Blog 24.1.07

Moni! Muli bwanji?

Greetings from Malawi! This is one out of date blog but not a HUGE amount has happened since the last entry and now, bar illness, leaving South Africa early, having a month at home and now I’m back at work in Dedza, western Malawi.

I MUST start with the journey from Centurion, SA, to the airport on Monday (22nd). I woke to the radio travel update that, not unusually, half the traffic lights in Gauteng province were out which meant there was chaos on the roads. We spent most of our time trying to get out of Centurion. As we sat at a crossroads, cursing at being stuck again in a huge queue I looked to my left and there were two elephants. I didn’t see them at first despite looking at them because they were so out of my sphere of reference (despite being in southern Africa). Then I thought they were cows, and then finally they revealed that they were, in fact, definitely elephants, at which point we all just creased up. The circus was in town, but what was the funniest part was that these elephants were just cruising around the wasteland, happy as larry, not far from the road. And the backdrop was the Centurion shopping mall and beyond that the manmade lake. The elephants were pretty unfazed so clearly well travelled.

If that wasn’t enough 5 minutes (and around as many metres) later the taxi driver decided to cut offroad across the wasteland to join another road instead. We popped out at the back of the bus station, bits of grass flying off, and got back on track. Hats off to the guy – we got there on time and made the flight, arriving 10 minutes before check-in closed.

We arrived without a hitch and without too many questions from customs and were picked up by Liz, Programme Manager for Dedza. We headed straight to the Ministry of Education in Lilongwe (nothing like starting your induction straightaway) and chased people around. Liz still hasn’t been given a permit for employment after a year, and it turned out she’d been told the wrong thing (or rather she’d been told the official procedure which isn’t really what you do de facto).

After a tour round Lilongwe and a stop off for supplies we arrived in Dedza. It is beautiful, but absolutely pours from 3pm every day. I’ve hardly ever seen such rain. Our guesthouse is a little removed from the town, set in beautiful lush gardens with mountains in the background. It is apparently a popular haven for ex-pats altough I haven’t seen that many. There is a pottery in the grounds, set up by an ex-VSO who’s been in Malawi for around 16 years. I’m going to meet him tonight...

Induction has been going really well! I’ve learnt loads, had lots of apprehensions assuaded whilst others have entered the equation. I have also been reassured that I know a bit more than I realised. I’m really excited. Today we went out to some schools and I saw what ‘good schools’ looked like, with positive leadership, structures and so on in place. I also had a go at the 4x4...I got to the first school ok, which was really not far from the main road. But the rain continued to fall and we went higher up the mountain! In the end I conceded defeat and gave the driver Emmanuel back the helm. And a good thing too as these were the sights around the next corner...



Anyway, that takes us up to about now and it’s time to go home. Laters!

XXX