We got this moving note from our great friend and supporter, Brendan Cairney, after receiving some very sad news about a little boy called Chancy he had met whilst volunteering with TT in Malawi.

I’m a bit stumped as to what to say about Chancy.
I left it till today to let it mull over.
I met Chancy with his mother, Fanny, and sister Jacqueline when his mother came for treatment at Ndi Moyo.
Lucy asked me to play with him as they were trying to distract his mother.
Both children were shockingly malnourished.
In hindsight Fanny was mentally exhausted and completely unable to look after either of her children. There was no sign of any husband/father.
She was admitted to Salima general hospital with Jacqueline .
And I couldn’t just do nothing. I went to visit her the next day, and well you know how it is in that hospital.
Everyone’s focus was on Jacqueline as her malnutrition and constant crying grabbed your attention.
Fanny had no idea where Chancy was. Long story short, I eventually found him.
He was at home with his older 12 year old brother. He was filthy. He’d soiled himself and stank.
I stripped him, washed him and dressed him in clean clothes .Fed both of them.
I got involved with Chancy because I just couldn’t leave it.
His mother died a couple of months later. Jacqueline responded well to emergency feeding and thrived.
Chancy unfortunately was  classified as stunted, HIV positive, malaria and no one wanted to take him on.
I suspect he became a better package when Mathias, his wife and I offered to fund his care .
2 years later and the last photo that Peter sent me I didn’t recognise him. Kathryn would fill me in on his progress.
I had asked the gardeners to look out for him and they did.
I got an email from Peter on Monday at lunchtime to say Chancy had been ill for the previous month, was admitted to
hospital on Friday and died on Sunday (January 11th, 2015 ) He had TB. I can only hope that someone was with him when he died.
We tried. We tried for him. We tried because it was the human thing to do.

B

January 15th, 2015. Dublin.