Well I hope everybody is well , had a Good Christmas and New Year , made lots of new year resolutions to furfill.
Today Wed 2nd of Jan I am sitting in an empty office , typically Milawan style official communications are poor.
Friday before Christmas there were rumours that they were closing the Ministry office until Monday 7th.
When I left that day still nothing official or if the days come out of your holiday allowance.
So I have come into the office except for 3 or 4 people it's empty and still no official notice or e-mail!
It's something you begin to learn to live with.
Well since my last blog in early December my Job is still very quite. I think the only good point was that myself and Herman were invited to introduce ourselves at his weekly Ministers meeting to his other ministers and executives, that lasted no more that 5 mins. Don't know who the 20 people were and still no organisation chart. ps we do ask all the time, it will come!!!!
Over the last 3 weeks been traveling quite a bit.
One weekend went with Elkie to explore Senga bay as she hadn't been there and was about to finish her project before going back to Amsterdan.
For Christmas a group of us Fiona,Marian,David, Aurden and Sam went to Cape Maclear.
First I drove to 2 hours to a town to pick up David and Aurden from Aurden's parents farm. Aurden is a local about 20 who David lodges with him another town. The night before David had slaughtered a Goat, Aurden mother cooked it and served it up for Sunday lunch. What must be typical custom I was led to a room Mud hut and sat down on a mat on the floor with all the food set out with just David and Aurden, no family. Once we had finished his parents did come in.
Nsima being cooked by Aurden's mum
His farther spoke some of the best English I have heard. Basically most of the people farm their land for their own existence and sell on any surplus. The main crop everybody lives off is maize. As the rainy season began 2 weeks ago every bit of land in Malawi is planted with it and spurting up most are a foot high now.
Everywhere is green. When they harvest the maize they keep the cob in special cool huts made of bamboo or reed. The maize is pounded into a floor and added to water that forms a very thick porridge and made into a bun and is called Nsima. They eat it with their hands with every meal. No real taste to it but typically a meal will be a meat or chicken tomato stew so the Nsima will soak up the juice. The goat was delicious by far the best I've had.
Cap Maclear is set at the end of a peninsular surrounded by sharp hills unto 300m that are part of a National park.
The Cape is about a 1 kilometre beach and has about 20 lodges, small single storey buildings that accommodate 10-30 people mostly set on the beach some have camping.
Set just behind is a long village, so the beach is very much a working beach, lots of fishing and people washing themselves and their clothes in the lake.
We stayed at Migoza Lodge, this had a main building made out of bamboo and one of the only with an upstairs and this is where we slipped in a 6 x 2 bedded bunked dorm, fortunately the 6 of us had it to ourselves. This was really nice the cool breeze off the lake would flow though the bamboo which meant sleeping at night was comfortable. As besides being cool the breeze kept insects (mosses) away even though we had nets.
We were lucky that this lodge had some of the best food in the bay at a good price.
Marian and Sam having Breakfast
The weather was kind and was sunny the 5 days we were there with the odd downpour.
Although the sun was too strong to sit out in for long periods there was plenty to do.
There are three islands off the bay, we took a fishing boat to one and did some snorkelling there are loads of small very colourful fish. Another day we took a kaiak to the end of the bay and found a small cove. The next we attempted to walk to one off the islands ( swim across small canal). However there were no tracks and boulders too big at the sea level but found a boy who would lead us there. Basically this ended up with a big scramble up the side of a steep hill, up/over /around big stones that were baking hot to touch, lots of trees and shubs so not too exposed to direct sun. We then saw the bay we had been too the day before so we scrambled down to cool off on the sea. Absolutly delightfull. Within minutes out of nowhere a group of boys with their dug out canoes ( hollowed tree trunks) turned up. All very keen to join us diving off the rocks and showing us their skills.
Half of us carry on with our jungle/mountain adventure to get to the island while the other half had lifts with the boys on the very unstable logs. It was a tough climb due to the heat and terrain but we made it to the point.
The idea was to swim across and climb up to the ridge 250m and walk to the end one mile but it had been so quite touruous so far we just stayed for a swim and got lifts back on the canoe logs.
The next day I swan the 3/4mile 45mins to one of the island, and back, yes I was quite tired after that.
On Christmas eve one of the other lodges has a music bar so went there until 2 dancing ,bumping into other people from Lilongwe.
There was a very jovial Malawan lady dancing with everybody, everybody dances with everybody. She suddenly says to me your Robin, where's Herman!!! It turned out she is the Country Program manager for Malaria and was one of the people at the Ministers meeting Herman and I introduced ourselves in. So now I know one of the people there other that the Minister himself.
For Christmas Lunch we went to a local ( I mean local) hostelry and had Chicken, rice and beans. for a grand price of £1. We all survived.
On Friday we left, as all the accommodation had already been booked for New Year, not an empty bed in the whole place unless you wanted to spent over £70 a night. Our dorm bed had cost £3 a night. Most accommodation is in twin/double chalets costing between £20-£50 a night.
It was a very enjoyable 5 days. And really good to meet Sam who had been invited by Marian who works with him. He is an Intern Doctor from Columbia studying medicine in Argentina. So we were all learning about South American living and their passion for Sala.
So Fiona, Marian and myself headed off South for Blantyre which is basically the commercial centre of Malawi. Pat another volunteer let us borrow her house while she was back in the UK. This town is very different to Lilongwe and it is very hilly.
We got out for some good walks including one where we came nearly face to face with human size stand up monkeys ( might have a different name). I don't know who was more scared us or them but they moved off.
We then got caught in one of there sudden downpours so absolutely soaked. All the tracks turned into rivers.
I was worried about how to get home as we had to drive down 3miles of very uneven track and boulders, 4x4 territory not a little wheeled car. When we got to the car we waited a while for the water to drain away and the had a slippery ( like on ice ) drive back, but the little car made it without too much crunching of the underside.
For New Years eve we ended up meeting another volunteer Alice and going to club. This place was heaving with people. They obviously have no restrictions on number of people they can get in. just manic inside.
Then yesterday have a quiet 4hr drive back to Lilongwe, in a couple of downpours where you have to stop as you just cannot see.
Well it now appears I have a few more days holiday until works starts again. so now need to work out what to do.
Hope you all have good plans for 2013. All the very best.
Robin
