I made myself wait until the next summer to decide what to do with my life. My health was horrible then and I hadn't the energy to function, let alone live, and spent most of my home hours laying on the floor recovering from an office job. (Sitting in an office was, apparently, really hard.) I never lost the ability to function, I just tired real easy. Then September came, the weather broke, it cooled down and I recovered to normal.

Despite the extremes we've had, this summer has been generally mild. The hot spells still wiped me out, even when I'm in cool AC all day. (Those 5 days in 70 deg temp control? Probably really good for me, even if I am freezing. I have a hard time keeping home temperatures at 78, let alone 76, and I can feel the difference some days.) But I have a better feel of it now, I know it's not going away but it can be controlled. Life will be harder for me than most, but that's true for more people than can be counted. I'm good most of the year.

It's reaching decision making time and, in keeping with most things, my subconscious figured this out long before me. Thanks to the US Dept of Labor's Occupational Handbook (which I posted for our Student Resource page) I've learned that I'm a technical writer, specifically, a science writer. (As far as titles go. There's a biological scientist and that's how specific it gets so tech writer is good enough.) As part of my job, I've started using illustrator in the adobe suite and working on our webpages. Both of these are very peripheral (I can update links and change text, not create webpages, and illustrator and photoshop have been used to convert or check things). If I ask, though, I might be able to get monetary help with courses about them. Or, which I'd prefer except I wouldn't get certified (though, if I leave AMS, I could include it. I don't have certification or education in writing/editing either), I could work on tutorials at work or just go through the manual. (The reason this would be at work is that my present computer is a netbook, which is small, and I'd rather not spend time doing anything other than fun stuff on it.)

Among other things, this would make me very marketable. (Should I decide to leave DC, if I stay in DC I will stay at AMS. I like it here.) It would, however, mean an office job for forever. That's what this work is. And what do I do but come home and sit in my apartment? (Going out in the summer is hot and exhausting, in the winter it is dark. Actually, in the winter I hang out with friends more, summer sorta sucks because my friends are all busy. I think this may be part of the reason I'm feeling a bit lonely right now. They're starting to return, and I'll be busy and so have less wanderlust.)

Today though, while checking links, I wished I could get out... ...

Hee. This was really bothering me, I thought it was a huge epiphany, but writing this out it strikes me that my discontent was just part of the job. It was boring and dull today, all my big projects are done, I'm working on odds and ends, don't know what's next, we've been having a horrible time with our Ocean Studies book (late to the publishers, problems with binding, this that, on and on, and some new stupidity every day), etc. But I really enjoy the rest of it. I enjoy the writing and editing. (I really enjoy the editing, they probably think I'm nuts.)

I guess this is the thing. What I wanted to do with my life was to be outside, not an office, to feel free and make my own way (wildlife management is pretty independent). That's not going to happen, most likely because I've done what I've wanted. Maybe I overstressed my body, maybe it was coming regardless, maybe I slowed or rushed it, but, whatever, I can't do the outside thing. Wishing won't change that, life isn't so kind, but it was kind enough so I could find another way to do what I love. And I do enjoy it.

HA! I finally got on livejournal to write out my problems and discovered I don't really have any. Win for me!

Have a nice day.

(ps: no, I still don't know how to handle the title but I've a habit of laying on my bed in the sun after a shower and falling asleep nowadays. It's a weekend thing (there's no sun when I get out of the shower on weekdays) and quite confusing.)

The wee hours of the morning are not the time I should be awake anymore. I now have grown up working hours and it is best if I am sleeping until the bigger morning hours. That is not the case this morning, however, so we'll just accept that.

In more exciting (but even less good) news, my wallet was stolen yesterday morning. I thought it was stolen in the afternoon and am still amazed at the time frame in which it was snatched. I have my smartrip (metro) card in my wallet so it disappeared between the metro exit and work, which is one corner, an escalator and crosswalk distance. I had to wait at the crosswalk for 30 sec so, altogether, the whole thing probably took 3 minutes, if that. There is the possibility that I dropped it instead of replacing it in my purse. Whoever took it, or found it, didn't waste too much time in using it. Not big purchases, only those that don't require signing. Convenience versus security.

The cards are now canceled, I've a few more things to handle tomorrow morning (replacing my ID, canceling my smartrip card, filing a police report) but, as far as that goes, I'm set. I've emergency money, thankfully, so I can buy groceries, as I can't charge anything or get cash from the bank, and the chunk of change I did lose will curtail my pitiful social life as well.

The worst part, however, was that I discovered the lose right before buying ice cream. No ice cream for Katie! :(

(In case you're curious, yes, I'm reacting to the heat. My earrings are weird. I think I'm losing sensation around the earlobes but not within the lobes so I keep turning them and trying to itch my ear. This is my response to going numb - I scratch. It's a subconscious reaction and only makes it worse. I can't feel the scratching. Fortunately, my brain kicks in and I stop. That's the least of the effects. The cool effect is that I sleep like the dead. I know this is because my body's past exhausted but I've had trouble sleeping lately so I'll take what I can get.)

I had to move the latest batch of ale from the coat closet to the clothes closet. The coat closet got too warm so we're just going to hope the amber ale doesn't foam over. It's pretty unusual they do but it's with my clothes now; that would suck. I'm still about 6 degrees too high but that's better than 10. I suppose I could turn up the AC more... but not enough. 68-72 F is COLD. My brew can cope. It'll just be fruitier and less alcoholic (yeast converts the sugar to esters, which taste fruity, above 75 F). Or, I'll compromise, we'll drop the temp to 76. Ages ago, I bought a black lager but that brews cold, 45-55. I'm mailing it to my parents, I don't have a basement. Wheat beers have a wider range of temperatures, 62-85, so I'll pretend that's why I'm brewing one next. (Explains a lot about it being a summer brew though. Of course, if I was a monk with a monastery, I bet I'd have nice cool cellars for fermenting my beer. I'd have to be a guy though, I don't think nuns brewed. I may also have to be a bit more religious.)

While pulling out some papers stored in the clothes closet, I decided I should clean the whole thing. Though a good idea in the long run, it means my mostly clean bedroom became a mess. (Cleaning the closet = taking everything out and dumping it on the bed then on the floor) I discovered I could fit on the bottom shelf then took a nap (in bed) and now it's almost 7pm!!! What happened to the day? Why am I more cranky after taking a nap then before? (Poor cats. But not that poor. I had to do my laundry last night because the big cat took a dump on my bed. I'm still pretty irritated with him. He almost got dropped in the bathtub with the soaking sheets. That was before I realized I should just wash them. I was really tired.) I am still really tired, I'd have tea if it wasn't so late. Or I'll have some herbal tea, it'll be warm and soothing.

So the fact that I haven’t been writing so frequently should be taken as an indication that I’ve been keeping very busy at work! I go through phases… on days where my back hurts too bad, I don’t work on books so I have plenty of time to write blog updates and emails. But then I take advantage of days where I’m feeling good – and luckily that’s been the case for the last couple of weeks! So I’ve been on a book spree of late. Cataloging and labeling books for hours on end, stopping only for lunch and the end of the day. I love it although days do usually end up being pretty quiet. Again, fine with me! And it’s great to see more and more rows of numbered books. I’m so ready to finish them so that I can paint the book shelves and reorganize them all. It’ll be a beautiful thing once it’s done!

There was a pretty sizable scandal on Chaminade’s campus a couple of weeks ago that has of course dominated much of the gossip since then. I found it to be very interesting in that while the man followed the norm here…. the woman certainly did not! Go her! Anyways, one of the teachers – married, old, and with children spanning the age of 4 to 16 (aka damn lucky that he found a young woman to manage his household) – has apparently been sleeping around with one of the female support staff members as well as one of his students (high school aged). Again, this unfortunately is not such a surprise here. From talking to Banda, it seems that he’s heard stories about 90% of the teachers having affairs with students and community members. And those are just the ones he’s heard about! Sad but true. Well the teacher’s madame (wife) found out and whoa geez look out. She followed him to campus and started hitting him and screaming accusations at him in front of his coworkers and students. Now I’m not a supporter of violence or public scenes, but I am proud of her for standing up to him. They tried to force her into counseling with him, with the end goal being their reunion. She went for 2 days and then packed up her things and left him. I was very impressed that she did not just roll over and take it, like so many of the other women here either choose or are forced to do because of economic dependence. The crappy thing is that she had to leave her children behind. Which is even worse considering that he isn’t even the one to take care of them. In general, fathers here aren’t particularly involved. But at least the kids usually adore them still – there are a few on campus where anytime their father is around, the kid is practically superglued to his legs. The children of this teacher basically ignore him. So hmmm. Anyways, that’s depressing that she had to leave them behind. And my anger at this injustice increased as I was passing his house a week later and saw an old lady outside sweeping. So basically, he’s still not taking care of the kids but instead had an old relative come to do all of the work.

I got a WONDERFUL phone call from Molly, Kat, and Ily a couple of weekends ago! So good to hear their voices and hear all of their updates! I was a little jealous that they were all together and going to the zoo :) But it was so sweet of them to think to call me and definitely the highlight of my weekend!

One of the teachers – Glory (Hotel & Catering instructor) – had a baby a couple of weeks ago! I didn’t even know she was pregnant lol. I guess I’m still on the outside of the gossip loop because no one ever talked about it around me. Or at least not in English. But anyways, I kept meaning to go visit her, but I never had a chance to go to town to buy her a baby present, so I kept delaying. Finally Glory brought her to MIRACLE so I got to see the baby who is just too cute! Priscilla. Had a fun time holding and playing with her while Glory did some work. We’re gonna be buds.

House update: The concrete floors are finished. The only thing left to do in the actual house is attach the window shutters and doors and install the toilet and sink. However, we also need to do the pit latrine and the septic tank, which is what is slowing everything down. And getting the water and electrical hooked up. Signed up for water but they said they don’t have the equipment so we should check back in a couple of weeks. Went yesterday to do electrical and they didn’t have the paperwork… and they said to come back in 1 week. Lord only knows why it takes a full week to photocopy some forms. So you can get an idea of how slow everything is going…. Also, I finally fired Cosmas, our crap builder who was stealing cement and lying every chance he got. I told him 4 weeks ago to come get the money for the cement so we could finish the pit latrine. It took him 3 weeks to come – despite frequent calls on my part – because he’d gone and gotten another job. I can guarantee you that if he hadn’t already been paid in full, my job would have been done within the first 4 days. But he finally came to get the cement money so I thought we were good to go. But then he told me that it’d be another week because he could start because he had to go to a funeral. Lie. Others had told me they’d seen him working at another job that very morning. Really I was just so sick of his lies, so I decided my sanity is worth far more than the $30 it would take to hire someone else to finish the job. I also got to give him a piece of my mind, although of course that meant nothing to him as he just kept insisting that I was wrong. Whatevs. Despite being rationally justified for laying out all of my problems with him, I still felt terrible afterwards for speaking to another human being like that. Ended up crying for a while but Banda was great, telling me over and over again that I had no reason to feel guilty as everything I said was true and that Cosmas needed to hear it and understand that impact he’d had on my life. Didn’t feel better though until Banda randomly picked out a movie for us to watch. And chose… The Rocky Horror Picture Show. I cannot think of anything better for my mood to watch at that point. Had a wonderful time singing along and laughing at Banda’s reactions to the scandal!

Banda was on a roll for picking out movies because the next night, he turns to me and says “What’s Grease about?” His favorite part? When Danny tries to find a sport to join. He rewound it to watch again and laughed hysterically throughout. He also enjoyed the dance scenes since the popular style of dancing here in Malawi is so different!

I had a very interesting hour-long talk with Mr. Singuini about the political and economic situation in Malawi. For those who do not regularly read Malawian news :) for the first time in 47 years of independence, Malawi is attempting to exist without foreign aid. This is huge, since 40% of their budget last year was in fact made up of such foreign aid. 40%!!! The reason for this change is not some patriotic, “let’s do it on our own” mentality. But instead, the president has pissed off the western world with his recent actions that are not so democratic. So they’ve frozen their support. And he (dilusionally?) thinks that Malawi can just say “F you” and do it on their own. Now, I’d LOVE to see a truly independent Malawi. One that can support itself and thrive and foster a population that is self-sufficient rather than one which is constantly expecting a handout. But realistically, I just don’t see that happening. Because the last 47 years of aid have been wasted and has just “disappeared” into the pockets of the government. So there is hardly anything to show for it. If there had been advances in infrastructure and resource garnering and education and higher education and economic initiatives, then sure, I’d be all with the President in his attempt to make it alone. But there’s not. So where are they going to get the necessary money? Instead, they’re raising the income tax to 46%. Read that again – 46%!!! So basically everything that anyone makes, they’ll lose half of it. And this is a flat rate. So as much as it bothers me as someone who makes a decent wage, it will absolutely cripple the poor, who need every tambala (cent) they earn to pay for the basic necessities. Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that those individuals who do actually make enough to in turn invest those earnings in building up this country, will leave. Why would they want to give up half of their earnings? It’d be different if they’d be getting a lot back, like in the European countries where taxes are high but so are expectations of services. But here it will be the same services (if we’re lucky) but more likely much worse as the government scrounges for money. So there goes any other chance of building the country from within. PLUS they’re raising the taxes that foreign business owners have to pay. Goodbye foreign investors. Oh and the prices of food stuffs will also increase with that same tax. Soooo I really don’t know what’s going to happen to Malawi within the next few years. According to scientific reports, there have been advances in food supplies and supposed standard of living (although that’s hard to see on a local level) made in the last few years… but my worry is that that’s going to come to a screeching halt and then slowly begin to backslide. What happens when the government runs short of money? There’s no one to borrow from. Which civil servants are going to be the first to not receive their pay checks? Teachers. And then it’s only a matter of time before they go on strike and you have thousands of high school students just wandering around. T-R-O-U-B-L-E. And then there’s no money for medicine in the hospitals (even with the aid, there was never enough – people would have to go buy it from the private clinics). And then what if there’s not enough to pay the army and police? Oi. So anyways, I know this sounds all doom and gloom, but it’s not unrealistic to wonder about such a progression of events. I’m hoping against all hope that Malawi somehow manages to pull through and that this is a wonderful success. But my realistic side is skeptical. We’ll see.

I started my “English lessons” with Ms. Kim last week. I was VERY nervous since I’ve never taught English before (my class is more of a communications class). But it turned out to be AWESOME! She basically just wants me to chat with her and correct her when she makes mistakes. Because she says Malawians are too nice and won’t correct her so she’ll never learn proper English. So we went on a walk the first day and I got to hear even more stories about her life, which I love because she’s just fabulous! The next lesson we spent writing an email for her. I could see my value then since she was having a difficult time with getting all of the grammar down. I don’t blame her – there were a couple of times where I even had to think about it! Oh English. But yes, those 2 days a week are clearly going to be bright spots in my already lovely life.

Sad news. Brother Beams is leaving Malawi. He’s getting transferred to Nairobi at the end of the month. I’m so devastated about it that I can’t even think on it. Every time it pops into my head I have to push it away because my throat starts choaking up. Like right now. I love and respect that man so much, I can’t imagine not having him around.

On Saturday, instead of doing our grocery shopping, we spent 1 hour at the post office. That’s right, 1 hour. Sigh. Not even waiting in line. We were being “helped” the whole time. I wanted to send some letters to Molly and also had a small package of stuff for Chris. Well it took about 30 minutes for the lady to figure out how to duct tape the package closed. She had to call over her co-worker to help her. It was all I could do not to rip it out of her hand and do it myself. But I stayed calm and just enjoyed chatting with Banda and Peter Daino who also happened to be there. But then came the real doozy. I asked the lady to check if there were any packages for myself or for Laura. We only said “Laura” because I’ve said “Aldrich” before and that is just too much for them to handle. And I even had Banda say it so that the accent wouldn’t be an additional confusion. So she goes back there and says there’s nothing, only a box for Kat! I’m excited by this and explain to her that we stayed together so I can take it. She makes me show her my passport. Who knows why? But I have noticed that she stopped halfway down the shelf, so she didn’t read all of the names. And I can clearly see 2 boxes from the US postal service sitting on that shelf. How many other Americans are in Karonga?!? Peter had already picked up his box and I doubt there are too many others. It was worth a shot. PLUS the box from Kat had arrived at the post office in JULY of 2010!! 10 months ago! So yes, I think I have a right to be skeptical about their checking of names. Well she was all pissy so she carried an armful out and started waving them one by one in my face saying “See? Not for you!” I wanted to pop her in the face for being a smartass because I asked her to actually do her job for once. But sweet vindication. On the fourth package, well what do ya know?! A package for Laura! She tried to backpedal and say that she needed the last name. Don’t even try lady, that package had been sitting there for months throughout multiple checks where I did tell you the last name and you still failed to find it. So after this she was ready to be done. But she still hadn’t cleared the shelf so I asked her again to finish. Would you believe that she still copped an attitude even after being proven wrong about Laura’s package?! Well she did. And I was justified again as she pulled out a box from my mom that had been there for a month. So despite all of the fighting that had to go into it, I was content as I staggered away from the post office with 3 boxes full of goodies! Banda was proud of me. He refers to it as “Alyson vs. the Post Office Lady.” It was like a replay of “Laura vs. the Nurses.”

We had a holiday on Monday so we had to go back to town to finish the shopping that we never got to do thanks to the Post Office fiasco. Spent the rest of the day sleeping and watching Nigerian movies. Although made some awesome homemade Macaroni and Cheese courtesy of the Velveeta sent in one of the care packages :)

While in town, Banda and I picked out rings because we’re going to get our marriage certificate sometime this month. I want Beams to be the witness since he won’t be here for the actual church ceremony, plus it’ll be good to have it already done when Banda goes to get his visa for the US. And if Banda gets a work transfer order, he might be able to swing a “follow the wife” so that he can stay at Chaminade and I can stay at MIRACLE. Anyways, it just makes practical sense and since we already see ourselves as married, there’s no reason not to get that slip of paper. So we picked out rings. Let’s just say there’s not a large supply here. My ring? 50 kwacha. Which is about 33 cents. And I’ll tell you what. I look at it just as often as I would a huge diamond ring. Because it’s about what it means. I think of Banda and our relationship when I see it. Diamond or no diamond. It means just as much to me. Who needs something that costs 3 months salary? Banda is still trying to get used to wearing a ring since he’s never worn any jewelry before. It’s kind of adorable to look over and see him fiddling with it trying to get comfortable. :) Plus he has really big knuckles and small fingers, so it’s loose once on but he has to struggle to get it off. I told him that one day, he’ll gain weight and it’ll get stuck permanently, so we’ll have to cut his finger off to remove it. Priceless look of fear flooding his face. :)

End note: In rereading this and other blogs I’ve realized that they often seem fairly irritated and that life here is a struggle. It’s really not. I just write about those things because they are vastly different from life in the States and I feel like those differences are more interesting to read about then daily happenings. But rest assured, life here is still wonderful. I love work as I make my way through the library. I still love that life moves slowly here. I am feeling great healthwise (minus the ever-present back which I’ve learned to manage). I love living with Banda. The students still make me grin as do the kiddos that hang around. Life is good. Some days I really do want to go home to the US. So much that it hurts. I hate that I'm missing out on weddings and vacations and big things in people's lives. And the small things too. I miss having a comfortable life where I can relax for hours rather than having to do dishes and cooking and such. But I came to realize that I only feel sick about it when I focus on that desire. When I just let it go and just live in the moment of Malawi, I'm completely fine and I love my life. So I'm going to work on maintaining that positivism as much as possible. Because yes someday I will end up back in the US and then you know what? I'll be missing Malawi. It's just how it goes. So I'm going to enjoy it while I have the opportunity to be here!

A rant, of sorts. I do apologize in advance if this rambles on or upsets certain individuals but it’s been irking me all week whenever it flashes into my mind so I must therapeutically release it. Merci.

So the other day one of the Madames at MIRACLE came to me (completely out of the blue, I was just sitting there minding my own business) and asked me when Banda and I are going to “officially bless” our marriage. AKA Get married in the Catholic church. Sigh. I dislike this question but whatever, I hear it all the time, so I’ve gotten used to it. “Next year, when my parents can save enough money for the airfare to Malawi.” Normally this makes people happy and they move on. But nope, not her. She plows on and tells me that that’s not good because until then I cannot take communion (from the Catholic church) since I’m living in sin with Banda. Now let’s take 2 steps back here madame. First of all, where is this offensive judgment coming from? Especially when last week you were sitting there telling me that you were praying that I am pregnant. Let’s get your judgment straight. Secondly, I pretty much lost respect for the church’s dictation of who can and cannot receive communion when they denied it to my friend’s mother after she got a divorce because husband regularly beat the shit out of her. So no, I don’t really care what the church says on that topic. I thought Jesus was supposed to be all about inclusivity and love. Psh. Not here clearly. Thirdly, Banda and I consider ourselves to be husband and wife. We don’t need some piece of paper from the government or some blessing from a church that I don’t even go to, in order to make it valid in our hearts and actions. We are faithful. We are in this until we have gray hair and can’t even see each other anymore because we’re so blinded by age. In my view, our relationship is far more “holy” than the majority of those I’ve seen here where men are treated as superior and also regularly cheat on their wives. In fact, this calls to mind a pillar of our very own local Catholic church who had a major sexual scandal last year with one of the high school girls he taught… So don’t you dare come to me madame and damn our relationship. But I kept all of that inside because I did not want to unleash upon her a whole 2 years worth of frustration about the religious hypocrisy here. I did make my main mistake in response though. I said “Well I don’t go to church here anyway, so…” Sigh. Big mistake. I should’ve known better. But it just popped out. I thought her head was going to explode. So I went on to explain that I don’t understand the Chitumbuka so it’s basically 3 hours of just sitting, not understanding anything being said, and distracting people by playing with children. Really, what’s the point of going? And that instead I just pray at home where I get much more out of it. Normally this explanation satisfies people and they move on. But again, not her. She launched into this whole thing about how I should still go for the community. “Well madame, I get enough community at work and with Chaminade teachers and my neighbors. And those are the same people who have good enough English at church to commune with me anyway.” She remained undeterred. She said that she was going to talk to the brothers about me. Excuse me?!? It is none of your freaking business whether or not I go to church! So don’t you dare bring my bosses into this! Not to mention the fact that they already know I don’t go to church. Next she switched veins completely and told me that I should go with Banda to his church because we are “one flesh now so you must do what your husband does.” By this point I’m ready to pop her a good one. No I will not convert simply because I am married. I am still my own being. I still have my own brain and my own principles and my own ideals. By this point I think she could tell I was more than a little irritated by her preaching. I mean, I didn’t say outloud any of my mental backlash but I’m sure some of it was showing on my face. So she said she’d come to me later with the issue. “Really Madame, you don’t need to come back to me about his.” She left. And then returned an hour later to tell me that even though I said I’d already made my decision that she was still going to come and that “little by little” I’d come to see the right way. OMG. So now I’m going to have to listen to this for weeks on end… I think the thing that is most frustrating about all of this is that I cannot sit down and have a reasonable conversation with her where I can explain my views. Because her conception of faith is just so narrow and confined to what she was brought up with, that she would never understand or accept my side. Just the few things I tried to slip in here, she completely rejected. Because I consider myself to be a spiritual person. I believe in something bigger than myself. It may not always be the God that you believe in, but to my side I think it’s more important that you have something grounding you and keeping you compassionate than to have a specific name for that greater purpose. And I have that belief which pushes me towards a better personhood. I have a set of principles (morals if you will) by which I strive to live my life. Compassion. Generosity. Honesty. Respect. Awareness. Simplicity. Gratitude. Courage. Patience. Acceptance. Peace. Hmm sounds like that’s suspiciously similar to what one would call a Christian life, no? Certainly more so than the thieves who have been stealing cement from my house and yet their main defense is that they’re leaders of their churches. Ha. So sue me if I don’t label my decency as “Christian.” I live a life of service rather than one of personal wealth or power. I strive to be generous with my time and resources in my everyday life while most people’s faith exists merely within the four walls of a Sunday church. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to toot my own horn. I’m just trying to demonstrate my frustration with the fact that the objecting Madame will never see all of this as a valid expression of faith. Nope, it’s just “WHAT?! You don’t go to Church?” packed full of judgment and a desire to convert me to “the truth.” But alas I see much disappointment in her future. I am content with myself and my spirituality. I feel more at peace now than I ever did when I was going to church every Sunday and swallowing wholeheartedly every dictum that was presented to me by the religious educators. I refuse to ever again just accept without question, without intellectual debate, or without a thoughtful consideration of the ramifications. That to me seems to be the useless (and often irresponsible) faith.

We were supposed to go down to Blantyre a couple of weeks ago to pick up the donated library books from customs. I was actually excited about the trip as it meant a chance to shop at some grocery stores that carry western products, eat at some new restaurants that serve something other than Malawian staples, and go to a legit hospital to get my back x-rayed to finally see what’s up with that. Buuuut the customs guy called and said the books hadn’t even arrived in South Africa yet! Awesome. So the new expected date of them being in Blantyre is the middle of June – a whole month late. We’ll see if they even keep to that time schedule!

So about my back, I’ve had a couple of bad weeks on that as it keeps flaring up. Really it’s been hurt for 4 months. Constant pain, literally 24/7. It’s mainly in my lower back but shoots up my spine and down into my right leg. Can’t sit or stand comfortably. The only thing that works is laying and even then I have to shift around constantly to find something that doesn’t send pain everywhere. So I don’t know what’s wrong with it. 4 months seems too long for it to be a strained muscle. And yet I didn’t do anything awful to it that would suggest a herniated disc or something. If I were in the US I would’ve taken care of it immediately with a chiropractor or surgery or whatever was necessary because it’s been pretty debilitating. I can’t do half of the tasks at home since carrying heavy buckets of water is a vital step in basically every task. And at work, I will go days without working on the books because I can’t lift them since doing so will mean I can’t walk for the next few days. But there aren’t any chiropractors here and I doubt there are even any massage people who would know what they’re doing either. And I’m not letting someone untrained poke around my back. So in the meantime to make it through I take a couple of breaks each day to lie on the library table. This bothers Envie (my coworker) to no end and has even resulted in her telling me to just go home. But it’s not like I have a choice. It’s either that or crying, darling!

This back pain has only enhanced the MIRACLE staff’s conviction that I’m pregnant. I’ve stopped even trying to convince them that I’m not. Because it’s falling on deaf ears lol. Madame Mwalweni even called me in last week to have a talk with me about pregnancy. Her reasons for thinking I’m pregnant? 1. My face is rosy. She says this is a symptom. Really, Madame? How many azungu have you seen pregnant because I’m pretty sure that African women do not get a rosy complexion… 2. I’ve lost weight. This one makes me laugh. First they were saying I was getting fatter and thus preggars. Now they say I’ve lost weight, so that’s a sign too. I think they’re just searching for any reason now… Cracks me up. Also, Madame thinks that the reason why I don’t know I’m pregnant is that the baby is a girl so she’s just shy and hiding. *Facepalm* She was actually serious. I love that woman so much. So anyways, they’re going to be disappointed in 9 months methinks.

We had a welcoming party at MIRACLE during which I was welcomed (yet again), bringing the total parties of which I was a guest of honor to 3. First welcomed as a volunteer, then farewelled, and now welcomed again as a real employee. Had a fun time chatting with Glory and hearing about her soon-to-be born baby (just found out this morning that she had a baby girl! Yay – soon I’ll have a new baby on campus to play with!). Also drank multiple bottles of Cherry Plum and enjoyed their equivalent of beef jerky. Danced a bit but really just got a kick out of watching the male teachers try to convince the females to dance with them. Looked a little bit like they were just trying to herd some goats together as the girls kept trying to escape.

Last weekend we had a little mini-holiday because we had Monday off. So Banda and I decided to go down to Maji Zuwa which is a lodge about an hour and a half away and not coincidentally about as far as I can go with my back pains. Luckily I was able to sit in the front seat of the minibus so it wasn’t too bad…. Except for when a new mother came in and just spread herself out into my seat. Can’t really elbow a baby in the head, so I just suffered through until she got off. Had a lovely time at the lodge. It still has a really quiet atmosphere which is fine with me, as we just spent our time swimming, lounging around, chatting with Frank, and playing Bawo. I beat Banda for the first time ever so that was a proud moment! Kaunda and his wife and Annie and her husband drove down for one of the days so we also had a fun time swimming and chatting with them. Always funny to run into Chaminade people off-campus. They showed us a little beach down the way that actually has sand rather than slippery rocks, so that was very welcome as well. The waves were particularly rough which, although making me nervous for Banda who is not so great of a swimmer, was also adorable to watch him squeal as the waves almost swept him off his feet. There was a brie (BBQ) on Sunday afternoon so the place was full of people which was a fun change. Although having to sit and listen to the drunk chief ask me for airfare to America was not so much fun :) The brie was sponsored by Matt’s mom who was visiting him with her boyfriend. So that was nice to chat with them and then Matt and I also had a very nice chat as we had a couple of beers and mused about life in Malawi. A lovely weekend away!

We returned on Monday afternoon just in time for a lunch date with Jim and Robyn (our nurse friends from America and Australia). They have just returned from holiday and were forced to move into a new house which is ridiculously huge and not to their liking as they preferred their former small abode. Got the grand tour and then lounged out on the porch which is the best part of the whole place. Enjoyed their cooking and conversation as usual but the best part was dessert – Snickers bars!! I never bought them here because I thought they were too expensive, but upon checking this weekend, they’re really only $1.25. Snickers bars, here I come. It was nice to see them again and as always I appreciate that they watch over me just as they did with all of the volunteers.

Someone’s been jumping over our back wall and stealing things. But in a very odd manner. Things taken? My razor. Banda’s boxers. Banda’s flipflops. An odd assortment considering there were several pots/pans/dishes out there as well as clothes and our stove-top cooker. I am rather sad about the razor since it was one of those nice ones where you just replace the cartridges. Fortunately, though, Banda fashioned a new handle out of half a clothes-pin!

Despite my back, I’ve actually had a really good couple of weeks health-wise. I don’t know if it was all of those meds wiping out anything bad in my system or the fact that I’m back on doxycycline (daily anti-malarial meds) so that’s suppressing everything. But I’ve had more energy and felt more like myself than I have in the 5 months since being back. So that is a huge relief. It’s made all of the difference in my general mood – feeling unwell all the time sucks! – so I’m very grateful and hoping that it keeps continuing this way!

Realized that I need to stop trying to reason with my house builder because it’s just never going to work. How did I decide this? Well Banda and I spent about 10 solid minutes trying to convince him that 50 kgs of cement weighs the same as 50 kgs of corn. Sigh. If you can’t accept that, sir, then I just give up.

We went to a concert at Planet for Organised Family and Wendy (forgot her last name). Unfortunately the people we went with insisted on getting there 2 hours before the guys started playing so I was pretty done with it all before it even started. Did enjoy dancing for a while but then it got to the point in the night where all of the guys in the audience were drunk and staggering and fighting and pushing, which is never really fun to be in the middle of. One of the artists played something suspiciously like a country song that made me laugh. Country music in Malawi – oi vey. Wendy was also pretty hilarious with all of her dancing antics onstage. All-in-all though it still did not even come close to matching the Baska Baska/Peterson concert. It also seems that girls have gotten skankier (and drunker) since I was at Planet a year ago, at least in terms of their clothing. It’s a bad sign when you can’t tell a hule (prostitute) from a college girl. I honestly had no idea half the time who was who. Also, BIG NEWS. Planet is classing itself up, former volunteers. It has its name on the building with a flashing spotlight. There’s a neon sign pointing you to the back bar. There’s a second bar where the couch/lounge used to be – I actually think that was a mistake lol. But most impressively is the bathroom! For those of you who have not had the sheer honor of going to Planet, let me describe the old bathroom for you. There was no door. So everyone stood there and watched you pee. There was no toilet seat. There was rarely any water to flush it. And no toilet paper, so I always had to bring a pocketful from home. And there was a shower right in front of the toilet, so girls would just pee in the shower while you’re on the toilet. Awesome lol. But NOW, there’s a door! Wowzers, this alone is news. Also, there’s a toilet seat and toilet paper. And a mirror and a functioning sink! If I had brought my camera, I definitely would have taken a picture I was so blown away. Next time. Got home around 2 am.

Dragged ourselves out of bed early the next morning to do our weekly shopping. Also went to immigration so Banda can get a passport and then bike taxied all over town trying to go to the water board and electric companies. Failed as they were closed early, so we headed over to the Museum restaurant where we were due to have lunch with Ms. Kim (the Korean opera singer). Her son was here to visit so in honor of that she was having a lunch concert. Her students get better every time we hear them and I thoroughly enjoyed sitting there listening to their new jazz numbers. Ms. Kim wants me to teach her English… eek. I agreed before I realized what she was saying. I thought she just wanted to chat to practice her English. But nope. Twice a week. Paid. That’s nice, but I have no idea what to do. How do I teach English to someone whose English I think is already just fine? We’ll see how it goes….

Bit the bullet and bought the $3.50 can of tuna. Made tuna salad sandwiches and it was GLORIOUS. So worth it. Now if only I can find olives, the meal will be complete… Banda actually loved it too – a surprise since my family makes it with carrots and onions in it – so I think it will be a semi-regular meal, despite the cost.

So. Bad news. Sick again. This time, quite bad. Started out with a simple UTI which have just about driven me around the bend here. I’ve basically had them for 3 months straight. They go away for a couple of days but then always come back. This means that I can’t go anywhere because I have a peeing emergency every 30 minutes. I can barely make it in town much less go to Embangweni or Nkhata Bay or anywhere else remotely fun. So I went to Mbukwa Clinic on Saturday which is a private clinic in town. Was very impressed by the doctor – he really seemed to understand UTIs, whereas the other doctors I’ve told just have blank faces of no recognition. But he went off talking about why women are more prone to them and how they’re becoming drug resistant. I was impressed. Anyways, got the meds. Went home. Ended up having a massive headache that has been persisting now for 6 days. Also was queasy. I figured these were just side effects of the drugs because that’s just too big of a coincidence to get malaria on the same day as the drugs begin. But then I started getting fevers and really bad chills. I’ve never had such chills where I was little convulsing because my body wouldn’t stay still. Thank goodness for Ibuprofen as that would lower it enough so I could sleep. Still woke up a couple of times with the chills though. The next morning (Monday) Banda decided I should go to the hospital since the fever/chills/awful feeling are all classic signs of malaria (plus the headaches and nausea) and were scaring him. Big debate about where to actually go. I’d sworn off KDH. Never again. But none of the private clinics have the laboratories needed to do a urinalysis (which we wanted to determine if the UTI was more severe and thus the cause of the fever). So we went to KDH. And it was a completely LOVELY experience! I was shocked. I’ve decided that they put all of their competent, nice people on the day shift and the awful ones at night :) We walked in and were greeted with smiles and respectful concern. The nurses loved me from the get-go. In fact, I wish I had been feeling better so I truly could have enjoyed our chatting. We were buds. And they told me that Osama Bin Laden had been killed. Love how I was apparently the last person in the world to know. (Side note: People dancing in the streets celebrating it? Oh some Americans (not all clearly), sometimes I shake my head at ya’ll. I wanted to crawl under the table when that news story came on in a crowded restaurant. I get that he was an awful guy. But celebrating an assassination? Yes let’s just meet hate with more hate. Sigh.). The clinical officer was the same guy who called me a drug addict before… I was worried when I saw it was him. But I think he had an attack of the conscience because he acted like he didn’t know me and was very professional and actually listened to my symptoms and treated me with respect. I was thankful. Although I did have one moment of wanting to pop him in the mouth. He asked if I’d had the kidney stone verified by an ultrasound and I wanted to say “no, jackass, you called me a drug addict and sent me away to writhe in pain for 4 days.” But he was perfectly nice, so I acted accordingly. I guess it makes all the difference when there aren’t insane nurses around who scream at you and lie when presenting your symptoms to the clinical officer. Took a malaria test which came back negative. Was told to come back the next morning for the urinalysis and an ultrasound to make sure my kidneys were clear. So we went home and came back the next morning, Tuesday. Spent 4 hours at the hospital. Oi. And that was only so short because Banda kept irritating them so much by constantly checking on the lab that I think they just wanted to get rid of us. Spent most of the time on the floor as there were so many people there. I’d say at least 100 in the lab/x-ray waiting area. God only knows how many there were in the other areas. I can’t imagine working at that hospital… I think I’d spend my life depressed and stressed beyond belief knowing that I’d never be able to serve them the way they should be served. So God bless the ones who manage to do it every day with a smile. I think it would also drive me crazy that things are done so inefficiently. I feel like they could just change a couple of simple administrative things and it would make a world of difference. Anyways, the urinalysis was all clear – not surprising since by that point I’d been taking the UTI antibiotics for 3 days. Had to wait 2 hours for the ultrasound guy to show up, but the scan also showed no remaining stones so that puts my mind at ease a bit. That was actually pretty fun although definitely had no idea what I was looking at! After those 3 hours we then got to wait for another hour to see the clinical officer. Who basically just told me that everything was negative so I should keep taking the UTI drugs and come back next week if I still feel sick. Thank you for that gem of wisdom sir. So it was basically a pointless 4 hours but at least I know I don’t have a kidney infection (which of course I’d convinced myself was the case). So I went home. Wednesday I woke up with a banging headache, massive sinus pressure, and diarrhea (sorry, TMI I know, but it’s important for the story). Again, malaria, anyone? Banda decided that he didn’t care what the test said, I was getting the malaria drugs. This makes me uneasy. But it’s also pretty much the only option. Everything else came back clean and for the other stuff – Typhoid, TB – I have had recently updated vaccines. And if it were a simple sinus infection, I wouldn’t have stomach problems. Likewise, if I’d eaten something weird or had a stomach bug, I wouldn’t have the sinus issues, cough, or headache. If watching ‘House’ taught me anything, it’s to look for the all-encompassing illness. Getting 2 illnesses concurrently is doubtful. So malaria was the last shot. Plus I have multiple friends who have tested negative even though they clearly have malaria and they improved with the meds. So I figured I might as well. Because by this point, I’d been sick for 4 days. My main worry was if I just leave it, then I’d feel pretty stupid/dead in 4 more days when it’s gotten ridiculously severe. So we went to Maneno Clinic this time and got the meds. Took them for 4 days. No real change. The general feeling of listlessness went away, but in the last 2 days of it I developed a wicked cough and then an ear infection to join the stomach problems. So we went to Care Private Clinic in order to get medicine for the ears/cough because to be honest, I am a baby about ear infections. And this is coming from someone who already admits to not doing well with being sick. But ear infections? I was crying from it within 3 minutes of it starting. Went to Care where the guy was ridiculously arrogant. Bent over and got a shot of penicillin in the butt. Spent 30 minutes thinking I was going to seize because OMG what if I didn’t know I was allergic? Made it through that hurdle. Took his antibiotics for 4 days. Still have the cough. And my ears still hurt when I yawn. I’m done with medicine. And incompetent doctors who are just guessing. Because as a summary: 5 trips to 4 different hospital/clinics; 5 different doctors; 5 different medications; 2 malaria tests; 1 urinalysis; and 1 ultrasound. It’s just been a pain in the butt experience overall. Bu-dum-ching. Because my behind still hurts – 4 days later – from that damn shot. At least I still make myself laugh.

So my holiday turned out to be not so eventful! Just around the house, watching movies, cooking, and cleaning. Banda went back to work after the first week, so I was alone a lot but that’s fine because the whole morning is consumed by practical tasks – washing dishes, cooking lunch, collecting water, showering – and then the afternoon is relaxing. Back to work on Monday. I don’t think I’m ready for it. I like just being around the house and I don’t feel like it’s been 3 weeks off, that’s for sure! I even had an extra week because the last week was supposed to be First Aid training. But it was in vernacular. And I’ve been certified since I was 15 since I’ve always been a lifeguard. So I got excused from that, thank goodness!

Awful bat experience 2.0: Well I told ya’ll before about the bats swooping in and out, scaring the living daylights out of me. I’ve also had bats fly up out of the hole while I’m over it… again, terrifying. I thought those were the worst things possible. I was wrong. So one night a few weeks ago, the bat was swooping in and out as usual. I remained calm. Tried to finish peeing so I could get the heck out of there. And then the bat’s stupid radar system must’ve malfunctioned because it hit the ceiling – BAM – and a second later I feel something hit my back. That’s right. The bat fell on my back. AHHH. And then to make matters worse, I’m trying to brush it off but it has decided to HANG ON FOR DEAR LIFE. WTF stupid bat?! Apparently I was screaming bloody murder – I don’t remember hearing it – because Banda came running out. By this point I’ve finally smacked the bat off and have run out of the chimbuzi (pit latrine) with my underwear and shorts down around my ankle. Good moment in our relationship. Anyways, the bat escaped. And we started a 3 week vendetta against these damn bats. Because oh that’s right, we realized there are not 2. Not 3. But 4 f-ing bats who have made our latrine home. So we’ve spent multiple nights standing by the door with brooms and mops, trying to knock them out of the sky. When that didn’t work, we tried to Doom (like Raid) them to death and cover the hole to let them suffocate. I think we might have killed 2 that way. But there are still 2 hanging on, swooping up while I’m crouched over the hole. Let me tell ya, there’s nothing much scarier than looking into the eyes of a bat as it’s flying towards your exposed behind. Shudder. I spent a week or so refusing to pee in the latrine after dark, choosing instead to just pee in the bushes. I’ve since gone back in – recurring UTIs, periods, bouts of stomach issues, and malaria will do that to a person. Fortunately, the bat and I have entered into a truce. I walk slowly up to the door, dragging my feet to make enough noise. He flies out and (usually) keeps out until I’m done. Thank goodness.

Had a lovely moment of going to church with Banda. He goes to the New Apostolic church which is apparently similar to Roman Catholic. He doesn’t go very often because it’s in Ngonde (language) which he doesn’t understand, but he still likes going for the community aspect. So we went one weekend and I knew it was going to be wonderful just from the feeling of happiness as we wove our way through the rice fields, barely peeping out above the tall reeds. And when he pointed out the mango tree from across the field and said that’s where the church is. They used to have a building but it was destroyed in the earthquakes last year. So now they just set up a little altar and some school forms (benches) under the mango tree. As I was sitting there I just kept thinking, “This is the way religion should be.” Who needs a huge church that costs millions to build and is so ornate it’s practically a royal palace? Psh. Give me a mango tree with corn fields on one side and rice paddies on the other any day. So since I didn’t understand any of the language, I basically just enjoyed my surroundings and made faces/friends with the baby sitting next to me. They did introduce me (as they do all visitors in small churches here) which caused some excitement and hilarity as first they thought we were brother and sister (really?!) and then Madame Mumba stood up and explained that we were actually married. Good ol’ Madame.

Had a very interesting conversation about politics in Malawi because things here are a little stirred up at the moment. Not in action but more in thought as a lot of people are growing more irritated with the President. Democracy seems to be struggling a bit and he recently kicked the British Ambassador out of Malawi because he’s been critical of suspected human rights violations. So anyways, politics are always a topic of conversation here and I’ve recently been wondering how people think politically here because when I came 18 months ago, people loved the President. My main question was about the different platforms of parties. Because there are a plethora of parties so I was curious as to what makes them unique and thus attractive to different voters. Well in response he told me this whole explanation of how political parties form. AKA the concept of different platforms is not known here. He was very interested when I explained to him how Democrats and Republicans have different notions of how things should be addressed. So basically whenever someone wants to run for office here in Malawi, they just form their own new party. And then they pick a few things as their “causes” – i.e. health, food, freedom. Real examples I promise. And that’s it. No actual explanation of how to implement those things. I mean everyone wants freedom and enough food. But how to do it? It seems like opposing sides could lay out different plans for food security, no? But not here. He said that the opposing party isn’t allowed to pick the same things as their causes because that would be “plagiarism.” So basically it boils down to them just picking someone who is charismatic and who they like as a personality. Obviously in the U.S. charisma also plays its role, but at least (I hope) there’s some sense of the issues.

The madames on campus (teachers’ wives mainly and the 2 female teachers at Chaminade) have a group that takes care of a lot of the social welfare issues around Chaminade. For example, when someone’s in the hospital, they cycle through cooking meals for the family. When there’s a party for school, the women do all of the cooking. And when someone new moves to campus, they come to the house to officially greet and welcome. This is what I was privy to a couple of weekends ago. Madame Mvula and Madame Nkhata stopped by the weekend before (of course while I was washing dishes so I – and the house – was a wreck) to let me know they’d all be coming the next weekend. Enter “Alyson being terrified and nauseous for an entire week.” I was having flashbacks of the first women party where I spent the whole time trying to stave off a panic attack and making everything think I was a weirdo in the process. Sigh. But I bought the snacks, chilled extra water and tried to wring as much information out of Banda as possible about what might happen. Because it’s not just about being shy and having to keep up conversation with a bunch of women who barely speak English. The real anxiety was stemming from hosting. If they’d been coming to greet me in America? No problem. Plop yourself down on the couch and I’ll grab you a soda. But here tradition and expected signs of respect are so interwoven into everything, that my mind reeled. I kept trying to tell myself that 1. I get a lot of free passes for my clumsiness since they just attribute it to me being a crazy mzungu and 2. That they already have impressions of me and I can’t change them, so why worry. That kept it down to a near panic. 5 minutes before 3 pm Banda scooted out of the house and I was left alone to await the masses. Oh but he told me there would probably only be 5 or 6 women. Wrong. Try 18. They “Odi”ed which is the word you call out when approaching a house. I opened the door and squeaked “Tampokelelani” meaning “You are most welcome.” That apparently wasn’t enough because they just stood there until I said “Njirani” which means “Please get in.” Oh man lol I huddle by the door as they come flooding in. We’re all wearing chitenjes. Thank God I knew enough to know that that attire was expected. Madame Nkhata hands me a wrapped basin… without saying anything… I assume it’s for me and take it into the kitchen. They all squeeze in on the floor and our couch and I perch anxiously on my chair. I tell them all to “feel free” and that they are most welcome in our home. Silence. I forgot to go around and shake all of their hands. Whoops. More silence. Finally one of the Madames pipes up. They do self introductions and then tell me about the works they do around campus. This is all interspersed with silence and then Chitumbuka (vernacular language) as they bicker amongst themselves about who should talk. The one female teacher who has perfect English is inexplicably silent lol. So anyways, they finish all of the updates and decide that there’s no point in sitting around because we can’t chat with one another. I do know enough vernacular to get that. So they ask for the basin back. P.A.N.I.C. Oh my god I was mortified, thinking that I had stolen someone else’s flour as my own when really they were just handing it to me for safe-keeping until we went to Madame Mughogho’s house (our next stop). So, face like a tomato and shaking like a leaf, I scurry into the kitchen and return with the basin. Hi-larious laughter. They explain that I can keep what’s in it. They just want the dish back. Thanks universe at least I wasn’t stealing flour. But now the question is where to put it? We don’t have basins. So while they all wait restlessly in the living room, I’m in the kitchen trying to untie the knot with shaky hands. Thank goodness for Annie (the teacher who speaks perfect English) who came in to save me! Of course Banda calls at this point of chaos. The women run my phone into me and I’m faced with a dilemma. Answer the phone while they’re rummaging around thinking I’m an incompetent fool? Or ignore my husband – huge scandal here? I answer the phone. Cut him short. Turn around and see that Annie has grabbed the baking flour bag and is about to dump in their gift. Thank goodness I realized in time… because they were giving us maize flour (for nsima). Would’ve ruined a whole bag! Finally get that sorted out and then we all walk next door together to do the same thing for Mrs. Mughogho. And then on to Annie’s house to give condolences for her cousin who had passed away. All in all, a very terrifying afternoon. Although I do think it is a lovely sentiment and I’m now prepared for the next time when Banda gets repositioned elsewhere in Malawi.

So I know I owe ya’ll a house update because it’s been a few weeks since I’ve mentioned it. The only problem is, it makes me so livid and puts me in such a foul mood, that I’ve been trying to avoid writing this post. But I’ve got a little split-screen action going on and am watching “Modern Family” simultaneously, so I’m hoping that wonderfulness will cancel out the rage. Because let’s be honest. The house is a nightmare. From beginning to end, it’s been one battle after another. It’s probably good that Laura left when she did, because I think she would have lost it long ago and we would have had a recreation of the hospital’s verbal undressing. Which is precisely what I did eventually. :) So at the beginning everything seemed to be going okay. It was all going very quickly with the actual building. But that’s just because I trusted people and didn’t truly see what was going on. Theft. That’s right, turns out people were stealing from me. Not only metaphorically stealing from me by creating jobs, presenting them as necessary, while I eventually find out they’re not. But literally stealing bags of cement and then reselling them. Cosmas. The builder. The one who I truly trusted and thought was awesome. Nope. One of my neighbors came to me and told me she had seen it happening and her conscious would not allow it to go unsaid. So we halted work on the project and attempted to have some consequences. Many meetings ensued but Cosmas denied the allegations (of course) and unfortunately the lady was too scared to come testify. Because she is old and lives alone in that neighborhood and was afraid the guys would come beat her up. And there’s no such thing as a police or legal presence here that could protect her. Which as a woman, I completely understand. Enter Flipout #1: Cosmas kept calling the lady a liar and when I explained to him why she was scared, he blew it off as if she were stupid. Oh I flipped out and basically told him to step the hell off because he is a privileged man in a chauvinistic society so he cannot understand. But anyways, we had a bunch of meetings and delayed for 2 weeks but nothing came of it. Drives me ABSOLUTELY INSANE that that asshole just got away with stealing from me. And that there’s nothing I can do about it. So clearly I did not want to continue with him. The only problem is that we’re so close from finishing that hiring someone else to pick up where he left off would cost even more money. And I keep hearing that all builders here are crooked, so who’s to say that the next guy wouldn’t steal too. Which side note is really upsetting to me. Whatever happened to common decency and honesty?! They claim to be such a Christian peoples, full of neighborly goodness and big on respect. But where is that when you’re stealing from me and trying to milk every last dime out of me?! F-ing hypocritical. But I digress. So we decided to keep Cosmas since it’d be too costly to switch. Had yet another meeting where we informed him that we wanted a discount on his labor costs. Because we’ve spent over 100,000 Kwacha on labor alone…. More than the cost of bricks and cement… which is totally ridiculous. I’ll explain why it was so much during another paragraph about their costly “mistakes” and “misunderstandings.” Point being, we got a discount and work continued. So at this point, the house is basically finished. They’ve finished the plastering and flooring. They just need to do some plaster around the foundation to keep the bricks from washing away. And then the plumber needs to install the toilet and sink. And then they need to do the septic tank and pit latrine. I’m just so ready for it to be finished. This really just has been a nightmare. To be honest, my 4 months of being back in Malawi have been filled with infinitely more frustrations than my year before. And I’ve had many more moments of wanting to come home. Not only immediately. But also in the future. I always said that I’d stay here as long as it made me happy. Well lately I’ve been envisioning that change to not being happy coming a lot sooner than previously imagined. But just today, I realized that 90% of that frustration has come from the house. Having to fight people on every single step, feeling like no one is listening to you, and being cheated repeatedly by people who are supposed to be your neighbors? Really not good emotionally. So I keep reminding myself that soon it will be over. And that I will not judge my return to Malawi until it is. Because then I think everything will shake down to living here still being a good life decision for the present and near future. Side note: I’d stopped Modern Family to go check on some boiling eggs and then came back and was typing without restarting the show…. All of a sudden I just noticed that my stress level had risen dramatically. Reason? I’m saying the lack of that hilarity. So I wanted to give some examples of these frustrations so that ya’ll can get an idea of what I’ve been dealing with every single day. There have been so many things that they’ve done which are contrary to my express instructions. Or they don’t even ask but just do stuff and then tell me about it later. And all they say is “sorry” but who has to pay for it?! Me. That’s who. Because there’s no concept here of professional accountability. They do whatever they want and then just show up with the bill and you can’t object because they’ve already “done the work.” - Simple House vs. Perfect Advertisement. The main root of the problem. At the very beginning of all of this – when Cosmas and I were discussing floor plans – I made it expressly clear that what I wanted was a simple home. That I just needed somewhere to move for now that would be safe and big enough for 2. That this was not my dream home where I would spend the rest of my life. That Banda would be transferred at some point, so it would spend most of its time being rented. Now how on earth would one translate that into “Please make something perfect that you Mr. Builder can use as an advertisement of your skills.” Not at all. But that’s what he told me when we questioned him on how the cost had ballooned into twice as much as the original budget. That he wanted it to be perfect and top of the line. So that other people would want to hire him in the future. Even though every time I was presented with an option, I would always pick the cheaper one. Never once did I say, “Oh yes please pick the best one.” No, I always said “whatever is cheaper.” Lime, paint, window frames, doors, wall supports, bricks, cement mixtures. EVERYTHING. Always went for the cheaper option. But nope, he found his way to use more supplies and use more workers and Bam. I could have smacked him when he said that about it being an advertisement. And all I got out of him was a “sorry.” Well tell you what buddy, your “mistake” and “advertisement” just cost me a few thousand US dollars. But your “sorry” really makes up for all that. Not. - Sheer Laziness. This mainly centered around assistants… he went and hired multiple assistants without telling me until the job was almost done. And then what can I say? They’ve done the work, they have to be paid. Note: They were never around when I came to the site. I kept telling him that I hired him as a builder… not a contractor. If you’re too lazy to do the work yourself, YOU pay for the help, not me. But again, that concept is lost on him. We’ve had huge fights about this and yet for the pit latrine and the septic tank, they’ve requested more assistants. I just want to scream at him: “are you kidding me?!” He never learns. The thing that actually made me lose it completely and start unleashing my anger on him was about assistants. When we did the discounts, their current assistant decided that it wasn’t enough money so he quit. They failed to hire a new one. I was happy since I’d never authorized an assistant in the first place. And then Cosmas came to me when the job was finished and said that he was claiming the assistant money because… get this… he was his own assistant. Hold the F up, buddy. How can you be your own assistant for work that you were supposed to be doing on your own anyway?!? - I say one thing, they do another. I tell them not to make a door yet. I come home one day and there’s a door sitting outside my house. I tell them specifically which lock to buy. The guy shows up and tells me that he has bought one that is far more expensive. I ask for the driver to go look to see if the road is passable and to come back to me with feedback. He decides that it’s not and then just goes and buys bricks elsewhere without consulting me about any of this. - Not doing things honestly or rationally. Not carrying full truck loads of materials. Huge problem when transport somehow became the most expensive part of the house-building. The carpenter just cutting the door instead of doing measurements. Now there’s an inch gap up top. So we need a new door. Cannot even imagine the fight that will ensue, even though it was clearly his ineptitude that caused the problem. Women still carrying water and expecting to be paid… when we’d halted work on the house. Who carries water when no one is using it?!?!? The carpenter comes to me and says he needs timber for fischer boards. This to me means that it’s necessary for the structure of the house. I then show up and find out that they’re just some stupid boards that are put up for decoration. Every time I look at those damn boards it makes me want to spit. We spent a good hour fighting with the water ladies about finishing their job. Namely spreading water over the concrete floor so that it wouldn’t crack. Everyone knew this was a necessary task. The job isn’t done until we decide that things have been done properly. I’m sorry, but a cracked floor is not okay. So their job isn’t finished until the floor is fine. The whole time I just kept thinking “I can’t believe that we’re fighting about something so obvious.” Clearly just another case of people trying to get more money than they deserve. We had another fight with the builders about the septic tank. He claims that building it should be a separate job and thus deserving of more labor charges. Umm no. It’s a self-contained house. This means that it has a toilet and a shower inside. How can you have that without a septic tank?!?! It just doesn’t make sense. It’s part of finishing that house. Without it, that whole room just doesn’t work. Now to Banda and I (and hopefully to ya’ll) the logic of that is clearly sound. But nope, he just kept saying that it was a separate job. And could not give me a rational reason when I asked. Well I’ll tell you what, sir, you’ve destroyed your right to say something is so and have me just believe it. That fight is still outstanding… Let you know who wins. And finally, the sand. The truck owner comes and says the builders requested 3 more loads of sand. Now that’s funny, because I had seen them the day before and they never mentioned that. So I go to talk it over with them. The sand is already at the site. It was there when they got there that morning. They never asked for it. So basically, the truck owner 1. Flat out lied and said they needed it and 2. Did the work before I authorized it. I’m so sick of all of this dishonesty!! So now there’s just sand sitting there unused. And yet he’s going to try to charge me 15,000 for the trips. Again, another fight still waiting to be had. - Guilting the mzungu. We spent over $100 on food for the workers. Now, I know that doesn’t sound like a lot, but here in Malawi it’s an astronomical amount. I don’t even spend that much in a month at the market buying everything (3 meals-a-day of food, household supplies, etc) that our 2 person house needs for the whole month. So how can it be that much for 3 guys’ basic lunches for 3 weeks? Oh that’s right, because the water ladies were also hanging around so they could eat. Totally unacceptable. Way too much money. Especially because we weren’t even obligated to be feeding them. Yet another thing that they presented as necessary only to find out later that it wasn’t. But yet when we told them that we were no longer feeding them, they freaked out and we spent yet another hour fighting about it and explaining to everyone involved. And then the best part. The guilting. They tried to make me feel bad that they hadn’t eaten any lunch that day. I’m sorry but no. When I showed up at the house, one guy was sleeping and the other was off at the video show. So clearly you’d stopped working for the day. If you’re so freaking hungry, go home and eat. Stop sittin’ around waiting to have something handed to you. You have wives who have spent years cooking for you and will willingly prepare lunch for you so you can pop in and eat. So don’t try to make me feel guilty when you’re not taking the initiative to do the rational thing. So those are just some of the lovely things that I’ve gotten to deal with virtually every single day since being here. It’s been very defeating emotionally. Am ready for it to be over.

I signed up for a local fresh vegetable delivery service thing, and they bring me a crate of fresh veggies every Thursday (provided I order it, which I'm not this week because I've an over abundance of veggies already). But they're just random veggies, and each time they have included lemons. I cannot tell you how much these lemons have befuddled me. Vegetables, regardless what kind, can be turned into a stew or made special or something but, for me, you just eat fruit. Chomp, chomp, chomp. But I am not eating a lemon. (I received 2 or 3 lemons each time, that is not enough for lemonade, which I'm not that interested in making anyway.)

Eventually (while eating out) it struck me that I could put them in water! (shut up) And so I did and they are delicious in tea (all by themselves) as well as in cold water and I am delighted with my lemons. (I even tried to eat a lemon, out of curiosity, and decided it definitely needs to be diluted.)

Out of procrastination, I looked up 'hot water with lemon.' (This is much like looking up the word 'cheese' or 'dragon.') I read about diets and health benefits and 'how to prepare hot water with lemon,' which was ridiculous. But they missed out on the main point in nearly all the posts (or else, they hid it somewhere in the middle and I, merely amused, didn't actually read it all) - LEMON IS DELICIOUS IN HOT/COLD WATER!!

I'm fully aware that this isn't that amusing of an antidote, but I don't care. I'm going to drink my lemon tea now. mmmmmmmm

Once again, apologies for the long gap! This time it’s actually not a product of my own laziness but rather a lack of internet. We went on holiday last week so I don’t have access every day and when I’ve walked to the wireless spot for the last 4 days, it’s been off. Thanks largely in part to other human beings turning off the router or electricity going out 5 minutes before I arrive. Thanks, Universe. And then we do finally get it to work, but not on my computer, so I’ve had to be borrowing one from the brothers. But today, it’s finally working so I’m seizing my opportunity! I’m very excited as I’ve been feeling very disconnected and homesick without any communication.

Things have been going well with living at Banda’s place. It was 3 weeks last Saturday and we seem to stay well together. We cook and clean and do dishes together. The pair of us had a terrible cooking day the other day, with Banda first burning beans and then rice and then I turned the dinner pasta into pasta porridge mush. But other than that, we seem to do ok. We had a lovely laundry lesson yesterday and it turns out, I’ve been doing it wrong the whole time! No more bleeding knuckles for me!! So I’m gonna keep practicing on that because it’d be nice not to have to pay someone to do it, plus it’s a bit of a pride issue with the other madames. He loves my fried rice which is awesome since that means I get to eat it all the time! And I’m just getting spoiled with food in general. I never bought meat here because it’s expensive and we get it 3 times a week at school for lunch anyway. But Banda eats all of his meals at home, so he does buy it. So basically I get meat every day, sometimes twice a day! Alyson’s gonna start gaining weight in Africa, the likes of which have only been seen by one Chris Tavares. :)

There has been massive flooding in Karonga lately because we had torrential rain storms for a week straight. Several houses were knocked down and something like 10 people have died as water levels inside were up to the windows and outside of buildings it was above neck-level. The marketplace was closed because it was completely flooded out, so they set up outside of the market. It’s still like that 2 weeks later. Not going to lie, working our way through that crowd was rather panic inducing. Gondwe’s shop has dramatically downsized as one of the walls of their main shop was washed away.

Met a geologist from Paladin the other day as he picked us up and gave us a lift to town. It was fun to hear all about his job and the workings of uranium exploration. Only lasted 5 minutes and yet it was just one of those random meetings that I love about Malawi.

Vitu’s still a little problem. He quickly went from adorable to annoying as he shows up at the house constantly, screams “Mzungu” at the top of his lungs, demands money from us, calls Banda a liar, and tries to break his way into the house. Thank goodness for locks.

We tried to go to Banda’s home village during the first week of holiday, so that he could present me to them. Oh the pressure. Terrifyingly nervous, but it had to happen at some point and I knew in the end I’d end up loving the trip, so I got over the nerves. Got up at 5:30 to prepare for the journey and then got delayed by rains. We intended to walk to town, but with the rains decided for a lift instead. None of the brothers were picking up their phones, nor were the half dozen taxi numbers that we tried. Finally Brother Paul came through and dropped us at the bus depot. Unfortunately I started having back spasms about 30 minutes in and since we were squeezed in so tight – Banda was already halfway off the seat due to lack of space – there’s no chance at shifting to a more comfortable position. I have been having constant back pain for the 4 months of being here – if you remember I messed it up shortly after coming here – but there are no chiropractors here and even if the problem’s more serious, there’s no way in hell I’m letting some untrained doctor poke around; oh and no chance at pain meds because Lord knows, then I’d be a drug addict. Anyway, the pain is always there but it dulls sometimes and then I’ll do something that kicks it up again, like shifting books in the library or hauling buckets of water. It just so happens that I hauled water the day before our trip. And being on the minibus aggravated it even worse with all of the bumps and sitting in a god-awfully-uncomfortable position. Result = back spasms with pain shooting up my spine and down into my legs. So I ended up crying silently because the pain was so excruciating and I knew that I had 7 more hours to travel in that same manner. Banda noticed pretty quickly and insisted we get off at Chilumba – about an hour’s drive. I tried to make him continue on his own because his family was so excited to see him and we’d already canceled once before. But he maintained that he would only go with me. Felt incredibly guilty, but there was simply no way that I could stomach that pain for 7 hours. So we turned around and came home. Tried to get a taxi but the prices were outlandish, so instead settled for the front seat of the minibus. Still uncomfortable, but at least there was space to shift a bit. So next time, we’ll aim for that seat or else a coaster which has established seating so there’s a bit more space. Definitely a disappointing experience. Banda was wonderful of course, trying to assuage my guilt, insisting that I lay in bed for the rest of the day and making sure I eat his prepared meals. And his mother called and said that she wished me a quick recovery and that she “accepts and welcomes” me as her daughter-in-law. Very sweet. And makes my stomach butterflies calm down a bit when I think about going there.

Banda’s birthday was on Saturday and it turned out to be just not our day. Went shopping like usual. It was raining heavily which meant we were soaked 30 seconds into the shopping. I then spent a good hour walking through every inch of the market – three times – in an attempt to find a present for Banda. I even had a backup option, but failed to find either. Eventually gave up and we went home. Where we realized that I had somehow lost the keys. Big mystery because we both saw them in my bag as I was climbing into the car for the last time. Who knows. We’ll probably find them in the brothers’ car a couple of weeks from now. So we ended up sitting on our front porch, wet and starving, waiting for Clifford to come and break us into our house. We did get to enjoy some lovely Snickerdoodles though and watched “Penelope” which Banda calls the “pig-face movie” and simply loves.

This was the major question running through my mind most of Saturday and Sunday. All of my worldly possessions (at least for my current life here in Malawi) fit into less than 3 suitcases when I came here 3 months ago. And yet somehow it took 2 truckloads to get everything into Banda’s house. But I’m jumping ahead of myself.

Last week I told Madame Principal of my upcoming move to Banda’s house because – I don’t know why but – things like that are shared here. Personal details are expected to be told to management and if they’re not, well the moment something happens you get a talking to about “why didn’t you share this before?” So I told Madame who promptly told Madame Mwalweni… and everyone else found out lol. Doesn’t bother me, I knew it would happen, but it does make me laugh at how fast news travels here. I feel like even people I’ve never met before know of my living situation now. The awesome thing about Madame Principal telling Madame Mwalweni is that Banda and I were called in for a meeting. Sounds daunting, but it’s actually a lovely sentiment. She was taking me as her daughter and as such she wanted to give Banda her blessing and also ask him to take good care of me and treat me well. And to offer herself as an Auntie with advice if ever we need it. It was all very sweet. I definitely teared up a little bit as she was talking about how I was a daughter of herself and MIRACLE in general and how they love me and want me to be happy.

Of course I failed to really pack beforehand so I spent a couple of frantic days throwing everything into boxes and suitcases. Let me tell you, even packing here seems more arduous. It’s not like you can run down to the store and buy some cardboard boxes or even trashbags. So there hits a point where you’re at a loss as to where to put things. Laundry baskets saved me. As did the box that Laura’s parents sent (thanks!). On top of this, there’s no air conditioning and it’s unbelievably hot in that house whenever you’re not lounging directly in front of the fan. So hot for most of those 2 days of packing and additional day of cleaning that I thought I was going to faint. But I made it. So on Saturday, after a rainy shopping trip in town where we navigated our first joint shopping trip and I got to play with Baby Doreen (yay!), we loaded up the truck and drove across campus to my new home. Thank goodness Banda is the most patient, eternally optimistic, helpful man I’ve ever known because I probably would have collapsed from exhaustion hours before finishing loading the trip. For the first trip, no one was around except for children. But by the second trip, all of the wives on Zimbabwe Line had “casually” gathered to “chat” a.k.a. to watch the happenings. Makes me laugh. Side Note: Zimbabwe Line is that they call the row of 5 teachers’ houses where I now live. It is called that because funding for the project came from a Zimbabwe-based NGO. I think. Former volunteers, correct me if I’m wrong. Spent all day Sunday cleaning the 2 houses – his so that there was clean space to move in – and my old house so that it was good for the brothers. Swept out the whole house – which, by the way, seems way bigger when cleaning it all. Scrubbed out the whole bathroom so it’s now cleaner than it was when we arrived. And I learned how to mop. Sigh. I wasn’t a fan of squeezing out by hand all of that dirty water from the mop. And I don’t really even see the point of mopping. It looked exactly the same afterwards. But I did it. We also burned trash one last time – with Banda burning off his arm hair and me nearly scorching my shins.

Not gonna lie, I was a little nervous about moving in. Had a couple of moments of panic in the car as I was driving across campus. Not about being around him all the time because that I am looking forward to, but more so in terms of household stuff. Since we come from 2 very different cultures, we obviously have different lifestyles/ways of doing things, so I was just nervous about joining those. Plus coming into someone else’s house is always a bit strange. It’s not like we found a new place together and are starting fresh. He already has his own routines and even simple stuff like where he stores things and how he manages water buckets. It seems silly and small but here those things are a huge part of life because they don’t fade into the background thanks to technology and plentiful cupboards like they do in America. Here it’s a real managing task that takes up a good chunk of your time. Where does one wash hands when there is no sink? Which buckets are for dishwashing? Are those inside or outside? Is cooking done inside or outside? Where does he store clean dishes? So it’s a bit strange getting used to the new surroundings, but I’m figuring it out quickly and the nervousness has dissipated. Plus it was simply adorable how excited he was. Like a kid on Christmas morning. So that contagious joy was hard to beat.

I’ll post pictures of the place soon, but for now a bit of a written description. The house is not as big as the last one that I was in, but it’s still way too big for 2 people. There are 3 bedrooms, an outdoor kitchen, and an outdoor shower. So we’re cooking and storing dishes in the kitchen but all of the food and water and refrigerator are in one of the extra bedrooms. I’m definitely stoked about the shower! Namely because the shower at the last place didn’t work, so we had to use a bucket and cup to wash ourselves. You never really feel clean when you can’t use both hands. Always seems to be a layer of soap still on you – which admittedly is far better than a layer of dirt. But anyways, there’s a working shower here – no showerhead though, so it’s like standing under a hose. But to me, bliss. I haven’t felt this clean and refreshed in a long time. The worst thing though is that there is no toilet. Whomp whomp. So I’m using a pit latrine all the time. It’s fine during the day (although a bit of an annoyance to have to walk so far, since I’m one of those 5 year olds who always waits until it’s an outright emergency) but nighttime is another story. Had 2 near-death-from-fright experiences with the not one but TWO bats that live in the pit latrine hole. The second fright was much worse as I was pants-less and thinking that all existing bats had vacated the premises. Wrong. Also had an epic battle with a cockroach the size of your face that took two smashing to kill. But I’m surviving. And getting used to it. Finally using my head lamp. And using the MIRACLE bathroom every morning upon arrival and every afternoon before going home :) There is also no sink which is rather difficult. There’s always a bucket of water around that you can use, but then the question becomes where to pour the water. Because you can’t pour it right out the door or a lake will form. So I’ve placed a handwashing bucket in the shower so it’s easy to access and the drainage problem is solved. Since there is no sink, teeth are brushed in the front yard. I kind of like this though as it gives me a reason to stand outside and stare up at the stars. Another difference is that we wash dishes outside. Must buy a little stool or something because I’m tired of crouching or bending over and it’s only been 2 days. This also means that we don’t do dishes after dinner since it’s dark outside, so dishes are washed in the morning. Must wake up 20 minutes earlier in order to not be late for work. Today I was late :) Oh and there are ants everywhere. You walk away from a plate for 5 minutes and BAM come back to a swarm. I realize all of this sounds a bit awful. It’s really not so bad though, I promise. Just little quarks that take getting used to. And it’s worth it to have electricity and be on campus and to be with the best friend all the time. Vomit.

Meals are different too. I’m a creature of habit that’s for sure, so my meals here before generally consisted of spaghetti, pasta salad, pottage (a bean, potato stew-like mixture), eggs, and rice. To be honest, I had a menu calendar so that I wouldn’t get bean-ed out and would always have food on hand. Man I’m lame. Banda also seems to be a creature of habit for meals but just different ones. Chips (huge French Fries) and eggs are his mainstay. He also makes a lot of rice. And of course nsima. It makes me laugh though because everything either has cooking oil as a major component or is fried in said oil. Chips, the tomato sauce (basically tomatoes, onions, and oil), cabbage salad, even rice has oil in it. And best of all, hard-boiled eggs! That’s right. He fries the eggs after they’ve been hard-boiled. Timing is different too. My mother can attest to the fact that 12:00 = ready for lunch. Dinner between 6 and 7. Always. Even here where things are trickier. But Banda’s more free-spirited :) Lunch at 2, Dinner at 9. Or whenever it happens to come that day. I guess now I understand why he was always late for dinners at Laura’s and my place. Again, I’m getting used to it though.

Got to watch Banda cutting a chicken one night. What’s the right word for that? Paring? Anyways, it’s a real skill that he fortunately learned from his mother. So many different pieces and you have to know where the joints are to slice through, otherwise it all is just a big mess. I was proud of my queasy self for making it through the whole thing. And the benefit is that we get to eat all of that chicken! I feel so spoiled lol eating chicken for 4 or 5 straight days. In my 3 months here with Laura, we bought meat once…and that was only because we were having the boys over for Hamburger Night. So strange to get to have meat more than the 3 school-lunches per week.

I also had the joy of ‘babysitting’ five 4-year-olds on Sunday afternoon. I put it in quotes because really children just roam around here, so my being there was more of an entertainment than supervision. They always hang out at Banda’s place because he lets them watch TV and gives them Sobo (juice) and cookies. Alas he had to leave in the middle of this hanging out and so I was left with them. Normally I would take this as an especially fun experience, but my tiredness from moving and cleaning was pretty intense. And of course the power went out, nixing the music video option. But I managed. Bribed them with bubble gum and snacks, let them play beauty salon with my hair (until she started making knots), watched the boys play soldiers, took pictures, and danced to our own singing. It really was a very fun time! I have decided though that it’d all be much more enjoyable if I could talk to them. They’re at the age where they just chatter on and on – I just wish I could understand their stories because I’m guessing they’re hilarious!

Unfortunately I had a little meltdown re: the children the following day. 2 days in a row with them there for hours. And apparently they were waiting outside our door, just waiting for one of us to come home so they could hang out inside. Don’t get me wrong, I love them. I think they’re adorable. And I enjoy playing with them. Buuuuut I am not a fan of working for 8 hours, coming home exhausted, and then walking in the door to 8 children who are listening to music at full-blast and screaming to each other (they don’t talk, they yell. Constantly) and who I cannot communicate with. Not really something I want to do every day, especially when I am looking forward to just coming home and relaxing with Banda for my 2 hour window before I have to start making dinner and doing house stuff. Also, their presence nixes the more practical things that needed to be done. I wanted to take a shower, but I cannot walk through the room in a towel when they’re there. I wanted to bake brownies, but nope, cannot because they will then expect treats every single day they come over. And lord knows a nap is always out because they’re screaming in the next room. Not that I can go into the bedroom while they’re there because 1. They will take food 2. That would be rude of me. and 3. They climb dangerously all over the furniture. Sigh. So I ended up in the room anyway, having a little meltdown. Sorted it all out though and I’m crossing my fingers that there visits will be not so frequent and thus appreciated.

Discovered a lovely Malawian tradition with my move. Whenever a new person joins the housing community, everyone comes individually to welcome that person and tell them to “feel free” and to feel at home, to visit their houses and to play with their kids. Mlotha was the first to come over. Mumba’s already told Banda he’s coming tonight. I guess sometimes in America you get the random neighbor who will come over with baked goods on moving day, but I just love that it’s a normal thing here for everyone to welcome the newbie, even if they’ve known you for over a year. I got a little choked up and didn’t know how to adequately express how grateful I was but Banda said I did just fine. I guess I should have learned by now that most Malawians I know don’t get all sappy and emotional like I tend to, but I always feel the desire to try to express such things…. Because being so far away from home and everyone I grew up with means that stuff like being welcomed or getting good healthcare or being welcomed inside for a meal… those are the things that really count. So maybe when Mumba comes, I’ll be more eloquent.

HUGE success on Sunday night. I made nsima for the first time SUCCESSFULLY! Oh words cannot even say how proud I was of myself. Banda stood by and gave instructions – and yelled “fast fast” when I wasn’t adding flour fast enough – but I did it all! Oh my arm was so tired, especially because I’m not really tall enough for the height of the table. Must get a stool :) And the result was just the way it was supposed to be. Not just “good for a first try” but legitimately good nsima that I would be willing to serve people. Oh so proud. So with some more practice, I’m sure I’ll be a pro in no time! Then maybe I can work on figuring out different densities. It’s based on the amount of flour that you add – some nsima is really solid and you feel stuffed even after one patty, others are lighter so you can eat more patties but aren’t so full. I prefer the latter as does Banda. I’d say mine from last night was middling – not as dense as the stuff Raymond made but more so than MIRACLE’s which I consider the best – so I want to keep working at it. Great excitement though!!

Community reception has been fabulous. To our knowledge, at least, everyone’s been very excited and supportive (minus some open school girls who are crushed that Banda is off the market). We have had some moments already though of people just not understanding that our relationship is different. That it doesn’t function the way that a stereotypical ‘Malawian’ marriage does. That’s it’s a team, not a master and a servant. And that, as such, I am not going to get up at 4 to prepare warm bathwater and cook breakfast and wash dishes and iron his clothes…while he sleeps an extra 2 hours. Yes, I will do my fair share of course, but I’m sorry, he has two working hands, is an adult and can do it himself if he wants hot bath water or a fancy breakfast. One of the madames was questioning me today about whether I’d cooked him breakfast this morning. She simply would not relent even as I told her that he’s not hungry when he first wakes up (and when I’m eating) so he comes home mid-morning while I’m at work and makes something for himself. Foreign concept to her. She just said “oh pachoko pachoko.” Which means “slowly by slowly” so basically implying that I’m just a newbie and that one day I’ll come to realize that it’s my duty to do such things. Umm no. I think she would keel over and die if she realized that we prepare our meals together, diving the work, and that he still washes his own clothes. Thank goodness he is not the typical Malawian man about such things…. Not that I would be with him if he were.

I feel like with all of my moving I’m getting progressively closer to a realistically Malawian lifestyle. To be clear though, I’m still really pampered since I’m still in teachers’ housing in a place where there is electricity and running water. First, volunteer house. Basically Little America in the midst of Malawi. Cooks, huge house, power, water tank, next to no responsibilities at home. Then came the Lalanne House. Definitely more work – doing our own cooking and cleaning and water boiling. Next to no running water, a.k.a. lots of bucket carrying and water storage when it did come. But still had a feeling of luxury and separation. And now I’m at Banda’s. It’s still on campus so it still has water and electricity. Evenings are much calmer – marking exams together and then early to sleep. Talking and sharing stories during dinner instead of watching a movie. That lack of technology banging into my head constantly is actually really nice. But it also feels much more in the midst of everything. Maybe it’s because we’re surrounded by the other teachers and kids now. Or maybe the difference is just in living with a Malawian. There’s just a different rhythm and styles of doing things. Yesterday the power went out while we were cooking dinner, so we switched to the charcoal cookers. Halfway through the power came back so we switched back and killed the charcoal fire. 2 minutes later, the power went again. Rebuild the fire. Now it’s raining so we have to bring the cookers inside the house. Smoke wafting through. Doing everything by candlelight. It was one of those moments where I just thought, “oh Malawi.”

Oh and Suzie’s pregnant. Suzie is one of the brothers’ dogs but she’s ancient. The Matriarch of the whole clan. Cannot believe she is pregnant at her age. But alas she is. And so is Special the little hussy. So I think we’re gonna get a puppy! Whoohooo! The only reason I didn’t before is because I didn’t make nsima at home… yes dogs eat nsima too…. But now we do, so why not! Now the only question is which litter to pick from. I’m leaning towards Suzie because she spawned Special who’s awesome. And while Special is great, her offspring? Meh. Teteza? PJ? I’m not convinced of her breeding skills. So I think it’ll be Suzie if she has any that I ‘connect with.’ Looking forward to that day! I miss having puppies around.

This week was strange. Bizarre, weird, and unpredictable, and it's spilled over into the weekend because I can't concentrate for ten minutes.

My apartment isn't that big and I can't count the number of times I've crossed from room to room, like I'm trying to find something out of place. I've managed to wash the dishes, tidy the bed room, start on the living room, all of these separated by hours. I've turned the tv on, played a game, turned it off, walked away, came back, turned it on and turned it off. I play games with the cats and stop, check my email, close the computer before I get it started. I've looked at my story and I can't even read it. I can't read books either, I went through three of my favorites before giving up. I figure I should go to the store but I don't know what to buy. I should go for a walk. I've tried tea, a shower, and am now having a porter but I'm still apathetic. I'm waiting, expecting, stalling. I don't know what for, I've plans for this evening that I'm considering skipping. (Watching Buffy at a club with theme drinks, but I did that that two days ago, with work friends for a happy hour and then a caving meeting. We drink margaritas at the caving meeting and I don't want anymore themed drinks, I just want beer. Maybe they'll have a red wine special? Just no hard liquors, I don't care if it tastes like candy.)

My funk is mostly the fault of work, which is so unfair. I rather like my job, at least right now, but I don't want it messing up my down time. It would take a book (a short book) to describe this week. From the automatic flushing toilets that showed up mid-day on Tuesday, and Maude (our accountant) re-potting the office plants in the conference room. We'd the Executive Committee metting in that conference the next two days, which meant getting things ready and then running amok when Diem hurt her back. How I can be the only person who knows where to look is beyond me but, by Thursday, when they left around noon and I finally got back to my job after two, I kept glancing at the door, expecting something else (which I'd never worked with before) to be needed immediately. There were other more normal abnormal things, like several people being gone or sick on Monday or Kira, who works remotely, being in back in the office.

On Friday, Heather (in charge of licensing) shared that she'd a new job where she would be doing outreach for NASA EOS. (SO COOL!!!) She'll be gone in three weeks, or maybe two. The week after next she'll be gone at the AGU conference. (AASHE? NSTA?) Super excited for for her but slowly realizing this means she, like Kira (who still works for us), will be gone from the office. In a selfish world, this is really unfair. I talk with her every morning, we joke throughout the day, she's not nearly as high strung as the other people in the office who chat with me. This is the best thing for her, and I knew she'd be going, but I thought she'd be around for another year-ish. She hasn't even reached her one year mark.

Okay, so work has been spastic. Additionally, I'm busy the next two weekends, caving the next and helping out with the EPA on the Mall the weekend afterward. Turns out, as I discovered yesterday, that not so much with the EPA thing because I said I'd fill in the time slots whenever and a few others were counting on the weekend for comp time.

Waiting, stalling, bracing.

I'm feeling calmer now, though still with that small alarm in the back of my head screaming that I've forgotten something important. I honestly can't imagine what it is, though if you might know, give me a hint. The sun is out now and I feel bad I'm not outside. Bah. I guess I'll go make that to-do list and try focusing on that. Maybe it'll help.

Cheers

So one of the things about living in Malawi is that there is no curbside trash pick-up. Shocking, I know. So this means that you have to burn your trash. I know, it hurts my heart to release all of those toxins into the air, too, but there is nothing else to be done. I would like to add that this is why the roadsides are often littered with trash. I don’t want to perpetuate some stereotypical image of trash heaps in Africa with fly-covered children picking through them. That’s not the way it is in Malawi. It is, however, totally acceptable to drop any piece of trash you might have onto the ground, since there are no waste bins and no government sanitation system for trash. So yes there is a lot of trash on the ground and there are frequent piles of garbage waiting to be burned. Anyways, our outside kitchen (that we never use) had become our trash station, as we first waited for the necessary paraffin and then for Banda to come over during the daylight. As you might remember, Laura and I attempted to burn trash before and it took forever, used a whole candle, and was fairly ineffective. Banda told us later that people use paraffin to get a good fire going. But we didn’t want to set a forest fire or light ourselves on fire, so we waited for him to assist. This resulted in a huge pile in the outdoor kitchen. I was actually quite embarrassed about it as I opened the door, feeling like a hoarder. But the weekend after Laura left, Banda finally came over to assist. It was fairly terrifying to watch him douse all of the bags in paraffin and then drop them one-by-one onto the roaring bonfire. Especially when one of the bottles would explode with a bomb-like sound. And the fact that he was kicking things back into the fire and touching burning objects. Oh Malawian fingers that feel no heat.

I’ve tried to start teaching myself Chitumbuka again. I have a Peace Corps language book that I’m bringing to work now, so whenever I have free time and I’m feeling inspired, I’ve been memorizing vocabulary words. Because I think that’s really the problem – I just don’t know enough words to follow more than a few conversations. I’ve also realized that I’ll never really get it until I start thinking in Chitumbuka. Back in college when I was doing German, I was really good and actually thought in German half the time. I need to do this for Chitumbuka because it is SUCH a fast language that there’s no way I can hear the word and then translate into English to understand. By that point they’ve said 10 more words and I’m lost. So it needs to be instantaneous. God only knows how many years that would take… so I’m not stressing about it.

The student teachers are gone! Oh how sad I am that I don’t get to see Raymond every day. He was like the brother I never had lol. Seriously. I’m so grateful that they ended up staying with Banda so he basically automatically became our friend. Chaminade had a goodbye party for them so I was happy to attend. And then immediately afterwards, I escorted Raymond to the bus depot, gave him a scandalous hug goodbye and then had to run after the truck as it left me. I’m crossing my fingers that he gets posted in Karonga or else somewhere that I visit frequently so I can see him every now and then.

Cobby and Isaac got expelled from MIRACLE for stealing equipment. Stupid idiots. Although not entirely unexpected in a town where students have notoriously sticky fingers. I will miss seeing them around though.

Hurt my back again moving books. I wish there was a chiropractor in Karonga because I’m pretty sure it’s all still from the original injury. The pain has never really gone away – just abated a bit – and flares up into seriousness again the moment I lift anything heavy for an extended amount of time. It really has been messing up this library cataloging though which is frustrating to feel like I can’t do anything at work.

I figured out how to make Snickerdoodles!! They call for cream of tartar but I doubt that’s even in Malawi, so I found out you could substitute baking powder. I guess they don’t taste exactly like Snickerdoodles but they are pretty darn addicting. I regularly lose count of how many I eat in a day. Fortunately Banda is making a dent in them too so it’s not just me. And the way he says Snickerdoodle with his accent is just too adorable.

I bought a coconut from the market the other day and Banda finally cracked it open with my handy-dandy pocket knife. I was very disappointed. I thought coconut milk was supposed to be sweet?! It was salty. Maybe we let it sit for too long? Does anyone know? But then the next question would be, how on earth do you know when a coconut is ‘ripe’?? I did thoroughly enjoy Banda proposing that maybe the milk would be sweeter from one of the other holes. His rationale? That different mannered babies come from the same stomach, so maybe we’d get sweet milk from the same place that also had sour. :) And then he discovered that the coconut bounces like an out-of-control basketball. Laura, you would have loved it.

When the Hotel & Catering students have their practical lessons, they invite select teachers to eat the outcome. I’d never been invited before, so I was thrilled to join them this week. It was like being back in America! They had cereal with milk (hot milk – new but surprisingly tasty), sausage (!), a huge omelet with vegetables in it, bread and butter (forgot how much I love that), baked beans (from a can – wowee!), chips, and cocoa. Oh it was just lovely. I was very impressed since in the past, food prepared by classes tended to be subpar and we wondered what on earth they were learning in there. But the new teacher really seems to know her stuff and the students are learning a lot! Awesome. And I got a great meal :)

We went to a music concert that Ms. Kim was putting on with her voice and instrumental students. It was strange to hear them singing English songs that they could barely wrap their words around, but they pulled it off and they sounded beautiful. Ms. Kim was just brimming over with pride – as she rightly should be! I also met the other Korean lady who lives in town and works at Lusubilo. I’d only met her husband before but she was wearing a beautiful dress so that gave me a conversational in. Even better, I found out what tailor she used, so I can use my favorite chitenje cloth to get a respectable yet adorable dress made! I’m excited! Also nearly peed my pants from laughter as Beams scared the begeezes out of Banda by pretending to be upset about my moving in with him. More on that in a bit… But yes, good old Beams pulled off the fatherly role and it was fun seeing Banda lost for words for the first time in a year and a half of knowing him.

So as mentioned I’m moving in with Banda this coming weekend. I can’t stay at the Brother’s guest house anymore since they want it open for other guests, so it’s time for me to move out. It’s actually purely a practical move to join Banda. I mean I love the kid and it would definitely have ended up happening eventually, but it wouldn’t have been this soon if we weren’t in Malawi. And by that I mean that the house that I’m building won’t have power for months, maybe years. And I’m not comfortable staying alone in a house off campus that doesn’t have lights. I’m far too jumpy for that. And it just wouldn’t be safe. Hence, him moving in. But it also doesn’t make sense for him to give up his $5/month house that’s on campus and has power. So I’m moving into his house and I’ll rent my new place until power comes. Then when electricity is set, we’ll shift to the new house. I am pretty bummed that it was so stressful and costly to build that house and yet someone else will live there first :( I already love the place and was really looking forward to decorating and making it a home. Stupid power company for being so inefficient. But that day will come. And in the meantime, I’ll hopefully be able to get some rent money to make up for the costs. One of the Malawian benefits of moving in with him is that I will now be unofficially Mrs. Banda. Haha no more creepy teachers hitting on me and asking me invasive personal questions. Yessss. In Malawi, if you live together, you’re married. Regardless of my telling them that an official wedding is not happening for a while. So that’s that.

I’ve unfortunately had some problems with the house lately. Specifically with people charging money for things not done, doing subpar work to skimp and sell the ‘extras’, and even worse, outright stealing materials from our storage house and reselling them. Had a meltdown in Singuini’s office as I expressed all of my frustrations about such a small house costs twice as much as the original budget proposal set out. We’ve also come to realize that the builders have been presenting things as necessary when really they are optional. Alas it’s nearing the end so not much can be done. Having a meeting this afternoon though to address the stolen properties.

Construction-wise, it’s still trucking along. They’re plastering the walls now. It actually looks like something you could live in! The window frames are done and adorable. Doors are being made and are just waiting to be attached. And flooring. Cool beans. I’m just ready for the outflow of money to stop, that’s for sure!

Had a Facebook Chat date with Molly yesterday that was absolutely wonderful! So nice to chat with her and hear about her life. Stayed at MIRACLE until it was pitch black and the mosquitoes were eating me alive. Totally worth it!

Also had a heart-filling afternoon with the teachers’ kids. I was sitting on Banda’s porch, waiting for him to come home so we could go visit the house construction. I hear a bunch of giggling and people running through the forest and thought to myself “oh it must be some students.” But nope, there comes Banda skipping and running along with a trail of my 3 favorite teachers’ kids behind him, Muche, Euclid and Hope. Of course this led to a photo shoot of the boys who were soon joined by two of Clifford’s sons, Owen and Clifford Jr. And then they followed us all the way to the new house, entertaining us and holding our hands along the way. They’ve all gotten so much braver around the mzungu than they were last year! And it was kinda adorable seeing them racing through the house exploring the rooms and then lose interest and go play with the long grasses in the front yard – they play horsie too! Beams met us on the road so we all piled into the car, where the boys danced in the backseat to Beams’ awesome music. Hung out at Banda’s place afterwards with Muche, eating cookies, drinking Sobo and watching music videos. Just one of those lovely afternoons with the kiddoes!

So Dad asked for more background about health care in Malawi, which is good because for me it just seems normal now after taking other volunteers and about a hundred students to the hospital – normal, not acceptable of course. It also helped to get Laura’s input since our late night trip was her first experience. To start off with, when you’re visualizing the hospital, you shouldn’t think of it as you would an American hospital. Laura said it seems like an olden-days insane asylum where they’re going to conduct all kinds of experiments on patients. You walk in and there’s no one there to greet you, so you just kind of wander along without any impediments. The hallways are not lit so it seems very dark and dreary. It’s completely deserted actually. Granted it was night time but I can attest that during the day it’s not too different – no medical personal bustling about, just patients. So you wander through these halls passing a bunch of gates, some locked, some not. There are 3 main wards – male ward, female ward, and the maternity ward. The wards are just huge open rooms with probably anywhere between 50-75 beds for patients. We obviously went to the female ward, which is further split into two sections, tuberculosis ward and general, where everyone else is just thrown together. I’d imagine it’s a miracle if you make it out of there without catching some additional disease. We were particularly worried since there were mosquitoes everywhere that had likely bitten multiple malaria patients. There’s no security at all – like I mentioned before, TB patients were just wandering in and out. It is expected here that someone accompanies you to the hospital and stays with you. So they sleep on the floors next to the bed. Molly has a particular horrid story about being attacked by an army of ants while staying with Matt. There is food at the hospital but it’s considered disgraceful if you have to eat it – your relatives, friends, or coworkers are supposed to bring 3 meals a day to you and stay for awhile to keep you company. I do actually think this is a lovely sentiment. The one good physical thing I can say about the building is that there were mosquito nets for each bed. I was shocked to see that actually. So you walk into the female ward and there’s a desk where the nurses sleep on the counter. You sit on a bench and give your symptoms to the nurse/clinical officer/doctor there. No privacy or confidentiality at all, just telling your tale for all of the other patients to hear. There are a couple of private rooms that the other volunteers got to use in the past, but according to a new sign on the door, it seems to have been reallocated as nurse sleeping quarters. Dad also asked how often Malawians would go to the hospital – for regular care or just emergencies. Considering most of them cannot afford the private clinics unless it is something really serious or their employers pay for it, I’d say they usually go to the hospital for everything. Especially since they seem to assume even the slightest feeling of weakness is malaria, so they’re quick to go for the free medicine. The hospital in Karonga is a District Hospital so it’s supposed to serve the whole area, not just the town. It’s run by the government. Apparently the private and mission hospitals are much better – both in staff and facilities. The teachers here threw a (justified) fit when discovering labor/delivery expenses were not covered under their medical coverage… this means that they can’t afford to go to the private hospital in Mzuzu and would be stuck with the Karonga District Hospital. They were livid. So clearly they do prefer the private ones as well. However, none of them were particularly surprised by the drug addicts story. There tisked but weren’t horrified as were Jim and Robyn. So I take that as an indication that they’re simply used to such horrible treatment. I feel like it would blow there mind to see an American hospital. I’m gonna take Banda to visit Brittany at work when we come home, just to see his reaction. Follow-up on the health care issues: Even a few days after using the medication from Maneno Clinic, I was still sick. So we decided to make another trip to the clinic to see if he had any other options. He didn’t. His advice was to go to Mzuzu to the private hospital there, since they have the proper lab facilities to do tests for anything other than malaria. Awesome. Well, let’s be honest, with my stomach issues there was no way I could sit on a bus for 5+ hours without having any chances of getting off. Instead, I called Jim and Robyn who – wonderful people (and nurses) that they are – came right over. After listening to my description of the severe pains I was feeling, they recommended that I most likely had a kidney stone. Considering that it came on quickly and was the worst pain I’ve ever felt and that it had gone by morning. Plus it’s apparently very common for foreigners who relocate to a tropical environment and never drink enough water. And I never had a fever, so infection/virus was automatically out. Seems like a doctor here would have known that? But anyways, that was the pains and they said the stomach problems were just the body reacting to the trauma. It’s very comforting to know that they are there for me with solid professional knowledge. Had a bit of a relapse a couple of days later as the stomach issues resurfaced. Had a major panic attack complete with uncontrollable sobbing and an inability to breathe. Laura was gone by this point and poor Banda just didn’t know what to do since panic attacks don’t often happen here and if they do, they certainly don’t have a name and explanation. The next day, we became convinced that the reoccurring stomach issues were happening because I was drinking litres of juice – a known diarrhetic – with the hydrating powder instead of water. So I laid off of that and the next day and the following days I’ve been back to my normal self. A little more tired than usual from the whole ordeal, but definitely on the upswing. Laura’s Departure: Sad times. I can’t believe the time went so quickly. In some ways it feels like we’ve been in Malawi forever, but when I think about her time period here, that seems to have gone very quickly. She spent her last day hanging artwork in the library – posters of beautiful urban scenes as well as various paintings. I love it – gives me something to look at other than white walls. I’m going to do her painting project soon, which will also add a great splash of color to the window frames and the bookshelves! We spent our last evening finishing “Out of Africa” and having dinner with the brothers. That was lovely since it was really just us, Beams, and Paul having our own little sub-party, so we got our fill of them. And Alick made a cake! Oh it was wonderful – how I’ve missed their cakes. I drove her to the bus depot the next day (my plans of accompanying to Mzuzu were scratched because of the sickness) and was happy that Banda, Raymond, and Envy all love her enough to come along. I’m glad she got to meet such beautiful people. Anyways, goodbyes and tears were had in the middle of the bus depot and then she was off! It’s strange being the only American on campus now. I do like living alone in terms of household stuff, but there are certainly a couple of hours of loneliness squeezed in between being content upon arriving home from work and when Banda comes over for dinner. I foresee a very clean house as I get antsy from just laying around – I’ve already cleaned my former bedroom (that I vacated after the decaying lizard incident). Football Fun: I finally went to a MIRACLE football game which I’ve been promising to do since coming back but always seem to miss out on thanks to lake days. It was a great time! Settled myself down to watch and thoroughly enjoyed myself even though the boys lost. They were playing against Livingstonia Technical, which is actually where Banda’s younger brother goes to school. And he just happened to be on the football team! What are the odds of that? Lol So I got to meet him which was fun although he was certainly much quieter than Mr. Banda. Domestic Duties: As mentioned, I’ve become a cleaning machine. Also since Laura was our only tall person, of course the universe decided to burn out 2 lightbulbs the day she left. Of course. So short little Banda stacked 2 chairs and a table on top of each other to switch them out. I could see death approaching. Especially when we had to turn off the fuse box and have him tinker with wires that had become unattached. But it was successful! I’m also on a recipe mission… I’m so sick of eating the same things all the time. So I’ve been scouring the internet for simple recipes that I can recreate here. Let me know if you have any suggestions! Keeping in mind that meat and dairy (except for butter and milk) are essentially out. So eggs and beans are the primary protein source. And lots of vegetables. Basically anything rice or potato based that actually tastes like something would be great! Last night I made fried rice for the first time and I’m pretty sure that it will change my life. So much better than plain rice which I get sick of daily. And I made Mom’s potato and ham skillet which was heavenly. I’d eat it every day except for the depressing fact that my spam supply is about to run out. Feel free to send more even though I’m sure the very idea repulses many of you – trust me, I was equally disgusted by the concept until I moved to Africa where meat is too expensive for me to buy! Or if you feel so inclined to send packets of powdered sauces… they must sell those right? I can recreate pasta-roni if I have some good sauces. Pretty sick of the pepper, garlic, salt and beef bouillon mixture that goes on everything here. A rant about gender (in)equality: I very nearly lost it recently during a meeting at MIRACLE. We received updates about multiple girls who had gotten pregnant and who were thus kicked out of school. And it literally made me sick to see every single teacher cackling with laughter over the situations and shaking their heads about the stupid and seductive girls. Even though I think I’m used to the inequalities here, every now and then it just smacks me in the face and it still continues to shock me how there is just no accountability for the men. Not only do the fathers get to stay in school. But even the acts of sex and pregnancy themselves. That it is all the women’s fault. They are temptresses and the men just cannot – and should not have to – help themselves. And that there’s no inkling in anyone that maybe the profound lack of respect for and subjugation of women in this culture could be a foundational problem that is simply unconquerable for most women here. Socially, financially, educationally, emotionally. Everything is all wrapped up together. All under the guise of “respect.” Well I’ll tell you what, that respect should go both ways buddy. But if the man doesn’t want to wear a condom, there’s pretty much nothing to be done other than abstinence which often doesn’t even work here since the man can just take whatever he wants. And if they are financially dependent – as younger girls are SO OFTEN here because students will go stay with relatives for their high school years – then there’s really no way out. One former student was even arrested because she got pregnant, went home and was chased by her family. So she ended up in Lilongwe with friends and decided to get an abortion, which is illegal, so she’s in jail. And the teachers just laughed their heads off and said she got what she deserved because she was stupid enough to get pregnant and that the man was her sister’s husband. Now yes, the fact that it was her brother-in-law upsets me. But in a Malawian context, I’d be willing to bet almost anything that he was the aggressor and that because she was his financial dependent and staying in his home, he felt like he could have whatever he wanted. And that he’s likely sitting pretty in his home as I type this, still being taken care of by his wife and not dealing with any consequences. I thought I was going to burst into tears right on the spot. Where is the compassion and equality in God’s eyes that’s supposedly preached in their churches every weekend?! Oh and the fact that 5 minutes later they were discussing a kid who was skipping school in order to do piece work. Expressly against the rules and grounds for expulsion. And the reason they decided to let him stay was… get this… that he has several children all over the place and he needs to graduate. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?! Not a single chastisement about his promiscuity. Just taken for normal. Whereas any girl with even one child would be kicked out of school and branded a slut, deserving of ostracization, mockery, and even arrest. It is one of those situations that make me incredibly grateful for being raised in America since the hypocrisy drives me crazy and makes me feel hopeless about true ideological change in this country despite all of their chatter about teaching gender equality in schools. House Update: To end on a more positive note, the house is flying along! Of course I feel like I’m hemorrhaging money and am way over budget. Sigh. Stupid first quote left out basically everything. If I’d have known it’d be this much, I’d never have done it. But I keep telling myself it’s a good investment. So anyways, the roof is on. I was pleased that even with the roof and walls, it’s still very cool in temperature. Cooler than any other house I’d been in on a fairly hot day. Good airflow and the tall ceilings really help. Today they are starting to plaster the walls and then all that is left is pouring the concrete floor and attaching doors and window frames. And then doing the pit latrine and septic tank. Very exciting! It’s just adorable and I love it already. When I went to visit last time, my neighbor came over and gave me a gift – 2 guava tree seedlings. My heart was full.

This next story just had to have its own post because it was so f-ing ridiculous. I woke up the next morning and said to myself “Did that really happen?!” So after coming home from our Lusubilo adventures, I was totally fine. Very happy and in love with Malawi. Around 6:00 pm, I started having some stomach pains, which was strange since I hadn’t eaten more than an egg since lunch time. And the egg was fine. And even if it wasn’t, it wouldn’t have caused days worth of agony. So I laid down, figuring maybe I just needed to stretch out for a bit. Well I ended up having severe stomach pains that were not only in my lower abdomen but that stretched all the way up to my rib cage and around my back. I literally could not lie down because the pain was too intense. Oh and my hands were going numb, I was nauseous and dizzy, and running to the bathroom at least every hour if not 30 minutes. But of course I’m stubborn. Especially because no one wants to go to the hospital at night here since it’s 10x less efficient than during the day (which is already dismal). So I laid there until about 10, hoping the pain would fade and that I would just pass whatever the problem was. But then Banda came over and I was still in pain, so he forced me into agreeing to go to the hospital. Which I knew all along would happen. I was just waiting for him to come so that we would have a Malawian speaker on our side. Woke Laura up who motherly yelled at me for not telling her the situation 4 hours ago. Drove to the hospital, where I was the only patient waiting to be seen. One would think this would mean good service, yes? No. The first doctor’s first question was “are you sure they’re not just hunger pains?” Yes, dumbass, because I came to the hospital at 10 pm because I’m hungry. How stupid do you think I am that I can’t tell the different between hunger and something seriously wrong?! After I convinced him that I was not hungry, there was no exam or anything, just me telling him the symptoms. Of course he decided that I had malaria. Shocking. So I stumble down to the lab where the guy pricks my finger for the test. By this point – I’m guessing from the walk and from being severely dehydrated – I’m about to pass out on the chair. So I lay down, but of course the pain is worse when I lay, so I was about 5 seconds away from vomiting from the pain and also about to have an accident. Matt would have been proud. Avoided both, thank God. The test came back negative – no surprise to me. But of course the doctor had left by this point. Ummm awesome. So the nurses that were there – who had been SLEEPING the whole time I was telling the doctors my symptoms – decided that they were going to take over. So they wanted me to come back in the morning to see the doctor. No problem, I was fine with that. My one request was that they give me a painkiller strong enough so that the spasms would stop so I could sleep through the night. Reasonable request, no? Well they give me the equivalent of Pepto Bismal and Ibuprofen. Umm no. So I try to explain to them that 1. The pain is not only in my stomach, so the pepto bismal is not going to be effective and 2. I have this strength painkiller at home and I know it won’t work because it doesn’t even cure a simple headache for me, so I clearly need something stronger for this. Thank goodness we had Banda there to help translate because I don’t think even that would have been communicated effectively, not that they took it into consideration or anything. But this is where shit hit the fan. Pardon my language. But it just all went crazy. They started asking if I had already taken any pepto or ibuprofen earlier. And no I hadn’t. Mom, don’t cringe. I had a good reason. Because I knew I’d get forced into going to the hospital anyway. And DUH one of the first things you learn as a child is that you don’t stack medicines on top of each other. I knew that I was going to get stronger painkillers soon so if I had taken ibuprofen I would have had to wait hours before taking the better ones. Why would I take something I know isn’t going to work, just for the sake of it? Sigh. This idea was completely lost on the medical professionals of Malawi. They started yelling at me that well here in Malawi it’s okay to mix drugs and that it was my fault that they couldn’t give me something stronger since I was refusing their medicine. Might I add that they were horribly rude the entire time, snickering amongst themselves, talking in vernacular which they didn’t realize I could understand/Banda would translate for us, and refusing to listen to our logic. So we requested that the doctor come back so that we could talk to someone who was actually qualified. Because seriously, the nurses here have about the training that we receive in First Aid for lifeguarding. And because of the Malawian school system, there’s a complete lack of any critical thinking skills that would allow for a diagnosis other than malaria. So yeah, we wanted a doctor who had the authority to give us something stronger than ibuprofen . We mentioned vicodin or codine, simply because we didn’t know any other drugs that they would have, but were also very clear that even something in the middle of the two would be totally fine, just to hold me until morning. Our request for codine or vicodin was met with a diatribe about how those pills are addictive and that’s fine in America because the doctors give you an antidote for the addiction at the same time… what?! Not only is this untrue and stupid, they failed to listen when I tried to reason with them that I only needed 1 pill for tonight and then in the morning they could refuse to give me more if they were really thinking I was gonna get addicted from one vicodin pill. Oh and to add to the list of incompetence: 1. A bottle exploded in another room. No one moved to clean up the mess. 2. A nurse walked from the lab (a good 3 minute walk) to where we were, carrying used bags of blood and needles, completely exposed. 3. Tuberculosis patients were just wandering in and out of the waiting room, hacking away. So yeah, we weren’t exactly inspired by their professionalism. So I think the doctor request was completely legit. Well oh man they fought that one. But finally said they’d called a doctor. In the interim while we were waiting for him to show up, the nurse also thought it wise and helpful to inform me that had I really been sick they would have given me something strong. EXCUSE ME!?!?! Apparently I didn’t look sick enough to them. I’m sorry my outward expression of pain is not exactly the same as a Malawian’s. I’m sitting here, white-faced and incommunicative, unable to lie down and feeling like I’m ready to vomit because of the pain, and you’re telling me that I’m not really sick?! And that “pain is all perception.” All I could say to that was SERIOUSLY?! Ok, lady, I’ve been to the ER before and the first thing they ask you is to rate your pain on a scale of 1-10. Why? Because, yes, pain is relative. But that doesn’t mean that just because pain is an 8 to the patient and to another it is a 3, that you will only treat it like a 3?! No, you treat for the pain that the person is feeling. Stupid witch. So by this point, I’m so irritated by their incompetence and rudeness that I’m just stunned into silence. But good old Laura has swooped into irate mother bear mode so she kept hounding the nurses until the doctor came. By this point, the nurses have been openly screaming at us and proving that they are not going to be calm and fair, so Laura requested that we be able to see the doctor alone once he arrives so that I can just start over with explaining the symptoms and getting another diagnosis since the malaria one was not accurate. They refused. Confidentiality anyone? So the “doctor” finally arrives. 2 hours into the ordeal. So we sit and listen to the nurses tell their side of the story. Even I knew enough vernacular to understand that they were grossly misrepresenting. And Banda was sitting there shaking his head the whole time. Calm, patient Banda was even getting frustrated. But we sit and let them have their piece. Most laughable was when she said Laura jumped out of her chair, banged her fist on their table, and refused to leave without codine. Ha.Ha. So after they talked, it was our turn. We gave the real story. And then Banda gave his story of events too. And then the “doctor” gave his opinion. We had the same fight about mixing drugs. And then he wouldn’t believe us that I already knew that ibuprofen wouldn’t work in this situation. And then the real kicker. He got up in Laura’s and my face and said loudly point blank: “You are drug addicts.” So my mind was reeling, thinking “Is he joking? Is this really happening?” So I asked if this was a hypothetical to explain why they just can’t hand out codine to anyone who asks… nope. He was actually accusing us of being drug addicts. After meeting us for 3 minutes. And not doing any exam whatsoever. WHAT THE HELL?!?! I have never been so offended. I was already about to lose it from the rudeness of the nurses alone but then to have this guy tell me I’m a drug addict?! No sir. Fortunately, that caused a whole bunch of adrenaline to flood my system so I was shaking with anger but no longer feeling as much pain. Let’s think about this logically. I doubt I would have told you my real name and that I was a teacher at Chaminade if I was trying to score drugs. You know I’ve lived here for 18 months – pretty sure I’d have tried to get some before this moment. And I doubt I would have come at midnight to do it. But no, logical reasoning isn’t big here. So he said that he personally could not give us codine but that he would call in the head of the hospital so we could get his opinion. To which I said, “But you are both doctors, so why is he going to give us a different answer?” because it was clear to me that they were not going to listen or help, so I just wanted to go home, take 3x the normal dose of ibuprofen and pray that it’d work. In response to my question: silence. That seemed suspicious. So I said, “Are you a doctor?” Silence. Repeat. Had to ask the question THREE TIMES before he finally admitted that he was not even a doctor. WHAT THE HELL. So basically they all just lied to us and he pretended that he was a doctor. Oh how I wish we were in America so there could actually be sanctions against him. Tell you what sir, I’m pretty sure it’s not W.H.O. (World Health Organization) procedure to impersonate a doctor and to accuse a patient of drug addiction within 3 minutes, without an exam. Jackass. Oh and when I called him on this, he tried to backtrack and say that he said “are you drug addicts?” instead of accusing us with “you are.” I don’t think so! I thought even Banda was going to yell at that point. So Banda and I were stunned in silence by these new developments. ButLaura was irate. She told him to call that other guy. And then we sat and waited. The nurse for some reason couldn’t keep her mouth shut though and kept shrieking about us and how we were faking. So Laura basically told her to sit down and be quiet because she didn’t want to hear her lies anymore. I was so proud and almost cracked a smile but I didn’t want the nurse to see it and pronounce me miraculously healed. I also had a shining moment in Banda’s eyes too. I’d managed to stay quiet the whole time – 1. Because I felt too terrible to fight and 2. Because it makes me incredibly uncomfortable to make a scene here in Malawi where I am a visitor and unfamiliar with processes. As such, I always try to fade into the background as much as possible. So yes I stayed quiet except that one “Seriously?!” But then the lady decided to say that I was lying – that I had in fact been sleeping on the bench. No f-ing way lady. I wasn’t even lying for more than 1 minute because I had to get up from the pain. So out slipped an “iwe” said with all of the disgust and disrespect that can be packed into the word. “Iwe” really only means “you” but when said with attitude, it hits the right note. Banda is still talking about it with glee, 2 days later. We finally just decide to ignore each other since nothing productive is coming out of this. The nurse goes back to sleep. And the fake doctor takes Banda out into the hall to talk to him. Where Banda apparently guilted the heck out of him, telling him that it wasn’t even our idea to come ask for stronger drugs, but his. And that he was highly offended, as were we – not that they cared about our impressions – by the accusations of drug addiction. So the fake doctor called the higher doctor again, who this time refused to come in, saying that they stood by the protocol to mix medications and that they would not give me anything stronger than ibuprofen. Again, all of this without a single doctor actually examining me and considering an option other than malaria, even after the negative test result. What if my appendix had burst? What if I had liver failure? What if I was having an ectopic pregnancy? What if I had a staph infection from my cut? Obviously this was not the case, thank God, but it’s not like those jackasses would know. So we left. But first they tried to get me to have myself admitted overnight for observation. You know, because watching me suffer in pain for 4 hours wasn’t long enough. I asked if they were going to give me anything stronger than ibuprofen? Nope. See ya. First we asked for their names, though, because I fully intend to write a letter to the administration about their unprofessionalism. Not that anything will come of it, but you know the principal of it. I say nothing will happen, because since this night, I’ve heard many horror stories. 10 years ago, a Chaminade student died of malaria because the nurse just refused to treat him. They let him lay there in a bed without giving him FREE medicine that is readily available.. and by morning he had died. His parents did nothing. I’ve lost count of how many babies have died because of negligence. And also have heard stories about nurses refusing to serve accident patients because their lunch hour is simply more important. And all of this goes unsanctioned. So my little letter will do nothing. But I’m still doing it. But I digress. The nurses refused to tell us their names. Hmm, seems like if they thought they were following protocol and acting professionally, there’d be no reason to withhold their identities. Finally got it out of them though when we said we’d just check the schedule. Went home around 2. Popped 3x the allowed dosage for ibuprofen. Still took another 2 hours of writhing before I was finally so tired that my body gave out and I was able to sleep. Woke up in the morning still in pain. Not as bad but still enough to want a doctor and medicine. And by then I was also severely dehydrated from all of the bathroom trips. And just to see, I took their stupid pepto bismol equivalent. And shocking it also didn’t work. And that was the next morning when it was far less severe. So Laura and Banda loaded me up into the truck and took me to the private clinic in town, Maneno. And sweet lord it was like night and day. He treated me with kindness and respect and was actually concerned about my symptoms and how weak and ashen I was by that point – which was actually better than the night before. He did a thorough exam checking out my abdomen and blood pressure and everything else you’d expect from a doctor. Turns out I have a virus and severe dehydration. Left his office loaded down with antibiotics, muscle relaxers, rehydration packets, and the very painkillers that I’d asked for the night before. And with my dignity intact without the labels of “drug addict” and “liar.” Fortunately he also gave me his personal phone number and urged me to call him the next time I have a late-night emergency. Never again will I set foot in that dump of a hospital. Since that night, Banda’s come up with a new theory about why the “doctors” and nurses were so hostile. Pride. He thinks that they didn’t even have the medication requested. But that to admit that would make their own jobs and professional worth completely invalid. And that they could not bring themselves to do that. Which is ridiculous because if they’d told us that from the very beginning, we’d have said thanks anyway and left peacefully as soon as the malaria test came back negative. Good things that came out of this whole experience: - - The Maneno doctor has my back in the future. - - Laura is an amazing mama bear who will stand up for me even when I cannot. Even when she is sick and feeling crappy herself. - - Banda is a wonderfully calm and supportive man who shushed us when we tried to apologize for making a scene and is still maintaining that it’s his job to take care of me. - - I’ve decided that I will never have my children here. They will be born in the States. I will not endanger them with someone else’s incompetence and negligence. However, multiple teachers are now convinced that this illness is in fact pregnancy. Oh sigh. I’m on the mend. Terrible first day after the meds as by that point I was so dehydrated that I was forced to chug a bunch of water and that nasty-flavored rehydration mix. My mind and body were resisting as it was making me nauseous, but Laura was great, pushing me to keep going. 2nd day, still definitely ill but I can feel an improvement. We’ll see what tomorrow brings!

Wow, I’m sitting here reading my notes and realizing that baking cookies for Beams seemed like forever ago. Has it really been that long? Sorry for the gap. As mentioned in the last post, I broke a luvre and sliced my hand. The resulting pain lasted for a good 6 days, the first 3 of which were so bad that I couldn’t even move my fingers without it throbbing. So of course hair-washing was out. And after a couple of days I was feeling gross. It might have been easier to get Laura to wash it for me, but both of us knew it’d be way more amusing to force Banda into it. So we pulled a chair up to the kitchen sink and after a quick tutorial from Laura, set him free. We were a bit worried that he’d tangle my hair into a big knot since mzungu hair is waayyy different than Malawian hair, but he did a marvelous job! Very gentle and was very meticulous – I kept telling him that he could be done and he kept saying he wanted every piece of hair to enjoy the shampoo. Of course a photoshoot occurred. And we like to think that he had a fun time! Good man that one. Update on the hand: It has now healed. It took about a week to finally close up and for the pain to subside. Cool scar though. And grateful that I avoided infection! Dr. Who in Malawi: Laura and I decided (for some unknown reason) to have a Doomsday photoshoot one night. For you non-Whovians, it’s from a Dr. Who episode where Rose and the Doctor get separated in different universes. But there’s a shared wall that they lean against and can feel each other’s presence. Judge all you like, but it’s a very heart-wrenching moment. I’m not even sure why we came up with the idea since we weren’t even watching Dr. Who at the time, but we positioned a confused Banda on one side and myself on the other. Photoshoot a success. Banda still confused so we made him watch the episode. Bad idea. He remained indifferent and Laura and I ended up depressed lol. Cooking adventures: We made vegetable tacos one night just like the ones Alick and Vicki used to make! Oh Matt, you would have been proud – they were so tasty! Laura also mastered the art of chipati making since my hand was messed up. You Georgetownians are in for a treat with all of the new things she’s learned to make here! Although I don’t know how thrilled ya’ll will be about nsima :) Ash Wednesday: Ash Wednesday was a holiday for us since we’re a Catholic school. We made the most of it since Laura’s time is drawing close to an end. We went to Lusubilo to hang out with the kiddos which was fun as always. We also went to the museum which I’ve wanted to do ever since coming. It is a beautiful space with lots of neat animal remains and interesting information about Malawi’s history and peoples. Definitely a fun time! Laura and I had lunch at the museum and then wandered through the market, buying chitenjes for my house and for her friends. We also got a hold of some of those beads that Madame Mwalweni was talking about (Molly). Successful journey. We also went to check on my house, which turned out to be even more fun than usual as the Gondwe children and their friends accompanied us first to the house and then all the way back to campus, carrying our bags for us. A lovely day all around! House update: The walls are up! Had a moment of difficulty as we realized that one of the windows was on the wrong wall (in terms of a breeze making it inside – vital, especially during the hot season!). But Cosmas was wonderful and agreed to knock down one of the walls in order to fix the mistake. They put the roof beams on yesterday and today they are putting on the iron sheets (roofing material)! So basically the structure of the house is done. Now we just need a plumber and electrician to come in. And then they’ll plaster the walls and pour the concrete for the flooring. And then the house is done! Just remaining with the septic tank and pit latrine to build. So maybe another week or so. Exciting! We finally got to spend time with Ms. Kim, the Korean opera singer who has moved into the former volunteer house. She invited us over for lunch and it was definitely one of the best days here! She made such wonderful food. She knew we were tired of Malawian meals, so she made us European foods. The best pumpkin/butternut squash soup I’ve ever tasted, lemonade, salad with lettuce, another cold vegetable salad with olives, spaghetti, pizza, and banana bread. Oh my goodness, I haven’t tasted food so flavorful in such a long time! It was marvelous. Laura and I just kept eating and eating. Ms. Kim brought all of the non-perishable things with her from Korea. So she basically only buys the vegetables from the market and then she also drives down to Lilongwe once a month to pick up other supplies. Laura and I did have some problems with our table manners, though not from lack of trying. It’s just that, especially with eating lunch at school now, we’re much more adept at eating with our hands than with a fork. Turned to look at Laura at one point and she had strings of spaghetti hanging from her mouth. Now instead of biting them off onto the plate like most people (uncivilized ones of course, myself included) would do, she tried to shove it sheepishly into her mouth with her hand. She failed and thus turned away to try again. It took a good 30 seconds of struggling before she got it, all under the watchful eye of Ms. Kim and my hysterical laughter. Not only was the food amazing, but we had a wonderful time chatting with her. What am amazing lady! She is 66 years old, single, and has decided to come spend her “retirement” in Malawi. She traveled to several different African countries before deciding that Malawi was the one. She randomly met Peter, deputy director of Lusubilo, while visiting some Korean friends in Lilongwe and instantly knew that her calling was to open a music center at Lusubilo. So she’s done that and is teaching lessens to a dozen students – voice, piano, drums, trumpet, violin, guitar. So amazing! She’s also opened 4 new CBCCs (is that what they’re called, former volunteers?) which are community centers in surrounding villages – places where kids can go for recreation, libraries, nutritional supplements, etc. We also loved hearing about her life as an opera singer. She has lived such an interesting life and we loved her perspective of time – she cannot even say what was her favorite place to live because she feels that at each moment in time, that was the best. And when it was no longer right for her, she moved on to the next adventure and happiness. Laura and I were pretty much in awe of her. We hope we can say such things when we were older. We also were treated to her playing the piano, watching videos of her son’s orchestra and her singing, as well as albums of her in all of her opera costumes. Such an amazing day! Ms. Kim invited us to come visit the music school the next day to check it out and listen to her students rehearse for an upcoming Easter concert. It was great to see the building and all of the instruments and see Ms. Kim coaching the kids. It’s pretty apparent that virtually everyone loves her! After the rehearsal we headed over to Lusubilo because it was Peter’s birthday, so Ms. Kim wanted the kids to sing for him. We ended up getting invited to his work birthday party. Haha I love how often things like that happen in Malawi. When we went to town we had no idea that would be a part of our day and yet it turned out to be the best part! Had a fun time chatting with people, dancing, and holding little Agnes (one of the babies). Our cheeks hurt from smiling so much! Sad news: Laura is going home early because she can feel herself getting sick again and none of us want her to ruin the next year for the sake of a few weeks. So she’s leaving in 2 days. I’m still in denial. As is she. Don’t really want to think about her not being here!

So I decided to split the house album from the general Malawi album because it was all just getting out of control. I'll still be updating both though so check back often!

Here are the links:

General Malawi Album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2030791&id=61900829&l=744ff8b211

House Album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031924&id=61900829&l=cc2e7024dd

Buying supplies for the house: We went into the town one day to buy supplies for the house. Really it turned into Laura and I just handing over money to the wonderful Cosmas and him going to get this. Purely a practical move – he knows what he needs and a white face just makes prices soar in most circumstances. So this meant Laura and I had plenty of time to explore, picking up extra groceries and making friends. Our favorite new baby to play with is Doreen, the daughter of a man selling lumber. We wandered into his stall in an attempt to avoid the sun, so he laid down a mat for us and we perched ourselves on the timber. Of course the baby was in my lap within moments and we spent a good long while playing with her. And then when we went back a few days later, we somehow ended up there again. Shocking! She’s just adorable and such a happy, contented baby. I was able to make myself entirely too useful at one point – While driving the truck, I cut a corner too short and ended up with one wheel suspended in thin air in a ditch. Awesome. Of course this meant there was nothing to catch traction on, so the guys had to get out and lift the truck and shift it onto the pavement. Driver extraordinaire! Exciting shopping moment: There was a 50 kwacha discount on spaghetti! (Roughly 20 cents) Of course this meant that we stocked up, buying 5 packages. :) House construction update: Very upsetting moment when Cosmas and Singuini told me I couldn’t come to the land/house regularly anymore. I must explain that they’re coming from a place of love and helpfulness on this. And I want to respect their requests because they’re the ones having to deal with the obnoxious people who are trying to gauge me out of money simply because I’m a foreigner. But it still hurts me and upsets me that these people are going to be my neighbors and yet they’re still trying to suck as much out of me as possible. Particularly laughable since I am very likely the poorest mzungu they will ever meet. I make less than half of what even the government teachers here make! But of course they fail to consider that possibility. Anyways, I was barred from the land and Mr. Singuini so graciously picked up the task of walking there daily to get a progress report and let me know how things are going. So kind of him. Still upset though. And Banda was utterly outraged, which I appreciated more than he’ll probably know. He was all set to march down there, camera in hand to take pictures, ready to give them a piece of his mind. But fortunately they’re letting me come every few days – just only for big events now. So I got to come when the foundation was finished and then when the walls started to go up. So I’m contented with that I suppose. As long as I don’t think too long about the reasons behind it. More positive update: Like I mentioned, the foundation is poured and the walls are starting to go up. The back wall is half done and they’re put up the front door frame. It’s just bewildering how fast they go! I’m used to American standard where it takes months or even years to complete a house! Granted the whole house is about the size of my parents’ living room, but I still think it’s impressive. When we went to see the foundation for the first time, Laura and I freaked out a little bit. Well moreso me probably. Pretty sure it was written all over my face. It was just so tiny that we weren’t sure a double bed would even fit in the bedroom, much less a set of drawers! But then we stood over it and it looked better from that angle. And when we went the next day when they had the foundations laid for where the walls will be, it looked even better. Still tiny but livable which is all I’m going for really. Football news: Chelsea beat Manchester United!! Big deal since Man U. is having a great season and Chelsea’s has basically imploded. Alas I did not get to watch because the staff room’s tv signal was out. Worst day of the month: Pretty sure. I don’t know, maybe I should go back and read my old posts to verify, but I don’t really want to remember those days anyway. All I know is that this day was terrible. It started out with such potential too. As a member of the Chaminade planning committee, I was on the food subcommittee, so our first task was going into town to buy all of the groceries for the day’s 600 guests. This actually sounded like fun to me because it was going to be with Mbale and Kaunda, two of my favorite people and I always love a good market day. Except for that I forgot the level of indecision and inefficiency that often pervades activities here in Malawi. Somehow I ended up being in charge of all the money. Awesome. So I got to work and of course none of the money was ready. Spent 2 hours running back and forth between both schools, trying to wrangle checks out of people and having the right people sign things. All things that should have been done beforehand by…say.. the financial person for the schools?! But whatever, I finally made it all happen and we were on our way to town. Had to go to the bank to cash the checks, so I suggested that the other teachers take the cash that we did have and start buying things. I mean they’re grown men. I’m 23 years old, cannot speak the language, and still have a very limited understanding of how market bargaining should work. Seems logical that they go for it and start on things while I go to the bank. But for some reason that suggestion only earned me a look that said I was clearly insane. What, divide and conquer?! What an insane idea. We should all stay together in a little group, discussing every minute detail multiple times, taking 5 HOURS to complete a shopping trip that Laura and I alone could have done in 2. I love both of them dearly and I kept reminding myself to breath and not get frustrated but by the end of the day I was just about ready to rip my hair out. I’m gonna keep that in mind next year and refuse to be on the committee like all of the other MIRACLE teachers did this year. No more getting thrown under the bus for me. Holiday fun: Fortunately we had a holiday the following day! It was very nice to just hang out and relax after that chaotic day. Got to go see the house construction and then we stopped at Gondwe’s on the way home for a mineral. Laura and I had a great time forcing Banda into a photo shoot and taking video confessionals of him. We were going to also go to a concert that night at Planet K.A. which I was stoked for since the last concert was a blast… but alas it was pouring rain, so we failed. Chaminade Day: The actual morning of Chaminade Day unfortunately started out just as chaotically as the shopping trip had been. Out of the 6 committee members… I was the only one there that morning. 2 had gone out of town for the whole day. 2 were MIA. And Kaunda was late. It’s a good thing he showed up eventually though because I was woefully ill-equipped to deal with the fact that the firewood guy never came or to force the assigned women to cook when they were refusing to do so. I decided that since the women were refusing, I would suck it up and go to the kitchen myself. So even though I don’t know how to make most of the things they were preparing, I joined the Hotel & Catering students who were doing the bulk of the work. Not gonna lie, I was thrilled when the ladies acquiesced somewhat and agreed to help supervise. I ended up having a BLAST though! Laura and I started out cautiously, learning how to chop cabbage and new ways to dice tomatoes and onions. Spent hours doing all of that prep stuff, loving the opportunity to hang out with the madames and the students. It was truly lovely to be a part of that sub-community on campus. I also got to learn how to make hot cabbage – one of my all-time favorite meals! I was a bit nervous because I was preparing it for 70 people in one huge pot and I was terrified that I’d ruin it. But Cathy supervised me and I managed it all despite having aching arms from stirring such a large quantity. So proud of myself!! And apparently the other teachers were very impressed, ticking off the Malawian woman’s qualifications box of being able to help the other madames cook for large parties. I do believe I will volunteer myself for the job next year too! I had way more fun talking with the women and preparing food than sitting through some boring speeches. A great morning and a well-needed reminder of why I love Malawi. Side note: Laura and I have been talking a lot about this lately. With all of the frustrations, it seems easy to get down in the dumps. But Malawi never lets you stay upset with it for long. It always finds a way to woo you back into loving it. Be it a great conversation or an adorable kid or a learning moment or a random visitor. There’s always some wonderful moment just waiting to pop up. More Chaminade Day: After lunch was ready, I was free as a bird! Thoroughly enjoyed eating lunch in the courtyard with Banda and Kalua. Cabbage was a smashing success and we were treated to an obscene amount of beef and even chicken! Met Mrs. Kim, the opera singer from Korea who has occupied the former volunteer house. Lovely lady and she even invited us to lunch next weekend (though we are having to reschedule). Was a bit disappointed because the teachers’ football game was canceled due to time restraints. I was really looking forward to watching the old teachers run around. But the students’ game was fun to watch although it unfortunately ended in disarray as a fight with the referee broke out. Disappointing to see students acting that way. But the sitting and watching was fun. We were with Beams which is always a blast and Vitu came to hang out with us too, spending the whole time lounging on our laps. Except for when he abandoned me to go sit with Banda. Although mine was the lap he fell asleep on lol so I was in charge of carting him home. Carried him all the way home, his dead weight like a sack of potatoes, but my stubbornness won out of course. Little blessings: Oh how I sit here giggling to myself about the pun. Because Vitu is short for Vitumbiko which in English means Blessings. So anyways, we were met with one of those Malawian blessings early one morning as Vitu and his relative Monica arrived at our doorstep lugging a basket of maize. Vitu so adorable as he tottered along trying to lift the basket that was probably half his weight. I didn’t want to assume it was a gift and I didn’t want to offend by trying to pay. But unfortunately I only know the word for gift, not “to buy.” So I pulled out my Peace Corps Volunteer Chitumbuka workbook and found the translation. Loved the flash of excitement that lit up Monica’s face when we both realized it was a gift. We didn’t have much in our house by way of return gifts, so Laura gave up one of her chitenjes for Vitu’s mum and I filled a bag of candy for the kiddos. Hopefully my broken Chitumbuka was enough to convey how grateful we were to their family and how much it made our hearts swell. Minor medical emergency: In the midst of an African thunderstorm with booming thunder and torrential downpour, I attempted to close the windows in my bedroom. They’re not like American windows but are luvres. So basically rectangular pieces of glass that are moved by a lever. But sometimes they get stuck. So I was pushing on one of them in addition to pushing the lever. Bam. Glass broken and my hand gushing blood. Everywhere. So I go running into the bathroom and stick my hand under the faucet. Thank God we had running water that afternoon. Laura said I freaked out… AKA I got really quiet and closed my eyes. She was great – called Jim right way – he’s a nurse – and gave me a new white shirt to use to apply pressure. He came over a few minutes later (despite the pouring rain – love him!) and checked it out. Fortunately it’d clotted by that point so we could see it wasn’t too deep. No stitches required and he put on some iodine and Neosporin and a bandaid and pronounced me fine. I’ve just gotta keep it clean and dry and it should heal up in 4 days or so. Hurts like the dickens whenever I stretch the skin too much, but I’m grateful that it was less serious than we originally worried. Rather terrifying moment as I laid down to take a nap and the blood pressure of failing to keep my hand in the air resulted in the wound reopening and blood gushing everywhere again. Oh and when I went out to greet Cosmas and in the span it took to walk around the house, I began dripping blood again. Fantastic. Fortunately I made it through the night without any more mishaps though. Whew! Vegetable taco masterpiece: Laura was a dear and ended up cooking dinner for us that night. Mastered the art of chipate making and we figured out how to boil maize and make the wonderful vegetable tacos that Alick and Vicki always made for us. Fabulous dinner – one that will be repeated many times I’m sure! Thanks Universe: I should’ve known that the Universe would never send me a right-handed boy to love. Spent a year and a half thinking Banda was right-handed. His one flaw lol. But seriously, on my list of goofy things that I’d love to have in a boyfriend, left-handedness is right up there :) Along with twin-hood and red-headedness. But some things have to be abandoned right? Anyways, I was struggling to wash dishes left-handed in an attempt to avoid further bleeding and he was amused because apparently he’s a pro at using his left-hand. So after some follow-up questions from me, I discover that he is in fact one of those Malawians who were forced as a child into right-handedness! As a kid, he always tried to eat and write with his left hand but his mother forced him to change. So now he only writes and eats with his right and does everything else with his left. What are the odds of that?! I knew the Universe was lookin’ out for me lol.

Soko, the electrical instructor who had left, thereby cancelling the 3rd year electrical class for Georgina and Cobby and company, returned so the great news is that they’re having the class! Glad that the students have something to do now that is helpful for their trade rather than just staying unemployed like they had been. Hopefully good things will continue to happen for them in the future! Land Update: IT’S OFFICIAL!! I bought the land! Not the chief’s land that was having all of the conflicts, but the second plot that I wrote about in the last blog. With the wonderful help of Mr. Singuini and Cosmas, I got a great deal cost-wise and they were able to communicate my wishes and needs to the owner. I don’t think they will ever understand how grateful I am for their help throughout this whole process… I think we would have been lost and at times unwittingly offensive as we stumbled our way blindly through the negotiations, setting border boundaries, paying process, getting appropriate witnesses, drafting a contract, paying the chief’s advisors, etc. They’ve been a god-send, truly! So anyways, I have a beautiful signed contract stating the land is mine and the chief okayed the whole deal. Cosmas was totally on top of things – signed the contract in the morning and by the end of the day, he’d already had people clear all of the grass and bushes. So the next day we were able to walk through with him and show him where I want the house and which direction it should be pointing, etc. Fabulous! I cannot believe that in just 2-3 weeks, the house will be finished! Granted, water will take a while longer and electricity will take months if not years. Mr. Singuini has suggested I get solar panels in the meantime, so we’ll see about that. And within the next day, they were already finished digging for the foundation. Am walking there every day to check on the progress and it’s really fun to see all of the changes! Celebrated the land purchase with some cold Cherry Plums at Gondwe’s shop. So excited! And will be posting pictures of each day’s progress so ya’ll can see how it’s going. Had a fabulous evening on Friday. To celebrate the land, we wanted to go out to dinner in town – plus our fridge was empty :). So we headed over to the Brothers’ house to ask if we could use a truck. Ended up sitting with Beams for a good hour, just talking with him about life and most interestingly about his decision to become a Brother and how he feels about the experience. I am always fascinated by the psychology of such a decision and the outcome because I could never do it. So I like hearing different perspectives and have certainly heard very different answers from vowed religious here. Anyways, it was just a lovely time as he gave us drinks and we just lounged at the table with nowhere to go and lots of time to enjoy each other’s company. Made me appreciate and love him even more than I already did! We’re definitely going to just show up at their house randomly more often. We also learned how to make chipati – Alick style – and got to taste test. Aaaaand Beams gave us a toaster!! So excited about that. Toast is infinitely more satisfying than bread. We did eventually break up the party as Beams had things to do. And we also got the truck, so we picked up Banda (sans Raymond since he had already left for the midterm holiday – MIRACLE alas has no such holiday so I’m still hard at work – miss that kid!). Headed to Beach Chamber because Laura was lusting after their vegetable curry. It was actually freezing outside so we ended up moving into their little restaurant area because they refused to give us blankets (it’s a hotel and a restaurant). Frightening moment when we realized the girl failed to understand that the curry came with rice… much too spicy to eat alone! But my beautiful MIRACLE attachment students, Wakisa and Kitty, came through for us and found some already cooked rice for us! Whew! A fun night all around. Oh we also saw an older couple who were camping in their tent… ON TOP OF THEIR CAR! Wow, what an awesome way to travel. It has its platform that half-way hangs off, so it must be custom made. How cool is that? They even had a ladder leading up. I’ve decided that’s the way to do it. Away from snakes and animals and you don’t have to pay a bazillion kwacha for lodging. Banda and Ganizani came over for dinner one night because Banda has probably the most awesome movie collection ever so we wanted to watch it. For clarification, they sell “collections” here in town that have like 10 movies per disc. Sometimes there’s a theme – this one is love movies, we’ve also seen “Sex of the Animals” (by the way, former volunteers, I saw another copy the other day so it must be a big seller) and they have a bunch of Nigerian and action collections, along with ones for actors like Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, etc. They’re a little over $2.50. Awesome. Especially when they have new American movies that we miss out on since we’re over here where there are no theaters. So anyways, he has a collection with love stories – Titanic, Ghost, Pretty Woman, The Lake House, My Best Friend’s Wedding, Meet Joe Black, etc… and Beyond Borders. Now, Laura has been talking about Beyond Borders for weeks and I’ve never seen it so we were thrilled that Banda had it. Bribed them into letting us watch it with pasta salad and eternal gratitude. Pretty depressing movie, by the way. Laura was curious as to why I wasn’t crying. Because I felt too empty and shell-shocked, that’s why. Had our usual cooking day on Sunday. Beans, Rice, Pottage, Tortillas, and Banana Bread. Very successful and I enjoy the rhythm of puttering around from task to task. Watched “My Best Friend’s Wedding” and “The Bodyguard,” which, by the way, worst ending ever. Laura and I were utterly outraged. He doesn’t die AND he doesn’t get on the plane? Psh. On Sunday night we had a little fiesta! We had bought wine and Sprite in town the day before so could make spritzers and oh it was a fun time! Started at approximately 5:15 and the wine was gone by 6, but Banda our hero biked to the airport to return with a backpack of Greens (beer). Kalua surprised us all by coming over, which just made the night even more fun as he was in a chatty mood so we had fabulous conversations and Laura was finally able to see why I love the kid so much! Ended up talking about a lot of serious issues too – homosexuality, belief in God, the purpose of religion, sexual experimentation in boarding schools. As usual, we were impressed by their openness and progressive beliefs, many of which would be considered liberal in the States, so borderline crazy here in Malawi. And of course there was dancing. Haven’t danced in a long time, so it was a great way to end the evening.

Highlights: - Mumba’s goodbye party. Really, not a highlight, more like a huge bummer. I’ve always thought of Mumba as a Malawian uncle and have much love for the man. He was the first person to make an effort to pull me out of my shell. He never failed to bravely try to make conversation on our Saturday trips into town and for that I’ll always adore him. Plus he just cracks me up. So I’m pretty sad that he’s being transferred to another school – in Livingstonia actually. So at least I’ll get to see him every now and then since I love going on vacation there, but it just won’t be the same without him at Chaminade. - Laura scared the bee-gee-ses out of the Brothers one night. She’d had enough of George (a huge lizard that occupies our house. There are many of them, but Laura has decided George has grown up enough that it’s time to leave the nest. Plus she’s convinced he’s taunting her). So anyways, one night she snapped and started swinging at him with a broom, trying to herd him out the door. Screaming at the top of her lungs throughout, of course. After a couple of minutes of this she finally gave up (a.k.a. he outran her to a hiding spot). 30 seconds later, Bro. Beams calls to check on us. Apparently he was halfway to our house when the screaming stopped, so he turned back. We tried to explain to him that, in the future, that should be a sign to hurry, since clearly the attackers have succeeded in subduing us into silence. But anyways, thought it was cute that he called to make sure we weren’t being robbed or beaten or something. - Thought I was officially a landowner for 24 hours. Great excitement. - And then I went to work the next day. And one of my fellow teachers told me that there have been disputes about the land for the last year. That it’s really Nyopyo’s land (a cook at MIRACLE) but that the chief took it from her and claimed it as his own. Of course, he failed to mention this to me and just tried to make a buck before anyone realized. This absolutely is not ok with me. So we had some meetings with Nyopyo and the Chief and basically he just told her that it’s his and there’s nothing she can do about it. And then tried to convince me that it was just fine, no problem. He wouldn’t listen when I told him to me it was definitely not fine. There’s no way I’m stealing land from this lady. I’m sure he’ll get away with it and sell it to someone else, but I refuse to be a part of it. I’d feel guilty for the rest of my life. So we’re back to square one, looking for land that is conflict-free and legit. OI. - Laura and Banda and I took a weekend trip to Hara where a former volunteer has built a lodge. It was way quieter than say a trip to Nkhata Bay, but my old-lady-self liked that. I’d rather sleep in late, swim, drink endless amounts of tea, and relax in a hammock all day than run around anyway. So it suits me. Raymond was supposed to come with us too but he failed at the last moment. Disappointed about that. But it was fun having Banda along for the first time. Also had a great time chatting with Frank who I’ve missed dearly (he is working as the bartender/everything man at the lodge) as well as the 3 MIRACLE students who are there on attachment. A lovely weekend. - Not so lovely? Returning home, walking into my room, and realizing something had died there in my absence. Not.Even.Joking. Oh man the stench was unbelievable. And terrifying because we’re still living out of suitcases, so all of my things are on the floor – terrified that it crawled into my clothes and died. THANK GOODNESS it did not. I found the decaying lizard behind the door, remarkably decomposed for 2 days, full of fat maggots. Makes me retch just thinking about it. Will definitely have nightmares about them being all over me. So amidst the dry-heaving of Laura and myself, we managed to get it into a Twizzler’s bag and out into our compost heap. Really did think both of us were going to vomit a couple of times. Alas, dropped some maggots while running through the house, so while we are confident that we got all of them… there will always be some paranoia. Definitely the most disgusting thing I’ve experienced in my year and some months here. - After that awful experience, I’ve switched rooms because of the smell. I’m actually happy about it because my new room is about half the size. My bed is walled in on 3 sides, so I feel very safe. I know I’m strange. But anyways, Banda was great about hauling everything across the house and we all had a good laugh as we tried to squeeze the bed frame through that poorly angled house. - Jim and Robyn showed up shortly after all of this craziness, which just made our day! They always make us smile. They were on a walk and just wanted to check in on us and bring us some wonderful ginger cookies. Such sweet people! - The new Bishop came to visit Chaminade on Monday, so I got to go to mass during the school day. He seems to be a pretty funny guy – at least he amused the students throughout his homily. Had a heart-filling moment when Beams was up on the altar, playing his guitar and singing the responsorial psalm. So much love for that Brother! - Land 2.0: Went to look at a plot of land with Cosmas (my builder, once this whole thing gets going). It’s just at the bottom of the hill to Chaminade so it’s nice and close, about a 10 minute leisurely walk. It’s a pretty enough area – lots of trees – kind of in between the first plot and the chief’s plot, aesthetically speaking. And it’s near power so that’s good – even closer than the last plot. And it’s at the bottom of the hill, so water should come more regularly than it does on campus (or at the chief’s land). Thanks to Cosmas, the price should be okay. He’s going back to talk to the owner again this morning to finalize the cost. And then we just have to come with money and have witnesses there to verify that it is his land and now it’s mine, etc. So exciting that this is finally coming together!

Sorry for the gap – nothing truly exciting has happened. Just a lot of work and hanging out with friends.

So I thought I’d take a different approach to today’s blog – not so much activities, but instead things that I’ve learned over the past couple of weeks (sorry for the cheesy undertones lol).

1. If I ignore the fear that I look like an idiot, I am in fact able to complete some tasks like a Malawian woman. We had a huge market day one weekend which culminated in my carrying a ridiculously heavy sack of maize (corn) on my head through the market. I always used to shy away from doing this because I just feel like a huge poser and a bozo to boot but it really is so much easier than carrying it in your arms. Especially because this bag was so heavy I never would have been able to lift it, much less walk across town. So Banda hefted it up onto my head and I tottered off, to the screams of “Ndalama mama!” Because that’s right, I was so caught up in balancing that I forgot to pay for the maize. Whoops. Sorted that out and then made my way to the truck, ignoring the cat calls and focusing on my sense of accomplishment when Banda told me I’d been “Malawianized.” Also washed some laundry by hand (we usually hire Madame Secretary to do this painful task) and I have been doing an inordinate amount of cooking lately. But it’s all fine since it makes me proud of my self-sufficiency. I may be slow and weak in comparison but I’m not nearly as inept as most Malawians assume. I get it done. I may have sore shoulders and bleeding knuckles but I do it. And that feeling of success definitely balances out the extra effort and hours of work that would have been done in minutes in America.

2. Sometimes it’s just nice to go out with fellow Westerners. Now I love my Malawian family, don’t get me wrong. I’d happily spend hours at a time with them. A lot of foreigners who I’ve met here have complained that the level of conversation with Malawians is generally lacking . But I don’t agree – I’ve had more gems pop up with them than I ever had with fellow foreigners here. Maybe I’m just weird and consider different things to be interesting. And sure, it doesn’t happen every time but when it does, oh how wonderful it is. But it was still lovely to share dinner with Jim and Robyn (our American and Australian uncle and auntie here – they’re great about looking out for us!) and their friend Duncan, who is a Canadian (our age) who is working as a water engineer here. They took us to Beach Chamber, my first time there since it’s very expensive. Had great chicken and rice – pretty sure I ate half a chicken – and enjoyed the beautiful view combined with interesting conversations about topics that took me back to America.

3. Building a house makes me tired… and we haven’t even started yet! Trying to figure out all of the land stuff and finding builders and making a budget and creating floor plans…. Oi. Hours of decision making. Makes me tired. But it’s coming together and I’m trying to tell myself “one step at a time.” And that if it goes a bit over budget, it’s not the end of the world, because way over budget here is a few hundred dollars which wouldn’t be catastrophic. To update though I’m going to buy the chief’s land. It did turn out to be more expensive than I wanted to spend, but since it’s right next to the school, it’s going to win out.

4. There’s nothing more beautiful than a child’s sheer joy. I was squeezed in the back of a pickup truck, folded up on the floor with Banda’s knees in my face, worrying that Muwona, the 4-year old perched on his lap, would either kick me in the mouth or shower me with the tray of eggs that she was clutching. Not the most pleasant of rides but somehow I was still enjoying myself. Especially when I turned to my left and saw Muche, Muwona’s twin. Now, I don’t think small children get to go into town very often. I imagine it’s kinda a big adventure. Especially when they come out of the deal with lollipops and a new haircut. On the drive home, I turned around and there was Muche sitting next to me, face flush to the wind, eyes barely squinted open from how fast the truck was going, with a huge goofy-looking grin on his face. True bliss. Especially as a giggle escaped every so often. He was loving it. And meanwhile I (and all of the other adults) had been ducking my head in an attempt to avoid the whipping wind. Made me belly laugh and then tear up from the beauty of it seeing such joy.

5. I’m pretty over living alone. Laura went to Nkhata Bay for a vacation but I couldn’t go because of work. Plus I spent way too much money there last time so I just can’t afford it. So I was staying here all alone for 5 days…. Something that I was actually excited for since I loved having my own place during college and have missed it since. But on Friday after work I realized that I just didn’t want to go home to an empty house. Maybe it was because I was angry (felt justifiably wronged at work) and knew that anger could quickly turn to being upset and crying… but I also kind of think I just wanted some interaction. So I traipsed around campus, failing to find the usual boys. So I perched out on the boys’ porch until they came home, talked to people for a few minutes and then was totally fine to go home alone. And I’ve been fine all of the other days – just always a touch bored and lonely. Especially when the power goes out so I can’t watch a movie or cook. So that will be interesting once Laura goes back to Texas – I think I’ll have to get into a routine of going to sit around at Chaminade for awhile to have some social time before heading home to my empty house.

6. I am indeed afraid of the dark. I always suspected this. A recent night proved it. The power went out for several hours so my computer eventually died too, leaving me with a candle in the middle of a huge empty house. Would’ve been fine with Laura there but alone, no ma’am. Even a dead-bolted door didn’t make me feel any better. Which is weird because I’ve never felt threatened here in Karonga. Ever. I feel safer here than in Texas. But the dark changes all of that. Too many creepy noises and possibilities.

7. How much it frustrates me that most Malawians are so passive. One of the most common phrases on hears here is “oh it’s part of life.” Basically, “it happens, move on.” Now sometimes this is comforting in its reminder that there’s no point in whining about the little stuff. But sometimes it’s just entirely unsettling. Case and point: Your newborn baby dies? It’s part of life. Someone steals your family’s land? She’ll accept it and hold no grudge. Your pay gets slashed without reason? It happens; you can’t challenge management. Yes, some things cannot be changed. Like the first instance. But the others – and most of the things here that get that blasé response – can and should be challenged. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve thought “Damn it, stand up for yourself. Stop letting people walk all over you. This passiveness is part of the problem!”

8. I do think the universe watches out for us. Water only comes to our house about once a week for roughly 3 hours, usually in the middle of the night. So this means that in the interim we survive on basins and buckets of water. We have a huge one in particular that we fill and use for everything from drinking to washing clothes to bathing to flushing the toilet. We’re pretty comfortable until that water gets to about 6 inches deep and there’s no sign of coming water. Start to get a little antsy and begin dreading the day when we have to lug buckets of water across campus, stop showering, and use the pit latrine. And yet it always seems like water comes just in time. I was thinking that at work yesterday because we were at the bottom of our barrel again, but I also said to myself “oh don’t be silly. It’s just a lucky coincidence.” And then I got home. And after a week-long absence, the water had started coming an hour before. Thank you, Universe.

9. How to make tortillas. And hot chocolate. I’ve been on a bit of a cooking spree lately. Becoming more experimental as we’re growing weary of the same meals all the time. Well kind of – I’m still willing to eat spaghetti every other day, just as Laura is willing to eat pottage (a kind of bean stew with potatoes) for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But anyways, I wanted to make quesadillas one night – and tacos and egg rolls and samosas eventually – so I needed to figure out how to make tortillas. Thank you Google. Found a recipe and it was a smashing success. They’re a bit firmer than grocery store tortillas but they taste good and look legit. So proud of myself. Also, figured out how to make hot chocolate starting from cocoa. Will probably go into diabetic shock one day from the amount of sugar I add to it, but such is life. It’s been cold here lately so it’s nice to curl up on the couch with a blanket and some hot chocolate – a dream to be remembered in a couple of months when it’s 120 degrees!

10. It really just sucks to be an outsider sometimes. I had a handful of sad moments last year when realizing that regardless of how long I stay here, I’ll always be an outsider looking in. But they were always just moments of “hmm that’s a shame” – never really enough to break me down because they were always in light of something beautiful about Malawi (like the women’s communities here). But this week I had a huge moment of “I will never belong here no matter how hard I try.” We had a meeting negotiating a salary change (important for me to know what’s going on!!) and despite my asking several times that they use English (which they are all fluent in and fully capable of using), they kept ignoring me and switching to vernacular. The only times they would use English is when they were telling me to do something for them. Or when deciding that I wasn’t part of the community as they created a schedule for the women on campus to go visit an injured teacher’s wife in the hospital. All along with a dismissive attitude of my being a huge inconvenience to them. Now this really hurt me. I’ve given up a whole heck of a lot to move myself here and try to make a life with them as my closest friends. So to be ignored and dismissed was pretty awful. And realizing that I can try to learn Chitumbuka all I want, but it’s so difficult I’ll likely never be fluent enough to really understand. Plus they’ve gotten mean in their vernacular usage lately. I’ve spent months at lunches, breaks, meetings, and casual chatting, not understanding. And I’m totally fine with that. I have no problem just sitting peacefully while they talk amongst themselves. It actually makes me smile. But lately they’ve taken to mocking us to our faces, refusing to tell us what’s going on, and then laughing hysterically at our incomprehension. I’m not okay with the meanness of it. So all of this was only fueling the problem of the meeting. It ended up with me leaving campus because there is nowhere private there to cry. The toilet – my usual hideout – was closed since we had no water. So I spent an hour sobbing in Banda’s room – his poor roommates must think I’m crazy. No resolution of course, but it helped to cry to someone who does actually understand my frustrations. I’ve since taken a more indifferent stance. I’ll do my best to learn all of the Chitumbuka that I can and that’s all I can do. They’ve had American people working here for 10 years – if they haven’t changed to be more inclusive by now, they’re not going to and there’s no point in my getting worked up about it.

11. Being sick really sucks when you’re away from home. Already knew this one of course. But I’ve been sick for 6 days, feeling alternately like an elephant is on my chest, feeling like my head is going to explode, having a nose that’s running all over the place, and a cough that is so violent it makes me retch.

12. So while it does suck to be an outsider, there are some undeniable perks to being a foreigner in Malawi. Near the top of that list is medical care. The hospital here is awful. It’s free which is great but there is also only one doctor and the nurses are horribly understaffed and overworked. Waiting times stretch into hours. And then you end up in a huge room with 30 of your closest friends, all of you sick with different things. I’d imagine it’s a miracle that you don’t catch something else while you’re there. But I have to say “imagine” because I don’t really know. My skin affords me better treatment. We’ve tried to refuse and push others in front of us who were waiting longer, but that rarely works. We see the doctor fairly quickly – within the hour tops – and for severe cases, we’ve all gotten private rooms. And if I don’t want to deal with the hospital, I don’t really have to. I can choose instead to go to the private clinic in town because I can afford the $5 fee for both doctor visit and medication… something that unfortunately most of my neighbors cannot. In fact, I experienced a combined advantage with this current bout of illness. Banda was going to take me to the hospital but at the last minute had to cover classes for an absent teacher. I didn’t want to go to the hospital alone. So Paul dropped me at the clinic, warning that if I wasn’t done in 30 minutes, I would have to bike taxi and walk home – roughly a 1 hour journey. Not really something that my sick self wanted to do. So when the receptionist walked me past all of the waiting women, I let it happen. I could say that it happened so fast, I didn’t really know what was happening. I could say that it’s okay to accept the one advantage per month when we are deluged by disadvantages at least 10 times per day. But let’s be honest. I simply didn’t want to walk home. I’m not proud to admit it. I hate when foreigners blindly reap all of the benefits while bitching loudly about the pitfalls. Or even worse, gallivanting through a foreign country without realizing that the only reason they’re living the good life is because of the elevated conditions their skin affords them. I like to think I don’t do that often. That I take the bad with the good and try to walk softly and in community. And yet, here I was passing up ladies with sick babies. I was out of that place in 20 minutes flat and home in bed in under an hour. But days later I still feel guilty.

13. They do celebrate Valentine’s Day here. Who said it was just a Hallmark holiday?! Lol Just kidding, it still makes me nauseous. The nice thing is that I got signed up for some promotion from the phone company where I got 100 free text messages in honor of Valentine’s Day…. not gonna lie, I’m probably most excited about that lol. It did actually end up being a nice day. Much more laid-back and simple than it is in America, so I appreciated that. I was going to make a special dessert that Banda loves but Vitu showed up at my door so that plan went out the window. Ended up sitting outside of the Open School chatting with students until the Vitu-Whisperer was done with class. Once Banda was done, we walked Vitu home but his parents weren’t there so we took him along to Gondwe’s where we had some minerals. Vitu got his very own bottle lol and finished it before the two adults! Dropped him off on the way home and then continued on to cook dinner – spaghetti with fried eggs. So weird. But apparently his mom used to make it all the time for him. He had to teach me how to do the eggs because they’re not our fried eggs. They heat up A LOT of oil and then pour the broken eggs into the oil. So it basically soaks up the oil and gets all puffy. Bizarre. And totally disgusting when you think about the oil. But they tasted ok. And to appease him, I tried it with the spaghetti and sauce. Not too bad. Watched “When Harry Met Sally” during dinner and then walked over to watch the Chelsea football game. Fell asleep in the staff room (of course) so that was pretty much my night. Loved that it involved hanging out with friends just as much as it did with each other. My kinda Valentine’s Day.

So I broke up with Matt. (Didn't see that coming, did you?) And I was trying to be nice, because it's not easy to say "I think we should break up."

As I got around to it, pointing out that we were both busy, had contrasting interests, worked better together when we had a lot of people around, he went off into a whining rant (this is one of those things that annoyed me about him) in which he proceeded to tell me how busy he is, how he wants to spend time with his nephew and family and he'll drop everything to do that, etc, etc. Then goes into a rant about trivia, the one time he went we ended up with a big table, and he showed up right at the end, and (as it was before Christmas and it was a gift) I was "knitting" instead of playing (I go to hang out with my friends, I don't actually like trivia), and there was that one guy at the table being all into it and authoritative (this is John, he's into trivia, and I don't like it when my friends are badmouthed. It's one thing for me to complain, occasionally, it's another thing for someone, who's just meet the guy for the second time, to do so), and then he goes, again, into a how he wants to party at the end of a long work week, and I want to sleep, how he doesn't want to get up early on Saturday...

That's about where I'd cut him off (I told him to stop whining) and said that's basically what I was getting at earlier and we should break up.

His response? "I never considered us a couple."

I made a really stupid comment about girls, having sex and being couples, which would have been more intelligent if I'd managed to throw four and a half months into it, but I wasn't interested in talking. I was interested in leaving. That's what I did.

Now, don't go all mushy on me. It took me about ten minutes (and a little more. I had to wait 19 min for the red line, but it got stuck at 11 and then suddenly went to 3, so my time skills were lacking) for me to stop feeling hurt and start feeling insulted. And then I felt insulted that a guy I dated would try such a stupid, juvenile line. "Not a couple"? Put, 'exclusive' 'serious' etc, and I wouldn't argue the point, but to say not at all? I mean, at the least, we were having sex and that makes us lovers. And we did have fun, and we still had a viable friendship, only there'd be less alone time (which we were bad at anyway) and no more sex. (Don't get me wrong, until I lost interest, that sex was good and worthy of gossip.) I was more than ready to chalk this up to 'future vague friends', which nearly all my ex-boyfriends are, and say we'd had a good run. I had friends who tried to talk me OUT of breaking up with him. But to end it on such a defensive, childish line? To pretend what we'd had, had been nothing? To dismiss it? How very... unworthy of him.

On the brighter side, I feel no guilt for breaking up with him, I need no reminder of why I broke up with him, and shall now be (happily) single without any regrets. I will choice to remember that we had fun, acknowledge that he (not entirely surprisingly) proved himself far below me, and move on.

On my own.

With a smile.

Wheeeeee!!!

Found out that the 3rd year Electrical class (with my faves – Georgina, Cobby, Charity, Chimwemwe, Haslon, etc.) did not make. Well there were enough people, but Soko resigned because he found a new job, so the teacher who was supposed to teach 3rd year got shifted to teaching the 2nd year class. Was pretty disappointed about this and we had a difficult goodbye with Georgina and Cobby, full of hugs and sadness since they will be moving down south (a 25 hour public bus ride) and I likely won’t see them for months, if not years. I’d gotten used to having them around again and loved hanging out and chatting. I was more upset though when Georgina started talking about her future plans. With the certification level that they have currently, they haven’t been able to find decent, long-term jobs. So they were hoping the better level that they would get with the 3rd year would boost them into something good career-wise. Without the class now, she’s planning on moving to Blantyre and going back to secondary school. To explain, you take exams at the end of secondary school (high school) that determine whether or not you go to college. Unfortunately there are only 4 (is that right past volunteers?) traditional universities here, which accept about 2,000 students in total for the whole country each year. So that’s like 2% of the population getting a college degree and the rest are just left out. Odds are, her scores are not going to be good enough to go to college. So she’s basically abandoning the idea of being an electrician and will likely end up just staying without a job. I cannot even explain to you how heavy this weighs on my heart. She’s so fabulous and bright and just plain amazing that it hurts me to hear that she thinks she’s at a dead end.

I went with Clifford and Chief Mwanganda to see the other plot of land that I’m considering. It was way bigger – I really only need half of it – but unfortunately the chief didn’t seem to want to sell only part of it. So I’m worried that it will be way more than I can afford. I feel more drawn to the other plot aesthetically, but this second one is the more practical option. It’s literally right next to MIRACLE (it shares a boundary) which is great socially since the majority of my friends live on campus. It’s also nice security wise because I’d be close to trusted people if anything happens, whereas the other is kind of in the middle of nowhere. And electricity hookups MIGHT be easier since it’s near campus. We’ll see. It’s definitely not as beautiful, but I think with some clearing of the bushes and some slashing of the grass, it has potential. There’s a great tree too which is nice. And there’s enough land that I could eventually cultivate (plant crops) one day or build rental quarters on it. Just waiting on Clifford to see what the prices are for everything. Keep your fingers crossed that I can afford one of them!!

Laura and I have had some very interesting chats lately about different Malawian cultures, specifically with gender roles, familial connections, and marriage. Because here in Malawi, they simply don’t understand the concept of just dating someone. Within a day of hearing that Banda and I were dating, they suddenly blew it into “Alyson’s got a fiancé.” Sigh. But one of the nice things that has come out of that craziness (which I’m about to give up trying to dispel since it’s like an indestructible cockroach) is that the Madames have been very forthcoming on their advice. And even though I’m not really in that place, I’ve always found hearing about such things fascinating. Last year Molly and Matt and I were able to have some long chats with Madame Mwalweni about similar topics, so I was excited to continue learning. Madame Sichone kicked it off by telling us about some of the traditions that seem stranger to a Western mind. I’m all for different lifestyles but when those rituals are physically and emotionally abusive to pre-teen and teenage girls, no ma’am. So those stories were difficult to hear at times. From what she was saying though, those activities do seem to be limited to a small tribe rather than being widespread. Because, as usual, it’s impossible to paint all Malawians with the same brush. No such thing as a definitive “Malawian culture” because there are so many different tribes of peoples, all with their own histories and traditions – and even languages (there are 40ish of them in Malawi – just an indication of how diverse this country is!). Our chat with Madame Mwalweni was much less voyeuristic and thus more to my taste; more about understanding the meanings behind certain rituals (some of which are emotionally lovely) and how to respectfully find a place of belonging. Especially because she not only talked about marriage relations, but also about how different family members are expected to act and signs of respect and how to visit new households. It was just really nice – like talking to an Auntie – and I know the things she told us will be more than helpful in the years to come and even now just in my daily interactions with teachers and neighbors.

Nearly sliced my thumb off while slicing bread the other day. A bit exaggerative, but there was blood spouting everywhere and I was worried for a bit that I’d need to go to the doctor. Fortunately, it looks like I’ll be just fine if I can keep it clean and uninfected (a bigger task here in Malawi lol). Oh how I miss American conveniences… never truly appreciated the saying “best thing since sliced bread” until I moved here!

Had a GREAT trip to Gondwe’s! As mentioned in a previous post, I was becoming dubious about the wisdom of taking Vitu along with us, because of his hysterical fits when we leave. So we passed his house without a peep, but of course he heard through the grapevine that we were around, so he came trotting up to Gondwe’s. He was even more adorable then ever – so much giggling and belly-laughter that we were shocked! He spent a good hour sitting on my lap and leaping for my neck when I dared to set him down. He loved the horsey game this time and also decided to help himself to the last sips of my Coca-Cola. Eventually we gathered a crowd so we spent a while chatting with them and drawing in the dirt, before it all got to be too hectic and thus time to leave. I was apprehensive, especially since we didn’t have anyone with us to translate for him and his family. But I used my limited knowledge to just keep saying to him “We are going home. You should stay here. We will find you tomorrow.” And I don’t know if it was that or if his parents spanked it into him last time, but he was perfectly calm! No crying, no clinging to us. He hugged us goodbye, I passed him off to his dad, and he even gave a little wave. Oh it was so lovely and made my heart happy to know that we can now spend time with him without feeling awful about abandonment!

Laura and I have completely bonded with Raymond and far from being the quiet, conservative boy we first thought he was, we’ve come to love his chattiness, frequent giggles, and suggestive side comments. Love him like the brother I never had! We’ve spent many hours watching Nigerian films with him (which I’m finally getting used to and coming to appreciate for their ridiculousness) and he even came by our house by himself the other day to visit. Had a fun time as he got his friendship bracelet from Laura and we offered him one cookie and he grabbed 10. And he ate every single one of them, the adorable kid.

Tragedy almost struck one day in the form of our water being turned off. The Brothers failed to tell us that we were supposed to pay the water and electric bills… now I’d be more than happy to, but the bills don’t even come to our house, so I have no idea what to even do! Figured we were just supposed to pay them back after they handled it. So the month ended and the water board came to turn off our water. Thank goodness that Beams found them at it and paid, so we still have water! Whew! That would have been a 2-week nightmare of waiting for them to turn it back on.

In related news, we just went through a 28 hour stretch of having no electricity. Without a supply of firewood, we’ve been pretty hungry without our stove-top cooker. Thankfully it came back tonight – my eyes hurt it was so bright!

Laura and I had our first experience of making nsima on our own… well really she did because it’s kinda a one person process and then next time, I’ll be the cook. The boys had us over again so we could do it, but adorably made their own pot of nsima so that we wouldn’t all go hungry :) Laura did a brilliant job – I was so impressed! She stirred the whole time which is quite the task since it gets very thick and tiring. And I thought the nsima was pretty great for a first try. It stayed together in patties which isn’t something I can say for my first attempt. Raymond said it wasn’t cooked all the way through, but that’s what he’s here for – next time we can make the necessary corrections! I’m sure it will just take time and practice but we are both bound and determined to become master nsima chefs. Had a great time eating with them, all 7 of us sitting in a circle on their living room floor, dishing up food and taking a meal together. Had an overwhelming feeling of family. I love when that feeling just rushes up on you unexpectedly. Moments to take note of and linger in. Also had a solid 5 minutes of hysterical laughter as we decided to figure out the logistics of one of the sweet Yawo rituals involving the knotting of a chitenje (cloth – like a sheet). Lol Oh man I can’t even type without shaking with laughter thinking of Banda waiting impatiently for my laughter to subside, Raymond looking on with non-stop giggles, and Laura’s inspired photography angles. Truly an epic evening.

The day after our return from Nkhata Bay, we didn’t go to work but instead spent the day in town, going to meetings for the library project, renewing visas, going to the clinic, and buying groceries since our house was empty post-trip. Was relaxing at home after running around all day, when suddenly I heard a knock on the door. Dragged myself up grumbling (unplanned visitors here 95% of the time are only asking for something, not just being pleasant). Open the door. And who is there?! VITU! With his older brother. Apparently he had been crying for us all day so his family finally got fed up and just brought him to us. So his brother left him with us and went off to watch a football game. Oh Malawi and your different ways of parenting. Laura was on the phone with her parents so I was left on my own for a while. Now I love children. But Vitu is stubbornly difficult. Always seems to be bored or unhappy no matter what you do. So I gave him a tootsie roll which he shoved whole into his mouth lol. Decided to take him on a walk because nothing in our house is kid-friendly. Meandered over to the summer hut in search of someone who could interpret so we didn’t have to sit in silence. As usual though he pretty much refused to speak despite the teachers’ attempts. Mlotha made me feel better though by telling me that as long as I kept giving him hugs and smiling at him, he was very happy. After a good while, it was finally time for Banda to be out of classes and since he’s the only one who can ever get Vitu to talk, we went in search of him. Swung Vitu up on my shoulders and thoroughly enjoyed him choking me/messing up my hair while we walked along. He even asked me later in the visit to carry him like that again. I was so shocked to hear his little voice! Found Banda and went back to the house where we continued to bribe Vitu with American food. Beef jerky, Cheeze-its, and Raisinets lol. He loved all of it of course. Banda’s face was priceless as he tasted the beef jerky and immediately passed it along to Vitu, who spent the rest of the visit doublefisting about 4 servings of beef jerky. That kid was content. Eventually we had to go though since we had plans for the evening, so we put Vitu on the back of Banda’s bike and bike-taxied him home. And this is where things turned not so pleasant. He immediately started throwing a fit, screaming hysterically for a good 30 minutes, writhing on the ground in agony. Oh my lord it was awful. And it happened again when we saw him a few days later. So I’m pretty sure that if he keeps that up, we won’t be visiting anymore. At least I won’t. It’s just not fair to his parents to leave them with a screaming child who refuses to listen or eat.

Laura and I tried again to go to the airport for drinks with Banda and Raymond, but alas again it was closed. Terrible luck with that. We even went early but to no avail. We did have a fun walk though and have come to realize that Raymond understands everything we say. This is not necessarily a good thing lol. Usually if there is something scandalous we want to say, Laura and I will just say it really fast so that it is lost to any snoopy ears. But not with Raymond… his giggle lets us know every time he has caught something scandalous! Fortunately, we’ve also come to realize that we feel free around Raymond and Banda in a way that we don’t usually around other Malawians. For all of the great friendships I’ve made here with teachers and workers and Brothers, they’re the only two where I don’t feel the need to censor or make sure I’m being proper. So that’s lovely. I’ll be sad when Raymond’s student teaching is up at the end of March – hopefully he’ll be posted in Karonga! Dare to dream lol.

Unfortunately I did spend most of last week very sick. As in – not going to work because I feel like I’m going to throw up every moment of the day – kind of sick. Definitely the most sick I’ve ever been here – or at least the longest and most consistent throughout the day. Being sick in Malawi is pretty awful, especially when the power goes out leaving you with no fan and a heat-box of a house. Spent a lot of time laying on the concrete floor, trying to get comfortable. Adorable moment as Banda brought over an Orange Fanta “for the patient.” My need for productivity did win out though since we were having dinner guests the first night, so I spent my sick day alternating between laying down with bouts of nausea and making banana bread, chocolate chip cookies, cheeseburgers, French fries (from scratch – unpeeled potatoes), pickles, and beans. Side note: So proud of myself for figuring out how to make banana bread! It tastes wonderful, even Banda likes it, and it’s going to make Laura and me very fat over the coming months because we snack on it every time we walk into the room!

Like I said, we were having dinner guests – Banda, Kalua, and the 3 student teachers - so I ended up making dinner for 7 despite my feeling crappy. I’ve never cooked alone for that many people before so it was bit daunting. Also, I’ve never made hamburgers before. They turned out pretty rare, close to raw for poor Raymond I think. But the boys powered through, eating all of their burgers despite the bad cooking and that they just think our food is so bizarre. It was pretty adorable watching them try to assemble their burgers though, keeping in mind that they had never even heard of hamburgers before. Had a fun time telling them how to layer and watching them squirt ketchup all over the place. Props to Raymond for creativity – he put the fries onto the burger itself. And to Kalua for cuteness – after hearing that putting cheese on the burger made it a cheeseburger, he wanted to know if putting cucumbers on it made it a “cucumberger.” They also must have thought dessert was strange because I made cookies but they were the soft kind, my preference, but here all cookies are hard. But despite the strange foods they seemed to have a fun time and my heart just about overflowed with happiness as I stood there and watched them laughing and eating on the couch. Love them.

So how many other crazy activities can Alyson do while feeling ridiculously sick? How to top a 7 person dinner party? Well, how about spending 2 hours sweeping water out of a house? That’ll work. While waiting for my Communications class on Thursday morning, Laura suddenly realized that she had left a tap open in the bathroom. So she ran home while I anxiously awaited the news. It turns out that there was about 2 inches of water flooded in her bedroom as well as the bathroom! So I ran home to help and had to search Chaminade’s campus for brooms since we had nothing with which to move the water. Thank goodness for Kalua who ended up missing his class in order to help me find them! And his reaction when he saw the great flood of 2011? “Oh that is just too much!” Because, you know, 1 inch would have been a pleasure :) So Laura and I spent a couple of hours sweeping water out of her room, through the living room, and out the back door. We called it “Lake Azungu” – “White People’s Lake.” Luckily nothing was ruined – only soaked – and our floors are now clean! Even at the time it was funny lol but now I can barely type for giggling.

Other than all of those exciting moments, Laura and I have also had some really nice moments of just sitting at home, having long chats about different things in life. Really nice. And she’s started getting into the swing of African cooking more, so that’s also been great to have someone to share in the meal prep tasks… it’s always more enjoyable when there are 2 sets of hands! Also rekindled my love for “Mama Mia” as we had a great night watching and singing along to that!

Signed my first contract at MIRACLE – exciting moment! Got my first paycheck – not so exciting lol. $130 a month, baby. Oh student loans, pay yourself back.

Took Raymond on his first trip to the lake with us and Banda. I think he had a fun time lol. Great excitement was had as a singing group was recording a music video while we were there. Pretty funny to watch them dance in the waves all serious-like. Also, scandalous moment as there was a Malawian couple who first was making out in the water and then moved inland to literally lay on top of each other on the beach with the waves lapping up on them. It was like a movie lol. And so distracting we couldn’t help but watch. Have never seen a Malawian couple give each other a peck kiss in public or even hug, much less have a full out make-out session. Poor Raymond was curled up in the fetal position he was so uncomfortable about it! Raced bike taxis home – Banda won, the skinny brat, even while balancing a tray of 30 eggs. My guy put up a brave fight, surging out in front for the early lead, but he didn’t quite understand the concept of “slow and steady wins the race.” Passed a truck that was stuck on the walk home and was suddenly deluged by people yelling “Madame!” and launching themselves on me for hugs. Remember that it was pitch dark at this point so I had no idea who people were lol. Only Cobby, who we could tell by his loudness and cologne. Fun to see him randomly since it had been over a week since our last meeting and I was missing the kid.

Went with Clifford to see some land that I might buy. As mentioned before, I’m going to build a house here in Karonga. It’s very difficult to find anything for rent that has electricity and water that isn’t more than I make in a month. And you can build a small house for about $2,500. Huge chunk out of my summer work savings, but it’ll pay itself back in 2-3 years. And if I have to move at some point I can always rent it to people. So it’s a good investment. By “small” I mean 23 feet by 20 feet for the whole house, so that will be 2 bedrooms plus a large sitting room that can eventually be sectioned off into a 3rd bedroom for the 10 children I’m planning to have :) Just kidding, take a breath people. But I digress. It’s tiny by American standards, but for me it’s just right. One of the bedrooms will be a make-shift kitchen and then if I do have kids one day, I will build another room outside to house the kitchen. There’s not going to be a toilet inside because that is too expensive. Instead I’ll have a pit latrine, but I’ll do it up nice – going to build a seat for it so that it’s comfortable. Also the shower will be detached outside. I’m excited! Once we get the land, it should go fairly quickly – maybe a month to build everything, although waiting for the electrical hookup sounds like it might take much longer.

Anyways, back to the land. I want to buy from a friend so that hopefully they will give me a fair price. So we went with Clifford whose father has a huge plot that he’s willing to sell part of. Walked for only 15 minutes which is great that it’s so close to campus. And I was also pretty charmed by the beauty of the area. I could definitely see myself living there. The plot itself is not as beautiful as the rest, but when you’re surrounded on all 4 sides by it, I think that’s enough. There are hills behind, a rice field in front and huge hundred-year-old trees on the neighboring plots. It’s like a little oasis in the generally unattractiveness that is Karonga bohme (town). So we’ll see what the price is – hopefully it’s right. He’s also taking me to see another piece of land that belongs to Chief Mwanganda, so I’m excited for that as well as to see the Chief again, who we knew before and who has to approve my land purchase :)

Lazy Sundays – my favorite day of the week here in Malawi. Even beats Beach Saturdays! Lazed about in bed until 2 pm and then spent the afternoon being enjoyably productive. Also got to talk to Mum for the first time in a long time and had a nice chat with Sara, even though we failed at Skype and had to move to Facebook Chat. I have also begun again in earnest teaching myself Chitumbuka because Dorcas told me I was going to be a terrible mother who cannot even understand my own children. Now I don’t believe her snarkiness for a second, but it did make me want to work harder at teaching myself. So I’m going through the Peace Corps grammar book that we have, slowly working my way through the lessons and trying to memorize vocabulary. Banda’s started helping too, talking to me in vernacular as much as possible. He’s good about it – he speaks slowly, doesn’t laugh, and is willing to repeat until I get it. None of which happens with the other teachers or students. So there’s a lot of “what?”s going on, but some of it is sticking and at the very least, I’m getting over my shyness of using the language. Because before even if I thought I knew how to respond in vernacular, I was too embarrassed about stuttering my way through or mispronouncing something, so I wouldn’t even try. But now it’s getting easier rolling off the tongue.

Here's the new link for my Africa - Year 2 - pictures:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2030791&id=61900829&l=744ff8b211

Oh Nkhata Bay! You have lost your appeal for me. Not quite sure why. But I do think it has something to do with how freaking long it takes to get there. I think I’d rather just go somewhere closer that only takes 2 hours round trip rather than 12 hours. Plus I just ended up missing people the whole time… missing Karonga friends but even more so, missing the old volunteers because it just wasn’t the same without them!!

But anyways, the trip started out with the regular craziness of the bus depot. Usually the Karonga depot is pretty tame. Not this time though. Maybe it’s because we went in the afternoon (I had to teach in the morning) so all of the conductors were frantically trying to scoop customers away from each other. I ended up surrounded with people yelling at me to come with them. I handled it far better than I ever would have last year and actually enjoyed being a smartass back to their lies and gimmicks. Works much better than getting frustrated or flustered. So I was contentedly trying to figure things out in a mass of 10 conductors but apparently it got too rough for Laura’s liking as I was suddenly transformed into a ping pong ball as they (gently) bumped me around a bit. Cue the yelling of the Mama lol so funny to watch Laura chastising them like they were children. It didn’t work, of course, but it was great to see. Ended up picking someone I knew since all of the buses were almost empty anyway. But that didn’t stop the other conductors from sticking their heads into the doors and windows to yell at us that we’d picked the wrong bus. They really were out of control. My attempt to explain to them that “I like this guy and I cannot stand the rest of ya’ll” fell on deaf ears. Laura eventually coined the phrase “Suck it!” as the most appropriate way to respond to their obnoxiousness – relieves our frustrations without them understanding its offensive nature.

Finally made it out of the bus depot after more than an hour of waiting for the bus to fill. And that’s when the true adventure began. Had a very urgent peeing emergency. I’m usually very good about this – heck, I’ve made it 25 hours on a public bus with only 1 bathroom break. I’ve got this. But not on this trip. Nope, with one hour left to Mzuzu, I suddenly knew I was going to pee my pants if that bus did not pull over. So I waited until Ekwendeni and then used my limited Chitumbuka to tell the conductor that I was sick and needed to find a pit latrine immediately. I was actually pretty proud that I could put together what I thought was a clear request. Well he ignored me. We pulled back onto the road and kept going. WTF man. Pull over for 3 minutes! Earlier in the trip, you spent 10 minutes sitting at a bus stop while the driver went off in search of cookies. Seriously people, DON’T pretend that an urgent sense of timeliness is a trait that 99.9% of Malawians possess. So I used more Chitumbuka to ask one of the other passengers where we were going. “Mzuzu.” To which I frantically say “chimbuzi yayi?!” which means “no pit latrine?!” Yeah, no, they apparently made the executive decision that I could just hold it. So not happening. At this point I’m sitting there saying out loud “I don’t know how to say ‘emergency.’ I should know that word.” And Laura catches that and just starts yelling at the bus driver “This is an emergency! An emergency! Pull over NOW!” over and over again. And with her crazy hair and eyes…. They decided it was worth it I guess lol. So they pulled over at some field (would it have been soooo hard to stop at a neighboring house where I could borrow a pit latrine – stupid boys). I rip Laura’s chitenje off of her so I’d have something to wrap around my bare exposed behind, leap out and start running/waddling to find some shrub cover. Find a bush but lo and behold there’s a couple walking towards me and a man hoeing in his field less than 10 feet away. Awwwwesome. But I drop my pants anyway. The show of a lifetime for them, baby. Make it back to the bus mortified beyond belief but laughing hysterically. Manic laughter from Laura and I for the rest of the trip. Those Malawians must have thought we were mad.

Caught the last bus to Nkhata Bay for the day. So of course we had to sit and wait for another hour for that to fill. Laura entertained herself by making up a song to capture the excitement she felt when she realized the man next to us had a (live) chicken in a bag.

Oh. And 20 minutes into that drive from Mzuzu to Nkhata Bay (mind you, it’s an hour and a half ride – nice and short)….. they stopped so half the men on the bus could pile out to pee. WHAT THE HELL UNIVERSE?! Guys have to pee right after leaving the depot? No problem. But we had to practically light a freaking fire on the bus to get it to pull over for me after being on it for 4 hours. Ugh.

Finally made it to Nkhata Bay. Stopped by Hot Spot for a quick dinner and some chatting with Jacob before continuing onwards to the lodge. That hike up the hill to Mayoka (lodge) seemed a lot steeper than I remember. Made it around 10. Was pretty exhausted from a full day of teaching and traveling, so it was intended to be an early night. Haha. Laura crashed and I meant to follow but Benji and Special were both in a very chatty mood, the latter uncharacteristically so, so I figured I should take advantage of that time. Heard more about their lives in that one night than I had in a year of visiting the place before. It was lovely. Stayed up until 2 am just chatting with them and sipping on sodas.

It was a pretty tame trip as far as Nkhata Bay vacations go. The place is known for nightly drinking and daily sleeping off hangovers. But this time, there was no drinking and our days were filled with lots of swimming and chatting and reading and afternoon naps on benches. It was nice to catch up on rest and relaxation since life in Karonga has been more hectic than ever! Also got to enjoy some great food – taquitos and pizza at Mayoka but I think I was even more excited by the chicken that I ate multiple times at Hot Spot. We don’t get chicken ever – not since being here – because it’s expensive and it doesn’t taste like ‘western’ chicken anyway so it’s not really worth it. But Jacob’s chicken is fabulous and I loved it!

Other highlights from the trip:

- Saw Alex a few times although regrettably he was seemingly glued to his seat at a bar in town. He came up to Mayoka both nights to visit but he came so late we were already asleep. Sad that I didn’t get to chat with him more.

- Bought some things from the curios which was strange for me. I never buy anything more than bracelets. But one guy had candlestick holders that I’ve been wanting every since Matt got some last year. And I also bought a beautiful painting. Still waiting to move into my new place before I’ll hang it. I was thrilled that many of the curios remembered me from last year as the teacher from Karonga. Makes me happy that I’ve made a good enough impression plus it means they don’t harass me to buy something every time I walk past. Had a nice time sitting and catching up with them.

- I was demonstrating the dance that Banda taught me the other day in an effort to prove to Benji and Special that I am simultaneously a horrible dancer and trying to improve. They informed me that it is in fact a wedding dance that the bride and groom do. Haha. I imagine you could have fried an egg on my face in that moment.

- Met with Matthias who was formerly a bricklaying teacher at MIRACLE and now stays in Nkhata Bay and is a building supervisor. We met so we could talk about the possibility of my building a house (more on that in a later post) and I was hoping to hear his advice. He was fabulously helpful in that area, but it was also just nice to talk to him. I’d forgotten how cheeky and funny he is! Wish he were still in Karonga!

- Some idiot locked us into the dorm one night. That’s right. INTO the dorm. At like midnight. There were at least 5 of us in there sleeping and yet for some reason, one of our dorm mates decided it’d be smart to deadbolt the door from the outside. I discovered this when I got up to pee. After a short burst of hysterical laughter and astonishment from Laura and me, I called Benji to let us out, but a showering girl (and the likely culprit methinks) made it there first. OH And I forgot – the night before, someone locked me OUT. They bolted the door from the inside even though my bed was clearly empty. Do people seriously not understand the concept of a dorm?! You are not the only person staying there. If you want privacy, rent a freaking chalet. Especially in a place like Nkhata Bay where it’s totally fine to drift in at all hours. Sigh, seriously don’t understand how people can be so stupid sometimes.

So needless to say it was an interesting trip, full of laughter and bemusement. After our 4.5 hour ride home (it’s supposed to take between 3.5-4 hours only), we were fairly exhausted and irritable. This was not improved by a brief bike taxi fiasco where they tried to gouge us and charge 300 kwacha to the roadblock. I’m sorry, but no. I just took the same route a week ago and it was 100. But we had Banda with us then. Still, the most I’ve ever paid is 150, the jerks. So I walked away and finally one honest soul came up and told us we could go with him. Thoroughly enjoyable ride. He had a friend who rode alongside of us for a while who was thrilled to learned that I understood some of their conversation. So we were able to patch together enough broken English and broken Chitumbuka to have a nice little chat. Big smiles when we passed Banda who was cycling into town to meet us! So he turned around and biked us to the road block and then walked with us up to MIRACLE. Lovely to see him again. Laura and I both agreed that it was like a piece of our group was missing throughout the weekend. It was strange not to have our little three-some running around being scandalous :)

So all in all, an interesting Nkhata Bay trip. Definitely some fun moments but overall it was just kind of lonely and strange. Like I said, now that I don’t really want that crazy party atmosphere, I’d rather just go somewhere closer to Karonga where the beach is just as beautiful and the quietness just as relaxing.

Lovely times at MIRACLE as old Electrical students continue to come back, specifically Isaac. Forgot how much that kid makes me smile! Had a great day just chatting with him in the library, hearing all about his past 6 months which, by the way, include an engagement so I’ll finally get to go to a Malawian wedding! Also had a fabulous time with Cobby which made me smile because he’s been a little snot lately. But that afternoon was just like the old days, full of laughing and giving each other a hard time. He even offered to be stick boy in my eventual wedding; or small bridegroom with Georgina as his small bride.

Laura and I celebrated our 3-week-iversary on Wednesday! It feels like we’ve been here so much longer than that. Clifford came over to visit which was a lovely way to spend the afternoon. Abraham also came by and brought his girlfriend which we’d been nagging him about for some time. I think we overwhelmed her with our excitement lol.

For our real celebration, we decided to walk to the airport for drinks. Banda and Raymond came along which made the walk all the more enjoyable, but alas the airport was closed. That always seems to happen to us. It was fun, nonetheless, and I think we’ve successfully forced Raymond to accept our friendship. To end the night, he told us it was his birthday. Oh Malawians! I wish they made a bigger deal out of birthdays here… apparently he had forgotten until his Mum called him to wish him Happy Birthday :)

Bu-bump-bu-bump… Beep beep beep…. Bu-bump-bu-bump. That’s the sound of Alyson getting (figuratively speaking) thrown under the bus. Then them backing up and doing it again. A.K.A. my day on Thursday. Awesome. The Director was away on a business trip so Madame Principal was supposed to cover his classes. But she is a very busy lady so she didn’t have time. And thus I was selected to spend allll day with one group of students in the computer lab. Even though I have plenty of work to keep me busy in the library. Oh well, it happens. What does one teach for 8 hours? Well not much apparently. Because they’ve already done typing and Word…. Which are the only two things I know how to do. The next task on their list was Excel. Haha. Right. Not. I know literally nothing about Excel. So I decided that if I knew nothing and if my planned day was going to be derailed, then I was going to enjoy myself and so were the students. So for the first part of the day they reviewed Word, typing business letters and working out the kinks in their knowledge. Break for a successful English/Communications class and then, after lunch, I made the executive decision to let them just explore the computers. I could make it sound good by saying that they will only learn completely if they discover for themselves and develop some sort of intuition about computer usage. Which is all true – their lack of curiosity and self-motivated discovery drove me absolutely bonkers last year. But really, I just didn’t have it in me to teach myself Excel over the lunch period and then teach them. Not gonna happen. So instead they got to have fun for a couple of hours and I enjoyed catching up with the Chaminade teachers in the summer hut.

“I told my father, ‘You may think my mother is dead, but when I’m with Madame, I feel like I still have a mother.’” – George. Well doesn’t that just make me want to bust out in tears?! One of my Electrical 1 students told me this yesterday. They’ve told me before that they think of me as their Mum, but for some reason this time just jerked my tear ducts more than usual. Love that class.

Laura, Banda and I decided to walk to Gondwe’s Shop after work in search of Cherry Plums and our adopted son, Vitu. No success on the Cherry Plums, had to make do with Coke. But after some calling, Vitu came trotting out of his house with a huge grin on his face, ready for some big hugs. Gondwe’s is always the place-to-be for children, but even so it seemed like there were more than usual around. Or maybe they were just braver. Because we were immediately swarmed upon arrival. Banda and I made our way to buy drinks and I looked back to find Laura lost in a sea of kiddos who were all fighting each other for high-five positions. It was rather adorable and I found myself wishing I had a camera because the joy on everyone’s faces (including Ms. Laura) was simply beautiful. They stuck around the whole time and we had a grand time figuring out each other’s names, making faces/noises, and writing ABCs and numbers and names in the dirt. And I was pretty thrilled to use some of my basic Chitumbuka knowledge to communicate. And you know what? Not a single one of them in the whole hour asked us for money or candy or anything. I wish all of our interactions went like that here! Just fun, no assumptions. Stopped to bring Raymond a birthday Coke on the way home.

Had a late dinner that night with the boys. Namely Banda, Raymond, and the two other student teachers – I love that they’ve become “the boys” in my mind. It’s nice to have a little go-to group. Anyways, Laura and I were supposed to prepare nsima for them, but they had a meeting that went really late so by the time we all gathered, Raymond (who skipped the meeting) had already prepared rice to go along with the beans that we brought. We even got to eat with spoons rather than with our hands like we do at MIRACLE. I tell ya, it was like being in America again. More music videos again and 5 horrifying minutes as Banda tried to teach me a line dance (Molly, the one that you and he – or Kaunda maybe? – did at Planet that one time). Lots of feet tapping and spinning, so of course I was a disaster. Took about 10 tries and lots of demonstrating before I got down the 5 steps. Sigh. But I did it! We also got to watch an awful (-ly fantastic) Nigerian movie. Normally I just think they’re tiresome, but this one was hysterically bad, so we had a fun time watching that together. Finally dragged ourselves home where Banda and I proceeded to accidentally fall asleep on the couch. Good old Raymond sat there for 20 minutes before Laura finally came in to check on us and woke us up. Poor kid.

We leave today to go to Nkhata Bay. Oddly enough, I’m not as excited about it as I used to be. Maybe I just enjoy Karonga too much. Maybe I’m not really looking forward to 11 hours crammed in a bus with my knees up to my ears and a hiking backpack on my lap. Maybe I’m not in the mood for drinking and meeting random travelers. Who knows. I’m sure it’ll be fun once we get there though. And it’ll be nice to catch up on sleep, since Nkhata Bay practically requires afternoon naps. And to have a real working shower for once, not to mention a warm one! And chicken and maybe even taquitos! See, I’ve talked myself into it. Then on Monday we’re going to Mzuzu so I can (hopefully) meet with some government officials to iron out all the details for shipping the books. I’m so ready for them to just be here and be all taken care of already!

After spending all week wishing it was the weekend so that we could go to the lake, Laura, Banda and I unsurprisingly spent 2 days out of our 3 day weekend lounging on the shores of Lake Malawi! We hitched a ride into town on Saturday morning with the school car, crammed in the back, hugging our knees, wedged between Madames’ open legs. Good thing space bubbles don’t really exist here! It’s times like those that I can only laugh about being in Karonga…. It’s a weird combination of being so uncomfortable and yet still grinning and laughing because the funniest moments also seem to happen in those situations. Made it to town and had a very efficient shopping trip. Was pretty proud that we got everything done with time to spare! Had a heart-swelling moment when we went to buy mangos from our usual lady. We got Banda to translate that we wanted to know what color the inside was (because last time we bought yellow ones instead of orange ones… not as tasty). So he tells her this and she cut up the whole mango for us to taste! We were just expecting her to peel back the skin. But instead we ended up standing in the middle of the market, savoring the best mango I’ve ever eaten, sun beaming down on us (but in a good way now that we remembered our sun screen!), a nice breeze, with two of my favorite people in the world! It was just one of those happy-to-be-alive moments for both Laura and me!

Once all of our shopping was done and Madame Kaunda had promised to take it back to campus for us, we hopped on bike taxis and headed to the lake. Laura was jazzed about her first bike taxi experience… myself… not so much. Haven’t missed them at all lol. Plus I somehow got talked into sitting like a lady – side saddle – which doesn’t seem all that secure for me. And we weren’t on a paved road. Beautiful. But we made it there and I enjoyed Laura’s happiness lol. Had a lovely time at the lake as always, but even moreso because it wasn’t scorchingly hot. It actually looked like it was going to downpour on us, but it skirted around the lake. Lovely day! Capped off the day by joining the teachers in the staff room to watch the Chelsea football match. I haven’t been going as often since I always seem to be busy with household stuff, but I wanted to make the effort since I’ve missed hanging out with the Chaminade teachers. And we had a great time, especially myself as I laughed while listening to them continue the same (good-natured) fight that they have had every single game for the last two years. It never fails to make me smile! And water came at 2 am. Only the 4th time it’s come in our 3 weeks here. Bah. My next home will be down the hill when water comes every day. I’m so over this ‘let’s be constantly worried about water’ life.

Had my first ever trash burning experience! Laura couldn’t stand to do it to the universe. We even prayed/apologized first… but what can you do? No trash collectors here. Fairly successful event. There are still some stubborn pieces waiting for a Malawian touch, but I was proud that I managed to burn most of it! And my pyro-self kinda loved it.

As previously mentioned, we also went to the lake on Monday because it was a public holiday – Chilembwe Day! Chilembwe was a freedom fighter during the independence movement, inciting an uprising. Great lake day – ‘rented’ the car from the brothers so we didn’t have to deal with the hour commute otherwise. Laughed hysterically as Laura pretended on multiple occasions to be a crocodile sneaking up on Banda, never failing to evoke shrieks of terror. Too cute. She also had her first experience of harassing drunk men at the beach… shockingly enough a frequently screamed “Hey White Girl!” failed to woo her into a relationship with the beau. On the way home Laura wanted to pick up some bananas so she went into the market all by herself! I was impressed. I definitely never woulda done that only 3 weeks in. Sounds like she had a fun time. And a short time later I heard a roar of laughter and turned around to see Laura sauntering away from a crowd of bike taxi guys. Apparently one kept asking her for a banana and she shot him down, much to the amusement of some nearby madames. Love it.

I’ve also been practicing my Bawo skills, which have dropped severely during my time away. My counting has just gone up in smoke. Bawo is like Mancala by the way and is a favorite here. It’s very addictive so Molly and I used to play all of the time. Banda keeps destroying me (cockily and with great joy of course) so I’m determined to improve. I beat Abraham twice one afternoon so I was feeling good but then I lost spectacularly again to Banda later that night. I often forget how smart he is, but then I hear him vocalizing all of the counting that he’s done in his head (Molly – he counts out everything… he knows exactly where the play will end, even if it’s 7 or 8 steps later! Wowza, I stop after 2 and say good luck!). And it’s then that I remember that he got 1s on all of his subject exams. So basically he got the best possible scores in every class and was one of the top students in Malawi. Oi. Great Bawo opponent, eh?

One of the things I’ve most wanted to do since coming back is perfect my nsima making skills. Because 1. I’ve developed a real appreciation for the food. I actually am disappointed when they serve rice instead of nsima at MIRACLE for lunch. So I’d like to be able to make it for myself. And 2. No one is going to marry me if I can’t make nsima. And what will little Wanangwa Youngpeter eat?! :p But yes, in all seriousness, it was on my to-do list. So Banda said we could come over to his house and he’d teach us. Whoop! So I prepared beans for relish, grabbed some mangos as a thank-you for having us present, and we headed over. On time – they must have died with surprise. Banda has 3 student teachers living with him at the moment, so it was really quite the nice dinner party. I particularly enjoyed getting to know Raymond, upon whom Laura and I have decided to force our friendship. Love doing that. But anyways, he seems like a very sweet kid, so we’re hoping he will join us on our beach trips and airport outings. Raymond ended up being the nsima teacher for the evening, showing us the steps, letting us stir at different intervals, and quizzing me halfway through to make sure I was paying attention. I think I’ll end up with some huge muscles by the time I’m good at nsima preparation! Takes a lot of work. But I feel a lot better now about the process. Next time we visit them, we’re going to prepare the nsima and they’ll just stand by and make corrections. I’m excited for that! My love for Raymond was first bolstered when I saw him take a second helping of my beans and then later cemented when he asked me to teach him how I made them because he enjoyed them so much. I am always nervous sharing food I make, so I was thrilled! Had a lovely time, not only with the cooking lessons, but also watching music videos (favorite pastime of many Malawians) and getting to know each other. Side-splitting laughter as I looked over at the end of the night and Laura was covertly shoving a mango in her basketball shorts pocket. She wasn’t thrilled about having to give up so many of them since they were the best ever… so she was sure as hell going to get her mango serving…. Even if it had to be on-the-go and on-the-sly. And dripping wet… because that’s right, she pulled it out of a tub of water.

I've writer's block and, as other have tried to use lj as a way to get past it, I thought I'd have a go. Can't be much worse than staring at the same last paragraph nightly for weeks on end. I'm currently blaming work, because I'm finally getting to do what I was hired for - edit the text books. We're revising the ocean text book and, with each section (from 3 to 20 (ack!) pages) that Joe has updated, he sends them to be and I go over them and make them easier to read. (You know, so they don't read like a really boring textbook, just like a boring textbook because it is still a textbook and I think that's in the definition.) While I work, I also get to do research and double check facts and I've learned more about the ocean in the past month than in any class I took (sorta), as I'm going through and rearranging the paragraphs, cutting out confusingly repetative material, getting rid of words that are too big for an intro class (equipotential!?! I think that was the most recent word and it took me some serious searching to even begin to understand it, and it really wasn't worth the effort), and generally moving things around so they're readable and understandable. And it's a lot of fun. I really like playing with words, I like the concepts behind them (except iron fertilization, that sucked and I had to put a disclaimer in at the top saying I disapproved so I wouldn't try to argue EVERY point that this Martin jerk made. I understand the concept but it's stupid and ineffective. at this point, you're just littering.)

...

Gotta love it when people rant about something they enjoy because it makes it hard for them to do something they enjoy more.

The rest of life is going well. I bought myself a wii over Christmas (my mom had bought one (with wii fitness) for herself and Dad and I finally gave in and got one). Humorously, I am unable to hook it up because I have to buy a converter for my computer and haven't done so yet. I had some of an excuse, because this past week (starting with the Friday before last) has been so social that I haven't had a day to myself until yesterday. It was all good things, spent time with Matt and then Karen and Bryan over last weekend. Trivia (as always) on Monday, and then got together with co-workers and ex-co-workers on Tuesday (it's great, Tom is still very bitter and all his advise is about sticking around long enough to leave. Emily, on the other hand, left on much better terms and appreciated the old job, even if not really her stuff. Heather took that over and it's all administrative work - Heather has a masters in Meteorology and is frustrated with it but it is still a job at the American Meteorological Society, which looks spiffy on a resume and, perhaps more importantly, it's a JOB. Eventually, we'll get Mo and Tom (she ended up with his old job) together after she's had a tough day with Jim and it'll be 'interesting.' I'm glad I don't work directly under Jim, our director can be a seriously inconsiderate and demanding jerk. Beth and Joe are much more awesome.) Um... oh yes, Wednesday was a surprise happy hour, at work, because the Policy Dept had just hired a Fellow and had some extra (nasty) bottles of wine, and then there was the caving meeting (with margaritas! yum! and deadly). Thursday was a mandatory building meeting - they're going to renovate, which means moving us renters about. It was good and informative and BORING. On top of all that, my stupid period was not showing up and not showing up, which it did so kindly yesterday, right before I went across the street to buy a pregnancy test. (Last period started Dec 1st, this one Jan 15th. Next time I'm going to ignore it until the two months. grumble.)

Well, that won't be interesting to anyone except me and I'd never leave such large paragraphs in any other writing. However, I have an orange to eat and cats to play with. (I have come home to eat and sleep, they are in need of attention.)

Chao

Fun times at MIRACLE this week – Cobby came back, so it was just like old times as him, Georgina and I sat around and talked instead of me doing work :) But I figure I might as well soak it in because soon they will be in classes!

Nearly died twice in one day however. First was in our dear little house. I had come home during the lunch break to check on Laura who wasn’t feeling well. Relaxed on the couch for a bit, sucking on a piece of hard candy that had come in a package from Mum. Must have begun dozing off because the next thing I know, I’m choking on the candy. Had a brief flash of “Oh my god, this is it. Do I swallow or try to gag it out?” Well I couldn’t get it out so I swallowed and it got caught in my throat. But with some water it eventually continued its path. And what did Laura do during all of this gagging? She kept reading in her room lol. Next time, do check on me dearie.

After that traumatic experience, we returned to MIRACLE and sat on a bench with Cobby, Georgina and Glory for a while so Laura could get to know them. As we went our separate ways, my second near-death experience occurred. Cobby went to kiss my hand (imitating Georgina, who had done it a moment earlier). I swatted him away. Keep in mind, I was sitting on the far side of the bench. He leapt up. And down my side of the bench goes! I’m about 3 inches away from face-planting into a pile of rocks, but in my eternal gracefulness, I somehow pull out of the swan dive just in time and stagger away. Whew.

We decided to leave campus after all of that. Didn’t want to tempt the “comes in threes” saying. Stopped at Chaminade on the way home because Jim and Robyn (yay!) were there with a group that was putting on a play about HIV/AIDS prevention. Tried to watch, but it was in vernacular and even our translator Banda couldn’t get it, so we ended up sitting outside waiting for a chance to talk to Jim and Robyn afterwards. Laura got her first traumatic experience with teenage Chaminade boys. One kind student came up and informed her that a crowd had gathered strategically to look up her skirt. Legs closed and down darling!

Also had a fun time as Banda brought over a bike one afternoon. It was like we were kids again as Laura and I attempted to ride. I say “attempted” because with the deep sand here, it’s a whole new experience. Had a blast pushing the bike so Banda could be a bike taxi for Laura. Laughed hysterically as Laura crashed the bike and Banda went running towards her screaming “Medical Help! Medical Help!” She was perfectly fine, no worries, and now has a great memory to smile about :)

Unfortunately I have been a bit hobbled lately. A few days ago I hurt my back (although I honestly have no idea how). It has become increasingly more painful and culminated last night with spasms that came with the slightest movements and shot pain all the way down my legs. Had a fun moment as Laura put on an Icy Hot patch and tried to do a massage… inadvertently in front of our open window so anyone walking past probably thought something scandalous was going on. But really nothing worked and I could barely move – spent the whole afternoon and evening prone on the couch, holding back tears. Didn’t want to come to work this morning but only did because I have to teach. Will likely go home immediately afterwards as even sitting in a chair is extremely painful. For now, I look like a 100 year old lady as I shuffle around all hunched over. When I told Madame Principal that I was having this problem, she replied without missing a beat, “When was the last time you laid with a man?” I of course busted out in embarrassed laughter, but it turns out she was completely serious. She proceeded to tell me that that was the grand solution to my problem. And that I should go out and hire someone (a little offended at the implications there lol). Dorcas of course chimed in with her own advice, telling me to take one of the male teachers and use the sick student bed in the Social Office. Yesterday, Madame Principal tried to convince Laura and I to go out and get pregnant. I told her we’d name the baby after her: Wanangwa Youngpeter. When did MIRACLE staff become so scandalous?!?!

We couldn’t decide which title / activity made us laugh more. So it’s a dual entry. :)

Had to give an orientation presentation about library usage on Friday. Was a bit nervous talking in front of 200 people – who I also had to cut off from lunch break dancing - but it went well. Kept it short and sweet! My heart was warmed when I visited the library later and found students skipping the disco (dance) in order to browse the bookshelves. Definite incentive to keep working hard on cataloging the books so that students have real, complete access!

As mentioned, MIRACLE had its first disco of the term, which ended up being so much fun! Nearly died of embarrassment when they told us the teachers had to start the dancing… my face was as red as my shirt! But one of the things I regret about last year is not dancing. I always let being embarrassed about my lack of skills get in the way and was too worried about looking like an idiot. So it’s one of my goals this year to just dance whenever I want and have fun with people and just go with it! So after gathering myself, I did a dance on stage and then proceeded to shimmy down the aisle of students, grabbing girls and getting them to dance. Old-self never would have done that! And you know what? I had a blast. And the students liked it! So pat on the back, Alyson. Also made Emmanuel’s day when I coaxed him into dancing. He may or may not have exclaimed with excitement and sprang up, all 6 foot 2 inches of him. I figured it’d be my last time getting to see him since he’s going for attachment and I love his dancing. Also had a blast watching Yezgani dance. New appreciation for him, even though I already loved him. His enthusiasm and cheerfulness just shine through his dancing! Will definitely spend more time with him this term. And, most exciting bit for last…. They played a Justin Beiber song! Let’s be completely clear here…. I do NOT like Beiber and never listened to him in the US. It just tickled me pink that his music had made it to Malawi, so of course Laura and I sprang up to sing and dance. Looks of confusion all around from the Malawians, but Hope graciously let it play even though they normally would’ve skipped it :)

I’ve also made two new friends at MIRACLE which I’m pretty jazzed about. I love the MIRACLE staff, but they do slip into vernacular a lot more often than the Chaminade teachers, so it tends to be a lot quieter on my end. On that note, though, eating lunches at school has really helped! There’s still a lot of silence, but they’re getting good at slipping side comments to us. And it’s only made me love being there even more! Ok, back to the new friends though. The first is Dickson, the new bricklaying instructor. We bonded during group work during a stupid workshop conference that we had to go to. He seems to be fun, so I’m looking forward to that. The second new friend, I’m especially thrilled about because she’s a woman! Now, I must explain. It’s proven rather more difficult to bond with women here than men. Part of this is language barriers (as their English is minimal and my own Chitumbuka fails after a few sentences) and the other is confidence/cultural norms (I’m guessing). Most of the women simply are not going to make the move to have a good long chat. So most of our relationships consist of “Hey! How’s it going?” It’s easier with the MIRACLE women, but they’re older and live off campus. The Chaminade teachers’ wives are younger and near but they are mainly the ones I’m talking about communication-wise. Anyways, it’s proven difficult. BUT Laura and I have forced our friendship :) on Envy, my fellow librarian and daughter to Mr. Nyondo, one of the Chaminade teachers. And she’s 24. Perfect friend to have! We’ve never chatted much, but it’s pretty awesome because she’s opening up more and we’re loving it. Talked her into coming with us to Gondwe’s shop and had a great time chatting along the walk. She’s just fabulous, so I’m hoping it works out! It’d be nice to have a woman friend around who’s my age once Laura’s gone.

P.S. – Stole little Vitu again on our walk. This time he greeted us with a huge smile. His mother waved us goodbye as he trotted along holding both of our hands. Love him. Alas he got in trouble when we dropped him off because he refused to leave us. So maybe we’ll only stop to get him earlier in the day when we can actually wander with him long enough to make him tired and complacent.

After this highly fabulous day, Laura and I settled down for a relaxing evening. Banda came over while I was bucket-bathing and so Laura entertained him. Came out to him peeling the sun-burned skin off of Laura’s back, sharing in her delight when they managed to pull off a large section intact. Two people after my heart. Although not gonna lie, it did seem a little strange :) So we spent quite a while in that pursuit although I put the veto on the back action lol. I just kept thinking how utterly horrified Mum would be if she knew we were doing that in front of Banda. He, however, was not grossed out at all. It’s times like these when I’m grateful for Malawians’ blasé attitude. Laura and I were horrified by our peeling appearances. But everyone we met just had the comment of “Oh, it’ll be fine in some days.” What will be will be I suppose and no use worrying about something silly!

Had a fabulous wakeup call at 6:30. Normally I would be grouchy about this, but it was Kelvin, so no problem! He wanted to say goodbye to us since he was leaving for attachment (internship) and won’t be back until July. So sweet – I will really miss that kid!

We had our first solo trip to town on Saturday morning. Banda was going to come with us but we made a last minute decision to get dropped off by Paul instead of waiting for the school car. This turned out to be a great choice since it gave us more time and it was actually nice to do it on our own. Sink or swim baby. And I’m so proud of us! We handled it very well! Got everything we needed at the right prices and enjoyed ourselves along the way. Saw several of the attachment students which was nice since I’d missed out on saying goodbye to most of them. Also visited the bank to see my friend. Was telling Laura how attractive he was, without noticing that he was standing right in front of us. Stupid Saturdays when he doesn’t have to wear his distinctive uniform :) Finished all of our shopping with plenty of time to spare so we plopped down in front of some shops to wait for the school truck to arrive, from which we would get our ride home.

Spent a good hour or so drinking minerals and befriending an adorable toddler and later a baby. Pretty sure many adults think we’re strange because we get such a kick out of kids. Also had a great time with Sume. Sume is a girl in town who has developmental issues, which are simply not understood here. People call her crazy and insane and treat her like crap. It breaks your heart to see, especially since all she wants is a little attention and kindness! She kept giving me hugs and laying on me… clearly she was not begging for money like everyone kept trying to tell me she was. Frustrating dealing with such ignorance. Molly, you would be happy to note that she’s looking well. I asked her if she knew Molly and Jesu but I don’t know if she knew what I was trying to say. But we spent a good long while with her, sharing rolls and laughs. Makes my heart sad to hear people yell at her and try to pull her away because they think she is bothering us despite seeing all of our smiles. I don’t think I’ve ever said “yayi” (meaning “no”) more often in an attempt to get them to leave her alone. Kept trying to explain that we knew her. My thought is that people are awful to her all day and if I can be kind to her for 1 hour than dammit, I surely will. Everyone deserves some love and attention. And we probably had as much fun as she did!

Eventually the school car arrived and we piled in. Stupid Chaminade boys scrambled in first, leaving a very awkward opening for myself to climb up. I would’ve made it though if someone hadn’t thought I needed an extra push. This push caused me to tumble head first into some boy’s crotch, with Laura and Kalua frantically grabbing my bottom and shirt (respectively thank god) to try to steady me. Pretty sure I jammed my thumb. Love the foolishness in front of a carload of people and god knows how many onlookers. :) The ride home was certainly interesting. Laura ended up sitting on my lap so that everyone could fit (Molly, I kept having flashbacks to you perched on Kalua’s lap, trying desperately not to touch each other lol. This pairing was a bit more kosher.) Laura’s foot somehow ended up wedged under the slab of beef that they’d bought for the school…. Blood all over her foot and skirt. Enough to make me retch. I don’t know how her former-vegetarian self managed to hold it together. Much love for that girl. But the important part is that we had a successful first solo town shopping experience, caught a ride home, and are looking forward to it being a weekly adventure!

Once upon a time, this morning, I refused to wake up and was running on the later side of on time. The ridiculously playful cats were not helping me speed along, but, finally, I decided I would toss the mouse for Carter one last time (Dresden had already lost his toy and I wasn't going to look for it again) then put my gloves on and leave. However, I misjudged Carter's excitment and nearness because, when I picked up the mouse, he made a swipe at it and got my finger instead. In response, the side of my finger immediately began to bleed, I yelped and Carter jumped away and gave me a reproachful glare as if I'd hit him. I told him he was a bad cat and went into the bathroom for a bandaid.

Being blind (apparently) I saw neither of the two boxes until I almost gave up (planning to wrap tp and tape around my already ointmented finger), then picked up the higher of the two. (They're on different levels.) At which point in time, I discovered I do not give high pitched shrieks when startled but, with a deep voice, loudly spout nonsense. (such as "potato ostrich" which is not what I said, I've already forgot that, but something similarly bizarre.) You see, the box, instead of being flat, had a lump on it which moved when I picked it up. As it turns out (proven Sunday while cooking) it was warm enough in DC for several of the stupid stink bugs to wake up and migrate indoors, again. I think, however, he migrated down the drain, as he (and the box of bandaids) had been thrown into the sink (by me) and the sink has no drain cover.

Then I went to work and was not late (but very much just exactly on time) except I forgot my key card so I couldn't get in. And thus began my first day back after vacation and the first Monday of 2011.

Next time I find a boyfriend, I want a morning person. I'm sick of staying up late and waiting around in the morning.

Guess what!!

A) my life has gone and gotten complicated and now I have a social life (stupid social life) but it'll be short lived because next month is November and everything will be sacrificed for writing. Which is a lie, it just means sleep will be sacrificed and I'll write at work. (pobre work, but they should give me more to do on a more consistent basis if they want me to be effective. Not needing to be effective, I am less than they think to require. sillies.)

B) Went to the ren fest yesterday (Yes, it's a festival in maryland. Had a discussion with matt about how it is a faire and everything, but the sign says festival. stupid signage.) The maryland fest is HUGE, a farmer has been converting extra wooded land into ren habitat over the years. Want an idea how big? We spent an HOUR in line waiting to turn left onto the street of the parking entrance and we were only contending with part of the DC visitors. (Karen, Bryan and co came from the opposite direction, turning right, and didn't have as long of a wait, but still a significant one. But it hadn't been like that previously! Not ever)

Okay, that's not the interesting part. (Of the many interesting parts. We'd raspberry wine, made from only raspberry's. good stuff. Also, mead. Also, cream stout, into which I later poured some mead. Oh, and I made a disgusting mix, prior, of octoberfest and blueraspberry snow cone. It turned green and I threw it out. In all fairness, I sorta knew it was a bad idea when I tried it but I was tired of carrying around the snow cone.)

Drinking habits aside. We looked at a painter's gallery (of which there are many) and saw a don quixote print, which I thought was lovely and desired (I'm trying to decorate my abode). However, not only didn't I want to carry it around, I have that rule that I have to come back if I want something. In retrospect, that rule didn't really apply here, because the print was small and only $15. I spent as much when I bought Matt the 'double' mead (that and wine are served in half glasses, beer in full) and myself the cream stout. (Which the bartender/wench found funny, because we had our mugs and she was ready to give me the mead but I wanted the dark beer and he the honey wine, and then I paid. So take THAT, gender roles. ... this has nothing to do with the painting story.)

At the end of the day, when we went back to the shop, all the don quiote prints were gone. I asked at the desk and they flipped through the prints as well but, sadly, none continued to be found. She pointed out the actual painting (for $400) and I said, of course I want it but I can't afford half that much. It was very sad. Then I dithered about and looked at the other prints (they'd some very nice dragon ones), convincing myself I should not be sad but buy something else, but really staring sadly at the painting. Then the shop owner asked if I was really was willing to pay $200.

After protesting that it was much too little (and shutting up my brain that had been ready to spend a little money for something small instead of a lot of money for something awesome), I did buy the painting, complete with frame. (Take that, stupid money-worrying brain. Good frames can be more than expensive all by themselves, and I got it all together! Properly done and everything, and they told me how to care for it but, other than that I need a feather duster because of the way dust will settle on the frame, I remember nothing. I was so, so drunk and happy.) The artist was there as well and they talked about people making a bee line to the shop (which we had, and had seen the painter in the window seat, though we'd not known who he was at the time), and sending them to a good home, and that they can set the price because they own it. (They also told me that they, and most places, will hold onto purchases so they needn't be carried, to which I replied that I would probably leave without them. They said it didn't happen often, but occasional someone would return the next morning to pick up what they'd forgotten. Granted, these are probably several hundred dollars someone just spent, so they'd probably remember.) I gave everyone a hug and was stupendously happy as we left, and then I listened to the organ for the last few minutes, (sitting with my amazing painting, which was wrapped) and he played the adam's family. On the organ. We all snapped and clapped.

In all, a lovely day, and I shall hang the painting this afternoon, when I am less worried about disturbing people. (Most everyone has today off, it's a federal holiday and so no one in dc works.)

The end. (of my attention span. adios!)

I wrote this on the airplane when flying back from DC after coming for my "job interview" and finding an apartment. So, early march some time. And then I left it to sit on the desk top until today, when I have decided it is annoying and I want it to go away. Therefore, here it shall be posted and the .doc on my computer dismissed.

It's interesting to see the things I got completely wrong, and what is important and I didn't notice...

********************

Since I’m in the air, perhaps I should jot this down quick. (also, I love biscofts. They taste like brown sugar and cinnamon. Yum yum.)

Let’s talk about my misadventures over the past two days. Applying for a job was easy, just returning to where I interned at, though being told I now had to dress ‘more professionally’ has very much confused me. I thought I have dressed more professionally. I’ll have to look it up online.

Yesterday, I rented a place to live. I was about to go out and look at other places when this one popped up. The other places were under $1000 but seventeen minutes from the metro, this was $1155, plus gas and electric, but two blocks from the metro. On top of that, the first month was free (or, a security deposit of $99). The real seller was that it was two blocks down and that was very easy to walk to (dreary, wet days do not encourage walking to look at apartments). So off I set, and I pass the ‘Colonial Village’ all but immediately. I turn at the next block and walk up and down the street trying to find the place. I call the renting office but get the emergency maintenance office, am very confused and head back home. I double check the number, and then call for directions, and start out again. While I’m out being lost (a second time) I call and confess my inability to find anything. Finally, the problem is solved – I turned a street too early. I was on N Rhodes, not N Troy. And, it turns out, the emergency maintenance office is always on call and answers the phone when no one is around. (also, maintenance is a horribly difficult word to spell.)

It’s a lovely place, and it has a court yard, so I was sold. (wood floors, lots of space, most windows facing west, I believe. I’ll have to look at a map sometime. Being a genius, I don’t even recall my number.)

I couldn’t sign the lease though, because I brought neither social security card nor passport. I’m not even sure where the former is (my room is a mess), so I’ll be signing the lease and receiving my keys on the 11th. (It’s mine though, they have my security deposit.)

The security deposit was another thing. They wanted a money order, not check or cash, so they send me off to the post office. It’s right down the street, super easy to find. But I’m four dollars short (and some odd cents) of $99. I bought a ticket for the metro the other day. Fortunately, I do have the money, so I trek back up the street (you know, three whole blocks) where I am locked out and wait around to be let into Bethany and John’s apartment. (If someone asks, just lie and say you are a resident. I don’t know why I didn’t; if he didn’t know by looking, he wouldn’t know the difference. Stupid git. The nice woman let me right in.) So then I found the extra twenty I had stashed, took a breather and recollected myself. (The hill is slight but I was feeling immensely stupid at that point; also, this was supposed to take twenty minutes, tops, so I hadn’t slowed before and I really wanted to now).

It was a good break, in that it let me think it over and decide I really did want the place, instead of just a willingness to pick any place. It’s close to the metro, that free month will probably cover gas and electric for the first year, my friends are close, and there’s a courtyard. Honestly, the courtyard was the selling point. It’s like it’s own private little garden – no dogs allowed, which means no random poop either. There’s benches and what not, which’ll be nice in the summer.

That was the adventure of the apartment. More exciting things happened that evening, the main one being a lecture from the Honorable Dr. Joan Luchachean (sp?). She’s the head of ocean stuff in the government, including (but not limited to) NOAA. (See, professionally, I’ll have to remember this stuff a little better.) Bethany, John, Karen, Bryan and I all met up there (or close to) and hung around afterwards then went out for some amazing thai in the china town mall/cinema.

Today, being Wednesday, I said goodbye to everyone in the morning, but had slept really badly. Honestly, once I woke up to pee, I hardly fell back to sleep. I was still very tightly wound from all my earlier stresses and, I believe, it was well after 5 when I finally calmed myself down and drifted back to sleep. Instead of visiting my apartment again, to take pictures, or AU, to say hi to people, I hung around Bethany and John’s, half asleep, and wrote. With two hours to reach the airport, I left. I should have gone fifteen minutes sooner.

There was some mechanical issue on Foggy Bottom, which meant my ten minute metro ride (having already waited ten minutes for the train to arrive in 4) was in trouble. I took the long loop around (skipping the blue line) instead of waiting. There’s never any way to know if that was the right decision or not, but I wasn’t the only one making it. It was five already, so the trains were crowded, and we just all pushed in. I was fortunate and caught both those trains with either no on a 2 min wait. I reached my gate with five minutes to spare, but we boarded seriously late, so I got some writing time in.

Now, I am sitting in an air plane, a little one direct from DC to GR, which I may use more often because, despite the price, is so very very convenient. If I buy my ticket earlier (AMS bought this ticket to bring me in for the job interview)

Plans landing, chao!

Ps: on the plane, I had a full two seats all to myself (that would be all the seats in my aisle. It was very nice.)

Lately, when I say I'm feeling good, it's a relative thing. Compared to the previous day/week, I feel good. Compared to a normal or average health, I would use a less optimistic adjective. Today, however, I'm feeling a lot better. My left ankle is a little soar and my fingers are feeling fat and stiff, but I feel refreshed and the pain is inconsequential. Now, all we must do is convince the weather gods that it should be more fall-like and less summer-like (a project that would work better in higher latitudes, I know), and then my life will be complete.

(actually, it's always the same star and, in relation to our planet, not moving at all. Better to say, my world turns to the sun - 'my world' being my personal/social world, not my planet)

Anywho

Thought I'd just drop a line to say that I'm feeling much better lately. I've even been helping out with cleaning out the basement storage units at work. It's a bit of physical work (the guys are finally learning that I can, actually, lift a box. If I pick one up, I can carry it into the hallway and go through it (recycling, shredding and trashing whatever's inside). I don't understand why this is considered a show of strength. Yes, few of the boxes are light, but seriously, they're boxes of paper, not water or lead. And I'm not volunteering to move them ALL or anything, which they use a dolly for anyway.) mmm... rambling? The point? I'm not dying from the effort, and I'm enjoying myself. The only time I'm really tired now is when I don't get enough sleep.

Yay!

Hello,

I feel a zillion times better last night and on into tonight. This could be from many things, including the self-enforced rest (though not the self-enforced sleep, as I stayed up way to late every day this week but last night. I always walk up better when I get more sleep, go figure). Also, it's cooled off several times over the past few weeks, so I've had the windows open, and it's been raining, which I love. (I have come to recognize the difference between a happy Katie and healthy Katie, but it's amazing how the two can influence and ignore each other.)

in case you're curious, no, it hasn't gone away. And, yes, I felt this good previously and then plummeted instead of continuing on to full health. But, like many things, you appreciate what you got (I stretched this morning! Shut up and be amazed. Its not often I'm awake enough, early enough, and feeling well enough that I can stretch/yoga/whatever.) Unlike previous healthy spikes, however, there is no imminent stressful situations to knock me back down. Hopefully, if I don't stress myself, I can continue to be heal and be all better. (At which point I'll stop doing exciting things, like morning stretching, because I am lazy and then I will be upset with myself for not taking advantage of healthy times.)

...

Every notice how much I like to ramble when I feel good?

Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

I have decided the former, as it took me the majority of an annoying npr radio blurb to get up and turn the stupid thing off. (I do like most of their clips, even the ones that I don't find interesting, but I do not need to have a childrens' story about a yeddish chicken read to me, thank you very much.)

This troubles me more than it normally does because it's a cool, overcast day today. I've already missed the farmers market (it starts at 8, and I had forced myself out of bed by then but I never left the house), and should go for a walk. I think I'll end up going back to bed when I finish this. Does it still count as a nap if it's before 10? Yesterday, I came home at 6:30 and hardly remember falling asleep but when I woke up (very groggily) it was after 9 and I dragged myself up so I could eat dinner. If I hadn't chatted with Jenni online, I probably would've gone right back to sleep. Most of the pain is gone, I'm just so tired. I might just blame the overcast weather; I can still do that, right? ;-)

In other news, no grad school for next year. Did I mention I was looking into this? My work schedule is 8-4, which leaves lots of time for evening classes and, because I'm going to be forced to move next spring/summer (apartment renovations, I can either be moved into another apartment on site, or I could go elsewhere) I could potentially find a place close to whatever university that accepted me. (Ignore the fact that I hate school, I think I might have to go back again. Up until this point in my life, I've been angling for a field research job, maybe with the park service or something. If I want to do research again, it'd be helpful to get some laboratory experience. I haven't been in a lab since biochem, back in '02 or '03.)

I've two reasons for calling the search off. First is health. I couldn't handle any classes right now, evening or otherwise. It's difficult for me to find time to write my stories (or even post this). Most of my energy goes into work, and occasionally visiting with friends, which takes time to recover from. (yes, I am that pitiful) I couldn't handle the extra time commitment, from classes to class work, required for grad school. On the other hand, I would hope to have some better idea, or coping method, by next fall.

The other, and real, reason has nothing to do with that. My boss is causing havoc at work, which is a rant within itself, and shall be summed up by the evidence that three of our long term employees (remember, that's about a third of the people I work with) are brushing up their resumes. A masters program would stick me here about three more years, a phd over twice that. On the flip side, I could wait until next year, or the year after, to begin searching, hoping by that time I know what's wrong with me and how to handle it, and look beyond the DC area for schools. Maybe I could get a second masters in the area, (taking two night classes all year long would still finish me in two years, maybe a bit more, all depending, of course) and then go elsewhere. I could even get a job writing or editing for science ... stuff. (When am I going to learn this terminology?) That wouldn't require anymore schooling.

So, there's one more thing off my plate. I am becoming rather skilled at emptying that thing. I should put finding a doctor at the top of the list, but I'm tired so I'm going to lay down. If I'm not asleep by 10, I will get up and try to be productive. My living room is a disaster.

Monday night is normally trivia night but was canceled because I was the only one that could make, it and, without any exaggeration, I suck at trivia. So I stayed at home and took it easy. (My unknown diagnosis had been acting up the week before and I thought, maybe I could rest it away. I am un-knowledgeable about this.)

Tuesday night, my brewing supplies & kits show up. (Seriously, I paid 13 bucks for a large paint pail because I couldn't FIND one at the hardware stores. Ace is stupid. At least, this way, I don't have to drill holes in them. I'm sure that's worth $10 plus shipping, each. grumble.) There was also a note from my apartment-complex owner-people. (I like in a 'heritage' site, FYI, so if they want to do anything to the buildings, the process is a bit more elaborate.) The brewing supplies were all good, except it looks like the ale yeast might've been activated because some idiot packed it under the ingredients box instead of next to it. (There are two 9 gallon pales in this box, it has a very clear up/down feel to it, and the two ingredient boxes aren't light.)

The letter from the apartment people said that they're planning renovations in April 2011, once they're passed by a board or something this January. They'll be updating the windows, kitchens, bathrooms, etc in all apartments. To do this, they'll be moving everyone one house over each time and we'll get 120 days warning. In the FAQ, there was a question about gas & electric (which is paid separately) and it said that the stoves would be changed to electric. I'd also be losing the awesome tree outside my window. I'm now planning to move next summer. If I move within the 120 window, they'll cover my moving bills. (They cover them for moving from apartment A to apartment B).

Wednesday morning, the metro had a smoking electrical panel at Metro Center and, eventually, I got on a train in the opposite direction so I would be able to board one. Earlier, I learned why it is dangerous to carry an easily spooked cat before dressing (band-aids are my friend). (Work was a little odd, but it'd take longer to explain the reason than it is worth. We did put the booth up, though, and i found it very exhausting, which was because I had the plague and didn't know it yet.) That evening the Nielsen guy (TV ratings) showed up to ask if I wanted to participate and find out which demographic I fit. I told him I'd represent the "people who don't own TVs".

I almost didn't go to work Thursday, but I figured I was just tired. I came home early and slept the afternoon away then, for the life of me, couldn't sleep well at night, despite having drugged myself. I was asleep for the earthquake, as I have no clear memory of it. (DC had a tiny little earthquake, notable only because DC doesn't have earthquakes.) I almost went to work today, I had much lunch ready and was putting my make up on and everything. But make up requires one to look in a mirror and i caught my own eye and told myself 'no'. So I emailed work and went back to bed.

I am now a germ factory. Or a germ battlefield. Vive el cuerpo!

Having always lived in shared housing, where the bills naturally arrive in the mail, I'd assumed my gas and electric would do the same thing. And then, once I received them, I would put them in my name and pay them myself. Interesting fact, this is not how apartments work.

When no bills arrived the first month, I assumed they were done on a tri-monthly cycle (four times a year), which meant it should've showed in March but, since I'd just moved in, I figured I missed it (and I wouldn't be paying the Jan-March bill anyway), and waited until the end of May. When I still hadn't recieved it by mid-June, I realized I was probably missing something but I didn't even know who to call. Then I was gone to the cottage for fun, then to Norman, OK for work, then my parents visited for the fourth, and I've been meaning to get to it all week. It's Friday now, I just did my phone calls, and they're 'turning on' my gas and electric (two companies) this Monday. I told the gas company what'd happened and they said they'd 'turn it on' on July 12th for me. I just told the electric company that my move in date was Monday.

Other than a slight fear that either gas or electric will turn off over the weekend, I have apparently gotten away with four months of free gas and electric. Happy Birthday to me!

All my friends in DC are either engaged or married (two engagements in the past two months). Since they were either seriously dating or married before, and I'm good friends with the fiances already, this hasn't really changed much except in terminology. Of course, terminology is what we all obsess about, and I had to pick at it to figure out what is fazed me. It comes down to this, while I don't really care if I have a boyfriend/fiance/husband/etc or not (as in, it'd be great and wonderful but I'm not going out of my way to find this mystery man), I do feel like I'm being left out. Not excluded (I don't feel like a third, fifth or any other odd number multiple, wheel). It's much more like everyone else I know is part of sorority-fraternity. I don't want to join myself, but... well, I fell left out. (I got an online boyfriend in high school because a friend had one, then he talked seriously and I dumped him.)

I'm content as I am, I actually prefer being single. I know that's very unusual but I don't care. I might just stay this way for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, I've discovered that I have grandmothers and aunts that didn't marry until well into their 30s, and that was even back in the early-mid 1900s. To counter it, I have some very nice spinster great aunts and, having asked one if she ever regretted it, I have no worries about being perfectly happy living into my old, old age without a husband or children.

I woke up this morning, at quarter to five, because of a headache that was trying to kill me. I'd one when I went to bed, so I'd drunken a lot of water and took some aspirin. Trying to repeat that when half asleep is really a strange experience, it included feeding the cats and nearly watering the plants, except that I wanted to drink that water so they couldn't have it. I, sorta, got back to sleep, but dreamed about long knives, killing people, blood, abandonment, hot marshes, and scary hobos. (I remember all of it, but it's really upsetting.) I didn't woke up late and not refreshed and was really slow about moving, so I did my laundry instead of going to the farmers market, only to get a call from a friend twenty minutes later about meeting she and boy at the farmers market. I'd to wait until the laundry was out of the washer and the only dryer was a bottom one, which doesn't work as well. (There were hardly any washers available either, I sorta wish I'd waited for this after.) Anyway, by the time I got to the market, my friends were leaving (they'd bought crab meat) but hadn't found a bike to buy (there's also a flea market) and I'd have gone shopping with them but my clothes were still in the dryer and I didn't want someone to be so impatient to pull my clothes out if I wasn't there. And now my clothes are hung on the doors and back of chairs because they didn't dry, and the bread people weren't at the market so, no bread. It's also hot and muggy out, and I'm scared of the heat so I'm staying inside. 

HOWEVER, there was cabbage at the market. I now have cabbage.

That'll make life better.

Nothing quite as exciting as a loud 'thud' as one finishes brushing her teeth. Nothing broke, but Carter and Dresden knocked over their cat tree. (I figure this is quite an achievement, considering it's not too tall and rather solidly set.) My cats are ridiculous and awesome.

So, most every morning, I get up around 6, shower, feed the cats, eat, brush teeth, apply makeup, get dressed and leave around 7:40. (I've cats with black hair, there is no dressing in nice clothes until I leave.) This morning, on top of all that, I wouldn't get out of bed, drank mate, fed the cats a second time (I'll be home later than normal), cleaned the kitty litter (we're having to resolve some issues with that), picked Carter up a half dozen times because he was feeling ignored, rebuilt (twice) the packing boxes & packaging paper mound (very cheap cat toy, which they love), chased Dresden about, and washed my bowl (this is a new habit, I'm trying to get it to stick).

I was ten minutes early for work!

(you wouldn't know from my updating this, but I've actually been rather busy this morning, here at work, which I was early for. ;)

Sick of some of those politics? Need a laugh?

http://www.twolumps.net/d/20100416.html

(The first few are just cats and fish. I'd tell you more but it's more fun to discover it on your own.)

I've got my cats and they humor me.

The pain from the last time has receded. I'm not even on the meds.

Work is boring but workable.

I've got friends to watch Doctor Who and play trivia at the bar with.

All in all, not so bad.

Someone must hear of my stupid morning and, as I am home sick, you are my only outlet. (I believe my voice is mostly gone as well but I'm not testing it.)

First off, I could not get my body out of bed, and, while I've become fond of the snooze button, it normally doesn't take me thirty minutes just stand up (I'm one of those hateful morning people, after all) and so I was running late. Then I turned the hot water on for the shower and, despite the nob moving in my hand, the actually metal connection (into the wall) didn't turn. I almost went back to bed. A fair amount of force (like pushing on a child-proof medicine lid) earned me a hot shower (thank god) and I even got it off again (also tricky). I ate very quickly, and then lost more time because I had to blow dry my hair (it was still wet). Then, of course, there's a list of things I couldn't find, ranging from my key card (which I hope I left at work, but that means I'll have to ring the doorbell to get in on Monday) to lunch money to my kleenex (which is a bandanna, actually, and if you ever want to hear an unscientific rant about why fabric is better than tissue paper, you just have to ask).

Eventually, I was pulling on my socks (couldn't find them either), realizing I wouldn't be phenominially late, and then that I planned on coming home after lunch because I felt really horrid. Having been distracted (I was walking around with one shoe and sock on, for some reason), it dawned on me that I really felt bad. I flipped a coin, it wasn't heads, I turned my computer back on, sent an email to say I was sick (and sent it without the 'e', so I signed it 'Kati'), changed, washed my face, and climbed back into bed.

But that's not the end of it.

My rent money was due yesterday (the 1st) , but I only received my paycheck yesterday (instead of Wednesday) because of flooding up in Boston. I opened a bank account yesterday, but that check won't clear until Monday morning. Since I went to see the cherry blossoms after work yesterday (which was stupid, I was feeling so much better until that little excursion), I didn't get home until after 6, which meant the office was closed. The plan was to turn the check in today after work, a day late, but no huge deal. Because i get out of work half an hour before the office (for Colonial Village) closes, that means I could give them the check a day late and there's no way they'd process it until Monday morning. With the broken shower, I figured I would call and 'ask' how to turn the check in if I arrived home after the office closes and then add that my shower needed to be fixed (immediately). You see the problem if I stayed home sick? I can't be in the apartment when they come to fix the faucet, or else I could turn the check in any time today!

Therefore, life is stupid. I'll just walk over at 3 or 4 and hand them the check and put the stupid request in then (so much for immediate fixing). Also, I'm missing Tom's birthday lunch and an easy day at the office because no one is there (it's the week of vacations). Not to mention, I'm really sick. I repeat my earlier conclusion: life is really stupid.

(and that's how things are going for me. How about you?)