I'm in the plane right now, writing a farewell to Malawi. Although we've been here for only 5 weeks, the familiarity and the comfort of this place (mixed with raw sadness) makes it seem like we've actually been here for 5 months. I have gotten so used to "hello...how are you?" and waiting for a response and probably a conversation, even if you or the other person is in a hurry. In India or the states, no one has the time or cares enough to stop and have a conversation (at least not in the way Malawians...and this includes all of them...do). The warm and invitingness of people, putting one hand under the other giving respect, people always willing to help (with the rare exceptions), these are things I will miss. Not only that but the sheer number of people we've met, their stories, the way they made us laugh, the interesting things they told us, the things we learned from their experience, in these past 5 weeks makes me want to stay and meet more people. Lois and the wonderful kindness and humility of her personality. Memory and Akone and their smiles and sadness of leaving despite not knowing us. Vicki and her guidance. Rosemany and her warmth. I can keep going. I guess it's leaving a familiar place that helped us in venturing out and meeting people the way we did. I will miss the babies at Crisis Nursery who are so beautiful and should have the potential to lead healthy lives but might not be able to reach their peak due to lack of care. The orphans and Michingyi, always running around, getting a life more fulfilling than many of the children of Malawi. Vicki is right...through what we have learned, we have to be the ambassadors of the children of Malawi, their mothers. Having learned so much from Malawi and its people (not only academically but also personally), it is only right that we remember and do something for Malawi, even if it starts with just awareness.
So what have I actually learned? Let's start with academics. I've learned so much about Malawi itself. About its economy, the poverty, the focus on HIV/AIDS leading to unforeseen population boom, the orphans, the politics (especially the success of the elections this year), the geography, a little bit of its history, its education system and especially the culture and its struggle to keep a balance between development and retaining its culture. "It takes a village to raise a child." I have been able to see a first-hand experience of the importance of understanding a culture for sustainable development to occur. However this has also led me to question the best method for development. It is important to empower the people; not just come in, do a project and leave. But what is the best way? Education? That leads to questions of what is culturally relevant/appropriate and when it's important to override "culture". Agricultural subsidies? That leads to questions of dependence and lack of empowerment of the people to be able to self-sustain. Economic support? That leads to questions of what kind is best...one time, monthly, cash-transfer, micro-credit. All of these approaches have been successful in their own respect, but they've also shown shortfalls. Yet one can't use all approaches since broad, general attempts of development have proven to be less successful. Hopefully in the next 2-3years, with more education and experience, I will figure out what direction I want to take with development.
This trip has taught me a lot about myself and who I want and don't want to be. Part of it has come through Malawi in teaching me more kindness and caring attitude and giving respect. The list goes on. But a lot of what I've learned about myself has come because of my friends' awareness. Spending 5 weeks in a small room has been a very interesting experience.
Basically all in all, this trip has been fun, educational and a great experience worth more than the time, effort and fight that we had to go through to go to Malawi. And even though when I had started this trip I never though I would grow such an attachment with Malawi, but now having left it, I felt an immense sadness that made me realize that someday I will have to come back to this place.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Kim - last post
Goodbye Malawi
It was really difficult leaving the warm heart of Africa. I didn't imagine I would grow so attached in just 5 weeks. The friend's we've met along the way have made this one of the most memorable experience of my life. Also, extremely commendable, Tanya, Becca, Shohini and I have somehow managed to remain friends even after spending every waking second of 35 days together. Each of us have grown so much from this, and the thing is I'm sure we won't even realize the magnitude this trip has affected our lives until we get back to our daily routines. We arrived May 26/27th with nothing but scholarship money and a proposal, and although many things changed along the way, we left with a Malawian mother and a new home.
I don't know how we said goodbye to all these people who became a part of our lives. Even IC Eggs was touched that for our final breakfast we didn't disappoint and ordered eggs...chips...toast. I will miss Louis and Badal even though we spent the majority of our time makign fun of them. Before we left Peacock we also made sure to wish farewell to our other lifesaver, Suleman; best lodge owner and possible dealer on the black market. But regardless, he helped us immensely; especially with the 1500 kwacha meals :)
Becca left early this morning and then there were 3. Mems was at the "Laising" office and so we got to say goodbye to him. I'm going to miss his child-like smile and why he would turn his head towards Becca in complete confusion whilst driving 120km/hr on the highway. We told the other members of "laising" staff goodbye yesterday. Vicki surprized me the most. She almost began to tear up even though she's only interacted with us twice. Her passion is very admirable and she sent us off as embassadors of the children of Malawi. Dear Rosemary was all smiles as always while giving us her usual double hugs. Goodbye office!
The trip ended how is began...with Lois. Being the loyal mother she is, she told Tanya, Shohini and I to the airport for the last time. She stood ad watched us check in and even came back to help when we had problems with immigration. Leaving her beyond the guarded immigration area is the saddest thing I've had to do in a long time. Mrs. Lois Silo helped shape the first summer of the rest of our lives, without even knowing it. And this is why we've grown to love her, and love Malawi.
XOXO <3
It was really difficult leaving the warm heart of Africa. I didn't imagine I would grow so attached in just 5 weeks. The friend's we've met along the way have made this one of the most memorable experience of my life. Also, extremely commendable, Tanya, Becca, Shohini and I have somehow managed to remain friends even after spending every waking second of 35 days together. Each of us have grown so much from this, and the thing is I'm sure we won't even realize the magnitude this trip has affected our lives until we get back to our daily routines. We arrived May 26/27th with nothing but scholarship money and a proposal, and although many things changed along the way, we left with a Malawian mother and a new home.
I don't know how we said goodbye to all these people who became a part of our lives. Even IC Eggs was touched that for our final breakfast we didn't disappoint and ordered eggs...chips...toast. I will miss Louis and Badal even though we spent the majority of our time makign fun of them. Before we left Peacock we also made sure to wish farewell to our other lifesaver, Suleman; best lodge owner and possible dealer on the black market. But regardless, he helped us immensely; especially with the 1500 kwacha meals :)
Becca left early this morning and then there were 3. Mems was at the "Laising" office and so we got to say goodbye to him. I'm going to miss his child-like smile and why he would turn his head towards Becca in complete confusion whilst driving 120km/hr on the highway. We told the other members of "laising" staff goodbye yesterday. Vicki surprized me the most. She almost began to tear up even though she's only interacted with us twice. Her passion is very admirable and she sent us off as embassadors of the children of Malawi. Dear Rosemary was all smiles as always while giving us her usual double hugs. Goodbye office!
The trip ended how is began...with Lois. Being the loyal mother she is, she told Tanya, Shohini and I to the airport for the last time. She stood ad watched us check in and even came back to help when we had problems with immigration. Leaving her beyond the guarded immigration area is the saddest thing I've had to do in a long time. Mrs. Lois Silo helped shape the first summer of the rest of our lives, without even knowing it. And this is why we've grown to love her, and love Malawi.
XOXO <3
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
becca last one
6/30 – airport grand hotel and conference center
so here I am in this nice fancy hotel in joburg (im here waiting for my next flight in the morning). My own room. Privacy. A big, comfortable bed. A shower. A bathtub. In my room. A tv. Heater. Lights. Pillows. Blankets. Electricity. THE WORKS. But I am so lonely. The past few weeks of scrounging and being poppers was much more fun. With friends. If I travel the world, I don’t want it to be by myself. Any takers?
So our last week in Malawi… what did we do? after we returned from blantyre, we went back to dusty Lilongwe… extremely unexcited about it, but we knew we had to. So the first day we did some errands and made our way to say good bye to the babies at crisis nursery. At night when we were locked in our hotel we forced ourselves to work on our info packet (after the light fiasco of course)The following day we made our way to a clinic in a rural village. We had no idea what to expect, but we drove 1 ½ in each direction to arrive at a clinic that had over 100 people waiting outside to be seen by the one doctor and one nurse. But we arrived and in pure Malawian tradition, the doctor came outside and welcomed us. In Malawi, visitors are compared to the morning dew… it may be here now, but you don’t know when it will be back, so you must appreciate it and care for it as best you can…
Anyway, he began giving us a tour of the 4 room clinic. We insisted that he get back to his patients, so the nurse finished showing us around. We were able to ask questions and attempt to understand the clinic and their needs. But as usual, we felt that we were intruding and in everyones way, so we made a hasty exit. Although we were there to learn and hopefully facilitate help for them in the future, we did not feel comfortable taking up their time while there are deathly ill patients who walked countless kilometers to see the doctor for fifty kwacha (about 30 cents).
So we drove another hour and a half back to Lilongwe confused and frustrated like usual. This was the only clinic for miles. The closest hospital is about 20 kilometers away. What we’ve learned in Malawi is that there isn’t necessarily a shortage of doctors or nurses, because the universities are FULL of them. The problem, like in many other industries throughout the world, is that they are not paid well. So nurses in Malawi aren’t paid well, so when people graduate, they move to other countries where pay is a little better, leaving hospitals- especially public hospitals- understaffed. So what to do? if you have an answer, you may want to contact the Malawian government and/or the US government. SOMEONE EXPLAIN WHY TEACHERS AND NURSES ARENT PAID WELL!?!?! WHERE ARE YOUR PRIORITIES?!
Anyway so after the clinic, we spent the rest of the afternoon at the Raising Malawi office trying to figure out plans for the weekend. Eventually we decided that we would travel to Mzuzu in the north for many reasons. First of all, the north is a very different climate: mountainous, cold, and beautiful. So we apparently HAD to see it. so we drove 5 hours to the north to visit the crisis nursery in Mzuzu. On the way there we stopped at a beautiful boarding school. We just wanted to see another life that exists in Malawi. It put my university to shame, it was so beautiful. And we met a VERY nice, wonderful woman who insisted we stay for tea and sandwiches after our tour. We had a great morning talking with students and teacher, learning about this drastically different, wealthy Malawian life. We also began recruiting new students for clark. ☺
So at the nursery we played with some babies… compared and contrasted differences between this nursery and the one we spent more time at in Lilongwe, and before we knew it, we had to be off. We decided to spend the night on the lake, so we had to drive a little further. By this time it was pitch black and we were driving up and down and around a steep mountain on a road that sometimes turned to dirt. But hey, we made it. hahahha. Best part. We get to the town where we were staying, but we didn’t know how to get to the lodge, so they sent someone to find us in town and show us the way… so a man comes to our car and says that he is going to show us. So this rasta man starts talking and introduces himself as Happy Coconut. Yes. His name is Happy Coconut…. We didn’t really ask questions… but he showed us down the mountain to the lodge. Down a rocky road that broke the car at leas 10 times, but finally we made it. still pitch darkness we arrived at Butterfly Lodge around 6:30 pm. We got to our dorm and to our excitement, there was someone else staying there. We were very excited about the prospects of another interesting character. Unfortunately we were disappointed when he turned out to be a really quiet awkward guy who maybe said one word. Oh well. We want to check out the night life at the hotel next door, but shohini decided to trip and fall and twist her ankle walkin around the lodge, so we couldn’t make it all the way next door. Did I mention these places are built on a steep rocky mountain. So everything is steep and rocky and cliff-like. All in the pitch darkness. Hahaha. yess!!
So the next day we were relaxing by the lake and a boat man offered to take us on his boat… so after negotiating the price, we decided to do it… it was beautiful and calm…. Until the clouds came rolling in and the wind picked up along with the waves. And oh did it pick up. Long story short, I got a little sea sick and threw up on the whole way back to the dock. But it was nice and we got some good pictures. And the boat guys were really cool.. david banda and co. haha.
What else? So after recovering from the boat we began our journey back to Lilongwe.. we decided to take the scenic route along the lake….. little did we know it was 2 hours longer. Jesus it was painful. Highlight: we didn’t hit any dogs. Only clipped a goat. And had to stop for a family of monkeys crossing the road. ☺
Sunday was spent at Lois’ house where we had an amazing meal and got to spend time with her and her family without talking about work. It was wonderful and I really want to go back! ☹
Monday we spent tying up loose ends and buying the last of our curios. I love those beach bitches. Maybe because it’s the end of the month (pay day), but they were all pretty drunk at 11 am. And it made for a highly entertaining experience. We bonded with many a rasta man.
Anyway… that’s about it… I am still reflecting on everything. Maybe thoughts wont be coherent until I am back home. I don’t know. Thinking back and remembering everything is whats keeping me sane right now in this hotel room by myself. Hope I didn’t bore you. Hmmm. I want to upload pictures.. I have over 1000. And we all have pictures… this should be interesting.
This may be the last blog entry. Hope you enjoyed.
so here I am in this nice fancy hotel in joburg (im here waiting for my next flight in the morning). My own room. Privacy. A big, comfortable bed. A shower. A bathtub. In my room. A tv. Heater. Lights. Pillows. Blankets. Electricity. THE WORKS. But I am so lonely. The past few weeks of scrounging and being poppers was much more fun. With friends. If I travel the world, I don’t want it to be by myself. Any takers?
So our last week in Malawi… what did we do? after we returned from blantyre, we went back to dusty Lilongwe… extremely unexcited about it, but we knew we had to. So the first day we did some errands and made our way to say good bye to the babies at crisis nursery. At night when we were locked in our hotel we forced ourselves to work on our info packet (after the light fiasco of course)The following day we made our way to a clinic in a rural village. We had no idea what to expect, but we drove 1 ½ in each direction to arrive at a clinic that had over 100 people waiting outside to be seen by the one doctor and one nurse. But we arrived and in pure Malawian tradition, the doctor came outside and welcomed us. In Malawi, visitors are compared to the morning dew… it may be here now, but you don’t know when it will be back, so you must appreciate it and care for it as best you can…
Anyway, he began giving us a tour of the 4 room clinic. We insisted that he get back to his patients, so the nurse finished showing us around. We were able to ask questions and attempt to understand the clinic and their needs. But as usual, we felt that we were intruding and in everyones way, so we made a hasty exit. Although we were there to learn and hopefully facilitate help for them in the future, we did not feel comfortable taking up their time while there are deathly ill patients who walked countless kilometers to see the doctor for fifty kwacha (about 30 cents).
So we drove another hour and a half back to Lilongwe confused and frustrated like usual. This was the only clinic for miles. The closest hospital is about 20 kilometers away. What we’ve learned in Malawi is that there isn’t necessarily a shortage of doctors or nurses, because the universities are FULL of them. The problem, like in many other industries throughout the world, is that they are not paid well. So nurses in Malawi aren’t paid well, so when people graduate, they move to other countries where pay is a little better, leaving hospitals- especially public hospitals- understaffed. So what to do? if you have an answer, you may want to contact the Malawian government and/or the US government. SOMEONE EXPLAIN WHY TEACHERS AND NURSES ARENT PAID WELL!?!?! WHERE ARE YOUR PRIORITIES?!
Anyway so after the clinic, we spent the rest of the afternoon at the Raising Malawi office trying to figure out plans for the weekend. Eventually we decided that we would travel to Mzuzu in the north for many reasons. First of all, the north is a very different climate: mountainous, cold, and beautiful. So we apparently HAD to see it. so we drove 5 hours to the north to visit the crisis nursery in Mzuzu. On the way there we stopped at a beautiful boarding school. We just wanted to see another life that exists in Malawi. It put my university to shame, it was so beautiful. And we met a VERY nice, wonderful woman who insisted we stay for tea and sandwiches after our tour. We had a great morning talking with students and teacher, learning about this drastically different, wealthy Malawian life. We also began recruiting new students for clark. ☺
So at the nursery we played with some babies… compared and contrasted differences between this nursery and the one we spent more time at in Lilongwe, and before we knew it, we had to be off. We decided to spend the night on the lake, so we had to drive a little further. By this time it was pitch black and we were driving up and down and around a steep mountain on a road that sometimes turned to dirt. But hey, we made it. hahahha. Best part. We get to the town where we were staying, but we didn’t know how to get to the lodge, so they sent someone to find us in town and show us the way… so a man comes to our car and says that he is going to show us. So this rasta man starts talking and introduces himself as Happy Coconut. Yes. His name is Happy Coconut…. We didn’t really ask questions… but he showed us down the mountain to the lodge. Down a rocky road that broke the car at leas 10 times, but finally we made it. still pitch darkness we arrived at Butterfly Lodge around 6:30 pm. We got to our dorm and to our excitement, there was someone else staying there. We were very excited about the prospects of another interesting character. Unfortunately we were disappointed when he turned out to be a really quiet awkward guy who maybe said one word. Oh well. We want to check out the night life at the hotel next door, but shohini decided to trip and fall and twist her ankle walkin around the lodge, so we couldn’t make it all the way next door. Did I mention these places are built on a steep rocky mountain. So everything is steep and rocky and cliff-like. All in the pitch darkness. Hahaha. yess!!
So the next day we were relaxing by the lake and a boat man offered to take us on his boat… so after negotiating the price, we decided to do it… it was beautiful and calm…. Until the clouds came rolling in and the wind picked up along with the waves. And oh did it pick up. Long story short, I got a little sea sick and threw up on the whole way back to the dock. But it was nice and we got some good pictures. And the boat guys were really cool.. david banda and co. haha.
What else? So after recovering from the boat we began our journey back to Lilongwe.. we decided to take the scenic route along the lake….. little did we know it was 2 hours longer. Jesus it was painful. Highlight: we didn’t hit any dogs. Only clipped a goat. And had to stop for a family of monkeys crossing the road. ☺
Sunday was spent at Lois’ house where we had an amazing meal and got to spend time with her and her family without talking about work. It was wonderful and I really want to go back! ☹
Monday we spent tying up loose ends and buying the last of our curios. I love those beach bitches. Maybe because it’s the end of the month (pay day), but they were all pretty drunk at 11 am. And it made for a highly entertaining experience. We bonded with many a rasta man.
Anyway… that’s about it… I am still reflecting on everything. Maybe thoughts wont be coherent until I am back home. I don’t know. Thinking back and remembering everything is whats keeping me sane right now in this hotel room by myself. Hope I didn’t bore you. Hmmm. I want to upload pictures.. I have over 1000. And we all have pictures… this should be interesting.
This may be the last blog entry. Hope you enjoyed.
tanya- blantyre
(yes we have left malawi but there will be more blog updates to come since we didnt have internet the last week of our journey. lots to explain and reflect on! -becca)
Blantyre, Be Mine
This past week visiting Blantyre has perhaps been one of the most exciting weeks in Malawi. More fun than work and we all learnt A LOT! Blantyre is a small cosy little colonial town nestled in the hills. It reminds me of the countless hill stations in India. The weather is cooler, the culture and character of the city compelling and the place is just more compact and delightful than Lilongwe. It seems that Blantyre has more interesting people per square kilometer. Then again, that could have been because we stayed at Doogles, a backpackers lodge run by a white Zimbabwean woman. When I say that the room had bare necessities, I am not making a feeble joke. The room had four bunk beds and a light. The beds had hard wooden slats covered with about three blankets that served as mattresses. Still, since it is a backpackers lodge the people (although mostly foreigners and mostly white) are hardy outdoorsy kind of people and do not complain. However, the real fun was a short ten steps outside of our room at the well-stocked bar. Over there, outside amidst cheap Carlsberg beers and Malawian vodka one could hear stories about hikes up Mount Mulanje or volunteering at Queen Elizabeths Hospital (we did that too) Iti s heroic eelng to sit amidst other people from the developed world who have seen its joys and wonders and still chose Malawi to be their home.
Over the past week, I have met some of the most interesting peoel in my life. There is John, the rakishly good lookng 24year old Canadian who majored in math and business and discovered he did not want to psend the rest of his life in a business suit. So he traveled to India and then to Maozambique and finally Malawi. He volunteers at the Home of Hope and eats nsima (local food) with the orphans. The man walks as long as his legs will carry him on he dusty highway hailng a ride when he is tired. He also told us that buinesswomen in Lilongwe look most amused when he walks down the street without shoes (just because he feels like it) Because of this rather Calrkie habit of walking without shoes, he and his girlfriend both have sandworms in their toes and they can actually see them move from time to time! (For your knowledge, the man is perfectly unperturbed about this and casually mentions it in passing) We talked hungrily because he said he had not spoken to a non-Malawina fo al ong time and it fwlt good to have people understand you. In doogles we met friendly old Jeff, a gentlemanly English man whom we watched cricket with. He had lived in South Africa before Blantyre and enthralled Shohini and I with tales of how he had met the South African cricket tea. There was also Vick the Indian man from Chennai another cricket maniac who has to his fame having watched all 38 matches in the previous Cricket world cup in West Indies. He bonded with Kim over this. In addition, Jef told us just how diverse Blantyre was. And Indeed, as people dropped by for a quick drink and stopped to say hi to him we found Austrians., Bolivians, South Africans and Dutch people who had all made this lovely town their home and enriched the city by their presence. The men sit there watching rugby and drinking and cursing for both the South African Team and the English Team. There was a lot of jostling and teasing as diaspora from both countries came by to watch. Doogles, even the terribly uncomfortable beds, remind me of memories my mother talked about of India in the 1970s and 80s where a good time and a sterling conversation were for very cheap if not for free. The next morning, we were up and trekked down the old colonial street to visit St. Marks Cathedral which was built by Livingstone. It has been certified as a National Historical Site by the Department of Antiquities (what a lively quaint name!) In Blantyre, it seems that people houses and buildings are just tucked into the hill creating a very cosy feeling. So anyway, we walk down to the church that is BEAUTIFUL. I have no words to describe it and my architectural vocabulary is quite limited but the entire church is really small and yet really ornate with gothic style spires and peaks making it look like a splendid toy castle amidst a patch of rolling green lawns. The church compound seems endless but a walk around will reveal, that the compound randomly bleeds into people’s houses. Gorgeous colonial houses that make me think I am in some quaint railway colony in India. The sense of security is so inbuilt that many people have pretty thatched bamboo stalks as their fences! I felt like I was walking in a story book. Kim and I were particularly interested I seeing the graveyard. For those of you unaware of my fascination with colonial graveyards, I must explain. I felt this way even in India seeing Some soldier buried randomly in the middle of Gujarat. Because they are so far way from home, the gravestone really does tell a story..a story that in this post colonized (maybe) era no one pauses to appreciate the sweet poignance of the fact that some random British soldier died in this strange, hot land believing he was dying for the Queen and the country even as greedy oily merchants and plantation owners made a profit of the system of colonization. It is fascinating because in imperial ambitions, one sees the beginnings of colonization and colonization os avery important part of my identity now..the fact that I am Roman Catholic and that English is my first language. So, I just find all of this very fascinating. So Kim and I visited the Commonwealth graveyard and so Graveyads as old as the 1700s of British soldiers who had died in ‘Nyasaland’ the British colonial territory to which Malawi once belonged.
More on our super exciting journey to Blantyre later…
……………………………………
The Light Fiasco
So I have said many times that you pay money for competence. Competent people are always in demand. The smart, quick to catch on, efficient people in the service sector will always do well for themselves. Seeing this, it is no wonder that on our student budgets, incompetence is something we encounter on the daily here in Malawi. From the sketch waiters in K-Lodge, to IC miserable (Incompetent Miserbale) in Doogles who botched up the simplest of orders (three fried eggs and one scrambled). Our latest addition to this group of IC’s has been L Dawg alias Louis who is the jaunty incompetent receptionist at P Lodge where we are currently staying in Lilongwe. We have always been suspicious of Louis with his smart alec smile. The first time he met us, he was positively lounging in a little arm chair and absolutely REFUSED to move an inch as he answered the question s we had about the lodge. To this effect, Kim and I were sitting in our room today and we discovered that the one tube light that powers the room was out. So Of course I brace myself for the incompetent journey of my life as I search for someone to change the lightbulb. It was surprisingly easy. Louis looking dapper today in slacks and a full dress shirt comes in, inspects the lghtbulb with a smile and strides out to get the job done. Kim and I breathe a sigh of relief (or apprehension) because Louis doing any job usually is either hilarious or bad news. At any rate, he then wrestles a massive ladder into the damn room. I am listening to Kiss me Through the Phone on my computer at this point and look slightly hesitantly at L-Dawg. “Umm..Do you want me to Move” I ask L-dawg. “No no problem” Ok, I still move to the other bed to be cautious. This man..please believe me when I tell you that he refuses to open the ladder but instead LEANS IT ON A BRICK WALL…IN A ROOM THAT HAS A SLIPPERY TILED FLOOR. Kim and I are by now looking very wary and are fully aware that the air is regnant with incompetence. I suggest with an action that Kim fishes out her camera to catch on tape this priceless moment of Louis incompetence. At this moment, Louis who by now is up on the ladder with that silly, aggravating little smile on his face CRASHES down on the floor. As he falls, he pulls onto my mosquito net for support pulling it with him and there is a resounding crash as the light bulb breaks into a million pieces. Kim shrieks and I am proud to note at this time, that Kims first concern was for L-Dawg by now tangled up on my bed in MY sheets and mosquito nets and light bulb shards. Are you okay? Ofcourse we don’t merit an answer. L Dawg sits up with pieces of glass firmly sticking to his face, brushes himself and moves on quite ignoring the fact that by now our precious artifacts that were on the desk have been crashed by L Dawgs descent from the ladder. Fool! You would think that one should know how to open the ladder. Kids at crisis nursery would know how to open the ladder. As he is brushing himself off he fancifully flings the mosquito net towards Kim who by now is in a deep state of shock ( there are precious few times Kim ever gets speechless and I suggest if you are ever privileged to such moments you savour it with all your heart) Mind you, this mosquito net that I speak of is FULL OF glass shards and he casually flings it in Kims direction to her horror. She gives a terrified shriek and I truly feel a mixture of laughing at this idiots incompetence and then slapping him soundly for throwing these dangerous pieces of fine lightbulb glass on Kim. Blindly, I reach for my phone and think this is a moment to call Shohini and inform her of this. Especially since by know Kim has “git it together” enough to note that Shohinis precius wooden carving that she bought for her mother is broken. She tries to tell this to Louis who ignores her and walks out o the room wheter out of shock or sheer incompetence it is not known. My phone dies on me and I wlak to Shohinis room to breathlessly narrate the happenings. Let me tell you al ittle about Shohini. She as an attitude and when things hapne her atttide does nto rain, t pours. The girl walked out with a face that could either kill someone or curdle milk. She strides towards L-dawg puts her hands on her hips and demands an explanantion. Louis by thus time, has wied the grin off his face btu sil has the jaunty attitude. We have figured out by now, that he has no fear whatsoever of being fired or anything. At this pont the mixture of the whoel drama that had ensued and Shohini’s attitude on a rampage has got me severely cracked p. I follw our little entourage of an angry Shohini, a calm becca and a terrified Kim and watch the fun. Wedemand a new room from L-dawg and are given a much shittier room but one that is glass fre nevertheless. At this point , our entire suitcases, shoes, clothes nd bedcovers hae had glass shattered all over thm, Ah, it yet another eventful, cincompetent evening in good ole dusty in Lilongwe.
Blantyre, Be Mine
This past week visiting Blantyre has perhaps been one of the most exciting weeks in Malawi. More fun than work and we all learnt A LOT! Blantyre is a small cosy little colonial town nestled in the hills. It reminds me of the countless hill stations in India. The weather is cooler, the culture and character of the city compelling and the place is just more compact and delightful than Lilongwe. It seems that Blantyre has more interesting people per square kilometer. Then again, that could have been because we stayed at Doogles, a backpackers lodge run by a white Zimbabwean woman. When I say that the room had bare necessities, I am not making a feeble joke. The room had four bunk beds and a light. The beds had hard wooden slats covered with about three blankets that served as mattresses. Still, since it is a backpackers lodge the people (although mostly foreigners and mostly white) are hardy outdoorsy kind of people and do not complain. However, the real fun was a short ten steps outside of our room at the well-stocked bar. Over there, outside amidst cheap Carlsberg beers and Malawian vodka one could hear stories about hikes up Mount Mulanje or volunteering at Queen Elizabeths Hospital (we did that too) Iti s heroic eelng to sit amidst other people from the developed world who have seen its joys and wonders and still chose Malawi to be their home.
Over the past week, I have met some of the most interesting peoel in my life. There is John, the rakishly good lookng 24year old Canadian who majored in math and business and discovered he did not want to psend the rest of his life in a business suit. So he traveled to India and then to Maozambique and finally Malawi. He volunteers at the Home of Hope and eats nsima (local food) with the orphans. The man walks as long as his legs will carry him on he dusty highway hailng a ride when he is tired. He also told us that buinesswomen in Lilongwe look most amused when he walks down the street without shoes (just because he feels like it) Because of this rather Calrkie habit of walking without shoes, he and his girlfriend both have sandworms in their toes and they can actually see them move from time to time! (For your knowledge, the man is perfectly unperturbed about this and casually mentions it in passing) We talked hungrily because he said he had not spoken to a non-Malawina fo al ong time and it fwlt good to have people understand you. In doogles we met friendly old Jeff, a gentlemanly English man whom we watched cricket with. He had lived in South Africa before Blantyre and enthralled Shohini and I with tales of how he had met the South African cricket tea. There was also Vick the Indian man from Chennai another cricket maniac who has to his fame having watched all 38 matches in the previous Cricket world cup in West Indies. He bonded with Kim over this. In addition, Jef told us just how diverse Blantyre was. And Indeed, as people dropped by for a quick drink and stopped to say hi to him we found Austrians., Bolivians, South Africans and Dutch people who had all made this lovely town their home and enriched the city by their presence. The men sit there watching rugby and drinking and cursing for both the South African Team and the English Team. There was a lot of jostling and teasing as diaspora from both countries came by to watch. Doogles, even the terribly uncomfortable beds, remind me of memories my mother talked about of India in the 1970s and 80s where a good time and a sterling conversation were for very cheap if not for free. The next morning, we were up and trekked down the old colonial street to visit St. Marks Cathedral which was built by Livingstone. It has been certified as a National Historical Site by the Department of Antiquities (what a lively quaint name!) In Blantyre, it seems that people houses and buildings are just tucked into the hill creating a very cosy feeling. So anyway, we walk down to the church that is BEAUTIFUL. I have no words to describe it and my architectural vocabulary is quite limited but the entire church is really small and yet really ornate with gothic style spires and peaks making it look like a splendid toy castle amidst a patch of rolling green lawns. The church compound seems endless but a walk around will reveal, that the compound randomly bleeds into people’s houses. Gorgeous colonial houses that make me think I am in some quaint railway colony in India. The sense of security is so inbuilt that many people have pretty thatched bamboo stalks as their fences! I felt like I was walking in a story book. Kim and I were particularly interested I seeing the graveyard. For those of you unaware of my fascination with colonial graveyards, I must explain. I felt this way even in India seeing Some soldier buried randomly in the middle of Gujarat. Because they are so far way from home, the gravestone really does tell a story..a story that in this post colonized (maybe) era no one pauses to appreciate the sweet poignance of the fact that some random British soldier died in this strange, hot land believing he was dying for the Queen and the country even as greedy oily merchants and plantation owners made a profit of the system of colonization. It is fascinating because in imperial ambitions, one sees the beginnings of colonization and colonization os avery important part of my identity now..the fact that I am Roman Catholic and that English is my first language. So, I just find all of this very fascinating. So Kim and I visited the Commonwealth graveyard and so Graveyads as old as the 1700s of British soldiers who had died in ‘Nyasaland’ the British colonial territory to which Malawi once belonged.
More on our super exciting journey to Blantyre later…
……………………………………
The Light Fiasco
So I have said many times that you pay money for competence. Competent people are always in demand. The smart, quick to catch on, efficient people in the service sector will always do well for themselves. Seeing this, it is no wonder that on our student budgets, incompetence is something we encounter on the daily here in Malawi. From the sketch waiters in K-Lodge, to IC miserable (Incompetent Miserbale) in Doogles who botched up the simplest of orders (three fried eggs and one scrambled). Our latest addition to this group of IC’s has been L Dawg alias Louis who is the jaunty incompetent receptionist at P Lodge where we are currently staying in Lilongwe. We have always been suspicious of Louis with his smart alec smile. The first time he met us, he was positively lounging in a little arm chair and absolutely REFUSED to move an inch as he answered the question s we had about the lodge. To this effect, Kim and I were sitting in our room today and we discovered that the one tube light that powers the room was out. So Of course I brace myself for the incompetent journey of my life as I search for someone to change the lightbulb. It was surprisingly easy. Louis looking dapper today in slacks and a full dress shirt comes in, inspects the lghtbulb with a smile and strides out to get the job done. Kim and I breathe a sigh of relief (or apprehension) because Louis doing any job usually is either hilarious or bad news. At any rate, he then wrestles a massive ladder into the damn room. I am listening to Kiss me Through the Phone on my computer at this point and look slightly hesitantly at L-Dawg. “Umm..Do you want me to Move” I ask L-dawg. “No no problem” Ok, I still move to the other bed to be cautious. This man..please believe me when I tell you that he refuses to open the ladder but instead LEANS IT ON A BRICK WALL…IN A ROOM THAT HAS A SLIPPERY TILED FLOOR. Kim and I are by now looking very wary and are fully aware that the air is regnant with incompetence. I suggest with an action that Kim fishes out her camera to catch on tape this priceless moment of Louis incompetence. At this moment, Louis who by now is up on the ladder with that silly, aggravating little smile on his face CRASHES down on the floor. As he falls, he pulls onto my mosquito net for support pulling it with him and there is a resounding crash as the light bulb breaks into a million pieces. Kim shrieks and I am proud to note at this time, that Kims first concern was for L-Dawg by now tangled up on my bed in MY sheets and mosquito nets and light bulb shards. Are you okay? Ofcourse we don’t merit an answer. L Dawg sits up with pieces of glass firmly sticking to his face, brushes himself and moves on quite ignoring the fact that by now our precious artifacts that were on the desk have been crashed by L Dawgs descent from the ladder. Fool! You would think that one should know how to open the ladder. Kids at crisis nursery would know how to open the ladder. As he is brushing himself off he fancifully flings the mosquito net towards Kim who by now is in a deep state of shock ( there are precious few times Kim ever gets speechless and I suggest if you are ever privileged to such moments you savour it with all your heart) Mind you, this mosquito net that I speak of is FULL OF glass shards and he casually flings it in Kims direction to her horror. She gives a terrified shriek and I truly feel a mixture of laughing at this idiots incompetence and then slapping him soundly for throwing these dangerous pieces of fine lightbulb glass on Kim. Blindly, I reach for my phone and think this is a moment to call Shohini and inform her of this. Especially since by know Kim has “git it together” enough to note that Shohinis precius wooden carving that she bought for her mother is broken. She tries to tell this to Louis who ignores her and walks out o the room wheter out of shock or sheer incompetence it is not known. My phone dies on me and I wlak to Shohinis room to breathlessly narrate the happenings. Let me tell you al ittle about Shohini. She as an attitude and when things hapne her atttide does nto rain, t pours. The girl walked out with a face that could either kill someone or curdle milk. She strides towards L-dawg puts her hands on her hips and demands an explanantion. Louis by thus time, has wied the grin off his face btu sil has the jaunty attitude. We have figured out by now, that he has no fear whatsoever of being fired or anything. At this pont the mixture of the whoel drama that had ensued and Shohini’s attitude on a rampage has got me severely cracked p. I follw our little entourage of an angry Shohini, a calm becca and a terrified Kim and watch the fun. Wedemand a new room from L-dawg and are given a much shittier room but one that is glass fre nevertheless. At this point , our entire suitcases, shoes, clothes nd bedcovers hae had glass shattered all over thm, Ah, it yet another eventful, cincompetent evening in good ole dusty in Lilongwe.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Kim2
Agogo's story
We met with Agogo at 8:30pm finally after the while day of waiting around. Lights went in the middle of us preparing dinner and we were subjected to sitting in the darkness playing some ridiculous free game Tanya found on her computer. When lights came back we went to meet Agogo in his house. The stars were beautiful and thousands seemed to sparkle in the endless deep blue of the sky. This is probably the most stars I've seen in my life.
Agogo's story was equally amazing. He told us how he was raised as an orphan and thus many years was driven to build an orphanage. He had nothing more than a donation of MK100 ($6 US) and now Home of Hope aids almost 600 orphans and vulnerable children. They don't even have enough money to meet all their needs but somehow they pull through with Raising Malawi as a main sponsor and money sent from their collection of friends worldwide. This institution has such an inspirational story of what can be done with practically nothing. $6 US brought 600 children such a long way, imagine what else can be accomplished. Just like the myriad of stars twinkling that we saw tonight, there are many hidden talents, ideas and great people: we just need to take a step back sometimes to learn their story and appreciate them.
We met with Agogo at 8:30pm finally after the while day of waiting around. Lights went in the middle of us preparing dinner and we were subjected to sitting in the darkness playing some ridiculous free game Tanya found on her computer. When lights came back we went to meet Agogo in his house. The stars were beautiful and thousands seemed to sparkle in the endless deep blue of the sky. This is probably the most stars I've seen in my life.
Agogo's story was equally amazing. He told us how he was raised as an orphan and thus many years was driven to build an orphanage. He had nothing more than a donation of MK100 ($6 US) and now Home of Hope aids almost 600 orphans and vulnerable children. They don't even have enough money to meet all their needs but somehow they pull through with Raising Malawi as a main sponsor and money sent from their collection of friends worldwide. This institution has such an inspirational story of what can be done with practically nothing. $6 US brought 600 children such a long way, imagine what else can be accomplished. Just like the myriad of stars twinkling that we saw tonight, there are many hidden talents, ideas and great people: we just need to take a step back sometimes to learn their story and appreciate them.
Kim
Home of Hope is a very different concept – a village which provides housing and care for orphans, school system with pre-school, primary, and secondary schools, and also a food security unit. This morning after arriving we got a full tour of the huge site. There are numerous brick buildings housing the classrooms, hostels (including the brand new boys’ hostel donated by Madonna), staff quarters, office, maize mill, guest house, church, and far up the hill the Fax Prayer House. The latter was the furthest point from the main site and it is an old brick building Agogo goes to contemplate and pray. It is the most beautiful scenery overlooking the entire Home of Hope. Agogo's grandson was able to show us everything and even introduce us in some of the classes.
The primary classes thoroughly enjoyed us visiting their classes, the secondary school...not so much. After the tour was over and we were on our own we were encountered by a group of girls. They were led by a headstrong girl from Form 4 (Grade 12) who promptly informed us her name was Tamanda and then insisted we "escort" her to class. This was basically her chance to show off to all her other school friends, as well as mock us in Chichewa. There seemed to be hundreds of eyes turned towards us, all of which belonged to bodies which towered over us and looked a good 5 years older than us too. We were relieved when they all returned to their classes for the second session of the day.
To pass the time we randomly walked around and met a bunch of pre-schoolers playing around in the dirt outside a building. They quickly abandoned their games and came over to us with the most fascinated looks on their faces. 5 minutes later and all 4 of us were knee-high in children. They led us down to their playground where we met one of the most interesting characters, probably equal to our encounter with Tamanda.
"This is Esta, you must be her "penpil" (penpal) from America"
I looked down and there was a girl dressed in her school uniform and obviously not in classes or wherever she should be. Her name was Anita and she made it a point to introduce everyone, tell us about her entire life and busy herself recruiting "penpils" for all her friends. She told us endless stories of her mom, dad, and witch doctor uncle. My newly found penpil, Ester was very quiet and didn't know much English as she was just in Standard 3. however we sealed our friendship over my hairtie which she was fascinated with and happily wore as a bracelet.
Close to 3we went back to the house for some time before afternoon devotions. Agogo had insisted we attend devotions every afternoon at half 3 and every morning at half 5 (yes 5:30!). 3:30 found out awkwardly standing in front of the church building with no idea what to do. Just as we were about to turn back a girl stopped us. Cynthia was 17 years old and in Form 2. She explained that there would be no devotions but instead SFK (Spirituality for Kids) classes. This is a big part of Raising Malawi so we thought it would be important tot attend.
SFK is an amazing syllabus used worldwide and empowers so many kids to love themselves and accomplish things they never thought they could. The class had a range of kids form different ages (one was as young as 11) all selected for the class. They sat in 3 circles each with a facilitator (who served as our interpreters) and the main facilitator form Lilongwe walked around the room. Each student had a workbook (in Chichewa) which had exercises on getting rid of bad habits, looking to the future, and having a direction in life. There was an innovative exercise where they learnt about compass directions (N,S, E, W) and then related that to life's directions; where you are coming form and where you are going.
After the class it was almost 5:30 so went back to the house to cook dinner. Agogo and the headmaster of the secondary school turned up unexpectedly. Unfortunately at this time we had all discarded our skirts which we had tried our best to maneuver all day just for Agogo's approval. They welcomed us to Home of Hope and assured us we'd learn a lot from being there.
Rose: Playing with the pre-schoolers
Thorn: Meeting the high-schoolers
The primary classes thoroughly enjoyed us visiting their classes, the secondary school...not so much. After the tour was over and we were on our own we were encountered by a group of girls. They were led by a headstrong girl from Form 4 (Grade 12) who promptly informed us her name was Tamanda and then insisted we "escort" her to class. This was basically her chance to show off to all her other school friends, as well as mock us in Chichewa. There seemed to be hundreds of eyes turned towards us, all of which belonged to bodies which towered over us and looked a good 5 years older than us too. We were relieved when they all returned to their classes for the second session of the day.
To pass the time we randomly walked around and met a bunch of pre-schoolers playing around in the dirt outside a building. They quickly abandoned their games and came over to us with the most fascinated looks on their faces. 5 minutes later and all 4 of us were knee-high in children. They led us down to their playground where we met one of the most interesting characters, probably equal to our encounter with Tamanda.
"This is Esta, you must be her "penpil" (penpal) from America"
I looked down and there was a girl dressed in her school uniform and obviously not in classes or wherever she should be. Her name was Anita and she made it a point to introduce everyone, tell us about her entire life and busy herself recruiting "penpils" for all her friends. She told us endless stories of her mom, dad, and witch doctor uncle. My newly found penpil, Ester was very quiet and didn't know much English as she was just in Standard 3. however we sealed our friendship over my hairtie which she was fascinated with and happily wore as a bracelet.
Close to 3we went back to the house for some time before afternoon devotions. Agogo had insisted we attend devotions every afternoon at half 3 and every morning at half 5 (yes 5:30!). 3:30 found out awkwardly standing in front of the church building with no idea what to do. Just as we were about to turn back a girl stopped us. Cynthia was 17 years old and in Form 2. She explained that there would be no devotions but instead SFK (Spirituality for Kids) classes. This is a big part of Raising Malawi so we thought it would be important tot attend.
SFK is an amazing syllabus used worldwide and empowers so many kids to love themselves and accomplish things they never thought they could. The class had a range of kids form different ages (one was as young as 11) all selected for the class. They sat in 3 circles each with a facilitator (who served as our interpreters) and the main facilitator form Lilongwe walked around the room. Each student had a workbook (in Chichewa) which had exercises on getting rid of bad habits, looking to the future, and having a direction in life. There was an innovative exercise where they learnt about compass directions (N,S, E, W) and then related that to life's directions; where you are coming form and where you are going.
After the class it was almost 5:30 so went back to the house to cook dinner. Agogo and the headmaster of the secondary school turned up unexpectedly. Unfortunately at this time we had all discarded our skirts which we had tried our best to maneuver all day just for Agogo's approval. They welcomed us to Home of Hope and assured us we'd learn a lot from being there.
Rose: Playing with the pre-schoolers
Thorn: Meeting the high-schoolers
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
becca HoH
So I write to you from Blantyre… the cultural capital of the country.. but im going to write about our time at the Home of Hope Orphanage about 6 hours away from here on the border of Zambia, in the foothills of a small cluster of mountains. It is a beautiful beautiful place… inside and out. We spent our days playing with the little kids, talking to the older ones after school, and learning from teachers. We decided that since we were in a pretty religious environment where we had to attend devotion services at half five and half three every day, wear chitenges (wraps) over our pants, and stay separate from boys, etc that we would make it into a little retreat for ourselves. We tried to only say positive things, to be proactive and to not talk bad about anyone. In addition we did a rose and thorn every night (the best and worst part about your day). The retreat aspect wasn’t the most successful, but it was still important for us to do and we are still doing rose and thorns everyday.
We met some amazing people at HoH… not only the family that started it, but the kids, and other volunteers. We sat and talked to some teenage girls who had some questions for us and we had questions for them. I think they were happy to have some visitors that were just there to get to know and understand them… not try to impose things on them. Another volunteer who we only spent one day with is there for a month tutoring. He was a very interesting guy who has spent the past year traveling all over the world. And he is only returning home to Canada when he runs out of money. So he is saving every kwacha he can. Another group of volunteers was an interesting mix of people from new york and LA…. They were doing some sports program… going to different schools and stuff to introduce kids to new sports, because they mostly just play futbol (soccer). They meant well, but I’m not going to lie that it was pretty entertaining to watch them teach baseball…
We concluded that this is how cricket was spread around the world to every british colony. A group of white people went somewhere. Taught the rules. And then the people went with it from there. Perhaps that is the hope with teaching baseball… who knows. But anyway… that was an interesting experience. And I know they meant well… at least they didn’t teach American football… and we got a good laugh out of it.
So again, HoH is a few km from the main town so it is fair to say that this self sustaining village of 654 children, teachers, caregivers, workers, and administration is in the middle of nowhere. It gets dark around 5:30 pm, so one night we had a meeting at another house in the village later in the evening. On our way we looked up into the sky and could see just about every star and planet in the universe. It was an incredible moment. I remember before I came here I was excited to see stars… and we finally did. It looked like a planetarium.. it was unreal…….
Then one morning we decided to go on a hike to the top of the Mchingi hill right outside the village. So 2 high school boys who regularly climb this hill guided the way. We left just after sunrise at 6 am and made it to the top around 8. We stayed up there for a little while and then returned by 9:30. It was not until we came back down that I was astounded that we climbed this mass. It was a beautiful view from the top, but I could only appreciate the vastness back at the village. Shohini kept saying “Did we really climb that one? Are you sure its THAT one? Not this smaller one?”
It was a great moment and even though going up and down were equally a struggle, we were glad we did it. (pictures to come. I am scared my computer will explode if I upload anymore)
We arrived to HoH on Tuesday, and did the hike on Thursday. After the hike we realized we couldn’t avoid showers any more so we each took turns standing in an ice cold shower quickly trying to removed the dirt from our legs and arms. It was a partial success.. but oh well… we’re used to being dirty at this point. we are counting the days until we have real showers again... but thas okay... We had made a promise that we would shower when we got to blantyre. And that we did. Friday morning we left for Lilongwe to catch a bus to blantyre. We were SO excited to be venturing off to the cultural capital. We heard there is a movie theater and actual things to do… so we spent 6 hours traveling here through beautiful terrain having good conversation and seeing our first bribe at the checkpoints. Yes, this country has checkpoints when you go into a new district? Why? I don’t know. It’s the most peaceful country on the continent. What theyre looking for? I don’t know. Maybe its just a means of employment… it gives the military something to do. cheers!
Anyway, so we arrived in blantyre, more excited than ever. And we made the trek to our lodge, lugging all our suitcases. Once again, we stuck out like sore thumbs. But more on blantyre next time! stay tuned.
We met some amazing people at HoH… not only the family that started it, but the kids, and other volunteers. We sat and talked to some teenage girls who had some questions for us and we had questions for them. I think they were happy to have some visitors that were just there to get to know and understand them… not try to impose things on them. Another volunteer who we only spent one day with is there for a month tutoring. He was a very interesting guy who has spent the past year traveling all over the world. And he is only returning home to Canada when he runs out of money. So he is saving every kwacha he can. Another group of volunteers was an interesting mix of people from new york and LA…. They were doing some sports program… going to different schools and stuff to introduce kids to new sports, because they mostly just play futbol (soccer). They meant well, but I’m not going to lie that it was pretty entertaining to watch them teach baseball…
We concluded that this is how cricket was spread around the world to every british colony. A group of white people went somewhere. Taught the rules. And then the people went with it from there. Perhaps that is the hope with teaching baseball… who knows. But anyway… that was an interesting experience. And I know they meant well… at least they didn’t teach American football… and we got a good laugh out of it.
So again, HoH is a few km from the main town so it is fair to say that this self sustaining village of 654 children, teachers, caregivers, workers, and administration is in the middle of nowhere. It gets dark around 5:30 pm, so one night we had a meeting at another house in the village later in the evening. On our way we looked up into the sky and could see just about every star and planet in the universe. It was an incredible moment. I remember before I came here I was excited to see stars… and we finally did. It looked like a planetarium.. it was unreal…….
Then one morning we decided to go on a hike to the top of the Mchingi hill right outside the village. So 2 high school boys who regularly climb this hill guided the way. We left just after sunrise at 6 am and made it to the top around 8. We stayed up there for a little while and then returned by 9:30. It was not until we came back down that I was astounded that we climbed this mass. It was a beautiful view from the top, but I could only appreciate the vastness back at the village. Shohini kept saying “Did we really climb that one? Are you sure its THAT one? Not this smaller one?”
It was a great moment and even though going up and down were equally a struggle, we were glad we did it. (pictures to come. I am scared my computer will explode if I upload anymore)
We arrived to HoH on Tuesday, and did the hike on Thursday. After the hike we realized we couldn’t avoid showers any more so we each took turns standing in an ice cold shower quickly trying to removed the dirt from our legs and arms. It was a partial success.. but oh well… we’re used to being dirty at this point. we are counting the days until we have real showers again... but thas okay... We had made a promise that we would shower when we got to blantyre. And that we did. Friday morning we left for Lilongwe to catch a bus to blantyre. We were SO excited to be venturing off to the cultural capital. We heard there is a movie theater and actual things to do… so we spent 6 hours traveling here through beautiful terrain having good conversation and seeing our first bribe at the checkpoints. Yes, this country has checkpoints when you go into a new district? Why? I don’t know. It’s the most peaceful country on the continent. What theyre looking for? I don’t know. Maybe its just a means of employment… it gives the military something to do. cheers!
Anyway, so we arrived in blantyre, more excited than ever. And we made the trek to our lodge, lugging all our suitcases. Once again, we stuck out like sore thumbs. But more on blantyre next time! stay tuned.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Shohini 5
Since my last blog entry, there has been so much to write about. But I won't write everything that happened but instead we (the four of us) are splitting up what to write about. So I'll start with the Friday after the last day at Consol. This weekend, basically was spent doing nothing. Kim and Tanya had to move out from Korea Lodge because there weren't any space since we hadn't made bookings up to that day. So Becca and I spent Sunday in the room going crazy by ourselves. We were speaking in British accents and screaming and saying ridiculous things. Before that we were all just fooling around, thinking about what games we would play with the kids. I don't I've laughed that hard in a really long time. I think we are going crazy slowly. Monday we wanted to spend doing something productive with our lives since we were bored out of our minds during the weekend. Instead all we did was change money, get groceries and buy tickets for Blantyre. There was insane traffic so it took almost all day to do that. So we woke up this morning early to check-out and leave by 8:30am. The car we had was a gigantic car and was really comfortable. We reached Michingyi pretty fast and reached around 10:30 am. The kids were out of class and we met the finance manager who we later found out was agogo's (grandfather/founder of Home of Hope) grandson. We asked him to give us a tour of the place. I was amazed. The place is pretty gigantic and accommodates about 640-660 children and about 142 support staff. There's a primary school, nursery, secondary school, library, a small (decently equipped) clinic, hostels for boy, girls and babies, houses for the staff and a graveyard. While we were given the tour, the younger children just really wanted to meet us in their classrooms and groaned really loudly if we didn’t enter their classroom. It was really adorable. They didn't speak a whole lot of English but they were taught how to say "welcome visitors". We then went to the garden/farm that was outside of the compound but still home of hope territory. There were all sorts of things; maize, sugarcane, vegetables, fish ponds, beans and of course chickens running around. We went up the hill and it was beautiful; I just wanted to keep climbing the hill and go over to Zambia. But we only went up to the Fax House which was basically a donkey barn when the Scottish people were the only white pastors till agogo became the first black pastor. He used to go up there which was now an abandoned place. It was a gorgeous place and beautiful view. It was away from everything but it could see everything like the home of hope and beyond it; it was beautiful. We stayed there for a little bit and then came down and went to the clinic, where little kids were staying, the hall, and then to the secondary school. After that, we went back to our rooms. We met Rodrik, who is the helper here, and he taught us many sentences in Chichewa though I've forgotten most of it and he's supposed to quiz us tomorrow. We decided to go out to play with the kids. The rest of our stay at Home of Hope was full to the brim through hikes, meeting new children and teachers and hearing their stories, devotion and beautiful singing and a difficult goodbye at the very end.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
becca 4
okay, so since everyone has written about our week at consol homes and everything, im going to just list some random thoughts ive had during the week. also funny quotes and things.Perhaps it will make sense. Perhaps it wont. this is how we stay entertained in malawi.
ALL I WANT IS A CHEESEBURGER.
Im a vegetarian… hmmm
im tired of people waiting on me hand and foot. I just want to carry something myself and clean my own plate.
Even though you’ve put us in the outhouse, it doesn’t mean you have to treat us that way.
Some people are genuinely nice... some have other motives.
Thank you Brittany for Norwegian Recycling.
I actually cant eat Pakistani food everyday.
I wish I had clean clothes.
Everything seems to be a give and take.
I’m going to miss this old nokia cell phone with SNAKE.
I now understand the game of cricket. I <3 colonization!
Fun Quotes:
“Our ice cream machine is also fuucked up.” J-Dawg.
“I once knew a man named Ingrid” Tanya.
“Do you know who this is? David’s sister. David Madonna.” – Mems, pointing the girl on Shohini's lap.
“Do you want this shirt? It is $40 US dollars.” Kim in an authoritative voice pointing to an old ratty shirt, trying to trade it with a salesman.
"Whats your name... and what about your other friend? The slim one... who was wearing a black shirt yesterday... shes not as white as you..." waiter, referring to kim.
New Abbreviations
J-Dawg/ Lemony Snicket
Snicketting- (verb); the act of sketching, usually carried out by a South Asian man.
Ic- (adjective); incompetent.
M-Dawg; Madonna
Mems aka Mem the Gem- Memore’
__- Dawg for just about anyone/ anything.
The outhouse- where we stay with the staff.
W-Dawgs- white people
The brethren- name to describe other foreigners whom we feel solidarity with when passing on the street. This may or may not involve a friendly smile or nod from one azungu to another.
K-Lodge- Korea Lodge where they put us in the outhouse. Run by Gogo.
P-Lodge- Peacock Lodge; new home with friendly manager giving us volunteer discounts left and right.
ALL I WANT IS A CHEESEBURGER.
Im a vegetarian… hmmm
im tired of people waiting on me hand and foot. I just want to carry something myself and clean my own plate.
Even though you’ve put us in the outhouse, it doesn’t mean you have to treat us that way.
Some people are genuinely nice... some have other motives.
Thank you Brittany for Norwegian Recycling.
I actually cant eat Pakistani food everyday.
I wish I had clean clothes.
Everything seems to be a give and take.
I’m going to miss this old nokia cell phone with SNAKE.
I now understand the game of cricket. I <3 colonization!
Fun Quotes:
“Our ice cream machine is also fuucked up.” J-Dawg.
“I once knew a man named Ingrid” Tanya.
“Do you know who this is? David’s sister. David Madonna.” – Mems, pointing the girl on Shohini's lap.
“Do you want this shirt? It is $40 US dollars.” Kim in an authoritative voice pointing to an old ratty shirt, trying to trade it with a salesman.
"Whats your name... and what about your other friend? The slim one... who was wearing a black shirt yesterday... shes not as white as you..." waiter, referring to kim.
New Abbreviations
J-Dawg/ Lemony Snicket
Snicketting- (verb); the act of sketching, usually carried out by a South Asian man.
Ic- (adjective); incompetent.
M-Dawg; Madonna
Mems aka Mem the Gem- Memore’
__- Dawg for just about anyone/ anything.
The outhouse- where we stay with the staff.
W-Dawgs- white people
The brethren- name to describe other foreigners whom we feel solidarity with when passing on the street. This may or may not involve a friendly smile or nod from one azungu to another.
K-Lodge- Korea Lodge where they put us in the outhouse. Run by Gogo.
P-Lodge- Peacock Lodge; new home with friendly manager giving us volunteer discounts left and right.
kim 4
One afternoon after our usual trip back fro Consol Homes, we decided to venture out and put Memore into god use. We asked him to take us to the Central Market so that we could buy some fabric. We had found that women in Malawi rarely wear pants. There were normally dressed in skirts or brightly coloured fabric wrapped around their lower bodies. The cloth is beautifully decorated with different patterns and styles, each for only MK400. With this task in mind we directed Memore through parts of Lilongwe he was quite unfamiliar with, in search of the market. Easier said than done.
20 minutes later found the four of us standing in a sea of people in the heart of the market. Not only were there thick clouds of dust, but random men from stalls took turns poking their heads out to cat-call us. At this point we were pretty much lost.
The puzzled looks on our faces were probably very evident because soon enough a middle aged business woman asked us if we needed assistance. We explained that we wanted to buy some fabric and she informed us we were in the entirely wrong section of the market. This was already obvious to us seeing that we were surrounded by hardware supplies mixed with the pungent smell of fish. The lady was very nice and took us to the correct section of the market.
Upon entering, there were mountains of fabric piled high on tables stretching far into the back of the market. Women were up beckoning us urgently to their tables attempting to offer us the “best fabric” (p.s. the patterns were pretty much the same at all tables). In no time we had chosen our patterns and navigated ourselves out of the market to meet a completely amused Memore waiting for us in the parking lot. I can’t wait to wear my fabric out, maybe that will stop some of the loud cries of “asungu!”
20 minutes later found the four of us standing in a sea of people in the heart of the market. Not only were there thick clouds of dust, but random men from stalls took turns poking their heads out to cat-call us. At this point we were pretty much lost.
The puzzled looks on our faces were probably very evident because soon enough a middle aged business woman asked us if we needed assistance. We explained that we wanted to buy some fabric and she informed us we were in the entirely wrong section of the market. This was already obvious to us seeing that we were surrounded by hardware supplies mixed with the pungent smell of fish. The lady was very nice and took us to the correct section of the market.
Upon entering, there were mountains of fabric piled high on tables stretching far into the back of the market. Women were up beckoning us urgently to their tables attempting to offer us the “best fabric” (p.s. the patterns were pretty much the same at all tables). In no time we had chosen our patterns and navigated ourselves out of the market to meet a completely amused Memore waiting for us in the parking lot. I can’t wait to wear my fabric out, maybe that will stop some of the loud cries of “asungu!”
kim 3
Is all aid good aid?
Going to Consol Homes for the past week has really provided us with first-hand experience as to how aid is treated in NGOs. Donors often times give many things without thinking about the cultural appropriateness of the items they donate and NGOs have problems allocated all they are given. We found Malawian people are very accepting and never want to seem ungrateful for aid, however when organizations from the UK and US give hundreds of English books to a pre-school taught in Chichewa, no one can benefit. We could definitely identify that Consol Homes suffers a lot from aid which they either can’t use or simply just don’t know how to use.
We were not assigned anything official to do so for the last two days we undertook two small tasks of cleaning and clearing which revealed some of the deficiencies within the system of donating in Malawi.
On Wednesday we went to the classrooms at Consol Homes to check the toys and books that were available for the kids. Problem #1, the classroom items were unequally distributed amongst the three classrooms. The youngest classroom was bare while the other two were well equipped with toys and games, the eldest classroom was even painted bright colours. Problem #2, with the abundance of crayons and pencils, there was much potential for art & craft with the children, however none of the classes had paper to draw on. Problem #3, there were lots of wall charts but no tape to hang them by. Apparently the teachers got by gluing things to the wall which led to much difficulty when they want to put up new things. Despite all of this, the worst was probably the gigantic piles of boxes we found taking up ¼ of one of the classrooms. We decided to clear this as our project of the day.
After investigating with the teachers, we found the boxes contained donations of chalk, crayons, scissors, rolls of tape, hair bands, vitamins, and almost expired worm medicine. This was from UNICEF and various other organizations which simply had not been distributed yet. What a mess it was to clean up so the kids could have their classroom back. Aid like this takes so long to distribute because they get so much of one thing and don’t know what to do with all of it and also if they give it all out, they don’t know when next they will be getting more. It’s really difficult deciding how and when to allocate what is donated.
Thursday we were in a similar situation but in a greater capacity. We were taken to the Consol Homes warehouse to help count things for distribution. When we arrived we were appalled to find hundreds of boxes of aid yet to be allocated. There were shoes, clothes, books, maize, plastic containers…you name it and it was there piled high to the ceiling of the warehouse. However, twice this week the children went home without food and everyday many come to school in the same torn clothes. It is very difficult to understand why it takes so long to give out aid when so many people need it. If only they kept an inventory of all the items they receive they wouldn’t have to go through the tedious process of counting, boxing and then recounting the items again. Also maybe if they regulated their distributions they could target the families who need it the most. Sadly, there are many things that need to be done before the system of aid can become an efficient process. Without computer, or even English proficiency it is very difficult to instill and sustain such a system.
Going to Consol Homes for the past week has really provided us with first-hand experience as to how aid is treated in NGOs. Donors often times give many things without thinking about the cultural appropriateness of the items they donate and NGOs have problems allocated all they are given. We found Malawian people are very accepting and never want to seem ungrateful for aid, however when organizations from the UK and US give hundreds of English books to a pre-school taught in Chichewa, no one can benefit. We could definitely identify that Consol Homes suffers a lot from aid which they either can’t use or simply just don’t know how to use.
We were not assigned anything official to do so for the last two days we undertook two small tasks of cleaning and clearing which revealed some of the deficiencies within the system of donating in Malawi.
On Wednesday we went to the classrooms at Consol Homes to check the toys and books that were available for the kids. Problem #1, the classroom items were unequally distributed amongst the three classrooms. The youngest classroom was bare while the other two were well equipped with toys and games, the eldest classroom was even painted bright colours. Problem #2, with the abundance of crayons and pencils, there was much potential for art & craft with the children, however none of the classes had paper to draw on. Problem #3, there were lots of wall charts but no tape to hang them by. Apparently the teachers got by gluing things to the wall which led to much difficulty when they want to put up new things. Despite all of this, the worst was probably the gigantic piles of boxes we found taking up ¼ of one of the classrooms. We decided to clear this as our project of the day.
After investigating with the teachers, we found the boxes contained donations of chalk, crayons, scissors, rolls of tape, hair bands, vitamins, and almost expired worm medicine. This was from UNICEF and various other organizations which simply had not been distributed yet. What a mess it was to clean up so the kids could have their classroom back. Aid like this takes so long to distribute because they get so much of one thing and don’t know what to do with all of it and also if they give it all out, they don’t know when next they will be getting more. It’s really difficult deciding how and when to allocate what is donated.
Thursday we were in a similar situation but in a greater capacity. We were taken to the Consol Homes warehouse to help count things for distribution. When we arrived we were appalled to find hundreds of boxes of aid yet to be allocated. There were shoes, clothes, books, maize, plastic containers…you name it and it was there piled high to the ceiling of the warehouse. However, twice this week the children went home without food and everyday many come to school in the same torn clothes. It is very difficult to understand why it takes so long to give out aid when so many people need it. If only they kept an inventory of all the items they receive they wouldn’t have to go through the tedious process of counting, boxing and then recounting the items again. Also maybe if they regulated their distributions they could target the families who need it the most. Sadly, there are many things that need to be done before the system of aid can become an efficient process. Without computer, or even English proficiency it is very difficult to instill and sustain such a system.
Shohini 4
We have almost been here for 3 weeks. There's so much we've learnt, so much we've experienced both in the personal sphere as well as in regards to our education. Being in a different place, being thrown out of one's comfort zone leads to meeting new people in random settings and learning so much from them. Yesterday we were at a new restaurant and the owner was a second generation Malawian whose great-grandparents were from India. Just talking to him, we got to learn so much like about the Malawian Indians and how many had left with their British passports while many were forced to leave Malawians villages and move into cities. Random things like that help so much in knowing more about a country than just reading it. I keep marveling at this fact that everyone has their own story and how that connects with a history of a place to explain the present. Anyway this past week, we were working in Consol Homes and I think we had a first-hand experience of the practicality of aid and the difficulties of it including distribution etc. One of the days, we were asked to create some sort of inventory of the donations that this center received to aid them with distribution. We were led to a warehouse where all these donations were stored. Let me describe this warehouse: it was a gigantic room filled to the brim with boxes of all sorts of things from expensive shoes to clothes to food to medicines and anything one can perceive as important for a child or his/her family. There were thick winter boots that in reality weren't useful. There were tons of crayons but no paper to use because when people donate crayons, I think papers are assumed to be in a classroom. But there were also many useful things like beautiful children's clothes and food and such other things. This just tied in to what one person was saying earlier about the fact that there is aid but a lot of it isn't effective and despite the fact that there are many willing NGOs who are here to help (and they have done so much and continue to do so) but there isn't a corresponding up-to-date distribution system that is effective enough to reach everyone in a proper way. There are just so many difficulties of development. For example, you have so much donations and there's so much to think about; allocate it over a period of time so it doesn't run out, make sure no one steals them, if you give it out to individuals it might not work, but giving it to centers takes forever to send, transportation hindrance, and then forgetting about a lot of supplies. Having worked here and with 2 more weeks, I think I am starting to understand the frustration of development in a day-to-day basis despite having people wanting to help and having the money and laws to create wonderful projects to help people, but there are so many practical problems that just don't even appear relevant till you see it firsthand.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Tanya- reflection
So we have volunteered for one week and one day. I am disappointed to note to myself that I am not saving the world. People that save the world in Malawi give up electricity for many hours every day, hardly ever use the painfully slow internet connection, spend their free time playing and teaching children and their working hours helping to make the situation better, giving up better jobs in a bigger city and a better life for themselves devoting themselves where they are needed. Quietly, efficiently and gracefully. Am I making a difference, I do NOT know..Have I learned something? More than words or a research paper will justify. I see the frustrations of volunteering in the development arena. Progress is slow and many times you question whether you are doing the best thing by becoming a resource and then magically disappearing after 5 weeks. (Sound familiar, western development agencies?) Many times, I feel too much like an azungu tourist. The people, rich and poor, administrators and maids laugh and smile and welcome us with such warmth. I guess, I am still reeling under the impact of being perceived as American. The term azungu is loaded. It speaks to power constructs so neatly stacked in place that the colour of my skin doesn’t matter anymore. My big sneakers and backpack and American clothes will suffice to instill a sense of subservience in the most skilled professional of people.
They were everywhere-Germans, Japanese, British, Americans-taking pictures, hailing taxis, fending off street peddlers, many of them dressed in safari suits like extras on a movie set. …Here in Africa, the tourists didn’t seem so funny. I felt them as an encroachment somehow; I found their innocence vaguely insulting. It occurred to me that in their utter lack of self-consciousness, they were expressing a freedom that neither Auma nor I could ever experience, a bedrock confidence in their own parochialism, a confidence reserved for those born into imperial cultures.Pg.312 Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama.
On a slightly different tangent, I just finished reading Obama’s memoir, Dreams From My Father. I feel, that in some small measure all the four of us here are not unlike the young Obama questioning colonization, racism, development, aid to Africa, big organizations like UNICEF (we had a meeting with them). Indeed, questioning ourselves about our work and its relevance in the larger context. We all desire to leave something, anything better than when we left it without letting this guilt of there being too little time to ever make a lasting impact overcome us… and that we will pack up ou bags and leave to our 24 hour internet, three meals a day, sterling education with Malawi being no more than a fond memory and a ‘learning experience.’ I am reading this book at a very relevant time because it has taught me that questioning and doubt is ALWAYS good if it leads us to change the way we are doing things and wrestle a more meaningful experience out of everything we do.
In this vein of constant questioning we have decided that we will create a volunteer packet and publicise the different things that can be done in Raising Malawis different organization to the western volunteer. It is nothing more than a network; identifying a need , reaching out across this network to make sure that the western young scholar, retired teacher, middle aged doctor WHOEVER that desires to make a difference is matched to this need. Basically making it easier for the two parties to identify what they are looking in. This internship is taking so many interesting turns and often what we learn in a random conversation with a nurse or a teacher is FAR more valuable than the field work.
Monday, June 8, 2009
kim again!
This morning was day 1 of Counsel Home. When we arrived the children were all outside because there was no electricity and the classrooms were locked. We introduced ourselves to the teachers and played ring games with the kids, most of which were between 3 and 6 years old. After a bit we were able to go inside where we split off into different classrooms.
The classroom Tanya and I were in mainly had 4 year olds. It was their snack time and before they could eat they had to each stand and recite a few words saying that they must wash their hands so that they don’t get diseases. (in Chichewa) The teachers encourage the children to practice good hygiene and there is a special lesson in cleanliness every morning. After the grace the snacks were distributed. Some families did not send any food with the children and so those who got food were encouraged to share. When they were done eating they were allowed to play with toys until the next activity. The main teacher then began the lesson of the day, which was learning the letters A B C D. each child was randomly called up to the front of the room to point and say each letter. If they did it correctly the whole class would sing “Well-a-done, well-a-done, sure, keep it up!” They have a lot of singing in the classrooms and often times teachers will even get up and dance to the children’s singing.
At the end of the lesson porridge was served to everyone, including us. No one was expected to go without food. It wasn’t bad just a bit bland, and crunchy at times, something that could take some getting used to. As Becca said “it’s like a surprise in every bite”. Some kids scarfed it down while others simply wasted it. For many this would be their only meal for the day.
After lunch the children were released to go home or play in the yard. It was a very short day compared to the long hours we had spent at Crisis Nursery last week. On our way out we met two of the programme directors who promised to meet with us the following day. Memore was already in the car waiting to drive us back into town so we left to come back again tomorrow.
On the car ride back we did some reflection on all the events from the past two weeks. It was obvious we were no longer looking at health care, it seemed the project had spiraled into a whole new field. We also were not doing as much to help as we had originally planned. Tanya continued to voice the fact that it seemed we were not being used in ways that can provide maximum benefit to Crisis Nursery or even Counsel Homes. Furthermore, nothing we were currently doing is sustainable for other volunteers or Raising Malawi to carry on after we leave. Through more discussion we realized we could channel our energies into rectifying all of the problems we were facing as volunteers. For future volunteers we thought should be some sort of a volunteer packet in relation to the three places we are visiting just so that others who want to help can see where their skills can best be used instead of taking days to orient as we had done.
We are going to try to develop these ideas more and hopefully speak to Lois tomorrow. We also have an agreement with the Pakistani man from Sana for him to cook us cheap good dinner tonight so we’ll see how that goes.
kim
As Becca and Shohini both accurately described, Senga Bay was nothing short of breathtaking. We knew the Lake was in fact 20% of Malawi's land but we had no idea it would stretch onwards for miles. The dazzling blue water resembled an ocean and you could only see the land on the other side if you strained your eyes. On the horizon there is the slight outline of dark blue mountains on the other side of the lake in Mozambique. Absolutely stunning. The rooms unfortunately were not up to par but nevertheless the lake made up for everything.
Minus the few creepy encounters, the sights over lake Malawi were memorable. After dusk we went out to the lake where we watched a magnificent moonrise over the water. It was a full moon and as it rose powerful streaks of light lasered across the surface of the water. It was such a beautiful sight the drone of mosquitoes buzzing over our heads didn’t even bother us. In fact the only thing better than this moonrise was the sunrise the following morning.
I was awoken at 4:30 am to watch the sunrise and as per usual I hate early mornings and almost refused to go. Good thing I didn’t though because I would have regretted it. At first when we walked onto the beach there were splashes of pink under the clouds decorating the sky, then as the sun got closer there were shades of oranges and yellows highlighting the entire lake. The still water was like a mirror reflecting the brilliant sky, not even pictures would capture the beauty we saw. This was definitely the highest point of our trip to Senga Bay (plus it being Tanya’s birthday J)
On another note, after Senga Bay we moved from World Camp to Korean Garden Lodge. I know for $10/night you can’t expect a palace but we were caught a bit offguard coming to this place. The extra expenses we were originally paying at World Camp definitely translated to cleanliness. At K Lodge, as we affectionately called it, we were basically placed in the outhouse/servant’s quarters. There are two closet sized rooms which serve as showers that at first we were reluctant to even enter. But nothing beats the toilet which, don’t get me wrong is clean, it just lacks one important thing: a sink. So the idea is if you need to wash your hands, brush your teeth or anything else, there is a big concrete sink outside the building.
This is our current situation in our new residence. At least we get WiFi…sometimes. How we miss World Camp’s luxuries. Too bad its not in our budget.
***DISCLAIMER TO PARENTAL UNITS:
We are SAFE and CLEAN at K Lodge…and saving money. We are college students we are used to small rooms and dirty bathrooms, and being broke. At least we get to bond :)
more pictures!
Shohini with many babies at the nursery... a common sight...
a truckload of school children hanging out of it on the highway.
Tanya's Sri Lankan birthday dinner... never been happier...
Kim and boat at sunrise. :)
sunrise... enough said.
Shohini 3
We woke up relatively early the next day to leave for Senga Bay. We reached Salima which was a small little town. It was cute but there really wasn't much. I was expecting a bit more since we had read somewhere that Salima was kind of a bustling city but all we saw was a smaller, less spread out version of Lilongwe. We went onwards to Senga Bay and it took forever to find our resort since we had through the dirt road. We eventually found it and it was an amazing view. The lake was multiple colors of blue and the waters were shining. It took my breath away. There were a lot of locals on the beach and few people in the resort. But we settled into our bat smelling, disgustingly mosquito infested rooms and left with our sunblocks on to sit out in the sun. After a while since I was getting really bored, Becca came with me to play beach volleyball. We were joined by a bunch of kids who came for their summer holidays. It was fun playing with them and we were later joined by a couple of South Asian men from Lilongwe. The kids left after a while and so did we since we were kind of playing ridiculously atrociously and I was so hot I just wanted to jump into the lake which is what Becca and I did. I waded pretty far out but the lake was pretty flat. After a while, Becca left the water at which point Tanya joined me and we went pretty far out. There were dead fishes in the lake which creeped me out but we still decided to stay for a while. Just when we were coming out, a bunch of kids who were playing with a huge tree in the lake decided to leave and we decided to go canoeing on that log. It's not as easy as it looks; balance and strength are essential attributes as well as a tolerance for pain since we kept scratching every part of our bodies. It was too entertaining though. After a while, we came off at which point we noticed Becca and Kim looking at batiks and paintings. There were some really beautiful paintings but I thought they weren't bargaining enough which was what Tanya was thinking as well. So I decided to buy one and got the price to go down. Each of our paintings totaled to about $10 which was pretty cool. So we decided to go into town for a little while. On the way we saw a really nice crafts market so we d we'd stop on our way back. We went in there to look and before I knew it, I was bargaining, bringing down prices of two things from 3000 MK to 500 MK and I bought it. I thought it was a pretty good buy. We had heard that we could trade things which we didn’t have at the moment, so we decided to come back the following day. (P.S. the whole trading thing did NOT go so well and they ended up catching our bluff about the prices of these "American" goods). So we returned and decided to sit out on the beach for a while (dousing ourselves with Odomos a.k.a mosquito repellent). We tried to talk to the reception about the fact that there were bats in our room but the man claimed that they leave at dusk which was an utter lie. So on the way back, we met the Sri Lankan man who owned the restaurant and told him about the fact that it was Tanya's birthday and we wanted good Sri Lankan food. He said he would try and cook as well as he could which he did. He was also watching ICC twenty20 which was so much fun since India won (against Bangladesh) and Australia lost (against W.I.). Holla!!! Anyway, we watched the game eating great Sri Lankan food and being creeped on by some man. Whatever...we reached the room and only got more freaked out but after a while I was over it. For some reason I kept waking up throughout the night and finally at 4:45am woke up to watch the sunrise which didn't actually rise till about 5:45. But the colors before the actual sunrise was beautiful and totally worth it. No pictures or words can really describe the view but it was picturesque with shades of red and pink with a distant island which was completely black because of no light and a lone boat floating. The world stood still in awe of what takes place every morning but is one of the most spectacular views and invocation of feelings. I officially didn't want to leave.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
becca
So since the last time I wrote, we have played and cleaned 16 babies, survived 2 malaria scares, traveled to Lake Malawi, lived with bats, wasps, mosquitoes, ants, avoided creepy men in straw hats, ate sri lankan food, celebrated Tanya’s birthday, bargained with many many men to buy curios, and drove in dozens of minibuses and visited lots of people that have all blended together to form one long week of memories and blurriness.
Time is so strange in this land.
Anyway, so last week we volunteered at the Crisis Nursery all week. On a physical level it was cute and wonderful to play with the babies and volunteer, but even more than that, I took it as a learning experience. Everywhere I go in this country I am bombarded with new experiences and sights and realizations. Its slightly overwhelming. Its kind of like when I first met these girls at Clark freshman year and we just kept talking and learning about the differences between our lives. I imagine that this overwhelming, sensory-overload is a common feeling for many international students. Regardless, it is something I am entirely unfamiliar with as an American that never strays far from home… it is overwhelming and tiring and makes me want to go home at times. I kind of want a break from not only mosquitoes, unsteady internet and phone, and hot burning sun, but colonial racial divides, and just being azungus… hmm… crash course on Being a Minority 101 I guess…..
oh right, back to babies… very cute little things they are. The nursery is funded by the Ministry of Hope Church in North Carolina and other churches around the world. Even with all this funding, and being in the capital city with all it has to offer, it is still lacking significantly. The staff consists of women who are called “mothers” who take care of 4 babies during their shift. Unfortunately, most of their training is just their experience being a mother… nothing really formal or skills to enrich or stimulate the children. There are also other staff members and it creates an overall atmosphere of disorganization where children may not be fed, changed or played with for hours.
If this is what it is like in a well funded organization, I don’t even know what to expect in a village.
I don’t know anything about villages. Hopefully this week at consol homes in the village will help me with this understanding. We don’t know what to expect, but I am excited… hmm…
on a slightly less reflective note, we ended our week by taking a one day trip to Senga Bay for Tanya’s birthday. This small town/ village is very very cute. It is dotted with large colonial homes and guesthouses for people taking a holiday. Its hard to get lost in Malawi because most towns, villages and cities are connected by one main road. So we see a sign on the main road that says “Carolina’s Lake Resort” and turn down the dirt road. Little did we know it was about a mile drive down a bumpy dirt road going through a village. To the left we could see “dots of blue” as Tanya kept pointing out and all around us was just an idealic, quiet, village life. After suspecting we were going the wrong way, we finally reached Carolina’s… a white, colonial house with a bar and lounge area… all on the beach and we couldn’t have been more excited. After checking in, and going straight to our rooms to change into our suits, we start to realize the reality of the rest of our night… we had a cute little balcony that was connected to the adjacent room, so we tried to lock the door and ended up breaking the lock…. Oops.. so ya… we slept with a broken door… but i’ll get to that later.. first we enjoyed a long day in the sun and on the beach being harassed by salesmen selling everything from fish, to trips to the island, to paintings. We played with some of the local kids and then Tanya and Shohini decided to jump on a log and pretend it was a boat… they saw the local boys doing it and thought it looked like fun… needless to say they are quite sore from the exercise..
Our evening ended up being full of Sri Lankan food and cricket (the game on tv) because we happened to find ourselves at a hotel with a Sri Lankan chef (thank Gd). The food was sooooooo delicious that we decided to take home the leftovers (too bad we forgot them the following morning when checking out).
So during the second cricket game some strange drunk man in a straw hat was creeping around, but the Sri Lankan man was keeping us safe. Since we woke up at the crack of dawn we were exhausted by 10 and I’m sad to say we didn’t even make it to Tanya’s birthday at midnight.
When we went back to our room at night, creeped out enough from the straw hat man, we got even more scared because we heard noises in the communal bathroom and didn’t know who it was (of course we assumed it was straw hat man). Tanya and I NEEDED confirmation as to who our neighbor in the lodge was, so we stood with the door cracked open to see the man when they came out of the bathroom. So we stood at attention… and kept standing and waiting for this mysterious creature… I must note that as Tanya and I thought death was approaching on the other side of the bathroom door, Kim said “guys, we have to blog about this”….. great… thanks kim.
Anyway…. About half an hour later after still standing and waiting for him to come out of the bathroom, thinking of every possible reason why the man might be in the bathroom for over half an hour, shohini got up the courage to knock on the bathroom door (which by the way didn’t lock)… and we quickly learned there was NO ONE IN THERE. We had been standing around like idiots (having to pee) waiting for some phantom creep in a straw hat to appear… after all the hustle and bustle of the bathroom man died down we pushed our beds together and crawled under the mosquito nets. Shohini and Tanya shared a bed because the fourth was our faux lock for the unlocked door.. ☺ so from my bed I saw our neighbor step onto the balcony for a late night cigarette.. and to everyone’s splendor, it was a fellow azungu! So we quieted down, trying to ignore the loud squeeking of bats in our ceiling and fell asleep… oh, did I forget to mention the millions of bats that we were apparently disturbing in the roof of our room… ps Tanya is terrified of bats…. Twas a grand ol time really…
We went to sleep at 11:45 and woke up at 4:30 am to watch the sunrise over the Lake…. DEFINITELY WORTH IT.
We went back to sleep for some time and spent the rest of the morning eating our FREE breakfast that you KNOW we were excited about and then stopped at a market on the way back where we were once again harassed to buy anything and everything.
It was a very nice weekend and now we are at a new hotel that provides “free wifi internet access”….. too bad we live in the outhouse with the chickens where the internet doesn’t reach… but more about that next time. Tomorrow: Consol Homes- Nametete.
*********Disclaimer to Parental Units***********:
NO ONE WAS REALLY THAT SICK. JUST A TUMMY BUG. NO MALARIA. Also, WE ARE SAFE. I SWEAR. Clean? Maybe. Safe? Yes. Smile! See you all soon!
Time is so strange in this land.
Anyway, so last week we volunteered at the Crisis Nursery all week. On a physical level it was cute and wonderful to play with the babies and volunteer, but even more than that, I took it as a learning experience. Everywhere I go in this country I am bombarded with new experiences and sights and realizations. Its slightly overwhelming. Its kind of like when I first met these girls at Clark freshman year and we just kept talking and learning about the differences between our lives. I imagine that this overwhelming, sensory-overload is a common feeling for many international students. Regardless, it is something I am entirely unfamiliar with as an American that never strays far from home… it is overwhelming and tiring and makes me want to go home at times. I kind of want a break from not only mosquitoes, unsteady internet and phone, and hot burning sun, but colonial racial divides, and just being azungus… hmm… crash course on Being a Minority 101 I guess…..
oh right, back to babies… very cute little things they are. The nursery is funded by the Ministry of Hope Church in North Carolina and other churches around the world. Even with all this funding, and being in the capital city with all it has to offer, it is still lacking significantly. The staff consists of women who are called “mothers” who take care of 4 babies during their shift. Unfortunately, most of their training is just their experience being a mother… nothing really formal or skills to enrich or stimulate the children. There are also other staff members and it creates an overall atmosphere of disorganization where children may not be fed, changed or played with for hours.
If this is what it is like in a well funded organization, I don’t even know what to expect in a village.
I don’t know anything about villages. Hopefully this week at consol homes in the village will help me with this understanding. We don’t know what to expect, but I am excited… hmm…
on a slightly less reflective note, we ended our week by taking a one day trip to Senga Bay for Tanya’s birthday. This small town/ village is very very cute. It is dotted with large colonial homes and guesthouses for people taking a holiday. Its hard to get lost in Malawi because most towns, villages and cities are connected by one main road. So we see a sign on the main road that says “Carolina’s Lake Resort” and turn down the dirt road. Little did we know it was about a mile drive down a bumpy dirt road going through a village. To the left we could see “dots of blue” as Tanya kept pointing out and all around us was just an idealic, quiet, village life. After suspecting we were going the wrong way, we finally reached Carolina’s… a white, colonial house with a bar and lounge area… all on the beach and we couldn’t have been more excited. After checking in, and going straight to our rooms to change into our suits, we start to realize the reality of the rest of our night… we had a cute little balcony that was connected to the adjacent room, so we tried to lock the door and ended up breaking the lock…. Oops.. so ya… we slept with a broken door… but i’ll get to that later.. first we enjoyed a long day in the sun and on the beach being harassed by salesmen selling everything from fish, to trips to the island, to paintings. We played with some of the local kids and then Tanya and Shohini decided to jump on a log and pretend it was a boat… they saw the local boys doing it and thought it looked like fun… needless to say they are quite sore from the exercise..
Our evening ended up being full of Sri Lankan food and cricket (the game on tv) because we happened to find ourselves at a hotel with a Sri Lankan chef (thank Gd). The food was sooooooo delicious that we decided to take home the leftovers (too bad we forgot them the following morning when checking out).
So during the second cricket game some strange drunk man in a straw hat was creeping around, but the Sri Lankan man was keeping us safe. Since we woke up at the crack of dawn we were exhausted by 10 and I’m sad to say we didn’t even make it to Tanya’s birthday at midnight.
When we went back to our room at night, creeped out enough from the straw hat man, we got even more scared because we heard noises in the communal bathroom and didn’t know who it was (of course we assumed it was straw hat man). Tanya and I NEEDED confirmation as to who our neighbor in the lodge was, so we stood with the door cracked open to see the man when they came out of the bathroom. So we stood at attention… and kept standing and waiting for this mysterious creature… I must note that as Tanya and I thought death was approaching on the other side of the bathroom door, Kim said “guys, we have to blog about this”….. great… thanks kim.
Anyway…. About half an hour later after still standing and waiting for him to come out of the bathroom, thinking of every possible reason why the man might be in the bathroom for over half an hour, shohini got up the courage to knock on the bathroom door (which by the way didn’t lock)… and we quickly learned there was NO ONE IN THERE. We had been standing around like idiots (having to pee) waiting for some phantom creep in a straw hat to appear… after all the hustle and bustle of the bathroom man died down we pushed our beds together and crawled under the mosquito nets. Shohini and Tanya shared a bed because the fourth was our faux lock for the unlocked door.. ☺ so from my bed I saw our neighbor step onto the balcony for a late night cigarette.. and to everyone’s splendor, it was a fellow azungu! So we quieted down, trying to ignore the loud squeeking of bats in our ceiling and fell asleep… oh, did I forget to mention the millions of bats that we were apparently disturbing in the roof of our room… ps Tanya is terrified of bats…. Twas a grand ol time really…
We went to sleep at 11:45 and woke up at 4:30 am to watch the sunrise over the Lake…. DEFINITELY WORTH IT.
We went back to sleep for some time and spent the rest of the morning eating our FREE breakfast that you KNOW we were excited about and then stopped at a market on the way back where we were once again harassed to buy anything and everything.
It was a very nice weekend and now we are at a new hotel that provides “free wifi internet access”….. too bad we live in the outhouse with the chickens where the internet doesn’t reach… but more about that next time. Tomorrow: Consol Homes- Nametete.
*********Disclaimer to Parental Units***********:
NO ONE WAS REALLY THAT SICK. JUST A TUMMY BUG. NO MALARIA. Also, WE ARE SAFE. I SWEAR. Clean? Maybe. Safe? Yes. Smile! See you all soon!
Friday, June 5, 2009
tanya 2
1st June 2009
We began our first day at the crisis nursery today. Volunteering we gathered will involve anything from helping with keeping records up to date to cleaning and holding and feeding babies. So we set off pretty early from the World Camp and walked across the old town area to catch a mini-van. It is rather like hailing a rickshaw or a matatu (city hoppas RULE!) but to my American friends I must describe this. As the name suggests ths vans seat about 14 people and have little ‘conductors’ most often young men aged anywhere between 15 to 25. Anyway they scream out the area they are traveling to and if that is where you are going you just hail one and hop aboard. People are most likely to stop and stare because our American attire and shoes and bags stick out like sore thumbs (as does our skin colour. Most azungus (whites) and brown people are just NOT seen in mini vans) This was pretty eventful and stops at the main road in Area
Anyway the crisis nursery was quick to welcome us with the screams, the gurgles and other various sounds. The nursery is impeccably managed in terms of caregivers and baby food and medicine schedules, follow-ups with the babies families etc. Mawi, a quiet and efficient is the stronghold of the nursery administration. It really is a task and a job that requires much dedication. The head nurse Alica was explaining to us that she had just retired from the Ministry of Health but could have continued to work in the city or one of the hospitals if she chose to. Instead many of these women come from over an hour away often walking to be at the Crisis Nursery located in an in-road to care for these children.
A look inside the nursery will present a happy calmness that hides the tragic stories of a lot of these pretty little children. They are clean and fresh, dressed in their donated American clothes that say things like ‘Daddy’s little girl’ and play with American soft toys and dolls. Many of these children mothers died during childbirths. In some cases, the grieving fathers and families have merely been unable to emotionally and financially provide a substitute for breast milk and hence the kids are brought to the nursery until someone can commit to care for them or until they are able to subsist on the porridge their families can afford.
Today was long and caring for the babies consumed most of our time. The nursery receives a lot of its aid from American churches and the financial crisis has had effects on the donations. As a result the nursery has had to cut down the number of children it admits.
2nd June 2009
Our day started today with an interview with NOVAC (Network of Orphaned and Vulnerable Children) It was proposed by the Ministry of Gender and Childrens Welfare. As such the organization functions all over the country co-coordinating with international organizations, non-governmental organizations and community based organizations. It .operates around 4 to 5 thematic areas; Networking,
Networking: NOVAK helps with financial management and infrastructure which results in capacity building. Many small startup NGO’s have very limited resources or even basic ideas about how to maintain financial records etc and make themselves more attractive to donors for ex: Some of them do not even have basic knowledge to write grants and NOVAK helps with this.
Advocacy: They advocate in order to influence government policies on the ground to ensure good practices are being adopted. So it basically targets policy makers and legislators.
For example: They are currently pressuring the government to allocate money for education of orphans and forcing them to put part of an annual budget regarding this.
Also, they influence government to waive user fees. Basically, although Malawian private education is essentially free the school often does not even have the basic resources or money to build infrastructure so it asks students for ‘user’ fees which basically means the student pays for the watchman, a new building, notebooks and hence ends up paying more than even a subsidized school fee would be!
They also advocate more for bursary fees in order to pay for orphans high school fees.
I asked about AID dependency and Cuthbert admitted that it was a problem that plagues the Malawian system .So part of what NOVAK does is making NGO’s reliant on a) themselves and b) local resources so that if the International organizations and churches decide to leave they can still operate (at least on a managerial level) by themselves.
International Sponsors’ help is advocated for issues like Prostitution and Jobs before 16.
NOVOC signed a memorandum of Understanding with the Mutharikas governement which stipulated the actions and roles of each party in their interdependent search for an end to these problems. This troubled me slightly because if it was merely another arm of the government who is to say that it could act independently and counter to governmental interests.
becca again
Hello all. Today (monday) we started our first day of volunteering. I’m not sure which was the most difficult part of the day: waking up at 7, walking 20 minutes in the hot African Winter, or feeding/ changing/ cleaning/ playing with 16 babies, or avoiding the sketchy men on our walk back home.
So yes, today we volunteered at the Crisis Nursery that is a part of the Ministries of Hope which is a partner of Raising Malawi. So the morning began with our walk to the minibus stop outside of shoprite where we were courted into the van that said Area 49. We were told by a reliable source that the minibus costs 100 MK so we brought 400 MK to give them and they took it no problem. So we flung ourselves into the back of the minibus. I’ll give a description, but if anyone has read gaby’s blog from
Picture it: old white dirty 15-seater van… well… 3 seats in the front 4 in the second third and fourth rows… filled out the window with people. The seats are in relatively stable conditions, but the seat on the side folds up so that you can pass behind it . well I ended up on that seat. I don’t think my mother would have approved seeing as how I did see one seatbelt in the van but I think it was a joke. Oh, and the seat was basically a sea-saw… with every turn my body flipped 45 degrees as well. But it was fine. No injuries. We weren’t going very far. And the people were nice, mostly just entertained to watch 4 azungus (aka white people/ foreigners) in the minibus oh, and get ripped off. We only find out on our ride back that it costs 80 MK per person, not 100. Regardless, we make it to our destination on the side of the road at which point we begin our journey to the Crisis Nursery which is in a very nice residential neighborhood full of beautiful houses. The walk from the main road to the house was about 20 minutes. I was hoping that I would get a little bit of a tan from this adventure, but it doesn’t look like that’s happenening. Anyway, while we’re walking, we realize we’re walking with one of the caregivers that works at the nursery so she made sure we ended up at the right house.
Once there we washed our hands, took off our shoes, and went right to work. We arrived at around 10 am and there was already a missionary group there from
Oh, side note: the infants at this nursery are anywhere between 1 day and 2 years old and usually either one or both of their parents have died or they were found or for some other reason, they cannot be taken care of.
So the day went on like that.. playing with and taking care of the kids. Feeding them a yogurt snack, nsima lunch, and a banana snack in the afternoon. Shohini went from never changing a diaper before to changing 3 in one hour. Hahaha. At one point they ran out of diapers so we had to use cloths, which was a first time experience for me. The caregivers happily showed me what to do, but I think they laughed at this azungu. Oh well.
Anyway, after a long day of babies we were exhausted and terrified to have children of our own. We walked back to the main road to catch a minibus with the nurse from the nursery, so we were able to ask her questions and things.
We retired home early and are now relaxing. That’s all we have for today. Tomorrow we are meeting with the organization NOVOC (Network of Vulnerable and Orphan Children) in order to better understand what we are doing and seeing at our placement sites. The rest of the day we will be at the Crisis Nursery. Today is June 1st. We will hopefully have FREE 24 HOUR WIRELESS WIFI INTERNET by next week so hopefully there wont be 5 long posts at once.
Oh, and for all of you that thought we weren’t ACTUALLY doing anything here, we told you we would…
Highlight of the Day (besides the babies): Man sitting next to me in the back corner of the minibus decided it was easier to climb out the window to get out instead of having 5 people move for him to get out through the door. And he did.
Shohini 2
It's just
Kim
Every day leaves me feeing like a 65 year old woman, doubled over with back aches and arm pains due to the 2500 little rugrats we chase after daily. And when I say 2500, I clearly mean 16. Who would have thought these adorable little cherubs would be so tiring! Nevertheless, we pull up or socks, put our maternal faces on (some more than others) and fight through dirty diapers, mushy food, loud endless wailing, and of course the occasional run-away baby. We’ve definitely come to realize how difficult it is to take care of children.
That being said it is unimaginable to think we muster up strength for the 20 minute walk to the main road where we can hail and/ catch a minibus to take us back in to town. As per usual we stand at the side of the dusty road only for a short while before the white van is in complete view complete with the self assigned conductor hanging off the side of the door beckoning anyone looking for a ride. With crushed dirty money crumpled in his hand he yanks open the door and quickly ushers us inside. The bus is off again before we can even sit. The conductor is once again hanging out of the vehicle shouting for potential passengers as we cling to the seats as the driver flies over the massive craters in the unpaved road.
Well as least we made it home safely. And you have to appreciate efficiency at its best.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
shohini
ps: make sure to also read becca and tanya's new posts below!
This is the fifth day I have been in Lilongwe and it has already amazed me. Since I landed this city has been such a mix of familiar (in terms of how Yangon looked) and so different with its red earth and different lifestyle and people. We've met all the people we are supposed to meet and went to the different places we're supposed to volunteer at. I'm so excited to be starting on Monday. In fact, we're probably and hopefully doing more than planned since we met the people from Raising Malawi, we'll probably be linked up with more remote and beautiful places. I feel like this trip will go by too fast and I will leave this place wanting to learn more and experience the beauty of this place more.
This is the fifth day I have been in Lilongwe and it has already amazed me. Since I landed this city has been such a mix of familiar (in terms of how Yangon looked) and so different with its red earth and different lifestyle and people. We've met all the people we are supposed to meet and went to the different places we're supposed to volunteer at. I'm so excited to be starting on Monday. In fact, we're probably and hopefully doing more than planned since we met the people from Raising Malawi, we'll probably be linked up with more remote and beautiful places. I feel like this trip will go by too fast and I will leave this place wanting to learn more and experience the beauty of this place more.
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