Hello From...

Zambia! On Friday morning we left Malawi to go to Zambia for two weeks with Zach's parents. Blogging will probably be pretty light until then but we'll let you all know how it went when we get home if we can't update regularly while there.

Dogblogging: Treats From America

Zach's parents have arrived! And with them they have brought treats from America for all of us. Sadly the luggage with my treats is still somewhere in Ethiopia but I sure hope it comes tomorrow. Bay's treats made it though! His friend Bola in America (companion of Nathan) sent these specially for him. His wide eyes don't do enough to express in the tense anticipation he experienced when he caught his first whiff of these treats. Boy was he excited. Thanks Bola!

Chicken Feeties...Yum

While out in the field last week my coworkers stopped at a small restaurant to have lunch. I declined to join them in their meal and I was sure glad I did since they all had diarrhea the next day. I did, however, taste one thing - these chicken feet. I've always meant to try them since they're so popular in African countries I've gone to. So how were they? Terrible. Absolutely horrendous. They tasted like a toenail fried in fish oil which I think is actually pretty much what they are. Maybe I just got a particularly bad pair.

Farmer Zach

When in Malawi, do as the Malawians do. Thus, as the rainy season bears down upon us, I'm diving into the small-scale farming gig. Near our house is an open area where Bay and I do our daily walking. When we arrived it was completely covered in scrub, dead bushes and grass, and dried corn stalks. In the last few weeks it has undergone a massive transformation.

                                   

You can see what it once looked like and, on the left, what it looks like after locals have cleared the brush, burned it, and cultivated the soil. The entire walking area is about a square mile and every passing day it becomes more and more prepared ground. Now, a little personal touch:

                                    

This is my own personal plot of six rows, each about 20 feet across. Rather than the local field corn I will be planting a sweet corn variety, though, I've been told I will be lucky if I actually get any of it. Apparently theft is common. I've heard locals don't like sweet corn. Too mushy.

I have been waiting for a big rain to plant and, sure enough, this morning we were absolutely dumped upon. Mid-February in Corvallis kind of rain. So, it's off to the field to plant. Just this morning I noticed all the land in the background was being prepared, so it's not quite the quaint little rectangle, rather one in what will soon be a big field of corn.

Road Blocks

Per Kristen's question about what is actually done at police road blocks. As near as I can tell and from conversations with Malawians in the know, two things are done. I've added one more:

1) Tariff enforcement. Trucks will sometimes take back roads in and out of the country in order to avoid taxes on the goods they are transporting. The government, in response, set up road blocks that check for paperwork that affirms taxes have been paid. This, actually, makes sense.

2) Fugitive finding: This seems like a stretch, but I was told the roadblocks are also used to catch fugitives running from the law. Unlikely. They stop busses and mini-busses and "search" for people and things.

3) My own theory: Nothing. Road blocks are set up to assert power. In the end, they simply hinder the flow of transport and create more stops for traffic. When gas is $7-$11 dollars a gallon that's just one (err, many) more unnecessary stops.

Creepy Things

I surreptitiously snapped this photo of this gorgeous manikin in front of his owners in Blantyre so that you could all enjoy his beauty. Next time I cut Zach's hair I'm going to model it on this guy and add the smoky eyeshadow too.

Honestly we should just start another regular blog entry for Creepy Things because there are weird, vaguely creepy things like this all over this country. Also weird mottos and badly photoshopped advertisements.

A Day in the Field

While Zach is at home in Lilongwe preparing for his parents' visit I'm still up here sweating it out, fighting mosquitoes and doing field work in Mzimba.

This morning as we were pulling out of the district hospital parking lot to go out to a health center I heard screams and saw a large crowd forming around something. As we pulled next to the crowd I could see a woman sitting on the ground in the middle. My driver had a short conversation with the security guard in the crowd. I asked why they were all staring and screaming at the woman. His answer was "Witchcraft. She was flying." Oh. I watched two people drag the witch away in my side view mirror.

This afternoon we returned to the district hospital to drop off a girl with a broken leg who we collected from the site of a car accident on our way home from our day of work. My team made her a splint out of branches and a scarf and she suffered it out for 45 minutes on a bumpy dirt road before we dropped her, her shin bones floating in her leg the whole way. My driver took pictures of the nurses loading her on her stretcher with his cell phone.

It is such a relief to wash off the red dirt in an ice cold shower and hide under my mosquito net for the evening.

Oil Change!

Today Jared (a friend who, like me, isn't working) and I changed the oil in my car as preparations continue for the big arrival of my folks and our subsequent adventures. I've changed the oil in a car once before: with my Pops, in our La Grande driveway, likely with plenty of cursing. This may be wrong, but I have it placed as having occurred when I was skipping kindergarden for the year, making it one of my earliest memories.

Anyhow, aside for having a hard time finding and removing the oil filter (come on Honda, that design wasn't as sharp as your hidden table), it went swimmingly. At least, the car hasn't exploded yet. Now, it's back to the drawing board, trying to locate some gas. How about dumping in the old oil?

Dogblogging: Lollipops

Something I noticed about Bay when we got him is that he likes to hold his bones in his hands while he chomps on them. I thought "Hey, it looks like he's eating a lollipop." Then I thought "Hey, I should give him one and see how he eats it!"

The other night the electricity went out and we were really bored so I dug out a lollipop and handed it to him. It turns out he eats it like this. Like a human. I find it very endearing. Zach thinks I'm going to ruin his teeth but I think two lollipops a year won't kill the poor guy and I wouldn't want Zach to be my dad.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like...?

Here in Malawi it's beginning to look like a lot of things. Dirt patches are turning into grassy lawns. Rains are coming more frequently. White people are turning more red as the sun's strength grows. But one thing it most definitely is not starting to look like is Christmas. Christmas in the southern hemisphere is nothing like Christmas in Oregon. As many of you know for yourselves, being abroad for a year can feel like a time warp or a trip through a wormhole. Is my family really sledding while I sweat my butt off? Are they all together eating a meal while I eat this crappy candy bar imported from South Africa? It's hard to imagine we're even on the same planet. Sometimes it feels like you're missing a year of your life.

I've been abroad for periods of more than a year before so this isn't my first rodeo. But Zach hasn't and he's a big fan of Thanksgiving and Christmas. This year we'll be struggling to keep things a little Christmasy while we travel in Zambia. His parents being here should help some. One other thing we'll do is listen to Christmas carols. We thought that's what we'd signed up for when we went to this little Christmas Carol shindig at Four Seasons but we ended up feeling like we were in church on Christmas Eve, singing hymns (well, I felt that way, Zach doesn't know what that feels like). At least we got to hang out with this cool wooden nativity scene and this tree made out of recycled water bottles. Also we got to watch little Malawian girls singing and the adorable children are one of the best things about every African country I've ever been to. While it was fun, it was also a reminder of just how far away from snow (rain), Christmas trees, and our families.

Hello From...

Dedza Mzimba. My itinerary for this week's travel was switched up yesterday. Instead of making a one hour drive south I'd be making a five hour drive north to Mzuzu with only two hours of daylight left in the day. But wait, you're in Mzimba, not Mzuzu? Yes. Because we never made it to Mzuzu last night. Sometimes in Africa you get the worst case scenario and that's very nearly what happened to me and my driver last night.

First, we left Lilongwe too late to make it north before dark. Second, I left the city with only one bar of cell phone battery. And third, I was with a Ministry of Health driver and car that I've never used before. When dusk started falling we realized that our headlights were essentially useless. I told the driver we'd just make it to the next town and sleep there and continue on in the morning. Ten kilometers later our car died for the first time. Dusk was rapidly turning into night. Keep in mind that night time here means total and complete darkness, without a pinpoint of electricity to be seen anywhere. Last night happened to be moonless as well.

We got the car going again and I sat hanging out the passenger window over the hood of the truck, using the flashlight on my cell phone to illuminate the white line in the road. Every time a car passed I ducked back inside because being white in a crippled car is like pouring blood in the water for sharks and I didn't want anyone to see my face. I knew this wasn't a sustainable solution since I had only one bar of battery but the closer to Mzimba we could get, the better. It didn't work for long. We lost power again about five kilometers later.

We hopped out of the car to look under the hood one more time. The narrow road was lined by trees on both sides. It was DARK. I had the equivalent of five years' salary for a typical Malawian in cash in my backpack. I could feel in my bones that we weren't safe. The driver must have felt so too because this time he demanded that I stay in the car with the doors locked. He banged on the battery with a rock for a minutes (seriously) before hightailing it back into the car.

"What's wrong?"
"I hear the voices of hyenas."

Ohh. We're both starting to get nervous because the car is clearly done for the night. We start calling our colleagues to see how far they are and can they maybe come tow us? They're an hour out. I stare out the window. I am completely unsurprised but utterly dismayed when I see the flash of a cellphone in the woods next to us. I tell Thoko, the driver, that there are lights in the woods. He says "noooo." I say "Well maybe it was just a reflection," though I'm 98% sure it wasn't.

When I see it again one minute later I reach over and touch his arm. We both watch the moving lights for a second before Thoko quietly breathes "God will protect us."

This is when I realize we are utterly screwed. There are people in the woods who have seen us break down and are waiting until the traffic on the road disappears completely before robbing us. I don't care about the cash, the camera, the ipod, but I do care about the work on my computer so I hide it under my seat and begin saying a mental goodbye to my other belongings. I send a text to Jonathan and to Zach so they'll at least know where I was/am if something happens because my phone is about to die. Thoko and I are both mentally resigned to the fact that we've been found vulnerable and are going to be victims.

Still, Thoko suggests maybe they're hunting? Yes, they ARE hunting. Hunting for mzungus with five years' salary in a crappy old backpack and tonight they've gotten lucky!

"Hunting for what?"
"Bees."
"In the dark?"
"Yes because it's cooler than hunting in the day."
"Yeah, you also can't see anything, so maybe hunting in the dark isn't what they're doing."
"True."

I highly doubt they're hunting for bees. I repeatedly call my colleagues in the other car, demand that they not stop in town to get the spare part we need (but they do anyway) and that they step on it until my cell phone finally dies. In the meanwhile Thoko and I sit in the car silently, searching the trees when trucks come by with headlights. We're both trying to breathe normally and speak in normal tones while counting down the seconds and praying for cars to keep zooming by. We get a car passing us about once every three or four minutes.

We know none of them will stop to help us because it isn't safe for them to do so. We might be clever criminals who stole this UNICEF car and planted it on the side of the road to wait for people nice enough to try to help someone. One does stop one hundred yards down the road, waiting for Thoko to come out to them to ask for help, but he says he can't get out of the car because we don't know the intentions of the people in the woods. I tell him there is zero chance of me allowing him to get out of the car and we watch the tail lights finally pull away without anyone getting out to check on us.

An hour later we were rescued. Why didn't they rob us? I don't know, but I'm sure glad they didn't. Thoko and I were thoroughly creeped out and exhausted from trying to keep the adrenaline under control and keep a straight mind out in the dark in the middle of nowhere Africa. We limped into Mzimba with no headlights but with all our stuff and our lives.

You know what never once occured to me out there? "Maybe we should call the police." In America they'd have been there in five minutes with a smile and a friendly greeting. In Malawi they'd have taken two days and then robbed us themselves. In Malawi if you get broken down in the pitch black in the middle of a forest 30km from anywhere, you're on your own.

Scary.

So now I'm hanging out in a hotel room (if you could call it that) in Mzimba, waiting out the five hours it will take to fix our car.

Well, that's bloggable

Often we find ourselves witnessing things here that prompt a "Well, that's bloggable." Unfortunately we usually don't have the trigger finger ready for a photo and, unless it's written down, the occurance is filed away and forgotten. Well, here's one of those things:

On our drive home from Blantyre yesterday we stopped at a gas station. The purchasing limit? Five liters. For those of you ignorant American yahoos, that's just over a gallon. If that were America, on Civil War weekend between Oregon and Oregon State, Duck fans on empty could have made it up to Corvallis, but would have been stuck in town after the victory, cheering up despondent Beaver fans.

Mmmm...mangos.

One great thing about living in Africa is cheap mangos (and in the winter, avocados, though I don't eat those). They make a great breakfast! On the way back from Blantyre we passed through Mango Central so we pulled over. Buying mangos out here is way cheaper than in Lilongwe. If I were Zach I would make you guess how much a bucket of mangos from the middle row cost but I'm not Zach so I'm just going to tell you that we paid about 70 cents for the whole bucket (about 25 mangos).

Beginning tomorrow I'm off to Dedza for the work week. That was the site of the previous hiking photos, though I expect I'll be too busy visiting health centers to be doing much hiking.

Hello from Blantyre

 As Zach mentioned, last week I was in Blantyre for most of the week for work. That's me eating breakfast at our hotel, enjoying the view.

Blantyre is the commercial center of Malawi and is very different from Lilongwe's sprawl and open spaces. Blantyre feels like a proper small town and has a much longer history than Lilongwe - in fact, it's the oldest urban area in southern Africa, if you believe Lonely Planet.

Colonialists have been building houses and farms and governing Malawians in this area for almost 150 years. We took an afternoon to stop by Mandala House, the oldest building in Malawi, which was once a home for the managers of some tea business or something. It's now a restaurant and shop, with meeting space and a library on the top floor.

We had a lemonade on the verandah and poked around in the library a bit before heading off to do something a little more modern - see a movie. Blantyre is home to the only movie theater in Malawi. The movie we saw was terrible (Hit and Run) but sitting in a dark theater eating popcorn felt a little bit like home.

Dogblogging: Tough Life

In between chasing young children and stretching Bay snacked on chicken and pie.

One thing Bay definitely didn't relish was his swimming time. Bay has a habit of moving his appendages like he's swimming any time he gets wet. By the time Zach had taken him out ten feet he was pantomiming swimming at a frenetic pace. We figured if his doggie swimming instincts were that good then he'd probably be a fine swimmer. We were right, though the only place he chose to swim was straight back onto dry land. Rough life.

Thanksgiving at Lake Malawi

 Zach and I spent Thanksgiving at Lake Malawi with some of friends (as you all know). We drove about 5 hours north to Chintheche, the third part of the lake we've visited. The lake is awesome - it's much prettier than I'd expected. The beaches are smooth white sand that slope very slowly into the lake, making for shallow water with perfect sandy bottoms near the shore. The water is a beautiful blue color, clear, and there are cool fish to look at when you snorkel, which is always a bonus. It pretty much feels like paradise. Best of all, the closest part of the lake is only an hour from our house so it makes a great weekend away, though we've only gone out there three times.

Early Friday morning we packed up our roommates, Bay, and some baking supplies and headed out. We had rented a 4 bedroom house for the 14 of us to share (4 of us, including Zach and I, camped). The food was delicious and the company was good. The weather was perfect - hot enough to want to swim but not humid. (A few thunderstorms passed by us, much to Bay's chagrin, but they didn't hit us - we just watched the lightening while we swam in the lake, which was an interesting experience.) Here's the house we stayed in:

We spent time walking along the beach, swimming, cooking, reading, and playing boardgames. Bay also had his first go at swimming. Definitely different from Thanksgiving back home - and we were both feeling a little bit homesick - but a great experience anyway. Here are some of our friends wandering down the beach:

One of the coolest things about Lake Malawi is that it's not a tourist spot. The locals still rely on the lake for food and water and children hang out on the beach everywhere. They found us pretty entertaining (especially when they saw us playing ping pong) until Bay ran out of the house and scared them away. I'll leave you with a picture of our audience, pre-panicked screaming and running.

I love coming back to the internet on a Monday and seeing how my friends around the world spent their American holidays. Thanks to those of you who posted your pictures!

Per Person, Per Night

Last night and for the rest of the week Serena and I are in the south of Malawi in the other big city, Blantyre. We arrived late to a small hotel that charged 6,000 per person, per night. Asif, our traveling companion, paid 6,000 for a room. We paid 12,000 for the exact same thing. Charging extra for extra bodies makes sense--more water, more electricity, more wear and tear, etc--but Malawi and its surrounding neighbors have an obsession with charging per person which completely fails to capture true costs.

This, however, shouldn't come as a surprise. I've seen many products sold individually at the same unit price as in bulk. It's a concept that hasn't quite caught on around here.

Police update: Lilongwe --> Blantyre  = 300km. There were seven police roadblocks. Seven!!!! They are loathsome.

More Police

Three random things about the police I love:

1. On our trip north for Thanksgiving we went through seven road blocks. What were they for? Who knows.

2. The police here carry rifles from, if I were to hedge a guess, World War I. Fix bayonets!!!!

3. A little over a month ago there was a debate as to whether or not the police's Shoot to Kill mandate was a good idea. Evidently it was common practice to shoot first, ask questions later. Considering how much I love and admire the local police force, one might be able to see how utterly ridiculous it would be to (a) give them guns and (b) give them the green light to use said guns. On the plus side, they likely can't afford any bullets.

Dogblogging: Can I Have Some?

This is how Bay spent his Thanksgiving weekend at Lake Malawi. He's asking for another bite of pumpkin pie please.

The Return of the Shortage

We're back, safe and sound! We spent this weekend at Lake Malawi with some friends, celebrating Thanksgiving with food and sun and sand.

Driving 5 hours up to the lake is daunting at any time. There are bicycles, goats, and drunk people all over the roads. Not to mention pot holes and chickens and children. Driving here takes a lot of concentration and attention. But when there's no gas in the country it makes a long trip even more difficult.

We had to store our own gas in a jerry can in the trunk of our car since there would be no place to fill up anywhere outside of Lilongwe. That meant actually finding some gas to go in the jerry can. We had no idea what to do since there is even less gas in the country than a few months ago when Zach liveblogged from the petrol line. Luckily my co-fellow Jonathan knew about an illegal (but overlooked by the police) "petrol station" in Biwi, an area of Lilongwe. We drove down there on Thursday to fill up at MK1,000/litre (rather than the pump price of MK640).

I wish we could have taken a picture but these dudes wouldn't have appreciated it. It was a dirt courtyard full of jerry cans and 5 litre containers that used to hold cooking oil. Guys covered in mud and petrol were using funnels to pour gas into cars. It was insane and awesome. They filled us up and $150 later we were good to go.

Driving with a can can of gas in the back of the car is just asking for spillages and headaches, both of which occurred but overall it worked out great! Once we got to our beach house we had to fill up our tank. That's two of our friends doing that. This is definitely the only time in my life I've had so much direct contact with petrol; in Oregon we don't even pump our own, let alone funnel it in.

More about our weekend to come!

Malawi National Library

Soon after moving to Malawi I encountered a dearth of reading material. There is a nice but small English language book store downtown that, surprisingly, doesn't cost an arm and a leg, yet it still leaves much to be desired. So, it was off to the national library for my library card.

It is an interesting process. First you pay 200 kwacha for an application (the attendant said it was to cover material and administrative costs; 200 kwacha is almost an entire day's wage for a laborer) and provide the basic information. In addition you must get a stamp from an employer or somebody/somewhere that will vouch for the applicant. In my case, Serena's job stamped their approval. In return for a completed application you get three small pieces of paper, each of which can be used for a book. I have yet to check out a book--Oliver Twist, I believe, is candidate number one--but when I do there will be a blog post!

Weekend Activities and Garden Improvements

Last weekend was hot! Hot here = in the high 90s, though I wouldn't be surprised if we hit 100 on Saturday. Still, we had a full weekend:

Friday:
-Spent the evening at trivia night. It was a trivia night that focused on seeds and plants (ie - a review of 7th grade biology class). We won third place! We won some herbs.
Saturday:
-Grocery shopping in the morning.
-Spent the afternoon at a soccer tournament/environmental fair.
-Listened to the Nebraska game.
Sunday:
-Brunch at our favorite restaurant, Ama, with some friends.
-Afternoon in the garden.

 Not a bad weekend eh? On Sunday afternoon we made some improvements to our garden, including the addition of this hand-made bird feeder:

Here are the herbs we won on Friday night in their new home. Red basil and rue. I have no idea what rue is, do you?

And here's an addition to our fence! It was an attempt to make Bay feel a little more restricted in our backyard. It's had very limited usefulness since Bay has realized he can move the sticks around with his nose but it still looks cool. Some of those little sticks are still alive and will hopefully grow into a cool bush/fence mixture.

And here are Zach and Bay hanging out in the backyard.

Next weekend we're heading to the lake to celebrate Thanksgiving, Malawian style. The gas shortages have returned to Malawi so it's entirely possible that once we get up there we'll run out of gas and be stuck there forever (which actually wouldn't be so bad). Wish us luck!

Post-Election Post

Two interesting things in Malawi surrounding the US elections. One serious:

The Nation, one of Malawi's large newspapers, had the above headline the day after the election. It was not about one candidate or the other, though they did include Obama's picture, but about the implementation and quality of our democracy. 

One not-so-serious:

I couldn't get my camera to focus, but what you are seeing are Obamapops, lollypops with Obama's picture, including a tasty, good-for-ten-seconds gum and a whistle in the handle. Rumor has it there are Obama Cigarettes as well.

Dog Blogging: Snuggles

Baobab has a lot of shortcomings. His toenails are like daggers and he takes swipes at you whenever he feels like it. He nibbles holes in our mosquito net, making us vulnerable to malaria. He whines whenever he feels like something isn't perfectly to his liking. His punishment involves one of us making him sit on our lap like a human baby until he knows who is boss and begins to act regretful:

Malawi Police

When people complain about the police in the United States I roll my eyes, figuring that most officers do a good job serving the public and that, like in many walks of life, the actions of a few give a bad name to many. Plus, lots of people do stupid things while driving, get tickets, and then blame the police rather than looking into the mirror. But I digress.

Malawi police, on the other hand, are truly incompetent and corrupt and have a massive net negative effect on this society. It is so bad, in fact, that Serena and I both dislike driving because of the constant anxiety that we are going to be stopped, interrogated unjustly, and fined. This fear is not unjustified (see Exhibit B).

It is generally known that the Malawi police force does not make a living wage. As a result, they station themselves around the country randomly stopping vehicles, checking registration and insurance and, if they are looking for money, identifying small finable offenses or charging drivers for violating traffic laws. Their intent is not to keep the citizenry safe, but instead to make money. In the end, they do nothing more than menace. I have no doubt that a Malawi without police would be a better place.

Exhibit A: Our housemate had her purse stolen. In order to get a new driver's license she needed a police report. Three visits to the police station and a "greasing the wheels" fee later, she finally gets the report.

Exhibit B: My friend Jeff and I drove downtown for various errands. We stopped at a stop sign, waited for eight cars to pass, then proceeded to follow the final vehicle. The police pulled us (and about a dozen other vehicles simultaneously) over and claimed we were not supposed to turn left at the stop sign, but were supposed to wait for a light. Huh? There was no light for turning left. Finally, after fifteen minutes and speaking with various "superiors" I flatly said, "I will not pay a fine or a bribe."To which he replied, "Are you failing to comply?" Clearly, yes. Finally, when he realized it would be easier to go after the next driver for a bribe, he gave me back my license.

Exhibit C: If you have a break-in or a mugging or an anything, don't bother calling the police. They rarely have working vehicles. If they have working vehicles they do not have gas. And, if they have working vehicles with gas they aren't going to use their time and fuel to respond to a call. Instead, as the joke in Malawi goes: First call the police, then go pick them up.

Seeing this kind of corruption on a day-to-day level genuinely makes me appreciate the United States. We have plenty of flaws--including corruption!--but nothing like what we see on the ground here.

Live Blogging: Sleepy Boys

Many of you probably remember a blog post about Zach's football routine. All nighters mean that Zach (and the dog,who keeps him company) have to catch up on sleep by taking a Sunday nap. Here's what they look like at this very moment.

Nebraska won so Zach is sleeping peacefully. Bay always sleeps peacefully.

Weeknights in Lilongwe

Since Malawi is at 13 degrees latitude it means that by 6:30 pm we're enveloped in darkness. About one third of the time the electricity is out so when I say 'darkness' I mean it's actually dark - not like America, where street lights give everything adequate light. Unfortunately it's not safe to be outside in the dark. That means that we're pretty much on lockdown beginning at 6:30pm with an occasional exception when we drive somewhere (with the windows rolled up and the car doors locked).

That means we have lots of time for board games! Big thanks to Carol for sending us Settlers of Catan. Above you see Zachary and Cary playing a variation of the game in which the board has been designed to resemble Jamaica, Cary's homeland. In the metal bowl is Zach's homemade ice cream. Delicious with strawberries!

In case you're wondering: I won.

Places We Go: My Office

This is the view from my desk. Seven of us (7!!) share this office. There are only six desks but we make it work; one of us is usually out at a meeting so we play musical desks.

On the far left is Cary. He's the Malaria Program Manager. Next to him in red is Newton, who works with the Drug Access team (his supervisor isn't in the pic). And on the right are Jonathan and Chris, who are my comrades on the Labs Access Team. Our Program Manager isn't pictured either but she's usually sitting on my left.

A little crowded but it means we're always in touch! We actually have plans to move to a bigger room in the future but for now we're sweating it out and having fun.

Whelp, that's one way to do it...

It's been a couple months since this first happened, but I have seen the phenomenon repeated. If you are in the fundraising business, take note. This is a Malawian special I call the "Bumper to Bumper Wallet Dumper"™. Here's how it works:

1. Gather a small group of people
2. Make a sign on an old sheet
3. Hire one or two police officers
4. Walk down the middle of a major road, grinding traffic to a near halt
5. Infuriate drivers in said traffic
6. Ask drivers for money

And that's that! Easy peasy pumpkin peasy. Except not. Gasoline costs an arm and a leg, so traffic jams are very expensive. Plus, no one likes to be stuck creeping along. We not-so-kindly declined to give.

Maybe, though, they are on to something. By doing this in traffic they are--perhaps knowingly--targeting the wealthiest Malawians who are the only ones with vehicles. It's like direct mail guided by advanced demographic algorithms... minus the mail and algorithms and plus a ton of anger.

Blogging is Back!

Greetings fair readers. After a bit of a hiatus, we now return to our regularly scheduled blogging. Things that have happened in the past week and half during the "blog blackout":

-We played lots of Settlers of Catan thanks to my Mom sending it to a friend's house in Florida while she was home from Malawi visiting family. Thanks Mom!
-My parents scheduled their flight to Malawi in December. Hooray!
-I blew apart my ankle playing soccer and am still hobbling around.
-And this guy won an election:

A lot can happen in ten days.

Awesome Plants

This flower is blooming on one of the many creeping vines we've planted in our yard. I love vines. Sadly, ours haven't creeped as far as I would have hoped. But these gorgeous flowers make up for it - a little.

Election Day in Malawi

 This blog post is pretty late in coming. The excitement of election day is long gone and people are returning to their normal activities and television commercials. Still, I took the pictures for this post so here we go.

Election day in Malawi was actually election morning. We're 7 hours ahead of the East coast so polls didn't even begin to close until 2am. Last election I stayed up all night to watch; this election I have a job so that was out. I happened to have a meeting on Wednesday that required that I leave Lilongwe at 5am. When my phone alarm went off at 4:30 Zach woke up with me and hopped on the computer to find that nothing had yet been called. I told him to let me know when something happened, threw on my Obama sweatshirt, and left the house. The sun was coming up over Lilongwe as I headed out of town (see above).

 This here is my fabulous Obama sweatshirt. And below is how I learned that Obama was given another four years.

Sometime during my meeting Obama gave his victory speech. And that was that. What a relief!

Whilst I Go on Safari… One Kilometer from My House

Earlier this week Bao and I did a bit of exploring in a wooded area on the west side of the national parliament building here in Lilongwe. If I haven't described it yet, Lilongwe is a "garden city," meaning it is exceptionally spread out with large plots of land that are free of buildings yet are still touched by humans: cultivated for corn, a few stumps and trees, used as trash receptacles, or have been clear-cut waiting for developing. Just to the west of parliament, within walking distance of our house, is one such area that has been spared the woodsman's saw and has received some attention as a park. It was in this area that Bao and I went walking and, quite by accident, embarked on a fifteen minute safari. It all started when I emerged from a thicket…

There, to my left not fifty meters away was an ape that, while I am unsure, looked like a baboon. He stared at me. I stared at him. He stared at me, I waved at him. He stood up. I waved again. At this point, Bao spotted him and took off running with me yelling, "He'll whip your butt, Bao!" Bao isn't the most athletic little guy and had no chance catching him.

Just as this happened I saw movement to my right and into the woods ran a large four legged animal. It was bigger than deer but smaller than an elk and beyond that I didn't catch much. Wow! In just a few minutes I saw two free-roaming animals. Bao returned from his fruitless romp and we continued down a footpath only to stumbled on a flock of guinea fowl, about 40 in number. They make quite a racket when flying into the trees, which Bao made sure they did. Just then we emerged onto a bigger path and, lo and behold, not fifty meters to my left was another baboon ambling away from us.

Again, Bao decided it would be a fun chase and, again, he was woefully unsuccessful. This time, however, the ape climbed a tree and was barking at the dog: a humorous irony for an American dog-owner in Africa. Just as I reached the path to retrieve Bao, off to my right a very small deer-like animal sprinted across the road about one hundred meters away. What am I, in Jumanji?!?! Finally, I dove into the forest to find Bao who was still the target of barking from his chase, and heard rustling to my left. I figured it was more guinea fowl or, perhaps, primates, but I was surely surprised to find it was a pack (herd? group?) of warthogs snuffling in the undergrowth just 30 meters away.

To recap: In fifteen minutes I saw two monkeys, one big four-legged animal, one small four-legged animal, a flock of guinea fowl, and a pack of warthogs all within a kilometer of the national parliament. The Lion King.

Car Camping

Another post about going to Dedza two weekends ago...

What happens when you forget the poles to your tent? Why, fold down the seats and camp in the back of your car!

Serena's leg looks broken. Eww.

 One of the perks, I suppose of owning a big ole SUV. Unfortunately, due to body heat we had to crack the windows and the mosquitoes descended upon us like Lilongwe hyenas to roadkill (to be explained later). It was a miserable night all because I failed to check the equipment.

Unfortunately this was the second car camping adventure this summer. In Maine, Eric and I tried to sleep in the rental car with the joys of heat, mosquitoes, and, because it was a sedan, the joys of sleeping with a steering wheel in your belly. Glad these nights are behind me.

Water Heater

While in Dedza hiking a couple weekends ago we stayed at a small hotel that heated their water thus:

It is a simple wood-powered water heater--you can see the in and outflow pipes on the left--that is beautiful in its simplicity. If not for the massive problems associated with deforestation in Malawi, this would be great.

I Know You Read My Blog; Get a Life

The title is for one of my favorites. But it still applies to the rest of you. Working abroad in public health can have a way of tearing you down and grinding you up. People in my office spend their lives at work. I leave in the afternoon and come in the next morning to find that the only thing changed is the clothing; people are still sitting right where I left them a few hours before. There's a lot to be said for putting in a few years of hard work. But a blog post from a co-fellow's blog perfectly expresses something I've also been thinking about in between sending 500 emails in a day and opening 10 Excel files at one time. Anna Quindlen spoke these words when she gave a commencement speech:

"Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my work stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the center of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends and them to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cut out. But I call them on the phone and I meet them for lunch. I would be rotten, at best mediocre, at my job if those other things were not true.

You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are. So here’s what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay check, the larger house. Do you think you’d care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon or found a lump in your breast?

Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze at the seaside, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over the water, or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a sweet with her thumb and first finger.

Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you would have spent on beer and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen. Be a big brother or sister. All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well will never be enough.

It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, and our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the colour of our kids’ eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again. It is so easy to exist instead of to live.

I learned to live many years ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get. I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it back because I believed in it, completely and utterly."

Truth, eh?

American Football in Africa

Interception. :(

 This is what American college football looks like when you live in Malawi. The South African sports channel only carries the odd Thursday college game or Monday night NFL game when they come on at 3am. We don't have TV, even if we did want to watch those games. Instead Zach listens on the internet some time 12-48 hours after the game has finished in America, having ignored his email due to an unfortunate email from Ian that once disclosed the score before we got around to listening. This is how it goes:

1. I set up the game by going to the Huskers website and finding the beginning of the game in the audio version (Zach can't be in the room in case the score is on the front page or I skip ahead too far and he happens to hear an early touchdown). This means I know the outcome of the game for the entire four hour process but have to act like I don't.

2. The internet dies and it takes five minutes to come back.

3. Zach listens to the first half quite calmly, staring into space.

4. The internet dies and it takes twenty minutes to come back.

5. We get the game going again but accidentally skip a huge play while trying to find where we were.

6. Zach starts standing up and sitting down alternatively. Kicks a soccer ball against the wall repeatedly when things become more heated. Still staring into space.

7. Zach notes how cool it is that they advertise for fertilizer and seeds on the Huskers radio (I guess so?).

8. The internet dies and it takes seven minutes to come back. Bad words are uttered.

9. Zach talks about how much he honestly hates the internet connection in Lilongwe and you'd have thought capitalism would have fixed this problem by now.

10. Zach screams because of a touchdown by the Huskers. Moves from the bed to crouching on the floor (see above).

11. The fourth quarter plays like a CD with a huge scratch on it, is barely intelligible. More bad words.

12. QB throws an interception. Zach screams 'That is the only thing that could NOT HAPPEN!! NOOO!!" Quickly followed by 'This is a BIG DRIVE, BABE! A BIG drive!! Here we GO!" Wanders over to one of our potted plants to stare at it and be a little distracted from the tension and stress. Continues listening while looking at the plant.

13. Huskers win. Zach dances with the dog. He spends the next three hours on espn trying to load video highlights, complaining about how terrible the internet is.

14. Zach sends his analysis of the game to his father. This week's football odyssey is officially finished until next Saturday night - or Sunday or Monday, depending on how long the guy in Nebraska working on the website takes to get around to posting the game.

Spacey staring

Places We Go: Ama Khofi

Our table last Sunday

I've found that when you live abroad you end up going to the same handful of restaurants over and over again. Usually one place in particular stands out for its caramel muffins (Swaziland) or pesto pasta (Guatemala). In Lilongwe our standout spot is Ama Khofi, a restaurant about a mile away from our house. The iced tea is heaven.

It's a cute little cafe with indoor and outdoor seating overlooking a nursery full of beautiful plants located in the Four Seasons complex, which feels like America. We go once a weekend with friends and have a delicious meal and enjoy the ambiance. On Sundays you can stay into the evening and enjoy free live music (and soccer on the big screen) at the bar next door. It still gets cool enough to wear a light sweater in the evening so its very pleasant to sit outside and enjoy the fresh evening air, live music, large beautiful trees and twinkling Christmas lights.

Last Sunday we spent a few hours at Ama playing BananaGrams with some friends (well, not me, I read a book, I HATE that game) and then watched the Chelsea v. Man U game at the bar with fifty of our most rabid friends. Not a bad Sunday, eh? Definitely a far cry from the way I spent Sundays in Swaziland.

Part of the nursery

I don't know these people

Serena Votes!

A couple days ago Serena exercised her right and civic responsibility to vote.

Bao was pushing hard for Romney, but then we explained that his tax plan numbers and promises are simply fantasy, that he wants to squeeze social services for the most vulnerable people, spend trillions more on the military, cut taxes for the wealthiest and most secure, and will appoint more Supreme Court justices like Scalia while Obama ended the war in Iraq and is concluding our time in Afghanistan in 2014, continues to work with the military (albeit too modestly) to cut spending, will allow the Bush tax cuts to expire and raise taxes on the wealthiest and most able to contribute, implemented a health care plan that, while flawed, takes us closer to a humane system of coverage, has implemented one of the most sane foreign policies in many decades, guided us through a devastating economic crash and recovery, and plans to continue reducing the number of bayonets and horses in our military.

Bao looked us in the eye and said, in perfect English, "Clearly, with their positions articulated, I support President Obama."

My ballot never arrived, so it is off to Plan B: An emailed ballot. I didn't even know those existed until the helpful Oregon Secretary of State showed me how. Technology!

Norwegians

Four weeks ago we became acquainted with a group of four Norwegian undergraduate students in social work. They were in Malawi studying child trafficking (primarily in sex and labor) as a practicum for their degree.

From left to right: Roommate Cassandre, Trygve, Siri, Roommate Andrea, Annette, Kristen, Serena, me, Baobab

We hosted them at our house for a few nights when they were passing through from one part of Malawi to another. They left yesterday along with another friend--Tina--from England. Today, four more friends from the British version of the secret service are leaving. It is our first brush with the revolving door of personnel that is international development.

Before the Norwegians left, though, they promised a guest post about child trafficking in Malawi. Keep your eyes peeled.

PS Evidently--and to my great dismay--the Vikings did not wear big helmets with horns. Another beautiful myth, like the Easter Bunny and the Lucky Charms Leprechaun, comes crashing down.

The Beginning of the Rainy Season?

Up until Wednesday it was pretty hot around here. Temperatures in the mid to high nineties during the day feel like 100 in the direct sun. But on Wednesday the skies got a little cloudy and the handy dandy farm scene to your right started showing rain. I scoffed because its way too early (I thought) for the rain to begin. Last year it didn't come until December and normal timing is mid-November. But that night we got some legitimate rain for an hour or so and Thursday the skies were cloudy the entire day. Temperatures have been in the 80s for the past few days. Does this mean the rainy season is pending? I hope so - the break in temperature is a relief. It makes for a good night of sleep.

In other new our dog is itching himself to death. I'm 99% sure it isn't due to fleas so we're on a mission to find out what might be causing it. Allergies? Mange? He's losing patches of hair so hopefully we'll figure it out soon! That's a picture of him looking sad and itchy up there.

Awesome Plants 5

While in Dedza we came across these two bushes/trees and their wonderfully scented flowers.

Serena thought we had one of these in our back yard and, sure enough, upon returning home I found a white-flowered beauty. These look familiar but again I know no name. Anyone?

Irrigation

I hear irrigation is important under the hot African sun:

One theory of what is holding back the first steps of Malawi's development (again, with all the caveats associated with pro-development arguments) is its lack of industrial level irrigation. Millions of Malawians--the vast majority of the population--are subsistence farmers without irrigation, relying on one harvest following the rainy season. As a result, there is little room for cash crops or additional yields that would bring in income for school fees, health care, electricity, clean water, environmental protection, improved diet, etc etc etc.

Take the photo above, snapped from the top of our hike in Dedza. If there is water, crops will come. In the photograph, people have harvested what is a very small stream for the growth of thousands of pounds (perhaps millions along the length of the creek) of food. The stark contrast of browns and green is incredible. Of course, there are also the myriad consequences of pumps, dams, piping, water reallocation, etc. Large scale irrigation is not all roses and chocolate.