Wheelchairs
Only those who live with the experience can understand the terror that rests with each effort to leave the house, and cross a road or highway if you are like Samson.
Samson Chiloti knows it well, for he makes the trip often. As is the case with so many of the people of Malawi he does not know his exact age, but he surmises he is somewhere around 50. Neither does he know anything about the reason for his handicap. He has lived with it since birth.
Samson lives near Lake Malawi in the trading center called Salima. It is an intersection where large numbers of big lorries pass each day on their way south toward Blantyre, or on their trek north toward Mzuzu or on up into Tanzania. He is from the tiny village of Kambwiri, which is under the jurisdiction of the Tribal Chief by the same name. He is married and has three children, aged 14, 21 and 28. Samson is a peasant farmer, but has spent almost all of his life unable to work his land. He has had to watch as his wife leave the house each day in order to do his work in the field.
Today Samson has become one of the lucky ones. He now has a tricycle. But the Malawi countryside is dotted with men and women like George who make their way day after day up to the edge of the roadside in an attempt to cross safely under the vision level of the lorry driver. Who can imagine the terror that one feels as he or she crawls to the edge of the highway, then looks up at the giant steel monster bearing down on them?
The Malawi Project/Blessings Complex is working with the Free Wheelchair Mission in order to bring much-needed wheelchairs to the handicapped people of Malawi. During 2006 alone the Project made available and distributed 1,100 wheelchairs to the needy in Malawi. The stories listed here are just a few of the many stories that have come as a result of this distribution.
The Difference a Wheelchair Can Make
These are a few of the stories of people who have received wheelchairs thanks to a cooperative effort between the Malawi Project, Blessings Hospital, and the Free Wheelchair Mission.
