My name is Anna Gleave, and I am a US-based professional photographer. I had the opportunity to fly to Blantyre this spring for a week to learn about the happenings at Open Arms, photograph the people and events, and most importantly, snuggle with the babies.
I am excited to do a series of posts about my experiences in Malawi with Open Arms and to share some of my photographs! My first post is an excerpt from my personal blog that I wrote while in Africa. It encapsulates my feelings and what I learned overall from my time with the children at Open Arms.
In chichewa, chikondi means love. The first malawian friend I made was a woman sitting next to me on the plane. Her name? Chikondi.
And the first baby I fell in love with at open arms was a little boy with HIV. His name? Chikondi. Before this year, I never knew I could have a heart so big or such a capacity to love. Through service, I’ve learned about what it means to love and how important it is to love. I realised a little bit of christ’s love for us. My week in malawi taught me so much about unconditional love. About the need to feel the warmth of another’s love and the need to give of your love freely to others. The babies run around the whole orphanage with their hands straight up, asking to be hugged and cuddled. If you sit down for a second, you’ve got twelve of them crawling all over you, snuggling right up to you! How could you help but not snuggle them right up, with faces like this?
Love is so important to share and to feel and to receive. If nothing else, my experiences in africa taught me how to better and more freely share my love to all.
chikondi to all of you.
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