Goodbye Mzungu, Hello rain!

Day twenty-eight. Hello again! I have missed you all dearly, there's some serious withdrawal going on here...Luckily my partner Emma has started a blog too so we can moan at each other for keeping it up to date! Here at Lukwe the internet is very slow and hard to come by as we use our host's laptop maybe once every two weeks but I'll keep the news coming! As you all know, I'm not exactly a punctual person so the Malawian way suits me really! Everything here goes at a slow pace, 'being in a hurry' is something that people just don't do! Unfortunately my delight in the fact that everyone here is late like me has gotten me the nickname of Granny’ or Go-Go in ChiTumbucka among Emma and the other volunteers! I am covered in bites despite there being few mosquitos here in the mountains, so much for spending a fortune on Malarone! (note for anyone who needs malaria tabs, Malarone gives messed up emotion fuelled dreams and hallucinations but it’s different for everyone!). The real problem here are the midges. They creep easily past your net at night, they terrorise you even when your fire is screaming with smoke and follow you everywhere you go. In short, they are stalkers. Termites are also a pain, they dig into your walls and get into your books and EAT EVERYTHING. Finally we have found poison and are getting rid of them. Very important to get rid of the termites or else you’ll get scorpions and no matter what Emma says I SAW THAT SCORPIAN ON UNDER THE MAT, it was not Malarone!!! Ahem...

  SO, where did I leave the story? We were at Sangilo beside the lake, waiting in great anticipation to get to our placement! Saturday came and began with me washing nearly all of my belongings in the lake with the locals! A bottle of soap had spilled all over my bag, obviously being thrown on and off buses across Malawi had done some damage! So there I was in my chitenje washing my rucksack, sleeping bag, underwear and everything else while the locals looked on in disbelief at the mzungu whose back was slowly turning bright red in the boiling hot sun as she tramped in and out of the water trailing pools of soapy water. Ah, such a great first impression! Our host for the next seven months, Lieza, came to pick us up on Saturday morning in her 4x4, loaded up with supplies for our new house. Balancing mangoes, avocados, solar chargers and buckets, we began our ascent up the 15km track from the main road at Chitimba to Livingstonia. No buses go to Livingstonia and we immediately understood why. It is without a doubt the bumpiest, most terrifying but scenic rides of our lives but it was pretty damn fun too! The track makes no sense, as parts are very well concreted and easy to get across while others are made of huge, loose boulders and mud. For 10km up to Lukwe any of our belongings that were not strapped down flew around the car. We had never experienced anything like it! Three weeks in and we have realised that everyone wants a lift up and down the mountain and that it is not uncommon to pack twenty-four people and five sacks of fish into the back of an ambulance across the never-ending bumps and turns of the upward scale to Livingstonia. Arriving at Lukwe was a dream! We knew it would be beautiful but wow, it was like nothing else we’ve ever seen. Lukwe Eco Camp resides 1,200 metres above sea level and overlooks not only vast, high forest land and hundreds of small villages but two waterfalls and the Northern part of the lake across to Tanzania. At light the lightening does a 360 degree around the camp and the thunder as if God himself high fived a tree, it’s ridiculous! On Sunday morning we began turning a house into a home as we carried bamboo for showers and toilets and making shelves for the kitchen and our rooms. Lieza had constructed a type of village using permaculture methods between the gardens and the lodge with two houses and a kitchen. One of the Lukwe workers, Veronica and her three children Mphatso, Kettie and Prince live in the larger house and Emma and I live in the smaller house constructed for volunteers. There is a partition between our beds to give us the rare bit of privacy and ‘me’ time that Emma and I so desperately need! Mud and concrete make up the walls and our roof which does not touch the walls consists of bamboo and straw. Our own little African mud hut J We don’t have the luxury of running water so we collect it from a well at the end of the garden and filter through what we drink. We’ve gotten pretty good at carrying twelve litre buckets on our heads even if we do get back to the house soaking wet! For washing we boil water on the fire and pour it over ourselves using a cup and a bucket. It takes some getting used to but after a long day of ABC’S, fractions and gardening it is surprisingly soothing. As for electricity we have a solar charger which gives us enough charge for our phones and a light at night but lately there has been very little sun as we descend further into rainy season but it’s nice to have a light sometimes because in Malawi, once it turns 6 o’clock: darkness: pitch black. It’s difficult having no running water or electricity. Never in my life have I appreciated a tap or a microwave so much. It can take two hours to start your fire as all of the wood is wet during the season we’re in. We share the kitchen with Veronica and her family so our wood burner never has a hob free and collecting water can really tire you out for the day! Lemon creams (the biscuits) have become our staple food as they are less than 30c a pack and all there is to eat is tomato and onion and banana....I miss food. It’s all part of the experience though, here’s hoping we get used to it fast! Already I can’t imagine staying up past 9pm or sleeping in past 6am! It gets to you at times though, living in the forest. The baboons come often at night to rummage through our rubbish and throw stuff around but we’ve found ways to block their paths with tables and mats so hopefully they’ll get sick of trying. Ants are also a problem. Even when you hide your butter in a top drawer or in a plastic container...they find it!!

   As for what we’re actually doing here, our placement description is community development. On the Wednesday of our first week we began observation in the different standards in Mantchewe Primary School. Primary School in Malawi is free and runs from Standard one to eight and anyone between the ages of five and seventeen can join. Standard eight exams determine whether or not you can get into Secondary School and even then, if you can afford to pay the fees. After three days of observation and a short teaching course on how to write lesson plans and schemes of work we decided what classes we would take. I am teaching Standard six and Emma has taken on Standard five. We both teach Maths and English, three periods a day. The first day was so daunting as it took the kids so long to realise that I was even speaking English, apparently Irish English is much more difficult to understand than Australian English and people, you know I speak fast... I have had to sloooooow doooooown. They understand more as the days go on though and I can really feel them warming to me. They get so into games and I used stickers as prizes the other day and they were so appreciative and sweet! The age range in my class is about eight to seventeen but absenteeism is high as parents often keep kids home to help with the harvest in rainy season. It’s sad really because they could be doing so well if only they came to school everyday. There are about thirty-five in my class but due to lack of classrooms, standard one to four start at 7.30 and standard five to eight start at 10.00. This cuts out so much time in the day but the school is trying to educate everyone despite a lack of resources and teachers. I am known as Madame Jenny and slowly, slowly we are losing the mzungu plague! THANK GLOB! We walk up and down the rocky, muddy track of Mantchewe to shouts of ‘What’s my name?’, ‘Hello Madame’, ‘Mathandala makola’ and ‘Give me kwacha!’ (hopefully we’ll lose the last one soon!).  During the seven months that we are here, we are also working in Lukwe on Permaculture development with the Primary School and the mapping of the grounds including a mountain bike trail. We’ve started our map which includes the gardens, our village and the lodge. The gardens are so beautiful and full of life but man is it difficult trying to draw every single plant, keyhole bed, tree and pond! We do up different drafts and discuss with our host how to make it easy to understand for tourists and any visitors who come through. We have papaya, guava, pineapple, basil, banana, nearly everything! We also have ducks, rabbits, frogs, snakes, lizards, dogs and cats to keep us company so we have plenty to smile and write about! As we are doing community development, we decided to hunt out a community centre or see if there was need of one. Through a contact at the lodge we met with Peter, the organiser of Mtende Homecraft and Orphan Care which is situated between Mantchewe and Livingstonia. Finding this place was one of the best things we ever! Emma and I together with Toby and Will (two Lattitude volunteers based in Livingstonia) met immediately with Peter to discuss what we could do for the organisation and how. He was so appreciative of our time and so keen to discuss with us how we could change the future of Malawi. No Presssure! He seemed to think we had political contacts and international development degrees but we soon made it clear to him that we were students straight out of school with little experience but lots of energy and enthusiasm, cute! :Don the first day of nursery, we kicked Mzungu to the floor and introduced Madame Emma, Madame Jenny, Sir Toby and Sir Will. The kids took to us immediately, fascinated by our skin, our clothes, our hair ( to keep children equal here they shave their heads). They can hardly understand us but we play and sing and learn colours, body parts, ABC’s. Peter is the pastor’s son and his mother works in the nursery too so she helps to explain and keep control. There are maybe forty kids and we work there Monday to Thursday from 7.30 am until we go to school at 10am. We now call Peter’s mother ‘Mama’ and she makes us tea and bananas (boiled unripe banana with tomato and onion which tastes like potato – so good!). We also sometimes go to their house for lunch, they make us feel so welcome! We have so many hopes for Mtende and the different developmental groups. Just the other day we visited the houses of the sick in Livingstonia and it was a harrowing but hopeful experience for us all. Some of these people have been living with these diseases for more than fifteen years but going to a doctor is either too expensive or too far away. They have hardly any food for their families and they live in damp, dark conditions with their families. We are now working on projects to improve their living conditions and provide them with food supplements every month. Fundraising here is hard but Peter is really enthusiastic about our input and we can’t wait to make a difference here!

   There really is so much to tell but a highlight of the week was running football and netball training with the school yesterday and kicking all of the older bullies off the pitch so the younger kids could play! Such a boss moment for us both. I’m developing a bit of an Australian accent, Emma has started saying janey mac though! We avoid mirrors and try to get away to visit other volunteers at the weekends as much as possible! It rains a heck of a lot here and walking in flip-flops is near to impossible these days. Welcome to rainy season! Will give a big update next time but for now, taluta and I miss you all like mad. Getting settled more everyday but homesickness really is a factor that is difficult to overcome. Hope you are all doing well. Jenny out!