Dear partners and friends,

A few days ago I walked into the clinic, into the incubator room, and found Manuela, our missionary from Switzerland in tears holding in her arms, the tinniest little scrap of human being, our little Andrew, only a few weeks old battling for his life.
His mum had been a mentally disturbed lady, who ran away from the traditional birth attendant when she gave birth to Andrew and who, after the family found her and took her to the hospital, ran away again. The results were, that she died because excess bleeding.
The father was no were to be found, probably not even known.
Within days of admission, Andrew developed full blown Aids. It was Manuela her first time to come across such a painful situation. It is heart rendering to see the suffering and pain of a child in that condition, we will never get used to it. The little blessing has now entered the Kondanani Nursery in Heaven. From the arms of Manuela into the Arms of Jesus, he is at peace now.
An other one of the 5 babies admitted in the last month does not look good, she is only 5 pounds we can't get the Anti Retroviral Drugs, for her, because she is to young. But it looks as if the dreaded disease which plaques our country is attacking her as well.

As I already mentioned we have admitted 5 babies in the last month, although we receive them with joy, it does mean that mothers are dying, leaving their little ones behind.
We will do everything in the power of God to meet as many needs of our children as we as we can. We are so aware of the love we need to give them, and develops their talents. The older they get,(one of them is nearly ten, that will be the oldest), the more we have to look at the needs as far as development is concerned.

We have quite an orchestra going, in March I am told, they are going to hold a performance. 5 piano players, 6 guitar, 2 clarinet and 6 recorder players. I bought a set of drums in RSA and a cello is on it's way from the UK soon. I can't wait to hear the Sound of Music from our children.
We have also employed an art teacher for special lessons as we have noticed some very talented artiest among the children which also has to be developed.

Martin has started a running club and they hoop to out run him, they can't quite get it right yet, but it may just happened one day..

Linda has our children's choir singing like nightingales, I just love it.

Of course being naughty is part of the deal with the children. There is always a lot of fruit on our premises, it is being used for the children. Do you, who is no longer a child remember pinching fruit of the trees, well I do ?
Well of course our blessings are no strangers to that. In front of the school is a big tree loaded with guavas.
When they come to school and at break time when they come back to school, they get searched. There are of course parts of the body we don't think of searching. Kids are clever and we discovered the guavas hidden under their arm pits.
You can't blame them for being intelligent.

They look a lot at Christian television and imitate the preacher, their favourite is an Nigerian, they are quite dramatic the Nigerians. Any time one of the children has a problem the first thing they do is pray, but in the same way as this preacher, it is really funny to watch.
Matthew who is one of our children who is not so bright, he is getting individual attention at present by a volunteer.
During the period she deals with him, and he does not have the answer, he says, come let us pray, he tells her to please close her eyes, and he really believes very strongly. Matthew prays more than he works during this time but at leas at he knows that Jesus is the answer.
The kids have been watching the baptismal service 3 weeks ago in the swimming pool (blow up) at my house.
Their swimming sessions have been turned into baptismal services. To watch them is the most amusing thing ever. None of them have forgotten the right words either.
But you know what, they are not imitating violence.

There is so much going on I loose track sometimes. Every month, the last Wednesday, we have meetings with all the staff, a time were the best gardener or the best cook or who ever is due for the reward, is rewarded. The staff may also put their suggestions into the suggestion box. Always time of great fun too. But I got such a surprise last to find that we now have our very own Kondanani Choir, they surprised me with great songs, AND it was amazing, they are soon going to sing in our city church and I will be very proud of them.

The rains are over and we can now complete all the building work, one of them being the new school which should have been finished at the end of last year but the rains were to heavy. It is going to be beautiful.
We have just had a intense two week training session, with the teachers of our primary school.
We had some great instructors from South Africa, they really did a wonderful job and there is so much enthusiasm among the teacher to give the children their best.

The other building we are desperate to finish is the police house, we are nearly there, it will be a deterrent for thieves. We had a visitor from Holland, from the company who are going to erect an electric fence around our property, he spent one night with us but missed al the fun of last night at midnight.
Actually it is never fun when people break into our property, last night was one of those nights again. Sirens blowing, police shooting. Anyway we are all fine. The angels ARE encamped around and about us.
The amazing thing here is that, we could have had the electric fence already, but the government of Malawi wants us to pay 15.000 Euros for import duty..
It is amazing, we invest into the future of their children, and this is the way they treat us, it is wrong, in fact I believe if our President knew he would make sure that the children are protected and the goods would come in duty free.
If you a person of prayer please pray about this. We are fighting the issue. Our girls are growing up they are very beautiful and it would be horrible if something happened to them or the missionaries who have been threatened with rape on several occasions by now.

The new farm has to be build, we have had over 80 new piglet's in the last 6 weeks, quite frankly at some stage I stood with my hands in my hair thinking what do I do, but a farmer makes a plan.
In February we have had 3 new calves and more coming, the herd is growing and it is very exciting.
It is so sweet to see the calves jumping in the fields.

I am of to South Africa in exactly one half hour. I have the privileged to speak at various conferences of the Assemblies of God in Pietermaritburg, East London, Port Elizabeth, Cape Town and Johannesburg. I am ready to share my heart is full of the children of Africa.

Love you all in His Service.
Annie Chikhwaza and all the Kondananians.