Fourth month in Malawi

Malawi is a beautiful country in many ways, and I was lucky enough to have a nice (but admittedly very difficult) experience on a trip to Malawi’s highest mountain, Mulanje. It stands 3002 metres above sea level at its highest point and consists of many wonderful sights. Ray, Tim and I spent 3 days and 2 nights at Mulanje this month and we had quite a nice time away. The boys had been once before some months ago but didn’t climb to the top, so that was their goal this time around. My goal was to not have an asthma attack whilst attempting to climb some steep paths!

Mulanje is south of where we live and the journey on the minibus is enhanced by the nice scenery of tea estates along the way. You can choose to stay for as long as you like, from some hours for a nice day-trip hike to 3 or 4 days usually if you want to reach the peak. You have a guide that is with you the whole time which is absolutely necessary because there are different paths you can take and of course for safety reasons you should have someone experienced with you for guidance. Our guide’s name was Ramson and he was really good.

There are many huts on the mountain which you stay in overnight on mattresses and sleeping bags on the floor and you can choose the huts you want to stay in and which path you would like to take. You also have to take food with you because there is nothing on the mountain. We had to be careful how much we bought though because not only do you have to carry your backpack of clothes and other belongings, you also need to carry your food. There is an option to hire a porter to carry your things for you, but we didn’t want to do that.

For 3 days we lived on mainly peanut butter and bread, and of course water (which we were able to refill in the rivers along the way - it is safe drinking water that comes from the springs). We also had some bananas, nuts, milk, instant noodles and a couple of other things here and there.

The first day was extremely difficult for me because when we were walking up steep parts, this triggered my asthma and made it hard for me to breathe properly at times. But to balance the good with the bad, we had a wonderful experience swimming in a river with a beautiful waterfall. The water was absolutely freezing but amazing at the same time because we were so incredibly hot and sweaty so it was a great feeling to be in the water. This would have to be one of my best experiences since being in Malawi. I could have stayed in the water all day.

By the end of the first day we had walked around 7 hours and I made a decision that the next day when the boys were going to climb to the peak that I would not join them. It wasn’t the distance or time of walking, it was the elevation/steepness at some points at which we were walking that I did not want to put my body through again as having asthma is not a nice thing when climbing a mountain. Luckily, for the time I have been at the project, walking long distances over rocks and bumpy paths to pre-schools has definitely conditioned my legs and ability to walk for hours over these kinds of surfaces. Unfortunately climbing at elevation was not my forte though.

At the first hut we stayed in, the surroundings were really lovely and there was one other group that also stayed there - A girl from Iceland, a Norwegian guy and a Malawian guy. Out of the three of them the girl, Edda, also found it difficult and did not climb to the top with her friends either. So the two of us stayed at the hut and hung out for a few hours until the boys got back.

We waited a couple of hours before starting to walk down to the next hut which was just under 3 hours away and not as difficult a walk as the first day because even though there were some steep uphill parts, it was more flat with some downhill parts too.

The second hut was a nice house but the area was a bit more isolated and quiet. This night the three of us had the house to ourselves, so we sat up talking for a while, not knowing we were in for a surprise in the night. Before we went to bed we heard noises coming from one of the rooms, which we realised was probably a rat. So we all decided to sleep on mattresses on the floor in the middle of the living room.

I think I had slept for around 2 hours when I woke up and heard the rustling of our plastic bag of food we had left on the table. I got my torch and jumped up because I suspected that a furry friend was probably trying to get to our food. I picked up the bag but didn’t know where to put it because there was not really anywhere to keep it safe. So I just put it up really high on a shelf and got back into my sleeping bag.

Some minutes later I heard the noise again, but instead of getting up I just shined my torch towards the shelf and saw a rat. I got up and it ran away, and by this time Tim had woken up and I told him what happened. We decided to put the food in Ray’s bag because he had a big bag and it’s the only place it would fit and hopefully be safe.

We both then went back to our sleeping bags and I pulled mine over my head and tried to sleep like this because I didn’t want to lay there uncovered with rats running around. Minutes later when we were trying to get to sleep we heard really, really loud scratching noises from the next room and between the walls. It sounded like there was a whole family of them and it was terrible. Then we heard scratches coming from Ray’s bag and it seemed that there were two or three rats trying to get into his bag. Meanwhile, Ray was still asleep.

We realised that the rats were going to continually try and get the food so we gave in and took the bag of food and put it outside. I also had a bag of bread in my backpack so I took that out too because I think they were trying to get in there as well.

Once we got back into our sleeping bags again, minutes later we heard the rats outside with our food.  They were so noisy. Tim and I lay there awake for hours while Ray slept through the whole thing. We both got up a few times because we’d try and get to sleep but then once our torches went off we’d hear the rats running past us. I couldn’t sleep the rest of the night until almost around 4:00am I think.

We had to get up at 5:00 to be ready to leave at 6:00. It took us around 4 hours to walk down the rest of the way and it wasn’t so bad, except that we had to be extra careful not to slip or slide. Once we got to the bottom and back to the small town around the mountain, we treated ourselves to a nice meal at a place well known for its nice pizzas. What a lovely end to a weekend away.

On a different note, after 3 months of living the Malawian life (in some ways), and living amongst the Malawian culture day to day, I’m left thinking about the “outside world”, or the “real world” you could say.

Being here makes me feel a number of things. Appreciative and fortunate come to mind quickly, but aside from that, I feel like something is missing. Lately I have been thinking a lot about my “regular” life and my “real” friends and how much I miss it all. I kind of wish I would snap out of it though because there are less than 3 months left here which is not a long time by any means, and it’s probably the last chance I will have to do something like this in a place like this.

My regular life will be there when I’m finished here, so why am longing for it so much? I need to focus on here and now because I know if I don’t, then once I’ve left Malawi, I know I will feel like I wish I had done more, or different. But I guess it’s all natural when you are far away from your ‘everything,’ from the familiar and from the normality of your life.

Motivation comes and goes. Some weeks are more or less fulfilling than others, and some days are a battle against myself, trying to work out why I am not feeling like I think I should. I think part of it has to do with the fact that some DI’s that I was close to have now left as they have finished their 6 month periods, and in an environment like this, you need support, team spirit and commonness. But it’s hard when this all stops now that these people have moved on.

Tim and Ray have both gone back to their preparation schools in England, and having spent a fair amount of time with them over the last couple of months, now it is not the same. Right before they left, we discussed what it would be like once they were gone, and Ray told me he experienced the same thing when he was close to previous DI’s, but they too moved on after their 6 month period ended. He said that when new DI’s came (mainly speaking about me) and he made good friends again, his motivation and spirit lifted. So here’s hoping this also happens to me.

Anyway, I’m not feeling terrible, or even bad, just a bit flat and searching for meaning of my ways. In general I am ok, and I do want to be here, but I think I am just going through a strange period. I have definitely realised how important it is to have people that are on the same wavelength as you, that you can also work with and share things with. I had this with both Tim and Ray and we all worked really well together.

I recently read a very well written book called “Dead Aid... Why Aid is Not Working and How There is a Better Way for Africa” by a Zambian lady named Dambisa Moyo, a former consultant for the World Bank and global economist and strategist for Goldman Sachs.

It is a book that criticises foreign aid in Africa and in a very real way. Her main point is that billions of dollars have been put into the African continent over the past 40-50 years, with nothing to show, except the fact that things seem to have gone backwards. She firmly believes that all this foreign aid has done the reverse of its intention and is the reason Africa is still the way it was, if not worse than all those years ago. Aid has made the poor poorer, and growth slower.

Many Asian countries have developed and continue to develop as quickly as many African countries are moving backwards. But why is this? There are many reasons. A major one is the unfortunate amount of corruption that existed and continues to exist among African governments. Many donations from other countries are directly transferred to governments, which results in the money reaching the pockets of a few corrupt higher powers and nothing ever benefiting or reaching the local people most in need.

A simple and yet logical example that stood out to me of another way that foreign aid hurts Africa is that (even though well intentioned), Hollywood movie stars, famous musicians or other donors think they are doing a good thing when they decide to donate hundreds or thousands of mosquito nets from abroad. What these people don’t realise is that there are actually African makers of mosquito nets, and by doing this ‘good deed,’ the Samaritan spirit of this donor has just put the local person out of business.

Moyo’s suggestion is that instead of trying to save the day by sending these donations over, the donor should purchase the nets from the African maker, generating business for the local merchant and providing for those in need at the same time. But this good deed is actually a short term solution because in 5 years time these nets would have to be replaced anyway. No one thought about the long run. What a simple and logical thing that not many people would even realise.

To summarise, several solutions are offered that can help bring Africa out of its economic and political disaster including large-scale direct investment in infrastructure, international bonds and microfinance institutions that have had much success in Asian countries.

What also makes this all very real is that the author is not an outsider criticising Africa’s ways, she is an African, with real life experience and expertise on the subject matter.

Some of the things she mentions I have seen on a smaller scale whilst living and working here in Malawi. The main thing being that money is not the answer. I have come to realise this in a big way. Everyday there are situations that relate to this dependency on outside help for money. For example, people (children, teenagers, adults-young and old) ask me for money many times a day, everyday, just because of the colour of my skin. And even working with the HIV positive support groups, my time, knowledge and care is not enough for them because I have also been asked for money or to buy them things to help with their group. This is not what I am here for and this huge dependency on foreign aid continues to be a problem. I’m sorry to say that I’m not sure when it will get any better because so many of the people just want money.

I also read another book in the same vain as ‘Dead Aid’ which is called ‘The Trouble with Africa… Why Foreign Aid Isn’t Working’ by Robert Calderisi. He is a Canadian man who has had many years of experience in Africa, living in Tanzania and the Ivory Coast, a 30+ year career in international development, principally at the World Bank in various senior positions, including being the international spokesman on Africa.

He too has similar ideas to Dambiso Moyo and also offers additional ideas including having a requirement where ‘all heads of state, ministers and senior officials to open their bank accounts to public scrutiny’ to tackle financial dishonesty and forms of corruption at the top. He basically says that if countries refuse to have such constraints then they should not receive aid because if they have nothing to hide then this should not be a problem.

Focusing direct aid to 4 or 5 countries that are serious about reducing poverty is another idea, and that number could grow as political systems opened up and corrupt leaders are replaced. "Governments that are indifferent to poverty, cannot guarantee basic education for their citizens, or offer only lip service to fighting HIV/AIDS, should not be helped at all.” He goes on to say that if the 5 countries meet certain desired objectives then the assistance can be repeated in 2 or 3 years time. If they do not then they fall back into the pack. Some countries could “graduate” from this group once they no longer required aid, but the group would remain small and the criteria to enter would be tough.

 Calderisi also speaks about supervision of the running of Africa’s schools and HIV/AIDS programs by international personnel, making primary education an absolute priority across all countries, and also to prevent funds running off into the wrong hands and abuse of power at local school levels.

And finally, one more thing I will mention is that the author speaks about merging the World Bank, IMF (International Monetary Fund) and UNDP (United Nations Development Programme). He says that these aid institutions have conflicting objectives that ‘have led to confusion in the advice they give to Africa,’ and that these 3 organizations are ‘as compatible as oil and water.’ The World Bank seeks to invest on the long-term health and stability of economies. IMF has more short-term and rigid approaches. ‘If international coffee prices go up, the Bank will want small farmers to get a larger share of the revenues; the IMF is likely to want governments to use them to reduce the public deficit or debt.’ The UNDP focuses on supporting institutional or ‘capacity-building’ initiatives. He continues to say that ‘all three agencies serve the broad goals of the United Nations in their individual ways. It would be more efficient and clear to consolidate their efforts’ and combine the strengths of all three institutions.

Calderisi does acknowledge that this merger would be quite complicated because IMF is responsible for monitoring economic development not just in Africa but in all countries, including rich ones. The Bank raises funds in the international capital markets with its board dominated by Western countries rather than subjected to the one country-one vote formula, and the UNDP reflects the views of all nations, to ‘be seen as everyone’s friend.’ I especially find this merger idea to be quite an interesting proposal, but I don’t know if this is something that would actually happen.

I have been continuing to work with HIV groups, teaching about the basics of HIV and nutrition. At the moment it is mainly two groups I am involved with. I have also been trying to establish one in a community who doesn’t have one and also meet with another existing group. But it’s been difficult because the people that I need cooperation from to either help me meet with the right people or help me organise to get people together have been quite slack, so it’s a very slow process at the moment. I will see how far I get, but I will put most of my time and energy into the already existing groups that I have already been with to help them as much as I can.

In one particular group, each time I have visited they have been talking about ARV’s (Anti-Retrovirals), which is obviously important, but I am also teaching them that in addition to taking their medicine, there are other things they can do to keep themselves healthy. For example, educating the people on the types of nutritious foods they have around them that they can eat to boost their immune systems and overall health and well being. There are many fruits and vegetables that are right in front of them that they don’t realise are very good for them to eat regularly.

Since Tim has now left, I have been working in cooperation with some Field Officers from the TCE (Total Control of the Epidemic) HIV project, Peter and Fumbani, to work on a project promoting the use of soy in people’s diets. Soy beans are very high in protein with nutritional properties that are beneficial to help boost the immune systems of HIV positive people. So we are working on promoting this and giving demonstrations on how to make soy milk with the people in their communities, encouraging them to plant soy beans so they can harvest them and continue to be able to make their own soy products. I will also do the same thing with the other group I am working with.

I have actually been drinking soy milk for the last 15 years or so by choice. I prefer the taste of it and am aware that it is a healthier option to regular full cream milk. So now that I know how to actually make it, it is something that I will take back with me to my regular life, and continue to make it at home sometimes. It is very easy and not so expensive.

Another book I read this month is called “Natural Medicine in the Tropics” which is really interesting. It talks a lot about Africa specifically and how “modern” medicine (pharmaceutical products) in the Northern Hemisphere (mainly Europe and the US) has contributed to less concern or focus on “natural” or “traditional” medicine over the years. It contains information on a plethora of medicinal plants, fruit and vegetables that are beneficial for good nutrition, health and medicinal use. It has been of great assistance to me when teaching people about nutrition in the HIV support groups and I have learnt several new things.

This has been quite a busy reading month! I am also half way through another book called “Dark Star Safari” by an American teacher and travel writer by the name of Paul Theroux. It portrays his overland journey from Cairo to Cape Town, having set foot back on the African continent after living in Malawi and Uganda, 40 years earlier. It’s nicely written and reminds me of some of my travels in Africa 2 years ago.

For the last few of my English classes, instead of the usual grammar, I decided to do something completely different with my students. I thought it was time to freshen things up a bit and try something new to broaden up their world of English, because I get the feeling that all they expect to learn in English are different words and grammatical structures.

Before I left Denmark I printed out and laminated many, many pictures of things from around the world, making sure I had some things from each continent. There are famous landmarks like the Colosseum, Great Wall of China and Pyramids of Giza, famous people like Barack Obama, Che Guevara and Nelson Mandela, famous places like Macchu Picchu and Grand Canyon, mountains like Kiliminjaro, Fuji and Everest, people from different cultures like the Vikings, Native American Indians, the (Australian) Aborigines and the Maoris of New Zealand.

So I have been giving English/Geography-Culture lessons to my students and they seem to really enjoy it and are very interested. I have a world map that I use as a teaching aid. To begin with I spoke about the idea of a continent, and then thought it best to relate something to them so I discussed Malawi being a country and Africa being the continent, which only a few of them knew about already.

The idea of these lessons is that they practice writing descriptions of each subject in English, they also practice reading the descriptions out in English, and I encourage them to ask many questions so they are having conversation practice too, while also learning about the world which ‘opens their eyes’ a little, so to speak. Each week I have tested them on what they learnt the previous week and some students have been able to identify everything I have showed them, including telling me the city, country and continent of each subject. It is very interesting for me to teach about the world and I can see that they are learning many new things which makes it even more of a pleasure for me to teach. I even showed them a photo of Sushi, explained what it consists of and how it is made, and they were so interested and curious because they had never seen anything like it. There is no variety at all in the villages so seeing food from different cultures was quite incredible for them. They even asked if I could bring some for them to eat the following week! I told them if I could get the ingredients I could show them how to make Sushi, but unfortunately you can’t get much of it here.

They have been asking me to teach them more about the world, so once I have gone through all the pictures I brought with me, I will have to try and be creative and prepare some more lessons about the world and other cultures to incorporate with English language.

The rainy season has begun and many times we’ve been kept inside at our home because it’s obviously difficult to go out and work in the heavy rain, especially when we walk everywhere. Also, we are in the bush so it means dirt paths, roads and trees that turn into mud, puddles and lightning attractions if it storms. I have never watched so many movies in a short space of time before as I have here!

Living in the orphanage continues to be very nice. There are always many children around, playing, running, laughing and of course staring at us to see what we are doing. I recently bought a basketball to use on the courts we have here and it’s been a good way to interact with some of the kids because straight away a group of them came and asked if they could play with me. So a few times a week (if it’s not raining) I play netball with the girls or just shoot around. I also have a few games I brought over with me from Denmark, such as Mikado (pick-up sticks) and Dominoes, so I have brought them out a few times to play with the little kids.

I spent a weekend at the Chinese Buddhist orphanage “Amitofo Care Centre” which I visited last month with Tim and Ray, where Tim gave a lesson about HIV to some of the kids. This time I went on my own and gave a Geography lesson to around 40 kids. I used the same pictures as I use for my English class, but simplified the language a bit as they were aged between 11 and 13. I used a world map as a teaching aid and tried to make the lesson a little interactive and involve them as much as possible to keep their interest, as this can sometimes be a challenge when teaching children especially.

I first found out if they knew what a continent was and it turned out they did and told me there were 6 and could name them, so that was a good start. I reminded them of the 7th continent, Antarctica that they did not seem to know about. Then I would show them a picture, ask them questions and if they knew who or what it was, and which city, country and continent, and then once we established this information I would ask them to come to the front and point to the map.

They mostly seemed interested in what I was teaching, but when I asked them questions or to come up to the front, the same 4 or 5 kids would raise their hands or speak up and answer. But if I called upon them individually to get different students to participate, they would get shy, laugh and look away, not wanting to speak in front of everyone. I think that is especially because of their age. It was interesting to compare teaching kids to adults. I found/find it easier to teach adults, at least if you compare these kids to my English class. Naturally, the adults ask questions and are more open and responsive, making my job slightly easier. Still, it was a nice experience and I enjoyed being up there as a teacher.

I stayed here for 2 nights in a room next to some of the younger girls aged between 6 and 10 years. I was introduced to 3 of the volunteers who live at the care centre, Kenny from Malaysia, Arleen from Mainland China and Lucy from Taiwan. They are mostly here to teach Mandarin and help look after the kids. Because it was the weekend, there weren’t any lessons, but I got to hang out with the volunteers and kids, watch them practice kung fu, and just enjoy my time out of the bush!

On one of the evenings, the kids that are part of the kung fu group had a performance at a function for an Indian organization. There were speeches and awards, and then a section of the evening was for cultural performances. There were many Bollywood dances, which were really cheesy and quite boring! I do appreciate the Indian culture, and my mum, having been born and raised in India, grew up watching, and still continues to watch really bad Bollywood films with almost as bad Bollywood music and dancing! So I was used to hearing this type of thing, but it wasn’t much better than what I remember!

Thankfully the kids from the care centre brightened up the night with their traditional African dancing and kung fu performance. Definitely the highlight of the evening and well worth the 3 hour wait through listening to speeches in Hindi which we could obviously not understand, and sitting through many boring performances!

Some other positive things from the weekend were that I re-learned some basic Mandarin, such as greetings and some other words. I used to learn Mandarin about 15 years ago for a couple of years, but gave it up, regretfully so. So I hardly remember anything anymore. I was even more impressed than the first time I visited this orphanage to hear the children speaking Mandarin. They are taught to greet the teachers whenever they see them with (in Mandarin) “Lao shi, zao an/wu an/wan an, Amitofo” I’m not sure if I have the correct spelling, but this translates to “good morning/afternoon or evening teacher, Amitofo. Amitofo is the name of the Buddha. I too got this greeting every time I saw or walked past the children, so by the end of the first day I had no trouble with all the greetings and continued to practice them all weekend.

In January I will go back to Amitofo with another DI, Assum, to do our investigation week there. We plan to organise a number of activities to do with the kids, both educational and fun.

After 4 months I am still feeling good to be here, even when I sometimes wonder what I am here for or have days when it’s more difficult to get motivated than others. Working with the HIV groups gives me a feeling of satisfaction, knowing that I am, in a small way, contributing to the bigger picture and sharing my time and knowledge with the people.

Even though there are two months left, in actual fact there is not so much ‘countable’ time remaining for work. Christmas holidays are coming up in a few weeks, I have a week of investigation straight after New Years, by which time it will almost be half way through January once I’m back at the project, and then it’s only around 3 weeks left of work, whilst handing over to the next DI. Also, being the rainy season, there will be sure to be some days where we won’t even be able to leave the house due to the heaviness of the rain.

I will be spending the Christmas/New Year period with some other DI’s. We will be going up to Lake Malawi again, but this time further north than Mangochi and Monkey Bay where we were for (Lake of Stars festival), to an area called Nkhata Bay. I was there 2 years ago at Kande Beach, but will go somewhere different this time.

We are also planning to spend Christmas at a locally run orphanage, to make a nice dinner for the kids, spend time with them and make sure they have a special time on Christmas. This will be my second Christmas in Malawi.

Four months gone, two months left.

Third month in Malawi

Having been here for more than two months, I have learned some things that make me think differently about what it is I am doing here, about development and foreign aid in general. I have a little more perspective about how the project is run and I’m not sure how much of that content and satisfied feeling I have now as I did early on.

The tone of my third recount, as you will see, seems to have changed, but I am simply recalling my observations and perceptions with honesty and little diplomacy.

We are supposed to be here at a development project, but somehow the more time that passes I continue to ask the question, is this development or a business? Most things seem to either be about money, image, useless meetings that never have conclusions, resolutions or decisions made and the word that always comes to mind is ‘fake.’

The Denmark period resulted in much of the same thing which seemed to be common to all DI’s. Of course it’s much nicer being in Malawi or Africa than in Denmark, with nice surroundings, climate, culture, people etc, but somehow in this Danish ‘organization’ you can’t seem to escape the same question - What are we actually here for?

After visiting pre-schools for 1 ½ months it has made me see that the program is not working. Here are some reasons why:

1. There is no system/structure in place to have sustainable development and ensure new DI’s that we hand over to continue the work that we do. Every DI that comes has a different vision, so it’s usual for something to be started but then never finished and something else concentrated on instead. We DI’s come to work here for 6 months, so it is 6 month period, after 6 month period, after 6 month period, with no continuity. And that is not sustainability. It’s not consistent and it feels as though the work you put in for 3, 4 and 5 months is wasted once someone else starts. You can easily say that every little bit counts and that nothing you do is a waste because it all contributes to helping in some way and to the bigger picture, but actually, if you are here working on something for months that isn’t followed through, it’s hard not to ask what the point was when it just gets lost along the way.

2. Working with pre-schools has made me see that the management here does not care what we do when we visit pre-schools. They just want to know there is actually someone going there, just so they can report that all gaps are filled. They never even ask how things are going or what we are doing, and no one from management ever comes to visit them with us to see what we are doing. They have no idea what we do and never will. There is no system in place to monitor any of it.

3. This point continues on from number 2. What is the actual goal of visiting these pre-schools? There are many obvious things you can see that is wrong with a pre-school or what it lacks, but what are we DI’s actually here to do? We can’t modernize classrooms or change their systems. Teachers have been teaching the same way for a long time and in some way have values that are part of their culture that makes it hard to break old habits. We can’t change this. Yes we can offer advice and ideas about different approaches with teaching, hygiene practices and monitor opening times and attendance, but in most cases all these things result in pushing someone that does not want to be pushed.

In my last blog I mentioned that I wanted to work on organising a feeding program for the children in all 30 of our pre-schools, however after giving it a lot of thought and having discussions with various people, I have realised that a feeding program is another aid dependency that is a short term solution, but in the long run of development is not the way forward. It would be more beneficial for each pre-school to find ways of feeding themselves instead of relying on being given things for free, otherwise this reliability and dependency will always be there. Unfortunately it is not an easy thing to do due to lack of funds, however some schools are able to make it work and have food cooked for the children by committee members every day. So it is possible, but it depends on how motivated the teachers, parents and committee members are, and how much they care to make this happen.

4. There are too many pre-schools per DI which means not enough time can be spent in each school. It would be ideal to visit all pre-schools in one week, because any less makes it hard for consistency and follow up, but due to the distances, we can’t spend much time in these schools at each visit. It would be different if we had 3 or 5 pre-schools to put all our energy into, but instead of choosing quality of quantity, DAPP (without much thought process or consideration) opted to bring in more pre-schools under their care. One of my biggest problems is the quantity over quality issue which is something that I constantly talk about when trying to address the pre-school issues. I also saw this quantity over quality thing in Denmark several times. It’s the same.

5. This is related to number 4. The walking distance (at least for my schools) is usually longer than the time able to be spent in each school. This does not make sense and is not productive or efficient. I am not complaining about walking because I don’t mind it at all, I am used to it and we walk almost everywhere, but it is not practical or logical to operate like this.

6. We DI’s are the ones visiting the pre-schools so we can see all the issues. But when we provide feedback and give our opinions, nothing ever changes. We are heard but not listened to, and this means that the same issues are going to continue to be problematic for each new DI that joins the project in the future. What is development?? I don’t know anymore. Or maybe I thought I knew but never actually did. And what is a “Development Instructor”? I’m not sure I can answer this question either.

These are the main points of concern and I was getting to a point where I was asking myself, “What am I doing here?” Almost 2 ½ months had passed being at this project but I couldn’t seem to find an area of work to fit myself into. I didn’t feel productive visiting pre-schools and the last thing I wanted to happen was to look back at my 6 month period and feel like I hadn’t really done anything worthwhile. I had to stop and take some time to think about what it really was that I wanted to do and achieve here. I took a step back and thought about the goals I had made myself in Denmark and made a new plan.

In Denmark my main goals were to develop a Health club for the students in the college, work at addressing the issues of HIV/AIDS (although back then I wasn’t sure in what way or who to help - ie. the community, the students, the teachers, etc), teach English, do some fundraising and work with pre-schools. But I think rather than pre-schools actually being a goal, I knew that there was a pre-school program and that I would be working with pre-schools anyway, but never actually specified exactly what goals I had in this area because I didn’t know what the schools were like back then.

I thought about how devastating HIV/AIDS is and that initially (before joining this program) when I read information about all the different projects this organization works with, I wanted to work with the TCE project (Total Control of the Epidemic). It focuses on raising awareness about HIV/AIDS, providing information and also mobilizing people to get tested. When it came time for selecting our projects there were no places in TCE, so I came to the Teacher Training College instead.

I decided that I wanted to change direction in my project and concentrate on making a difference with HIV/AIDS. Even though I am at the TTC project, there is actually quite a broad scope and as well as being able to work in the college, we are also able to work with communities. So my new main focus, instead of pre-schools is working together with existing HIV positive support groups, or if there are areas/villages that do not have support groups in place, to develop/form them myself. And with this I would want to have a central point where people from the villages can attend the closest one to where they live.

Of course, before doing all this I had to speak with my DI responsible leaders to let them know of my plans. I knew that they wouldn’t just say yes because there would be no one to work with my pre-schools if I changed direction. It might sound like I am giving up on helping the teachers and kids at the pre-schools or avoiding the challenges I have come across, but it’s not like that at all. I can simply see that what is currently in place is not working and what is there now is the same as what was there 6 months ago, and 12 months ago, and several years ago, so I don’t want to be a part of this cycle that continues to run but with no positive step forward. ie. No development.

You could ask, if something is not working then why don’t I try and do something to help make it better or change it? But it’s not that simple. We identify problems all the time, make management aware of them and do our best to try and help with resolutions, but there is only so much you can do, and when the next step needs to be left to management, they don’t do anything. They say they need to speak to this person or that person (above them) and then we never hear about it again. They ask us to give our feedback, but they don’t do anything with it even if they say they are going to. So what are we supposed to do?

I put together a plan and went and spoke to Fred, the person in charge of community work in the college. I informed him of my ideas and asked his advice about who to contact and what the best approach would be. He welcomed my ideas and told me the best way to do this would be to approach local clinics and community-based organizations to find out if there are existing support groups, and if not, what the best way would be to get people together to start one.

If working with existing groups, the objective would be to see how they operate, what information they discuss and offer my knowledge, time and advice where possible to raise awareness and share information about transmission, prevention, treatment, nutrition, natural remedies, etc. If developing a new group, the objective would follow the same lines but obviously take some extra investigation work to find out which villages are close by to which central locations, speaking to the Chief of the village, to identify who the positive people are in the communities and to locate and get permission for use of a place in each area.

Once I received as much information from Fred as possible I asked my DI leaders, Macdonald and Magura to meet with me. I told them about my plan and naturally they were concerned because they didn’t want me to leave the pre-school program. I told them all the things I thought was wrong with the program as I mentioned above, which are also the same things that have been discussed time after time but with no resolution. I also said that I didn’t feel productive doing what I was doing and didn’t want to look back at my 6 months feeling like I had done nothing, and that whether a DI visits a pre-school or not makes no difference. That might sound a bit negative, but it’s true.

We continued to exchange thoughts for about an hour, and we probably could have continued all day, but it wasn’t really going anywhere so I told them that I would think about things and make my final decision by the end of the week and let them know. I also asked them what would happen if I said I didn’t want to continue with pre-schools and decided to continue with my alternative project and they said that they can’t force me to do anything I don’t want to do, but they would like me to keep visiting pre-schools if I can. Anyway, by telling them I would think about it all and get back to them was my way of stopping the useless back and forth discussions that were happening and really I had already made up my mind.

The next day I went and visited two of the local clinics that Fred told me about. One of them was Amalika Health Centre which is actually located in the orphanage I am living at and the other was Makungwa Health Centre located in a town called Bvumbwe, which is about 1 ½-2 hours walk away.

The orphanage clinic was not open yet and visiting the other clinic resulted in a nice discussion with Brown, the Medical Assistant there who informed me that there is an existing support group who are associated with an organization called NAPHAM which stands for National Association of People Having Aids in Malawi. He told me that the two leaders of the support group do HIV counselling at the clinic twice a week and that he could organise a meeting with them for me if I came back the next morning because they would be there for a counselling session.

I also asked if there was anything at the clinic I could help with because I am a volunteer and have some spare time here and there and would like to help in any way I can. I was honest and said I didn’t have any medical experience, and Brown said that many of the staff did not know how to use a computer except for him and maybe one or two others, and if it’s possible I could help train them on the computer. I told him it was no problem so we agreed that Tuesday mornings would be a good time for the staff at the clinic and for me too. Since then I have had one class of computer lessons. It is at an absolute basic level, from turning on the computer, to the names of the parts of a computer (eg. keyboard, mouse, monitor, etc), to opening a word document, typing some information and saving it. Some even have trouble using the mouse and clicking on a folder or icon. But they are all very interested in learning so that is a good thing.

After meeting with Brown I called Fred to ask if he could come to the meeting with me the next morning to help with Chichewa translation because Brown told me it would be better, as English is very limited with the leaders of the support group. Fred asked me if I had discussed my plans with Macdonald and Magura and I said that I was going to give them my answer tomorrow, so he agreed to come with me.

That same day as I was going to the clinic to find out about support groups I met James, one of the field workers from the TCE project, (Total Control of the Epidemic) on the way. TCE people usually wear their TCE shirts so you can recognize who they work for even if you don’t know who they are. James was going to one of the villages he looked after to do door-to-door mobilization. Field workers are usually responsible for visiting individual households, raising awareness about HIV/AIDS and performing HIV testing and counselling. It is a very big job, as you can imagine, having to visit hundreds and thousands of households.

I told James about my ideas to work with existing support groups or develop new ones if need be, and I also asked him if he knew of any areas that did not have a group or a central location for members to meet. He told me that what I wanted to do was great and we exchanged contact numbers because he wanted to help make a support group in an area called Chinkwende, which is also where I teach English. They currently do not have a support group that is close enough for their members, so we discussed working together to try and get something happening there.

Later in the day I went to visit a community-based organization to try and get some information for the Chinkwende group, but unfortunately it was closed and I was told by a pre-school teacher who lives next to the organization that they are only open from 9:00-12:00 on Thursdays, meaning I would have to come back the following week.

The pre-school that is located here is not one of my pre-schools and I did not know the teacher but she told me she knew me, introduced herself as Margaret, and invited me in for some nsima. We are always offered to go to people’s houses to eat nsima with them which of course is a great way to get to know local people and culture, but I usually don’t like to accept because when you are the “Mzungu” coming to visit they make a big deal and give you a lot of food, and I would prefer them to keep the food for themselves and their families because these people are poor but still offer you to join them. I told her that was very kind of her and declined the offer, but she said that I am a friend and that I must come and eat some nsima with her. I told her that she shouldn’t worry about me and that she should keep the food for her and her family but she wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer. Of course they gave me plenty of food and even though I had already eaten, out of respect you should eat what someone has given you, so I did.

The next morning I met with Fred at the college so we could go to the meeting together. He told me that I should speak to Macdonald and Magura first before we go to make a final agreement on what I was doing. So I went and spoke to them, and they told me that they had spoken to the project leaders, Moses and Charlotte, who both said they would like me to continue with pre-schools, and maybe is there a way I could do both things? I told them that it would not be good to do both because if I am doing something worthwhile I should be able to focus on it 100%, put all my time and energy into it rather than have my hand in too many things without being able to give enough attention to either.

They said they understood but asked how many pre-schools I had and if it were possible that instead of visiting them all in one week that I could visit them all in a month. For the sake of telling them what they wanted to hear and coming to a compromise so I could get on with my work, I told them that instead of visiting 10 pre-schools in a week I could visit 3, which would mean they would all be visited in a month. They agreed and were happy with that, but actually, that is a completely stupid idea because visiting them once a month does not allow for follow up to be efficient, any real productivity to happen or consistent plans to be made. I rest my case with point number 2 above - No one cares what we do at the pre-schools or how much worthwhile time is spent there, they just want to know that someone is visiting them.

I went to meet with the two leaders, Sophie and Dennis, of the Makungwa support group to find out how they operate, where they meet and how often, and any other information they could tell me. I explained to them that if it is possible I would like to work with them to help where I can and offer my knowledge, time and support. They welcomed me and said that they meet every second Tuesday from 9:00-12:00 and that the next meeting was the following Tuesday so I would be welcome to come and join them. Fred agreed to come with me since it would be my first time, so he could help with translation and also try and identify any members that can speak English so that there is someone to help with translation for me in future.

The Makungwa support group meets at a local church and when Fred and I arrived they were waiting for us. Soon after this we started the meeting. Sophie made an introduction and let the other members know who I was and what I was doing there. Each of us had a turn to also introduce ourselves and everyone was quite welcoming. There were around 20 members and I noticed that the majority were women. There were only around 5 or 6 men. Later I found out that there are usually around 30-40 members in this group. Fred found out that one of the members, Harold, could speak English quite well so he asked him to sit with me and help with translation as Fred had to go back to the college for another engagement.

Malawians are very religious. Usually there is always a prayer, followed by some singing and dancing, and this is exactly what happened. After two songs Sophie acted as a pastor and began to preach from the bible for about ten minutes. And then Dennis commenced speaking about Anti-Retroviral (ARV) treatment. I learned that the Malawian government subsidises the cost of ARV’s to those diagnosed as HIV positive. So effectively, ARV’s are free, which I think is great because they are expensive and the average Malawian would not be able to afford them. As far as I have read and heard, the Malawian government really started to address the issues of HIV/AIDS around 7+ years ago, with the current President, Bingu wa Mutharika, the first National HIV/AIDS awareness program was implemented.

Once it reached around 10:45, something kind of strange (or maybe unfamiliar is a better word to use) happened. There was a table set up with some bowls that contained rice, chicken and vegetables. I was told by Sophie that it was time for my lunch and I was to sit and eat with Dennis. I asked if everyone was going to eat together but they said no, it was just for Dennis and I. Nonetheless, out of respect, I went ahead and did as they had informed me. Dennis and I washed our hands and sat at the front of the church at the table eating our food, African style (with our hands). The other members sat in the church and spoke to one another while we ate. It was very unfamiliar to me, and I felt a little awkward and uncomfortable eating while everyone else wasn’t.

When we finished eating, the meeting commenced and I heard from Harold that they were talking about some of the issues that they had in the group. This is where it started to get a little bit funny. They were talking about how they didn’t have enough plates for their meals and that they needed to find the money from somewhere. They talked about how they needed to get money for fertilizer and seeds to start a vegetable garden for the group so they could have the vegetables for their meals each meeting. And they also talked about how one of their members is not well and has to stay home and that they need money for everyone to be able to go and visit them because as members they should all care for and support each other (I didn’t understand the need for money here because I am pretty sure that all the members live in nearby villages and that everyone walks).

Now I wasn’t exactly sure how to take all this. Were they indirectly talking about needing money in front of me because they wanted me to give them money or buy them these things that they needed? This is usually the Malawian way (white person = money) so I wasn’t entirely sure. I thought to myself that if it gets to the point where they directly ask me for money then I would make it clear straight away that this is not what I am here for, and if this is what they expected and continued to ask for then I would not come to their meetings anymore. I waited to hear some more and Harold continued to say that they needed to tell me their problems so that I could help them, and I just continued to say, “Ok.” It got very close, and almost seemed like he was reiterating the point about not being able to afford anything, and waiting for me to say that I would help them with the money, but I didn’t say anything of the kind. Still I’m not sure if that’s what was being insinuated, so I also didn’t say anything about not being here to give them money.

I really hope that it is not like this because that would really disappoint me. I approached these people to try to help and support them with my knowledge, my time and my genuine concern without expecting anything in return, so I sincerely hope they don’t have the intentions I previously mentioned. I am going to see how things are at the next meeting and if I hear the same things and they continue to pry on this matter, then I will set them straight. This is where the dependency lies – “Azungu” are good for money and free things. Not this “Mzungu!”

Once they finished talking about the issues it was time for lunch for everyone else. But instead of rice everyone got nsima. I was curious about the whole eating situation so I asked Harold why I ate before everyone else with Dennis, and why we had rice, chicken and vegetables, and everyone else had nsima and vegetables. He told me that I was their special guest and that I shouldn’t worry, it was ok and normal for this to happen. I told him I understood, but that I didn’t feel I was worthy of sitting there and eating before everyone, that I am not above anyone else and we are all equal, and that we should all eat together. He understood where I was coming from and said that he could mention next time that everyone eats together. I told him I didn’t want to change their ways if this was normal practice, so if it was a problem then I would just do as they do. After this it was time for me to leave.

One Saturday we had a DI meeting at the Chilangoma Teacher Training College for DI’s from all projects in Malawi. We DI’s were required to make a presentation on our achievements so far and the plans we had for the remainder of our periods. Most DI’s did their presentations separately but we at Amalika combined ours because a lot of our work (mainly pre-schools) is similar, so I spoke about pre-schools for all of us and then each of us also spoke a bit about our work and plans.

I decided to stay in Chilangoma for the weekend because I joined some of the DI’s attending an HIV positive living group and we also celebrated Eva’s birthday who is a DI there.

The positive living meeting was really nice. Fraser, who was a DI at my school in Denmark, started visiting the group recently after taking over from another DI and he had been teaching the people about nutrition and natural remedies in regards to HIV. The day I joined they did a practical action and made soy milk with the people. First they explained the benefits of soy milk and then showed the people how they could make it for themselves. Soy milk contains a lot of protein and has nutritional properties that are beneficial for HIV positive people.

It was a great meeting and the people were so happy and appreciative. As with any type of meeting, gathering, ceremony or similar, there was lots of singing, dancing, music, etc, and everyone (DI’s included) were in great spirits. Many children were gathered around to watch what was happening, and once the soy milk was made and we gave it to each of the group members to taste, the leftovers were given to the cute kiddies that were around. What a great experience. It was also a good learning experience for me to get some ideas for my work.

Continuing my investigation work about HIV support groups in local areas, I visited a private VCT clinic (Voluntary Counselling and Testing) to find out if there were any support groups associated with them or that they knew existed. I met with Gideon, the Clinical Officer there and told him about my plans. He said it was a very good idea and advised me to speak with the Human Resources Manager and General Manager at their head office which was not too far away. This clinic is privately owned by the nearby Makande Tea and Coffee Estates business. I met with the HRM and GM who were very nice and told me they would like to work with me and that there are two committees associated with them, an HIV steering committee and peer educators committee and that the best thing would be for me to meet with them. They told me it would be best to go back to the Clinical Officer at VCT and ask him to introduce me to the chairman of these committees. So I went back and spoke to Gideon again and he told me he would speak to the chairman and organise a meeting for us and to call him in a few days.

While visiting the VCT clinic, again I happened to run into James from TCE and we arranged to meet at the community-based organization (Makala) that I visited the previous Thursday but it was closed, to try and discuss what we can do with our original plans to get together a central location for HIV positive members from the Chinkwende area.

Because I am interested in doing work with HIV, my friend Tim from TCE promised he would take me out to the field when he was visiting people in local villages to see the work he was doing. I told him I was meeting James and he said we could go together to meet him and then afterwards go to the field.

Tim and I spoke about working as a DI and it seems that it is a common feeling, regardless of your project that there is not much concern about having DI’s at the projects or what it is we do here. He was working with door to door mobilization of HIV counselling and testing but it was all done in Chichewa and without any information really translated for the DI, so it was useless him being there because he could not understand what was happening or being discussed, and it didn’t seem to matter for the field workers he was with whether he was there or not. So he decided to make his own soy milk project in relation to the benefits of nutrition for HIV positive people.

I told him about my plans to work with HIV groups instead of visiting pre-schools, and he said that I have a plan so I should go for it and just look forward with what I am doing and not worry about the pre-schools with the way the program is. It made me feel more certain and better about changing direction.

We both agreed that it is a shame this sort of thing happens and that if we were to have known before coming here that it would take us some months to realise we are better off making our own plans rather than in cooperation with our actual projects, then we would not waste so much time figuring this out and only having a few months left to do something worthwhile.

Now I have only three months left, and it took me almost 2 ½ months to see that I should do my own thing and not waste time with DAPP related works because it seems to amount to nowhere fast. My friend Maxi who I mentioned in my earlier blogs took six months to figure this out, and now as I also previously mentioned, she started and is still working on her mushroom farm project that is entirely separate from DAPP. This is common with many DI’s I have spoken to. Six months actually turns into two or three productive months (if that), and then it’s time to leave, not having been able to maximise a full six months of solid work.

Anyway, once I had met with James, he told me that he had already spoken to someone about the Chinkwende support group and that he just needed to confirm a day for the group to meet regularly. While I was there I dropped in to see Margaret, the pre-school teacher that had invited me for nsima the previous week to deliver her a bag of rice to show my appreciation of her hospitality. She was not there but I left it with someone at her house. I ended up running into her later and she very much appreciated the rice I had left for her.

Tim and I then went to visit one of the villages in his field, Chimbalanga, and met with Peter, one of the field workers there. Peter took us to a centre in this village where there is an existing support group and he introduced me to some other TCE members as well as people from the village and from the support group. He gave me information about the group and how they operate, what kinds of things have been happening and he told me they meet every second Friday and that I would be welcome to join them. He also showed me their vegetable garden which has maize, soy beans and moringa, just to name a few things. This group seems to be really well organised, and from what Tim told me, they are. So I will attend their next meeting and this now means I am involved with two support groups so far. I am looking to try to work with about three or four as my timetable permits.

A very positive experience I had recently was the opportunity to visit a Chinese-Buddhist orphanage. Tim at TCE is from China and he has been to this place a few times before. He found out about it from another DI who volunteered there after her project period with DAPP. Tim had organised to give a course to some students about HIV and Ray and I were interested to go along and see.

The orphanage is called Amitofo which is somewhat like a greeting to say, ‘hello’ or ‘welcome’ or something like this. It was founded by a Buddhist Chinese man who they call “Honourable Master” and has been around for 3 or 5 years (I can’t remember). It is quite amazing with plenty of land, a large Buddhist temple, lots of nice hostel rooms for the children, classrooms as it is also a school, a big office and conference area among other things. I really didn’t feel like I was in Malawi! There were many Chinese staff from the mainland, and also from Taiwan, as well as some Malawians. What was wonderful to hear was that the children learn 30 minutes of Chinese every day and are able to speak it! Tim tried speaking to some of them in Mandarin and they were able to answer him. It was so amazing. The local staff can also speak Mandarin which is great. So throughout the place there is a mix of Chichewa, English and Mandarin. It’s very nice.

Even though Malawians are mostly Christian, by being here the children also learn about Buddhism in a way that does not force it upon them, but the intention is for them to be open to other religions. Hence, they learn about Buddhism.

We were able to have lunch before Tim began his course, and all food served here is vegetarian because it is a Buddhist place. The children still get nsima because what was explained to us by the headmaster is they do not want to try and change the children’s culture in any way. By the same token they are also offered African dance classes to keep up with their culture, and as an insight into the Chinese culture the children are able to learn kung-fu.

The school is from primary to secondary and the age of the children vary from around 6 years old to 17 or 18 years. Once graduating from secondary school some of the students have the opportunity for a scholarship to go and study in China or Taiwan. And once they graduate from university or college there is also a chance for them to come back to Malawi to work at the orphanage.

They are looking at opening more of these Buddhist orphanages in other parts of Africa too, such as Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Swaziland and Lesotho. It was great to visit this place because you can see that the children here have a really nice life. When you come from visiting the villages that are near where we live, you can see the difference in the children’s quality of life. Even though it is wonderful to see how the children live at the orphanage, it breaks your heart to see the extreme opposite in the villages.

Recently Tim and Ray planned to make tofu out of soy beans at Tim’s house and invited me to join them. The boys really looked after me as they cooked all weekend, not allowing me to do anything, even when I tried to insist! The food was amazing and a mixture of Chinese and Korean-style dishes. I felt so spoilt but appreciative to have so much Asian food which is something that I miss a lot being over here. I felt like I was eating all weekend!

It was a very nice time spent at Tim’s house and the boys are very pleasant company. Tim and I always seem to talk a lot about politics and the world and it is very refreshing to have these conversations. I enjoy the mental stimulation, and being with Malawian people a lot means this kind of thing is lacking. Unfortunately interesting, deep or meaningful conversations are few and far between with the local people. Everything is just small talk and on the surface and nothing that has any real importance or meaning. It doesn’t take away from their friendly spirit, but they are in dire need of knowing how to have a proper conversation. I guess it comes from how educated (or uneducated) they are too, and perhaps having English as their second language (even if they are completely fluent in it and quite advanced) may not allow them to express themselves or speak about a broad range of things if they are not speaking their mother tongue. But anyway, I need more stimulating conversation and unfortunately I don’t get this where I am living either.

Earlier this month I took a week’s break for the Lake of Stars music festival. Nine of us planned to go to the festival, but we were all going up there at different times. Ray and I decided to make a week of it and break up the trip travelling north. The festival was in an area called Mangochi, but first we spent a day in a place called Zomba where we walked up alongside the Zomba plateau/mountain for around 6 hours.

After Zomba we headed for Monkey Bay. Our plan was to relax on the beach by Lake Malawi for a couple of days before the 3-day festival. It was a long trip to Monkey Bay by minibus. We left Zomba around 8:00am and didn’t arrive in Mangochi until 12:00pm. Then we took a pick-up (truck) to Monkey Bay, arriving around 2:00pm. A pick-up is a truck that carries as many people as it can fit on the back of it. Usually you have to pay but I’m not exactly how much as in this case we had already paid from Zomba all the way to Monkey Bay, but we just had to change vehicles at Mangochi so didn’t have to pay again. It should only take an hour or even less from Mangochi to Monkey Bay but this pick-up stopped (what felt like) every two seconds!

At Monkey Bay we stayed at Venice beach. There were only seven of us at the hostel. Three American guys, Brian, Kasey and Bart from the Peace Corps in Zambia came down for the festival, David, a guy I actually knew from the four year program in Denmark, who had finished the program and was travelling around as well as spending time with his girlfriend, a DI at the TTC in Chilangoma. There was also a lady of Ethiopian background named Minnie who stayed in the dorm with Ray and me. She actually happened to live in Melbourne for more than 20 years, but was travelling south from Kenya where she had been living for the past year.

For a day and a half we all hung out by the beach together playing volleyball, swimming in the lake and hanging out with the local kids who were so fascinated by us “Azungu.” The town was around 30 minutes by foot so the only place to eat nearby was at the hostel which was expensive. Brian talked to one of the local guys who worked at the hostel and managed to do a deal for some nice food for all of us for dinner. We had heard that the local fish from Lake Malawi was a must to try, so the guy agreed to catch a fish each for us and prepare it with rice and salad, all for 500 kwacha (approx. £2) per person. The dinner turned out to be amazing and the tiger fish was huge! They cooked it on the grill for us and everything. It was probably one of the nicest meals I’ve had in Malawi.

The American guys managed to organise to work at the festival some weeks back which meant free entry. Good thinking on their part. The five of us hitched a lift back to near where the festival was going to be. The Americans were camping but Ray and I had accommodation at a rest-house organised already thanks to Laura, a DI from Chilangoma who was coming with us to the festival. We met her and some of the others, Eva, Vaida, Rita and Kornell at the rest-house the afternoon before the festival, and then went walking to find out exactly how to get to the festival each day. We also went for a swim in the lake. The rest house was in a great location and it only took us 20-30 minutes (each way) to walk back and forth each day. On the first day of the festival, two other DI’s coming with us, Annie and Assum arrived.

It seemed as though every “white” person either living in or travelling through Africa was there for the festival. Even though by western standards the cost of the three day festival was cheap (7500 kwacha-approx. £30), for the locals it was very expensive. There were many African people there but I think we were the majority this time.

Before the entrance to the festival there were many stalls set up by local people who were selling arts, crafts, food and drinks and I think it was a great business for them. Each day there were many local people (kids included) standing out the front of the festival for hours, watching the hundreds or thousands of foreigners.

On the first day before the music started, Eva, Ray and I were sitting on the beach talking, when five English guys approached us and asked if they could interview us for a documentary they were making about the festival. They said the interview would be aired on MTV and other music channels, but I’m not sure what happened with that. Anyway, it was quite a nice interview. They asked us what we were doing in Malawi and if we were just here for the festival, what we thought about a festival like this, and other questions about Malawi, the people and culture. We had our 5 minutes of fame!

The set up for the festival was great and right on the beach. There were three stages and we were lucky enough to hear some amazing music from Malawi, other African countries such as Zimbabwe, Zambia and South Africa, and also the UK. Music started late in the afternoon each day and finished around sunrise at 5:00-6:00am. We danced in the sand, barefoot for hours, which was a lot of fun.

Our group managed to lose each other all the time but then somehow continued to find one another later in the day/night. But at the end of the night we never ended up coming home altogether. Sometimes some left early, sometimes some came back the next morning around breakfast time and sometimes some didn’t come back at all and stayed on the beach! Fun times!

I also met and hung out with different groups of nice people and it was actually refreshing to meet other “Azungu” because we could have more in-depth and interesting conversations than what I have been experiencing with locals, as I mentioned earlier. The foreigners were predominantly British and American, but especially British, and I also met some Israelis, Dutch, South Africans, a Slovenian and a New Zealander. I heard the voice of another Australian on the first night but made sure I turned around and walked in the other direction! Haha!

I think the festival was quite a positive thing. If Malawi can’t see the world then bring the world to Malawi, is what I thought. It was a meeting of cultures and I think it was a very interesting thing for the local people to see so many foreigners in one place. Hopefully it also brought attention to the good things this country possesses, as well as hopefully opened people’s eyes to the not-so-fortunate circumstances and reality.

Due to the fact that I have become completely lazy with my hair, and for convenience sake, I decided to get my hair done in dreads at the festival. It cost me 2000 kwacha (approx. £8). They are not too thick and I’m not sure how long I will (want to) keep them for, but right now I have no need to brush and no use for a hair dryer or straightener! It’s great! The thing about being in Africa is that you don’t always have water, sometimes not electricity and you can’t really be bothered looking your best (at least not me) all the time. No one really cares how you look or what you dress like here (aside from the cultural precautions we need to take). It’s kind of nice actually because image is a big thing in the western world and something I do not miss.

Month number three has had its fair share of ups and downs and playing with my mind. It’s come to the half way mark and even though I am fine in general, I don’t know if, just like in Denmark, now that the half way point is here, I am starting to feel a bit flat. It might just be the routine and going through the motions each day. Hopefully though this change of direction in my work keeps things interesting and allows me to do something worthwhile and productive without too many frustrations. Let’s see.

Second month in Malawi

My second month has been a more ‘active’ month in terms of work to do with my project. I have started visiting the pre-schools which is the central part of my work and it has been a great experience so far. Ray is coming to the end of his time in Malawi so I have been visiting pre-schools with him to allow us to do a handover where he has been teaching and informing me about everything I need to know in regards to the pre-schools, including exactly how to get to each one.

There are 32 pre-schools in the program and each DI has at least 10 pre-schools each to look after. We walk to all of them and my furthest pre-school is about 2 hours away and the closest is around 40 minutes. The pre-schools run from 8:00-11:00am, Monday to Friday. Depending on where the school is I usually leave anywhere between 6:00 and 7:00am each day, which means 5:00-6:00am wake ups. I am an early bird though so it’s been no problem for me.

We normally visit the pre-schools with a supervisor to help with translation if the teachers don’t speak English. Luckily in almost all of mine I am able to communicate with the teacher in English. There have been some problems with the supervisors though so I actually haven’t been going with any of them really and just with Ray or on my own. We follow the same schedule each week, but after the first 3 weeks I changed mine to co-ordinate with other activities I have in the afternoons, depending on how far away I have to come from and then travel back to get to the afternoon destination.

We spend many hours a day walking. On Tuesdays I have Youth club in the afternoon and Wednesdays I have English class, and I normally get back to the college from pre-schools anywhere between 1 or 2 hours before I have to leave again to get to these activities. This gives me time to sit down and take a short rest and have some lunch. It can be tiring but I am quite used to it. On these days sometimes I am walking for almost 12 hours – it’s good for the body and soul! What keeps me motivated is the fact that I am helping people and contributing to making a difference.

Visiting each school has allowed me to see the school conditions, teaching methods, materials or lack of materials, the food situation, among other things, and of course to meet and communicate with the teachers and kiddies. Each school is quite different but also many of the things they teach are the same. ABC’s, numbers, English words, games, songs, etc.

The teachers are all volunteers and each pre-school usually has one or two teachers. There are also normally ten committee members per school who are also volunteers. The committee members are supposed to be responsible for helping with various needs of the school and children, which can consist of anything from cooking porridge for break time, helping with construction of a classroom, fetching water, cleaning up, maintaining the garden if there is one, and plenty of other things. It’s a nice idea but the problem is it’s not consistent across all the schools and some committee members are more active and involved in some schools than others, if at all really.

Some schools don’t have a classroom so they are either using the teacher’s house and the classroom could either be outside or a room in the teacher’s house. But usually it’s outside because for the amount of children there are they don’t fit into the small room that is there. Some have a classroom which is usually just a room that varies in size in each school and is made of bricks. The bricks are all hand made with mud and water by committee members or other people in the community. It’s quite an interesting process. They lay hundreds of bricks on top of each other into something like the shape of a house and then they make a hole so they can light a fire inside which burns the bricks. I think they do this for some hours and then leave the bricks to cool for 5 or 6 days which allows them to set and become quite hard.

Some schools have a blackboard (a piece of wood painted black which enables use of chalk for writing). Some schools have various materials such as laminated numbers, letters and pictures of different objects which were given to some of the schools by other DI’s. I think these came from some people that visited from Denmark. If they have the resources, some teachers use their initiative and make some materials with numbers or letters on them by just writing on a big scrap of paper. Some schools have writing on the walls with mud that has numbers, letters, pictures and other things that can be useful for the kids.

Each DI that works with the pre-school program has a different vision of what to focus on in the period. For example, Ray was concentrating on building classrooms if the school didn’t have one and making sure the schools were actually opening each day because sometimes you find that you will show up one morning and the teacher has decided not to open the school. Sometimes it’s because there is a funeral, a holiday or a so-called ‘holiday’, and sometimes it’s for no good reason at all. Maybe the teacher had something personal to attend to that, where I come from wouldn’t warrant not opening a school.

I met a primary school teacher one day when I was walking back to Amalika from visiting pre-schools. It was a Monday at around 11:30am and I found out she had graduated from the Chilangoma Teacher Training College in 2009. I asked her why she wasn’t at school and she laughed and said because she had other things to do today like her washing. I told her that wasn’t good and she should think about the kids and that from Monday to Friday she should work and the weekend should be for doing her washing and other things like this. She told me she understood and she wouldn’t do it again. But I know that probably if she feels like it she would do it again. Sometimes these are the types of reasons given for not going to work or not opening a pre-school and this is where the struggle continues with changing the way people think about certain things and making them understand why something is important.

Another example that happened recently and happens a lot is the teacher doesn’t open the school on time. I arrived at one of the pre-schools at 8:00am for opening time and there was no sign of the teacher but around 6 or 7 kids just hanging around the classroom, some inside, some outside, but no adult at all. I saw an old lady nearby who I went and greeted and she said something about the teacher in Chichewa and headed in the direction of the teacher’s house. So I waited with the kids. Then a young boy came over to me who spoke English and it turned out to be the teacher’s little brother. He said she was bathing and that she would come soon. He helped me set up the classroom with the blackboard and mat for the kids to sit on and I asked him if we could get the kids to sing some songs while we waited. At 8:30 the teacher showed up and I asked her why she didn’t come here at 8:00 to open the school and she just laughed and that was it. Sometimes I don’t know how seriously they take things but also realise that time doesn’t really matter to them so no one is really that bothered about waiting or making people wait.

My visions are different to Ray’s and the two major priorities I have are with the nutrition of the kids and the teaching methods. In some schools the kids bring some food from home, and in some schools, sometimes, there is porridge cooked for the kids by committee members. But it is not consistent so the kids don’t always get food. I have found out that there are several organizations that have feeding programs in some of the primary schools, so what I am trying to do is put together a proposal of the amount of pre-schools we have, the number of kids and various other pieces of data, approach these organizations and find out what possibilities there are of bringing the program to these pre-schools. It bothers me a lot that the kids don’t get enough of what they need or the right amount of nutrients in their diet, so this is my main priority.

From the first day I could see the problem with some of the teaching techniques used by the teachers. Many times you see the kids are just repeating what the teacher says and not understanding what they are repeating. Many teachers teach the order of letters in the alphabet or numbers from 1 to 10, but it seems the kids don’t really know how to recognise these letters or numbers. The days of the week and months of the year are also taught, but don’t seem to be taught in a way that the children know what they are. They just repeat the words and remember the order when the teacher asks them.  Some schools seem to be better than others and sometimes it seems like the kids can recognise or know the difference, but mostly not.

The kids are also taught what they call “introduction.” When they are asked to say the introduction, again they just repeat what the teacher has told them in the same order. My name is…. I am a girl. I am ….years old. I go to ….. school. I live at…. etc But I think if someone asked them one of these questions individually, they would not be able to answer it because they do not understand what the question is asking them. It is quite clear because a child stands up and says, “Introduction. My name is, I am a, I live at…. You get the point.

For sure, the highlight of visiting the pre-schools is the kids. They are absolutely wonderful and always a pleasure to visit. Some of them jump on you, want to be picked up, want to hold your hand or sit next to you and some of them cry their eyes out because they are scared of you! These kids, with next to nothing, are so happy and I’m sorry to say, could teach some of our ‘western world’ kids a thing or two about appreciation and spirit.

Being “azungu” in Malawi feels like you are a celebrity sometimes. At least from some of the experiences I have had. For example, one day Ray and I went to visit a pre-school and because of some circumstances we needed to go and see the Pastor that is linked to the pre-school and community about the building of a classroom. His house is right opposite a primary school, so when Ray and I walked past the school the kids were all outside and saw us walk to the Pastor’s place and immediately followed us. The Pastor was sitting out the front of his house and we joined him and discussed some things with him. The entire time hundreds of kids were all crowded around us, just curiously looking at us and watching everything. Many of them pushed each other out of the way so they could try and be closer to us than their friends. Something like this at home would be if there were celebrities or important people and everyone would be crowded around trying to get a glimpse of you. They want to be where you are and see what you are doing. When we left the kids followed us and were so excited when we were talking to them and wanted us to take pictures of them.

Another example is that one of the pre-schools I visit is near another primary school and when they know “azungu” are visiting they come crowding around to see what we are doing. It happens at this pre-school every time, and it’s not good because this school is the teacher’s house, and it’s quite disruptive when she is trying to teach. Ray and I actually had to go and ask the teachers at the primary school to control their kids, but of course they keep coming back every week.

I am always being followed by kids when walking past the villages. One day in particular I was walking back to Amalika from pre-schools and about 20 kids were following me for ages, asking my name, where I was going and wanting to hold my hand or walk next to me. Again, they were pushing each other aside so they could walk closest to me. This kind of thing happens almost every day and the kiddies are so sweet.

Each month there is supposed to be a pre-school workshop that is run by us DI’s and the pre-school supervisors for pre-school teachers and committee members. Usually the pre-school teachers come one month and the committee members come another month, although I’ve heard that we don’t always do them every month but every two or three months.

A few weeks ago we had a workshop for the teachers, which was from 9:00am to 3:00pm. We invited two teachers/representatives from each school because of the fact some schools have more than one teacher. When we sent the invitation letters out though we told them we would be starting by 7:30, because most teachers would more than likely arrive at least an hour or more late (African time!). And we were right to do so because by just before 9 o’clock, practically everyone that intended on coming was there and ready for us to start on time. Amazing!

Usually there is a headline for the day and we give presentations relating to the headline. So our chosen headline this time was the Teacher Training College motto, “Make Learners, Learn More.” I made a presentation about Teachers, Children and Teaching Methods, Ray presented the Importance of Using Teaching Materials, Krisztina presented the Importance of Music as a Resource or Teaching Method, Sarah presented Learning Theories and Gift, one of the supervisors made a presentation about Indoor and Outdoor Play. There was also a song and theatre play in Chichewa presented by some 2010 students.

As the native language is Chichewa and many of the teachers don’t speak much English or at all, we had translation from English into Chichewa for each of our presentations. One of the 2010 students, Fanizo was our translator, and each sentence or two we spoke in English he translated into Chichewa. Even though there was translation it was hard to tell how well we got the message through because many of the teachers looked bored and didn’t always seem to be paying attention. But we understand that it’s because they are not used to sitting listening to presentations for long periods of time, and especially because they are mostly in English, they probably tend to ‘switch off’ half the time. Plus it seemed that the teachers mostly just came for the food more than anything. Many of them complained their portions weren’t big enough but actually they were absolutely huge! They saved a lot of leftovers in plastic bags to take with them. I don’t blame them though because many have families to feed and they are unfortunately quite poor, some worse than others.

We have taken note of several things from this workshop and discussed how we don’t think it’s so useful to stand in front of the teachers and speak for long periods of time and just have them sit there. So we thought about ways we can make it better for them the next time and more interactive, perhaps with small groups and getting them more involved.

Every so often we receive bags of shoes of many sizes from donors to distribute between the pre-schools for the kids. In this last 6 months there have been 2 or 3 “Shoe Actions” to give shoes to the kids and we had another one just recently. We made an agreement that we would only give shoes to children who come to pre-school regularly. Many parents don’t send their kids to school, but what normally happens is when they find out that we are giving shoes then suddenly they send their kids. This is obviously really bad and what we tried to do this time was change the parents’ minds. We want parents to send their children to school because it’s important for them to learn and begin their education at an early age. We don’t want parents to send their children to school only because they get free shoes.

We also find a lot of the time that when teachers hear we are giving shoes away they add more kid’s names to their attendance lists. So, all of this makes it hard to see if we should even give shoes in the first place. Of course we would love to give shoes (plus so much more) to all the kids and their families, but what we don’t want to do is lose sight of something that continues to be a problem and that is local people expecting ‘free handouts’ all the time. Even aside from the shoes, every day we are asked for money or other things and this is not why we are here.

Just a quick thing on this – one of the pre-school supervisors, Joseph, explained that a reason why Malawian people ask foreigners for money all the time is because the ex-President, Hastings Banda, continuously asked many countries for foreign aid, and so the people see this and do the same thing. The dependence of foreign aid comes from the top and carries through the nation’s people… and the struggle continues.

Something else that I have been involved in for a few weeks is visiting a primary school in Blantyre with Ray and doing creative arts with the kids. They are at the ages of around 12-14 years old. One week we asked them to draw what they did on their recent school holidays, then another week we made masks and another week we made a huge sign they could hang up in the class where the kids drew the school’s name and pictures of whatever they wanted to draw. It has been really nice because as well as visiting pre-schools it’s also nice to see the older kids in primary school to get an idea of how things are run. It’s also nice to get out of Amalika during the week and go to the shops and markets for some groceries and have lunch outside for a change.

Some more involvement I have with kids is a youth club that used to be held in Amalika for kids in the closest villages and run by Ray and Sarah, but recently there was a change of plans because it was noted that coming to Amalika seemed to be too far of a walk for the kids and that maybe they wouldn’t get back to their homes by dark. So Ray and I made a meeting with the headmaster of one of the local primary schools which also happens to be where I teach English, and asked if we could use his school for youth club so it would be closer for all the kids, seeing as though they all attend his school. So now I have taken over from Sarah and Ray and I had a couple of weeks of youth club together, but because Ray is leaving soon it is just me for now until another Development Instructor arrives at our project. We made a new plan with some structure where we do different activities on a 4-weekly basis. Week 1 – games, week 2 – creative arts, week 3 – education and week 4 – music. So far we have played some games and done creative arts and it’s been really nice. The kids are all really keen and happy and love to draw and learn new games. There are also many kids from the village that don’t go to the school but come and have a look at what we are doing so we welcome them to join us too and they love it.

English class is going well and I now have around 10 new students in my class. One Wednesday afternoon I was getting ready for my lesson in the classroom and all these new people started walking in, mostly women. I asked if they were here for English class and they said yes. I wasn’t prepared at all for so many new people because I also did not know of their levels of English and most likely they were all at different levels. The headmaster of the school walked in and mentioned the new students. He said he enrolled them for me. I said to him that he could have told me he was going to do that because I wasn’t prepared for this and he asked me if I was going to send them away. I said of course not and that everyone is welcome, but just that he should communicate so I know to be prepared. He didn’t seem to understand the concept of this. Anyway, I had to try and improvise at first but then realised the lesson that I had planned was not too difficult so I used what I intended to anyway and it all worked out fine. TIA. This is Africa.

A rather memorable “This is Africa” moment I had recently was something that I heard can happen over here but never actually thought it would happen to me. I was asked by one of the teachers if I could help the 2009 students with a discussion/debate they were going to have about ethics. So right on time at 7:00pm (I never learn) on a Wednesday evening I went to the dining hall where I was told the debate was going to be held. But no one was around except for some students finishing their dinner. I went to the kitchen and saw one of the project leaders and asked him if he knew anything about the ethics debate and he said no but he called the teacher that organised it. He said that there was miscommunication during the day and that the students were in their hostels but that one of the teachers was going to get them.
I went to the staffroom and saw the teacher that asked me to help and he said the students would be there at 7:30pm but he was busy so couldn’t attend and another teacher would be there conducting things. I told him if they don’t come by then I can’t wait around because I had to finish my pre-school workshop presentation and that I went to the dining hall on time to start but no one was there.

I waited until 7:30pm and still no one was there yet so I went back to my house. Then about 10 minutes later one of the teachers knocked on the door and said the students were there and they were waiting for me. So I said I would come in 2 minutes. Then when I got there I sat down at a table and all the students moved to the front closer to me. The teacher then asked me, “Do you want to use the board?” I said, “What do you mean?” And she said, “We are having your course tonight, do you need the board?” I laughed in shock and said that I had no idea about giving a course and was only asked if I could help with a debate, which by the way is a topic I don’t know a whole lot about so wouldn’t be able to get up and give a course anyway, and that no one told me anything about presenting!

The students were all staring at me asking why can’t I get up there and I explained to them that no one even told me I was giving a course, I was only asked to help with a debate so I couldn’t just get up there. They didn’t seem to understand this concept. Then they asked if I could give the course the next night and I told them I was sorry but I didn’t have time because I also had a presentation to prepare for the pre-school workshop and one of them said, “So you are saying you don’t have time for us?!” I said no of course that’s not what I’m saying and tried to explain myself. It was such an uncomfortable situation and the teacher asked me if I should send the students away and I said that I was sorry but yes she should. I was so mad and I could see that the students looked disappointed, even though it was a result of something that wasn’t even anything to do with me!

I went to the staff room to speak to the teacher that was in the hall with me and told her that what just happened in there was not good and that there was no communication at all and how could they do that, etc, etc. She acknowledged that there was miscommunication but it didn’t really seem to bother her that things happened like that.

The next day I spoke to the teacher who had originally asked me to help and told him that he knew I wasn’t aware I was supposed to give a course, so why did he let the other teacher go and get all the students from their rooms for a course I was supposed to be giving. He said that he was sorry and it was supposed to be a debate where they presented the topic to the students but that it wasn’t prepared properly and it shouldn’t have been turned into me giving a course, but somehow it did. I told him that even if I was supposed to give a course that he didn’t even ask me if I knew anything about the topic and didn’t give me any information at all about anything, and that I was under the impression I would be observing what was going on and offering feedback if and where possible, etc, etc. He apologised and said he would make sure things were handled better in future, but I wonder how this kind of thing happens! This is how it went… I got a knock at the door one night and Magura, the teacher said:
“We have a debate about ‘Ethics’ on Wednesday night with the 2009 students, can you help us?”
Me: “No problem, what time?”
Magura: “7-8pm.”
Me: “That’s fine, I will see you then.”
The end…. Can you believe it?!!!! TIA!!!!  J

I was asked to help with being on one of the teacher’s panels while students made thesis presentations about a certain topic to conclude the completion of the first period’s subject “The World in Which We Live.” This was a really interesting experience for me because I was able to learn of many of the different areas the students had studied and had the chance to provide feedback on their presentations.

Out of the 64 students they were divided into groups of around 10 or so to present in different classrooms, and there were judging panels of 3, 4 or 5 teachers. We had a feedback form to fill out for each student which included such things as: (Ability to grasp subject area, presentation of introduction, personal appearance, relevance of information presented, presentation materials used and conclusion, among other things). One of the teachers said that each one of us should take a turn at marking the students while they were presenting but I told him that it would be better if we let the students present so that we could give them our full attention throughout their presentation. Then we could discuss as a panel what we thought, give our opinions and come to an agreement on how we graded the students. So this method was agreed upon.

Students presented such topics as child development, HIV/AIDS, the Greenhouse Effect, human rights, health and personal development, etc. The overall level of the students’ presentations was quite poor but it was an interesting process to have discussions with these teachers after each student presented because more often than not the final decision was ‘swayed’ by my opinion. I expected what it was going to be like, but was interesting to see that some things that some of the teachers thought were very good, I didn’t think was good at all. And many times I gave them constructive reasons as to why I thought it wasn’t good, and also made the comparison between students, saying, ‘do we think that this student presented better than this student?’ or ‘this student didn’t use any materials but made a better argument in this way, although didn’t answer our questions as well as this student.’ etc, etc.

It turned out that all the other groups had finished going through all their student’s presentations so some of the students in our group were sent to another room to present so we could try and get through everyone in good time. When I heard about this I was slightly disappointed because I knew probably in all the other rooms they would have just raced through deliberating about each student’s presentation, not properly deciding on the final marks and most likely gave better marks than deserved because somehow, like I’ve mentioned before, there is no constructive criticism.

After the presentations were all finished and the students went to do other things, the teachers had a meeting to conclude how we thought the day went. The project leader made a small speech about how it seemed to be quite successful and then we went around the room to get everyone’s opinions, or lack of opinion I should say. It seemed like I had the only constructive thing to speak about which was this… First I asked how much practice the students get at doing presentations and speaking in front of each other or if it was their first time. I was told it was their first time and I said that it was obvious and we could clearly see this judging by the standard of many of them. I also suggested that for the future study periods that they should include more presentation tasks for the students instead of just asking them to present something right at the end of the period, because the more practice they get, the more they will improve and can learn from each time. I gave them examples of some of the things I did in Denmark and that it was an area I improved in and they welcomed my feedback and said they will try and implement this. As we went around the room to all the other teachers, the extent of the feedback went something like this…
“It was a very nice day, and I think everyone did really well…”
“I think it was a very successful day… “
“I agree with what the others said, it was a good day….”
“Yes, we did very well and it was very nice….”
TIA… It’s the way it is…

I mentioned African time in my last blog. Something that has become quite evident here is that when you want to do something, you should do it “now, now.” This is a term that I hear all the time and if you don’t do it “now, now” then either it won’t get done or by the time you get around to doing it, it could be months later. My example is giving courses to the students in the college. Since I got here I have been trying to find a timeslot to give a course about Australia as an evening program. But somehow or another, now two months on, I still haven’t been able to do it. Every time I speak to the head teacher or one of the lecturers in charge about doing my course, they always say it’s no problem, we will fit you in, but then something comes up or things get moved around. I have also been told I can choose a regular night each week to give courses but this has also not been possible so far.

In the middle of October there is a music festival called “Lake of Stars” which I am going to with Ray and some DI’s from other projects.  Many, many local and some international musicians play over a 3 day period in an area called Mangochi which is heading towards the central part of Malawi, south of Lilongwe and North of where I live, and obviously right near Lake Malawi. We are planning to camp and it should be a great experience. It costs 7500 Kwacha which is around £30. So that’s really cheap by UK/European/US/Australian standards but for here it is quite expensive and probably will mostly be tourists or foreigners because most local people for sure can’t afford that. It takes around 9 hours to get to Mangochi from where we are, so to break up the trip, Ray and I have decided to leave some days earlier and make a stopover in a place called Zomba which has a nice mountain we would like to see. Then we will also stopover near Lake Malawi a day or two before the festival to relax and spend some time on the beaches. Then it’s 3 days of festival fun!

We DI’s at Amalika have recently moved to the nearby orphanage, “Victory Christian Children’s Home” because one of the project leaders was promoted to headmaster of the school and his family has moved to the college and into our old DI house. One of the teachers here used to live at the orphanage but has now moved to the college into some new rooms built for teachers and lecturers.

We are quite lucky because there is electricity and running water all the time, except in the case of a blackout which if it happens isn’t usually for long. Although since being here, we have had a shortage of water. It’s quite a nice atmosphere and there are always kids around so if you feel like going outside and playing around or going for a walk, you can hang out with the kids or connect with other people around the place. There is also a basketball court which I am very happy about, so I need to try and find somewhere I can buy a basketball. The disadvantage is it now takes longer to get to some of our pre-schools and we have had to try and find out different ways and shortcuts of getting to each school. I have only recently learnt where all my pre-schools are from Amalika, so to change so quickly isn’t ideal, but I’ll manage and it will be fine.

Being here means that lifestyle changes a bit. Aside from the obvious electricity and water, time is a big factor because previously we always had to try and get things done before electricity went off and we would sleep early, but now it’s no longer a race against the clock and we can fit more into our day. It’s a nice change, even though we were ok before and used to planning our time. It also means that now instead of being able to walk 5 minutes from our house to the college to do things or see people, we have to make an afternoon of going to there with a list of things we may need to find out or do to make the trip worthwhile. It means we aren’t able to be as involved in the college as before, but this is how it is. We still go there every Monday at lunchtime for a weekly meeting, and between visiting pre-schools and going to English class on Wednesdays I also go there to eat lunch and say hello to everyone. I will start to go there on Thursdays soon too once I begin my “Health Club.”

It’s crazy that two months in Malawi has already passed. It doesn’t feel like I’ve been gone that long, but of course as the years and months go by, time passes by quicker and quicker. I have this constant feeling that I am running out of time here because six months to do some form of sustainable development really isn’t long at all, so let’s see how the third month goes.

Good news is that Ray is able to stay for a month longer due to some circumstances here at Amalika so I am really happy about that because we have some plans to work together for his last month to do some good things. We want to do a “hand-washing action” with our pre-schools, work on getting something going with the feeding program I mentioned and doing some things in the college with the students. One weekend we are also planning to climb Mulanje Mountain which is more than 3000 metres high and not too far away from where we are now. We might also visit one of the many national parks Malawi has to offer before Ray leaves Malawi. Liwonde National Park is one of the more well known ones and that could be a weekend adventure also. It’s going to be a busy third month, just the way I like it!