We would love to have you! We welcome over 100 visitors to Home of Hope each year.
Please feel free to come for a week or a year...
We have prepared a visitors' welcome pack to help you prepare for your trip to Mchinji, Malawi. We recommend you read it thoroughly before finalising your travel plans. While life at the Home is comfortable, Malawi is a third world country. We want to help you make the most of your visit.
Ideas for helping
Whatever you would like to help with when you're here, we suggest you bring anything you need with you (eg hammers, musical instrument). It is not always easy, or indeed possible, to purchase things here. A full list of ideas can be found here.
- Loving, playing with, chatting with the kids;
- Engineers, builders, plumbers, electricians, etc - we have many buildings and there is always something to do;
- IT - our computers are very old and there is always something that needs fixing - repair costs are prohibitive;
- Teachers - we are always happy to have your help in our schools;
- Musicians - we love music here. Maybe you can teach some kids an instrument?
- Administration - we always need help in our office;
- Your ideas - we would love to hear from you!
Our visitors' centre, including all furniture, bedding, kitchen utensils, etc, was funded through donations.
You are welcome to eat with the children, but most visitors prefer to prepare most of their own meals. We have pots and pans, cups, plates and cutlery, but you might like to bring anything else you need for cooking with you. There is a market and small supermarket in Mchinji, where you can buy vegetables and some groceries. Again, if there is anything you particularly want, we suggest you bring it with you. A list of things that might be helpful for the visitors' centre can be found here.
Planning your trip
Plane travel within Africa is expensive and can be difficult to book from outside Africa. We suggest you plan well ahead and use a travel agent experienced in booking African travel.
A number of vaccinations and other medication are recommended for travel to Malawi. To benefit best from this, you should contact your doctor at least 6-8 weeks before your planned departure date.