Tuesday 31 August and Wednesday 1 September

Our last full day was spent around Blantyre, shopping, packing, relaxing a bit. I bought some hymnals to share with my choir back home and some other small things. We had lunch at an Italian restaurant, which seemed a little odd to me, but was good. Usually when I travel, there's some food that I'm excited about having when I get home. (When I was in Mexico, it wasn't food so much as having a glass of cold milk!) We had so many different things in Malawi, familiar or not, that I wasn't determined to have anything in particular upon my arrival.

I packed like a champion. Because my duffel bag was so full of donations on the way over, it was very light and mostly empty for the return trip. I even put my second carry on in there to check it all as one bag, just taking my backpack with me for the flights.

We cooked dinner together. After the meal, we cleared the table and played a really lively game of spoons.





I didn't lose!

The night was peaceful and quiet. The team spent some time together before we went to bed, reflecting on the adventures of the past two weeks. I think this has confirmed what I've long believed-- my life is definitely leading me to serve others. I don't know if that will be with the church, or the government, I don't know if that will be close to home or really far away. I just know.

The last day arrived without any rush. I woke up pretty early on my own and took my time dressing and wandering over to the Machinjili's main house, where I helped Liz slowly set the table for breakfast. This is the first thing you heard about when I returned. It was a peaceful morning filled with oatmeal, bananas, papaya and tea. It was bittersweet goodbyes with Bonongwe and Mwalabu at the BSHDC. It was the shortest car ride of the entire trip to the airport. It was holding back tears as the Chinupule Women's group and the Machinjili family bid us safe travels.


Liz and Serah Machinjili, followed by the Chinupule Women's Prayer Group

It was amazing.



PS: We did not bring the chicken with us for our long journey home.

Monday 30 August part two: closing ceremony in villages, back to Blantyre

We arrived back from safari quite a bit later than originally planned (oh, Malawi time), but they held the goodbye ceremony for us. Racing sunlight, introductions were condensed to the group scale instead of the lengthy traditional individual style. The ceremony was great-- lots of singing and dancing, and someone was translating the entire time. My favorite was hearing a song I knew-- my church sings it as "Siyahamba ekukhanyene kwenkos'", but in English it's "We Are Marching in the Light of God". It was nice to have something so familiar.

We quickly presented the hundreds of pounds of donations that we had carried into the country-- the sun was already behind Zomba Plateau at this point and we were fast losing light. We were also presented with a few gifts:


a guinea fowl


the group was given a box of fruits and vegetables. I was given a tool that they use to sift flour, which I was awful at when I helped cooked in the village, but I was just absolutely in awe of this kind gift. Wherever I end up next in my life, you can bet this will be proudly displayed in my kitchen.


the sun setting behind Zomba Plateau

Night fell quickly and beautifully. We said our goodbyes. I sat in the back of Mwalabu's truck with a few other men and a pile of empty duffel bags. As we drove each of the men home (people who worked with VIP, helping with logistics and translating), the stars came out. It was a cool, beautiful night and I just stared at the sky, trying to soak in the incredibleness of it all.

That guinea fowl would become a ridiculous part of the evening. Somehow, once again, I was the only one keeping track of the bird in the slightest. As I rode in the back of the truck I knew it was on the floor in the truck. Then, we all heard a scream and Randa jumped out of the truck (while we were stopped at Mwalabu's house to drop off his children). She didn't know the fowl was at her feet, and then it moved! We ended up moving it up to the front seat with Bob, where it ended up riding for the rest of the trip that evening.

The team plus Mwalabu and Bonongwe went out to dinner after this. The place Liz had elected to go to turned out to be closed, so then we joked about getting pizza. One woman told King Bob to make it so!... and then we pulled into a place called Domino's! It was a little funny. The place did make pizzas but also served all sorts of other things. I had a vegetable curry.

At one point, Liz, Bonongwe and Mwalabu left to pick up the plans for the school at Matawali. It was really exciting to see the plans printed out, knowing the bricks were made and the people were ready. Things are truly moving forward in this place.


Liz and Bob looking at the school plans

After dinner, which took the restaurant about an hour to prepare (which was fine since three members of our party were out hunting down those school plans), we headed back to Blantyre. It was very hard to stay awake during the drive, but I fought the drowsiness in order to spend as much time talking with Mwalabu about plants as possible. We arrived back at the Machinjili's at close to 11PM, tired but fulfilled.

being Presbyterian in New Jersey

Sometimes, my awesome adventures get more awesome.

So, after Tuesday's adventure, it was my goal to continue to let life take me cool places, but to maybe keep it under control, at least till my thesis gets done (draft one due in less than a month!). This weekend I had a few outstanding plans: Saturday was babysitting the Z children up at camp, and getting together with some of the Human Ecologists somewhere in between camp and home. Both of those were excellent-- I had little Will attached to my arm for almost the entire afternoon (we go way back) and had a lot of fun playing outside in the beautiful weather before kicking it back and owning at Cranium while eating awesome foods from around the country and world and trying Sangria for the first time at Kristen's house (she rocks).

Today's plans included singing at the early service at my church (in the place of someone who might not have made it due to her imminent grandchild) and then heading out to Allentown to visit with my Malawi teammates and report back to their congregation about our incredible time there this summer. It seemed pretty straightforward and like maybe I wouldn't end up driving off anywhere else. But then I felt the urge to go on facebook while I ate my Cheerios before church and right at the top was my friend Emma: "is being commissioned at Allentown Pres. this morning." Not that New Jersey is huge, but I think being Presbyterian makes it smaller! She was the chaplain at camp this summer. She is from western Pennsylvania, from a town where I chaperoned my church's junior high mission trip last summer-- I have slept on the floor of her high school, I have worked with people from her church, including a guy whose mom used to babysit her and apparently saved her life when she was young, making it possible for me to know her and make all of these connections in the first place! And now, here we were, in Allentown. It was really awesome to see her! We decided lunch was in order, so I figured we'd head over to Hightstown to a diner my cousin brought me to once, because that would put us next to a nice county road that would send her north and west to Princeton Seminary, and me south and east back home.

Except I missed the diner because I was too busy enjoying that part of the state-- very historic, roads are all named for towns (Hightstown-Princeton Road) and taverns (Burnt Tavern) and mills (Browns Mill), interspersed with quite a bit of farmland.

So then I lead her north on CR 571 figuring we'd find something to eat. I just continually missed signs until it was too late. Until we were practically in Princeton. We eventually stopped for Chinese food which we went back and ate in her dorm. It was so so awesome to catch up, a really nice surprise added to an already pretty wonderful morning for me. So cool what a small world we live in, especially when that world is in a small state and we're part of a big community within it.

Goal for the week is actually to do no excessive driving, more specifically, to stay in my town except when I go to school on Tuesday.

Monday 30 August, part one: safari part two

We woke up early to take a morning walking safari, just to increase our chances of seeing elephants. I woke up before the alarm to the not-so-distant sound of hippos burping, which is surprisingly peaceful first thing in the morning. Maybe it was just the context of being on safari in Central Africa that made their loud, rumbling, groaning noises so pleasant. Anyway, the walk was escorted by Danger, and also Lastone (pronounced Lah-stone, not Last One, but I can't help but notice the deeper implications of the spelling) who carried a rifle. Just in case.


We saw monkeys!


Tree of the day: sabistar. It flowers like this in the winter. The flowers are poisonous, which explains how they're so intact. They fall off and leaves grow during the rainy season into spring and summer.

And then we saw some elephants marching off in the distance!


Danger told us about being charged by an elephant. Shortly after he'd completed his training as a safari guide, he and a friend were out walking when they accidentally interrupted a parade of elephants by walking between the larger group and some straggler at the end. Straggler was not pleased. But this is what you do when an elephant charges (good to know): first, they will do a fake charge. This is to line themselves up with the enemy. Then, they back up. Once they start backing up, that sets the direction they'll charge in. They are too big to turn when running with all of that weight. So the enemy/victim-to-be should then step aside a few meters, because the elephant will not be able to tell such a small change, and will thus go ahead with the charge instead of taking the time to line up properly again. Danger said the elephant ran right past him. His friend thought he was dead though, and went back to the office and told everyone. They were all quite impressed when he showed up later.


me with Danger and Lastone

So after breakfast, we took a boat safari down the lovely Shire River. We saw quite a lot of animals, but it exciting was when we got pretty close to a large parade of elephants!



AND THEN LATER WE GOT REALLY CLOSE TO AN ELEPHANT WHO WAS ON THE SHORELINE HAVING A SNACK AND WE WERE MAYBE 10 FEET AWAY!!!



We watched in awe and took tons of pictures of her. We had actually be called over because a few people working in the office by the boat landing were looking for a bit of protection and the guards weren't coming fast enough. We picked them up in the boat and went back to watch her some more until some guards arrived, just in case the elephant wandered any closer to their office. It was really amazing though. She just chomped away at some leaves and didn't really mind us so much. She's such an incredible animal, it was so, so SO awesome to be able to get so close and just admire how beautiful and enormous she is!

We continued on. Saw many hippos sitting in the water. They can't actually swim, they are too heavy. They walk along the bottom. If they're "swimming" it means they're in too deep water and they're falling. They can hold their breath for six minutes though, which I guess is enough time to stroll back to higher ground.



So amazing. After lunch and settling the bill (surprisingly hard for a tourist destination-- they didn't seem to have a lot of cash to make change with, so it was quite an effort to make sure they were being square with us, though it did all work out in the end). With lunch came my Carlsberg Extra Special, which was not any more exciting than the Kuche Kuche flavor wise but a little bit stronger. We checked out, took a boat ride back across the river and were eventually met (late) by our driver, who managed to get us safely back to the village for the closing ceremony that afternoon...

a brief but awesome interruption in Malawi stories and life in general

I woke up Tuesday morning believing that my day would consist of teaching two sections of Human Ecology, taking the train into the city to meet up with a few friends from college and possibly have dinner with another friend before heading back to my car at Rutgers and driving home to Toms River.

Shortly after the first section ended, I received a phone call from Taylor. He and Justin had driven up from Virginia late the night before and stayed with our friend Brendan in Ocean Grove. The three were going to see Pavement in Central Park and we were all going to meet up for a while first, as far as I knew. Except Taylor told me they were on the Turnpike, how do they get to my classroom?

Within half an hour they had successfully found parking and navigated the Rutgers bus system and were standing outside of my classroom door. At this point, I learn they have an extra ticket to the concert, so the plans changed to us all going into the city together from New Brunswick. Sweet! As much fun as it would have been to have them sit in on my second class, I sent them over to the grease trucks on College Ave for lunch while I taught. Afterward we met up and got on a train to NY Penn Station.

Once in the city, it should have been easy enough to get to Central Park and find this concert. I had never been to the Rumsey Playfield in the park before but we figured it all out. Someone had been "injured" further up the line from where we needed to go, so there were huge delays and we ended up having to switch trains. Brendan had insisted the concert was at 5.30 which sounded a little strange to me but we went with it. I didn't know better since I hadn't planned on going until it was too late to check the details myself. Doors were 5.30; they were still setting the stage. And we foolishly went in, rather than killing time elsewhere. At least it was good company and a totally gorgeous day.

The concert was great!


group shot waiting for the subway train

We got back to New Brunswick close to 1AM. Justin and Taylor both had work in the morning in Virginia, and Brendan still needed to get home. What am I responsible for on Wednesdays? Little to nothing (besides working on that thesis, of course). And so, after driving 60 miles to Rutgers, teaching, then spending the rest of the day in the city, I drove Justin's car first to drop off Brendan in Ocean Grove (about 40 miles), then to get Taylor and Justin back to VA while they caught a few hours of sleep. It was about 225 miles to Taylor's in Northern Virginia, and I drove all of it, arriving a little before 6AM. We decided it'd be cheaper for me to take a train from Washington, D.C. and Justin was rested enough, so he drove the last two hours to Richmond, practically straight to his office. I took the Metro to Union Station, Amtrak to Philadelphia 30th Street Station, SEPTA to Trenton, NJ Transit back to New Brunswick, Rutgers bus back to the campus where my car was, then drove home a very tired girl. Very tired, but feeling fulfilled by another excellent adventure.

Sunday 29 August: safari part one

One year ago on this day I was specifically not in Malawi because I was at Chris and Kerin's wedding. I am so glad I could be part of that wonderful day, and everything seems to have worked out for me, too.


My congratulations for these two continue. I love you both so much!

Like August 29, 2009, I spent the morning in a church.



The pastor at the Sakata CCAP reminded us all a lot of the old man in the Six Flags commercials, except tinier and more cartoony. I really wonder how old he is. I'd guess 80s, honestly. He was really kind and actually kind of funny, but he had this twitch around his mouth and these huge glasses that reminded me a lot of Uncle Don's in the Marines:



Anyway. Church was a short two and a half hours-- the sermon came about an hour and forty minutes in but we were all kind of surprised that we had been sitting there so long. This included a lot of singing and also time for translations (which we hadn't gone in expecting but were certainly happy to receive from Mwalabu). The pastor began his sermon talking about how having lots of different colored flowers makes for a more beautiful garden (even if people in the village couldn't tell the white flowers apart). It was actually very sweet. We presented him with a stole with the PCUSA cross on it. He was very excited because stoles aren't very commonly worn in Malawi, or in Africa. He was excited because it would strike his academic colleagues with fear that he is better educated. That kind of amused me, since I definitely dress a particular way when I teach in hopes that my students will believe I'm actually qualified (and not still in high school, as I know my face suggests). We also gave him Bibles and hymn books in Chichewa and English, as well as a blue hymnal from my church (more a ceremonial gift-- I did not meet a single person who could read music during my entire stay in Malawi). They were very excited.

After the service, we shared a light meal and spent a bit of time with the youth choir. Then, three of the women and I left for an overnight safari in Liwonde National Park along the Shire River (pronounced shee-ree), while Liz, Bob and Charlie stayed behind for some more serious logistical meetings for VIP.

Because everything in Malawi is on Malawi time (read: late), we arrived after our first safari drive was scheduled to depart, which it did, without us. But we settled in quickly and were taken out to meet our guide, "Danger by name, not by nature." Seriously. His given name was Danger. "That is the name my mother gave me at birth." Seriously.

We saw some amazing and beautiful things as the sun set.

Tree of the day #1: Candelabra Tree. Not a cactus. Really cool looking!

Tree of the day #2: Mopani. I did not get a good photo of this. Mopani is Chichewa for butterfly, which the leaves resemble.


Tree of the day #3: baobab, which is sort of the stereotypical African tree. There are some on the continent that are thousands of years old. We didn't see any that old, we mostly saw them with some massive scars from elephants colliding with them (sometimes accidental, sometimes as a scratching post).


Water buck having a drink


It was so beautiful. The air was fresh and the weather was perfect. And when everyone would stop talking about how silent it was... it was so peaceful. It was incredible. I loved hearing the sounds of branches snapping as different creatures had their dinners, and the far off groan/burp/call of the hippos. It was really awesome.

We did see some elephants! They were off in the distance, munching on some trees. Danger held up a filtered light-- red light is the only color that doesn't wreck night vision in animals (including humans).

You can kind of make them out-- it's a big one in the middle, facing left, and some babies hanging out with her.

Since we were with the church, drinking was not really acceptable in the villages, nor in the city because we were always with other people from the church. However, on safari, that rule could be overlooked. Beer of the day: Kuche Kuche, which is somehow Chichewa for "you can drink this from night till dawn without getting drunk." Three different Malawians told me this, so I guess that's really what it means. Such a fascinating language. And such a plain beer with low alcohol content that you probably really could drink all night without noticing. This beer is brewed by Carlsberg, whose first brewery outside of Denmark was actually in Malawi near the city of Blantyre.

All in all, a very cool day. We went to bed early. I was kept up for a little while by the sounds of the wind and the hippos and other critters, but I really didn't mind it. It was so serene, and I was excited to see more of it the next day...

Saturday 28 August: school plans and a well dedication

This day had a very slow start. We were all various extents of tired and sore, but we were able to sleep in a little, and then spent a long time waiting for a ride to the village. Liz, our leader, had gone ahead with Mwalabu and Bonongwe to meet with a surveyor and get plans ready for a school in another village. Eventually, Mwalabu came back for the rest of us, and took us to visit the site of the school for Matawali village. Here we learned about the second half of the brick making process as well as a bit about the education system in Malawi.


To finish the bricks, they are stacked into a solid structure like this pictured above. Well, solid except for the small openings on the bottom where the fire is stoked. The stack of bricks, called a kiln or oven, is then coated in mud for insulation and topped with grass. This is a job that men do. They stay up all night for a day or two, stoking the flames on the structure. When the grass on top catches fire, they know the whole kiln has been fired and is complete. They let the flames die out, and let it cool for a few days. This stack has about 54,000 bricks in it.

We talked about the school project with a few elders, one of whom only said one sentence of English the whole time: "You can call me Corpse." I kid you not.


Corpse in the middle

To be a teacher in Malawi, one goes to a teachers college and is then placed in a school somewhere in the country with little to no say. They can quit, of course, but otherwise have very little choice in the matter. Apparently the one thing they all want is electricity in the provided housing. People don't mind teaching in village schools so long as there is electricity. School plans almost always include teacher and headmaster housing. Here in Matawali, there would also be space for recreation. This land was donated by someone in the village.

This meeting took place under what was clearly the tree of the day: a kachere tree.

A type of fig, this type of tree was traditionally where chiefs would hold meetings, because of the awesome shade. This tree in particular was easily over 30 feet around. In a place like New Jersey, a tree that size could be 400-500 years old. With Malawi's climate, I'm going to guess it was probably a bit less, like 250-300. Still. Ridiculous. Imagine all of the things that have happened around that tree. Nearby was the remnants of a structure that Corpse told us was built in 1912. Part of me wonders if he constructed it and that's how he knows that. (He told us that year when we asked how long they have been making bricks this way. His response was, "Well, that building was made in 1912, so at least that long.")



The rest of the day was spent at a well dedication celebration. There was a lot of singing and dancing for a while, followed by many speeches. The dedication itself involved a "ribbon cutting", VIP's President Bob cut a string with a small pair of scissors. Everyone cheered as the chief drank the first cup of water pumped. Safe, nearby water supply. So awesome.

We were given gifts of a rooster and a sack of bananas. They told us this was so we would not be hungry during our long journey home. I'm not sure if they were joking or not, but we were pretty amused.

These people prepared lunch for us, which was very similar to our lunch in Kalino. I ate with a man named Felix who spoke some English, Liz, our leader, and a woman named Jeannie, who is exactly my age and could not wrap her mind around the fact that I am not married and do not have children. It was interesting to see just how different life is. She has a six year old and a two year old. She got married before she was 18. That's security there. Security here is me getting a masters degree and not having a husband or children.

After lunch, I went with Charlie back down to the well to take some pictures. There were a bunch of children there, playing and reenacting the ribbon cutting with imaginary scissors and string. They would count, in English, "3... 2... 1..." and then cheer wildly as one child walked through the makeshift fence to the well. Charlie was having trouble getting a clear shot of it for the VIP documentary, so I whipped out my camera to distract everyone.



This photo cracks me up. Everyone is pushing and posing. I have quite a few versions of this shot, but this one is the most meaningful to me, because the young mother jumped in the back. At first, I was kind of annoyed, because I'm thinking, this is something children do, and you're ruining their shot. But then I realized... she is a child.



It was a really good day in the village. It's amazing to see the progress happening and the excitement surrounding it. It was also nice to end a little early and have a leisurely dinner back at Namangazi. A dinner that included our gift... I personally handed him over to the cook! (...but did not eat him myself, which I almost wish I did have a little-- I have way more confidence in the way that chicken was raised than in our own meat industry in the United States... but that alone is not enough to get me to eat meat.)

Friday 27 August: Kalino Village

The day we have all been waiting for... brick making day!



A primary school is going to be built in Kalino Village through Villages in Partnership. Since we were in the neighborhood, we thought we'd help make some bricks! Most people make their own bricks for a house or school or whatever, then hire someone else to come in and actually build something out of them. In Kalino, they made bricks out of a patch of earth that they were growing vegetables on last year. What does that say about the soil that they're farming in...

So, to make bricks: first, mud is mixed. Typically, women fetch water, but some men helped. Then, we grab a chunk of mud and slam it into the molds, which have been sitting in water so things don't get too cake-y and dried up.



Then we flip the molds over and leave the bricks out in the sun to dry. We did this by assembly line after a while.



We probably a couple thousand bricks. It takes 30,000 to build a modest home (by their standards; in the US it might be more of a nice, big shed). I'll leave you in suspense about the next steps in brick making for now (we got the full explanation the following day in another village)...

After I washed up a bit to help the women cook lunch, Violet insisted I walk to the well and carry a bucket of water on my head. It wasn't an unreasonable request, or even something I was particularly avoiding. But Violet really, really wanted me to do it, just once. We walked down to the well, which was only a few minutes away from where we were working. Many villages have to walk much further, but in Kalino, the Muslim community had put in a borehole well very close to the middle of the village. Violet wrapped her chitenji up into a little pad for my skull to carry the half-full bucket of water that I'd pumped. I felt terrible because she filled her bucket to the very top (I'd guess 15 gallons) and was carrying it on her head without any sort of buffer. I tried to get her to take back the chitenji since she was letting me carry a lighter load, but no luck-- she is a strong but stubborn girl. It wasn't the most comfortable or graceful thing I did, but I did it, and she was very happy that I had the experience. I was pretty happy too, I think mostly because it seemed very important to her that I try.


I am not in this picture, this was a family walking to a village that was further away from the well


The mosque in Kalino, which the well was built next to

There was a little "tea" break with some boiled cassava and thobwa, this awful lukewarm grainy beverage made from water, corn flour and ground millet. I am pretty adventurous when it comes to trying new foods (at least, vegetarian foods) but this was not something I will not be making back home. Then, we began cooking lunch!



The women all sat together shelling nuts and beans, cutting up other vegetables. Yes, I washed my hands pretty well-- I know what my feet look like here. There was lots of talking, although I wasn't particularly involved in any conversation, but it reminded me a lot of having too many women in the kitchen cooking holiday meals together, what my mom often refers to as being very carefully choreographed (and is so impressed how my sister-in-law has joined the dance so gracefully). Granted, we weren't walking around a busy kitchen here, in fact, they barely had any kitchen tools at all, but it was a really great time of fellowship.

Later, I got to help over the fire as well. Here, I am taking a turn stirring nsima, which I can only describe as trying to stir concrete:



Lunch ended up being completely vegetarian, which is just a fact of life for these people most days, but I was certainly grateful.



We had nsima, nsima made with some ground nuts mixed in, rice, cabbage (made with ground nuts, tomato and onion), lettuce (cooked in the sun with tomato, onion and salt), papaya (cooked with salt and ground up nuts), some fried bananas, and a sort of hot peanut butter (made by grinding nuts and cooking them with a little oil and salt). I ate very well!

I joined a Village Savings and Loan group called Titanzani, which means "let's help each other". Basically, a group of friends and family in a village got together and decided to contribute a little bit of money each week that any member could borrow in a time of crisis or just for entrepreneurial reasons. It then gets paid back, with interest, and each member receives a share of the interest back. The money is kept in a box with three locks, so that three different people hold the keys, avoiding any sort of corruption. I didn't have much to contribute and I don't plan on hunting down my cut of the interest, but they were really excited that members of VIP had joined them (Charlie, the youth pastor/documentary maker on our team, is also a member of this particular VSL).

Tree of the day: moringa tree, which I learned about on a walk to the well with Mwalabu. The leaves of the tree, crushed up and cooked (usually with porridge) work just as well as ARV's in treating HIV/AIDS. Incredible. There is a lot of research being done on how to do this sustainably and on a larger scale, but it's so amazing that these possibilities exist.

After a day of hard work, we went back to Namagazi to quickly shower and then visit the Chinamwazi CCAP church for a time of worship and potluck dinner. There was a lot of singing and dancing, and despite our exhaustion, it was really great. We were all given chitenji of our own!


Men don't wear chitenji, so they wrapped Bob's around his shoulder like kings used to wear them


so so so many dishes!


my plate, piled high with vegetables

Dinner was great, although lunch had been a bit late in the afternoon and I was still rather full. I had a pineapple Fanta and sat with a bunch of choir members and youth workers, talking about what our programs are like at my home church and what sorts of things they're up to. It was all very good, but I was so exhausted. Liz rescued me from conversation around 10.30 and we probably didn't leave for another 20 minutes. I was so, so happy to climb into bed after such a long day.

Thursday 26 August: agriculture and meetings

Another glorious day at the foot of the Zomba Plateau


We found ourselves with a bit of extra time between breakfast and heading back to the villages, so we were able to walk around the Namangazi Farm and talk about agriculture in Malawi. You know I was all up in this conversation!



Here you can see cabbage, fish ponds, and off in the distance, papaya and rice. They are experimenting with larger varieties of cabbage here. The fish ponds are fed by a little stream that comes down from the plateau. There are a few wet patches on the other side of the fish ponds where they are growing rice, but there were also drier rice plants elsewhere on site. Papaya is something being encouraged more recently, because it's relatively easy to grow in Malawi and has some great health benefits. It wasn't a particularly well known or popular fruit until recently.

Mwalabu (from Synod) and Nelson (a groundskeeper for Namangazi) walked around the farm with us. Namagazi was an agricultural experimental center run through Blantyre Synod, at least, until the crooked accountant kind of brought them down. The place is still open as a hotel and they do raise a lot of their own food, but the program is not as extensive as it used to be. Still, there is hope that they will be able to return to hosting farmers from the villages to teach new agricultural practices. The emphasis is on "Farming God's Way" which is a transition to organic, low-impact farming over the course of a few years. This includes a switch from chemical fertilizers to manure and compost over the course of a few growing seasons and leaving crop residue to reduce erosion and to continue a composting cycle to enrich the soil, among other techniques. I won't bore you to death about farming. It was a really beautiful place to walk around though.

In the villages, we met with the Village Development Committee and Area Action Committee, leaders from the villages in the Sakata catchment. After many introductions (everyone has to be very formally introduced every time-- this goes for us and them!), long discussions began about the work being done through VIP. They were very excited and grateful for all of the changes in the villages.

Looking through my other entries about Malawi, it seems I have not yet introduced you to Daniel Bonongwe. My apologies! This is as good a time as any. He is VIP's community worker in Sakata. He is a high-energy, charismatic, friendly, hard working, awesome person. With a very, very memorable smile.



In the middle of the meeting he decided everyone was getting to sleepy, and proposed an energizer-- a game called Zip, Zap, Zoom that I actually learned in 2003 from a guy I worked with at camp who was from New Zealand. Amazing how connected the world is! And it was hilarious to see all of these leaders, some of whom seemed a bit stodgy, get silly and laugh together as we attempted to play the game.

After a traditional village meal sans silverware at Mwalabu's sister's home (how on earth do people eat rice with their hands without making a huge mess?!), we met with the village chiefs and the Traditional Authority (another leader who is in charge of exactly what it sounds like). An awesome moment in this meeting for me was that during the introductions, Mwalabu introduced me as "Amayi Colleen Earp". My name is very difficult for Malawians to pronounce, but I enjoy hearing them take a stab at it (Mwalabu always did pretty well, speaking very slowly and carefully so my name didn't sound like rude noises). But more importantly was the Amayi. Mayi literally means "mother" but is used like we would use Mrs. or Ms. Adding the "a" in front of it is an additional sign of respect... a huge turnaround from my first meeting with Mwalabu, when he thought I was a child. Despite being the "young one" one this trip, as I was frequently introduced, it seems that people did respect me. It was a very welcoming feeling.

Wednesday 25 August: meeting friends in Sakata

Click on people's faces in the photo to tag them.

We traveled to the Sakata region near the city of Zomba in the morning along a very rough road for about an hour and a half. We actually stayed at an agricultural center near the villages, but since I didn't get to see much of it until the second day, I won't focus on that now. We dropped off our bags and headed straight to Kanuple, where a health clinic had been built during the last two years. There we would meet with many villagers as we distributed chicks that had been donated through Villages in Partnership.


the clinic, and Zomba Plateau in the distance

Actually, the clinic was pretty sweet. There was classroom space as well as a room for health workers to come run clinics, examining patients and giving out basic medication and supplies like soap. Tree of the day: mango tree. You can see one small one right at the corner of the clinic building, but the site of the clinic is very close to a pair of much larger mango trees, under which many villagers and leaders met with the people from the Allentown Presbyterian Church in 2008, which lead to the formation of Villages in Partnership, which lead to the building of this clinic and many other projects that we'd visit in the coming days. Actually, a few of my teammates had helped make the mud bricks that became part of the clinic. I was thrilled to see such a major accomplishment, but it was especially exciting for them to see.

Most of this trip was focused on meeting with people and talking about the issues they were facing, not necessarily doing the labor and leaving tangible change. The goal was to show the villagers that we are not just some blind benefactors far away, but we truly care about their progress and want to work with them to accomplish the things that they think are most important.


Liz, our leader, talking with some of the village women with Violet's help

Helping us communicate was Violet, the furthest right in the picture above. When I met her, I immediately liked her. She's really spunky and sweet. However, I struggled to have conversation with her for most of the first day because I could not for the life of me place how old she was. Was she in school? Was she married? Was she a mother? I didn't want to ask questions that might come off as offensive or stupid. Late in the day, I learned that she is 20, and has a 3 year old daughter. Violet didn't finish secondary school, presumably because she got married and had a baby. However, she dreams of completing secondary school and going to college to become a nurse.


Bob, the president of VIP, handing off one of the chicks

After the chick ceremony, we toured some of the farmland in Sakata. Our visit was during the end of the dry season, which is usually when the food starts running out from the previous harvest. One of the reasons for the shortage of food is the shortening of the growing season due to climate change. They just can't grow as much as they need. Another reason is because of the lack of irrigation infrastructure.


Above are some small plots that are constructed this way to help reduce erosion when irrigated-- this has been made possible by negotiating a little bit of waterfront land and connected a series of long hoses to the manual water pump picture below! It is basically like a Stairmaster, and once it gets going, it's really quite easy. I imagine pumping water loses its novelty quickly, but it's easy enough for people to take turns, and makes a huge difference in their ability to grow more food for more of the year.




It was easy enough for the smaller boy to work steadily on his own. I think the bigger boy just jumped on to help when he saw all of the cameras out!


We visited with a man (pictured above) who received a goat from VIP, based on his neighbors decision that his family was at risk. He is a pastor in his village (Roben), and he and his wife are sending their two children to school, plus two other children who were orphaned who they've taken in, plus another child or two besides whose father is not in the picture for whatever reason. Pastor Sewula's goat was pregnant, and he gave the kid to another family in need. In talking with him, he seemed very dedicated to the concept of paying it forward. His goat is pregnant again. Not sure what that says about the goat, but it is good news for the villages, who see goats as security.

It actually rained at the end of our time with Pastor Sewula, which is absurd because it's the dry season. However, it was warm and gentle, so it was not a bad thing. The VIP team walked back to our vehicles with probably two dozen children following us. They were excited to hold our hands and walk with us. Unable to communicate with the little kids who haven't learned much, if any, English yet, I just acted silly, taking large steps or jumping or skipping and dragging them with me. This brought so much laughter, which was more than adequate means of communication.


sunset over Zomba Plateau, through the rain clouds