What is love?

This is a question that I feel has no definite answer, except for maybe here in Malawi!! And before you think I am going to spill the details of my love life you are mistaken! (Sorry to disappoint but anyone could be reading this!!). So here is the answer to the above question told in a story format:

My nightwatch man is called George. He has a friend called Cosmos. They both work for VSOs and we all know them well. Cosmos has 2 daughters and is divorced from his wife (he bought the girls back from their mother a while ago for the cost of a cow but this is a financial stroke of genius as the girls will both be worth a cow each when they are ready for marriage!) Anyway Cosmos decided that he really needed a new wife to help look after his children and to attend to him. So off he and George went one day in the search for a new wife – it really did sound like they were just popping off to buy some groceries or a cow! They searched in vain for a few days and came back empty handed. Cosmos was very depressed about the whole thing.

Luckily their next search proved to be more fruitful and a new wife was arranged. She is from a small village quite far from Rumphi and apparently is very beautiful! The following week Cosmos had his loboro (money to buy his new wife from her father so it really is just like shopping!) ready and off they set to bring back his new wife. Unfortunately there was a funeral on so the village was empty and the trip was wasted! So again the following week off they trotted to collect this wife. However, it turns out that she is only 15 (not that that actually matters), has a child and is already married!!

Cosmos and George once again made the long journey home and once again were empty handed. Cosmos was very upset as he claims that he really wanted this one as his wife because he really does love her!!!!! (NB not actually sure if they have actually exchanged any words as the business is conducted through her father!)

This is very common practice in Malawi especially among the less educated but of course it still boils down to good old LOVE!

Other events of interest

I’ve been quite busy with various things lately including a trip down to the bottom of the lake for the VSO National Conference where all the volunteers get together and hear presentation etc. It was really good to catch up with everyone and some I hadn’t seen since arriving in country way back in Febrauay. The place we were staying in was called Sun and Sand and was lovely – it even had a swimming pool. Luxury plus hot showers which is always a bonus!

I have had my mice/rats back again although last time I think it was just some big lizards!! This time they have been getting into my clothes and eating them so I had to put a stop to it. George got me some fatal poison and managed to kill 12 of them over a 3 day period. They aren’t actually living in the house but in my boys quarters about one meter behind my house and they just pop into for food. I have acquired a mental little kitten to help in the quest of keeping the little buggers at bay. Katrien’s cat had 4 kittens and she didn’t want to keep them all so I took the boy. I certainly don’t want to deal with anymore kittens either. At the moment he has taken to scratching me everywhere and also enjoys destroying my house. I can’t let him out has he still needs his rabies jag and there are too many large dogs roaming about who would finish him off in a second! Apparently he is good at his job already as George found a dead rat in the house while I was away at the conference! Unfortunately he almost mauled my pet (ish) lizard who frequently pops in for a chat and cup of tea the other day. Jonathan had to tear JAMBO off the lizard who slowly ran for his life full of cat scratches on his body. I hope he learns not to come visiting my house again!! Shame I did enjoy his company!!

So not much else to report – I am going to rename my house the Sauna as we have already had a few really hot days and my house is really like a sauna. I’m going to pleed with my landlady to put in a ceiling to try and sort out the tin greenhouse effect!

I’m now preparing for my parents visit in less than 2 weeks time and hoping that everything goes smoothly!!! Mother has just about finished up her guiding and hopefully Malawi will come as a well deserved break! Congratulations to her for being awarded the Silver Fish last weekend and I’m only sorry I wasn’t there to see her receive it!

Catch up soon and will let you know if there are any developments with the LOVE story!!

photo!

Finally - A photo for you! The net was working well so I thought I'd try my luck! It took 20 mins!!

Half a year!!

6 Months in Malawi!

I can’t believe I have been in Malawi for just over 6 months. How time seems to fly past! I have had lots of time to reflect this week as I’m the only volunteer here at the moment, Katrein and Andrew are away at a Doctors training thing, Sue is down in the South of the country, Jonathan is on motorbike training and Hill has left for home. I feel I have achieved some good things at work, albeit slowly but I still have lots to do before I can call this a successful placement. Some weeks there is really nothing to do and other weeks I don’t have a minute for myself.

My main job so far has been to set up and help run events that wouldn’t happen otherwise due to funding or forward planning. This really includes holding a chairing some monthly meetings for the Education Advisors, running workshops like library training and computer training, helping the Advisors run their Teacher Development Centres by setting up Action Plans, facilitating exchange visits to try and help the Malawians learn good practise from each other and finally monitoring and giving advice to the classroom teachers. I especially like working with the teachers and I really to admire how they try to cope with such large classes and such poor resources (Basically no resources at all!). I do sometimes feel like I am an intruder to their classrooms (a bit like how us teachers feel when someone comes to watch us) but they really seem appreciative that I have come to watch them teach.

I have also been taking lots of photos for use back in school and recently asked George my night watchman/gardener if I could take some pictures of his family and especially his nephew for a sort of Day in My Life type activity. George was very pleased about this and we agreed to meet at his house a 9 the following day. When I arrived the whole family was very busy washing themselves, brushing their hair and changing into their Sunday best clothing. It was very humbling to see them make this much effort just to have their pictures taken. Mind you I did tell them that all the boys and girls in Scotland would like to see the photos!!

Anyway had a great Saturday night just past and woke up on the Sunday with a slight hangover, only my third hangover since arriving here 6 months ago! At least my liver will be a lot better when I return home!! We had a double celebration in Rumphi as it was Jonathan’s birthday and Hill’s leaving bash combined into a barbeque at Dr Andrew’s house. (Poor Andrew actually missed the event as he was in Blantyre!) Hill has been working with a small organisation called DAMRA so several of his Malawian counterparts came along as well. His boss is well known to us all as he is the resident language teacher – although my skills in Timbuka, the local language, are still very limited surprisingly enough!


So this way a party with a difference – a Malawian difference. They do like to have formal proceedings for every event and this one was no different! We had a Master of Ceremonies to conduct the whole evening and there were formal speeches from just about everyone, singing, dancing and an opening and closing prayer for the event! It was highly entertaining and for my dance, I taught them the Flying Scotsman in a very small room!

We had all prepared the food which of course had to include rice for the Malawians and there was lots to drink. I really enjoyed the whole event as did the other volunteers. It will be sad to lose Hill from Rumphi as he is highly enthusiastic and always on hand to help out with any of my motorbiking problems!!

It does make you think about our placements and how our Malawian counterparts must feel. They spend a long time getting to know and getting used to the volunteers and then all of a sudden they leave for home and, if the organisation is lucky a new volunteer arrives and the whole process starts again. I guess that is the general pattern when working in development, well especially volunteering. Some VSO’s do stay for up to 5 years but mainly they are fellow African volunteers from Kenya or Uganda. Most of the European volunteers need to get back home and start earning proper money again and paying their pensions etc etc!

Hills leaving speech summed up the past year from him by saying that at home the years can feel like they just roll into one but this past year has been something totally different and special. That is quite a true statement, well for the last 6 months for me at least!

Missing you all

Caz xx