the interior spaces do not match the exterior. Without a properly-considered interior environment, the center is far from living up to its potential.

In each of the classrooms, materials and toys are assembled in piles. The piles are disorganized, dirty, and dangerous, as they’re breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Each time I moved items in the piles, a crowd of mosquitoes came flying out. I never thought that shelves could be used to prevent malaria.

This last pile has the added problem of having two Chibuku beer cartons in the mix of toys (Yes, these containers are used as toys.)

The OCC in Namitete also demonstrates the value of shade. People flock to any shade available, and the community congregates most often in the central shaded pavillion.

Lastly, the playground is also a great start, but it could use some more work. (…and shade? Who said that all playgrounds had to be uncovered?)

Working list of requirements for the toys that I will develop here:

•Cool

•Cute

•Foward-looking

•Fun

•Free for village children 

•Made from local and natural materials

•Built by children themselves

•Engaging play patterns that involve construction, mechanics, imagination, storytelling

…so that they don’t have to play with (used) condoms (found on the beach).

In Cape Maclear this weekend, I came across three boys making their own toys. The cars were made out of milk boxes, jar lids, and dried reeds.

Last week, I talked with a specialist in early childhood development. She said that in the villages, boys make their own cars such as these, while girls pretend that corn cobs and bottles are dolls. Unfortunately, the cobs don’t last very long, and the bottles can be sold to recyclers, making them too valuable to be used as toys. (To me, these improvised dolls are much more heartbreaking than the cars, which are simple but also kind of cool. Maybe that’s just a personal bias, and I have yet to see the dolls, since they’re mostly kept indoors.) Children will also sometimes use scrap bricks as building blocks.

I was told that there wasn’t any McDonald’s in Malawi.

(LNS = Lilongwe Nature Sanctuary)