With just a single tap in the centre of the village providing 2,000 residents with water, it is not a life of luxury in Muhiyo.

But as well as tackling poverty in their eye-opening trip to Malawi, Bermuda Overseas Missions members found themselves building bridges of cultural awareness and developing new friendships.

The charity took 32 team members to build four houses in two weeks in the rural village of Muhiyo, at the base of Mulanje mountain.

David Thompson, BOM president, told The Royal Gazette: “With Habitat [for Humanity] there supervising, they made sure to have the tools ready so we could literally hit the ground running.

“Some of the villagers helped. They put what I call ‘sweat equity’ into the construction phase.

“In this village where poverty was everywhere, there was no way these people could pay back for the home they got.

“These are people that were basically subsistence farmers.

“They grew enough to survive and sell a little bit of extra produce just to have a little bit of income.

“You could say it was an eye-opening experience.”

Mr Thompson and team were surprised at the population’s literacy rate, which he said was “appalling”.

The only school is 5 kilometres away with no transport, so many children will never receive an education.

“It’s really a shame,” he said.

In his presentation to Hamilton Rotary this week, he outlined BOM’s mission statement: “To provide the people of Bermuda, from all backgrounds, ages and faiths, an opportunity to make a difference in our world by addressing global issues and by building houses in countries where a critical need exists.”

He said they “strive to build bridges of cultural awareness, develop new friendships and to renew our faith by committing to help our fellow man and woman with practical caring action”.

“We want to teach kids a habit to start giving,” he told this newspaper.

“And I see many students over the years come back for multiple trips and even if they don’t do it with us, they do other trips with humanitarian needs.

“I think it has a profound effect on them. It creates a sense of wanting to help.” Next spring they will shake the Habitat model to partner with the Feed My Lambs Ministry on a trip to Haiti.

“It’s a short trip — about five days, no R and R and it will be a team of 16.

“I once took 50 to Romania. That was a bit of a challenge,” he said, laughing.

“I see Haiti as a long-term project for us and if this goes well then we plan to do annual trips to Haiti.”

BOM have successfully completed missions to 15 countries, including the US, Bolivia, Botswana, Romania, Brazil, and India.

In the last 16 builds they have had more than 500 volunteers and helped to build 82 homes, housing at least 400 people.