Mom and son plan another ’bags of hope‘ trip

Watching a slide show about his trip to Malawi on his mom‘s laptop, Jaako Polkki dances in his seat.
Arms waving above his head, he sings along quietly to the African voices projected from the computer.
On-screen, photos show the boy with the mop of white-blonde hair surrounded by Malawian children, handing out his “bags of hope” to kids his own age and younger.
Nine-year-old Jaako and his mom Sue returned in February from a trip that saw them buy truckloads of food and farm animals to donate to villagers in rural Malawi.
An exhausting illness after she got home – a parasite picked up in Africa – meant Sue has only felt back to normal in the last week.
It was a visit to his family‘s church last May by a missionary from Guatemala that led Jaako to creating Hope for Malawi.
He and his mom appealed to the public and to their church, hosting yard sales and meals.
They raised $32,000, well shy of Jaako‘s $800,000 goal, and 2,000 cloth bags full of small toys, pencils, notepads and candy.
Mom and son intend to continue raising money, and have tentatively chosen June 2008 for their next trip.
“We went there to help them and they ended up teaching us so much,” said Sue.
Beyond the foot-long centipedes and crossing flooded rivers, she‘ll treasure memories of her son‘s compassion and watching him emerge into a self-confident person who took charge of roomfuls of people.
The day after landing and being met by their host missionaries in Lilongwe, the southeast African country‘s capital, mom and son went to market.
They bought 75 50-kilogram bags of maize along with sugar, oil, rice and other staples.
Over three weeks, they visited 10 rural villages to distribute the food through church or community leaders.
Canadian donors had pledged money for chickens, oxen and goats. Sue and Jaako bought them at each village.
That program, they discovered, was a bit stressful, as they struggled to find 63 chickens, 45 goats and two oxen – and keep track of exactly how many they‘d already given away.
Also, because it was the rainy season and crops weren‘t in yet, what people really needed was maize, noted Sue.
“There are things we will do again and things we won‘t do,” she said. “But all the money donated went to good use.”
At each village, they arrived in two trucks with their interpreter, usually at the community church or school – or the building that was both.
Church leaders had organized groups of children to meet Jaako, but everyone in the villages showed up.
Ritual greetings and exuberant singing and dancing – Jaako taught them English songs as well – were involved at every meeting.
At every village, Jaako handed out hundreds of his bags of hope.
“We always ran out,” said Sue. “It was so heartbreaking.”
The visitors brought blades and fashioned hockey sticks from branches.
“Well, it was good to have a translator,” said Jaako about teaching hockey to people who speak another language. “I‘ll just say that.”