It was the week before christmas and all through the house...

23^rd December

 

 

nothing was stirring except for the flying termites…

 

 

And the giant African land snail in the garden

 

And the huge centipede that decided to wander through our kitchen.

 

So the flying termites come out at about 7 or 8pm and fly round the lights. They are like the ants only huge and you can hear them clunking into the walls and doors. In the morning again all you see is a sea of wings that have fallen off. These are the termites that they eat over here. Soak in warm water for a few short minutes until the wings fall off. Pat dry with some kitchen roll, or leave in the sun for a few seconds! Then lightly fry them with a small drop of oil. Season to taste. I have yet to try them but apparently they are a delicacy.

The snail was about the same size as a tennis ball. I really wouldn’t want to accidently step on one of those.

The centipede was just wandering round the house. He looked fairly chunky (hence the ‘he’) and when I tried to pick him up with the fly swot he gripped it and started crawling towards the handle. I am only glad Pam told me they are quite poisonous (not fatal but quite painful) after I had launched him out the back door. Sorry about the poor photo but pams phone is playing up so that is a picture of a picture.

 

So wildlife aside what has happened this week. Well let me tell you! So Tuesday was a pretty rubbish day. We had heavy rains over the weekend and a lot of our building work was er, squishy and some had to have copious amounts of mud and water dealt with. So I left in a pretty deflated mood. Now on the way home the kids play football all along the streets – but they use burnt plastic bags and bricks. Seriously get about 5-10 plastic bags inside each other, tie the last one off and then burnt the handles away, it’s a pretty good ball. So the bricks are offset from each other and are about two foot apart. Makes it more interesting when there is only 8 of them playing.

So (where was I?!) on my way home I was walking through one of these games of football when behind me I heard the crunch of a tackle flying in. Next thing I know the ball and squirted out straight through my legs and as I took my next step I caught it and directed it straight into the goal. Well the street when nuts! Malawians thing everything is highly funny, so much so that one of my foreman struggled to tell me he was having chicken and rice for Christmas lunch because such a meal is so funny!? Anyway all the players were laughing and cheering, the spectators all eight of them were laughing and cheering, even the man in the stall on the corner cheered, so I took my applause, made the appropriate celebrations and walked the rest of the way home with a smile on my face.

 

Saturday was Christmas day for us. We had roast chicken, mash potatoes, roast potatoes, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower cheese (soooo good), bread sauce and Yorkshire puddings. I made us some homemade crackers, with a manual ‘bang’ and homemade jokes. I could tell you some of them but they are all Malawi based so erm they would be even less funny!

We also managed to get some Malawians playing twister. One of them had never seen twister before!

 

We also had a bit of a gangster moment. So Malawi is a cash based country, not many shops take cards. So Pam, myself and another volunteer decided to go and get some cash for our up coming holidays. Not knowing how much to get we all ventured on better safe than sorry. The issue is the highest denomination of Kwacha is 1000. Which is about £1.50. So we got out a bit, the only problem was we put it all in one bag to keep safe. But as we were pulling out of the parking on the street a traffic warden wandered over to asking for parking (20p for 1 hour). Pam took the bag to get some money but somehow the bag was upside down. 400 bank notes fell out into the back of our car. The traffic warden looked completely bemused, especially when we gave him the parking money and then drove away very quickly.

 

It doesn’t feel like Christmas though. There is no hype here. Only one shop I have seen over the weeks has Christmas decorations in it and that is the big supermarket. We have very limited fancy food and the nice stuff is really quite expensive. And as much as I am sure everyone is shivering and cold at home it is too warm for Christmas.

The other thing to consider is the graph. Apparently, according to Pam, there is a long term overseas graph of peoples emotions. Around 2-3 months the novelty wears off and you begin to miss all the things that make home home. That period is around now so combine that with Christmas and both missing family and friends it is a bit subdued.

 

We also got invited to Pam’s bosses for Sunday lunch with a load of the Doctors from the hospital. And what a lunch it was. To you it will seem like a normal meal, but to Pam and I it was good old fashion home cooked fare. A boiled gammon (Nigella’s recipe in coke……takes on a whole new meaning now) with little fried potatoes, roasted veg, tomato salad, macaroni cheese. It was a little slice of home.

 

But now we are officially on Christmas holiday. Currently I am sitting on the khonde at Dedza Pottery Lodge writing this have made the three and a half hour journey up the M1. It is better than the UK one for traffic, but not great for pot holes or lunatic drivers, or stray livestock.

I also got stopped for ‘speeding’. Being just before Christmas there is a lot of traffic police around. One flags me down and, after the pleasantries have been exchanged, the conversation when something like this;

‘You were speeding’

‘no I wasn’t’

‘yes you were you were, we have a camera’ (points to said camera which I don’t think was on or the man using it knew what he was doing)

‘no I was doing 30’

‘are you sure’

‘absolutely’

‘oh okay then. Thank you’

And off I drove!

 

Found these aswell - childish but funny!

So all is left for me to say is that I hope you all have a very merry Christmas wherever you are – for those of you that we are related to hopefully we can skype at some point over the festive season!

I am now going to sit in the sun with a cup of tea and read my book.

 

STATMAN

 

Number of crackers made – 12

Chickens consumed – 3

Food left over – about half the veg and none of the meat!

Blantyre to Dedza – 229km

Time taken – 3.5 hrs

Number of bites whilst sitting on the khonde – 4 obviously dedza mossies find me tastier than the Blantyre ones do

Nights away from people we know – 5 (no offence people we know but it is nice to get away)

SLEEPS UNTIL CHRISTMAS – ONE!!!

Ants, Ministers and Exhausts

16^th December

 

So the rains have really started. It has rained every day. Some just a dribble but yesterday wow! We had thunder and lightning for a good half an hour before hand and then the heavens opened. We stood out on our khonde and watched a torrent of brown water run past, occasionally shouting at the neighbours who were standing on their khonde watching it run past! (Khonde is African for veranda).

All the roads are strewn with rubbish and mud and rocks that have been washed into the roads.

Friday was a busy day as well. One of the departments in the beehive family, Tailoring and Fashion, has finished the course that they run and as such all the students were graduating. It is a massively important day for the students so they had a visiting dignitary. This year it was the Minister for Labour. As a department head I was invited to join the contingent.

 

 

She seemed very nice dressed in a lovely pink sequined dress. Not to be out done by Dave, Barrack and the bird from Denmark, the children centre manager and I attempted a selfie with her in the background. Our stealth was ruined somewhat by our receptionist who yelled ‘SELFIE’ from the other end of the corridor. That and the fact that by the time we got sorted the minister was half way down the corridor.

On the wildlife front we are being plagued each night by flying ants. They swarm the lights in black winged clouds of doom. Well there are a lot of them anyhow. And as our front door doesn’t quite shut properly we have to put a towel down to stop the march of the ants underneath. In the morning the only evidence of the night’s activities are the hundreds of wings that are lying around. Weird!

 

Jimbeckerzoid – we have named the car Jimbeckerzoid because it is our version of the Chichewa word for hope – as in we hope it will survive 12 months so we can sell it. But this month it’s had a bit of a rough time. So first we had a puncture, I have changed the tyre but need to get the spare fixed now. Then the stone chip in the window – Autoglass haven’t made it out here yet – has started to grow across the windscreen then today on the way back from town I went over a large speed bump and heard a big clunk and scrap. Yep the exhaust just fell off. What was more annoying was the three Malawians who dived under the car to help pull it off – a job I could well manage myself – and then expect money for their inconvenience! Luckily I know a man with a welding rig and a workshop so tomorrow my metal work foreman has a very important job of fixing my car!

 

In Christmas news we have booked our accommodation. So on the 23^rd we leave Blantyre to drive north to the town of Dedza, famed for the potteries (if it’s like Stoke I’ll be gutted!). We stay there three nights over Christmas with day trips to Lilongwe for slap up Christmas lunch, there is some really old rock art near there and a bay that is quite nice. Then onto Mua Mission which is an old Catholic Mission with an amazing garden where we can chill out for a couple of nights and then on the 28^th we go to Cape MaClear, at the bottom of Lake Malawi for the New Years Party. Quite looking forward to it!

This is me bravely deflecting the water with my flip flop - see last weeks blog regarding the burst pipe! 

 

 

STATMAN

 

Rainfall – 6cm in 1 hour

Average size of a flying ant – 3cm

Cost of three Malawian exhaust technicians – 500 kwacha (80p)

 

Cost of rewelding and repair - 0 Kwacha

Size of crack in windscreen – 15cm and growing

Drink of choice on Sunday – Sherry and JC Le Roux – NICE!

D&V, SA and A&F

9^th December

 

They’ve found me out! They have found me and they have found me out! No not the charity about the fact that I don’t know what I am doing and am making it up as I going along. No I mean the other volunteers. One of them has been snooping around the internet and has found this blog. It means I have to be more circumspect about what I post! Ha.

In actual fact it does raise an interesting question as to how honest this blog is. The truth is it is honest in what is put up here but dishonest by omission. There are things I haven’t posted for various reasons, some because it would be unprofessional. Some because it could be classed as libel and I could find myself in a spot of bother and some because my parents would worry.

 

Anyway on with the show. Well this week has been are relatively quiet week, forced upon me due to the illness I mentioned last week. Wednesday was mostly spent in bed trying to retain fluids but by Thursday I managed a whole six chips at dinner. To be fair even Friday I was still pretty tired but I received an unexpected visit from our HR manager. Just to see how I was. She arrived with our PR representative, not sure if that is part of her role, and a carton of guava juice. It was very nice too.

So Saturday I felt strong enough to face the world and we ventured out to the local shops. It would appear that event Blantyre has a chapter of the Salvation Army and they were playing for money at the local Mall. There performance was....well....lets settle for enthusiastic.

 

Following that we decided to treat ourselves to some lunch at one of the nice local hotels where the waiter decided it would be a good idea to throw a bottle of coke over me. Nice.

Lunch was very nice, coffee, followed by bbq chicken kebab with rice. And to really push the boat out we had tea and an ‘English Tea Scone’. When said scone arrived it was pre cut with a splodge of jam. When we enquired if there was any cream or butter the waiter nodded. Luckily I was more cautious with the butter when it returned only using the packaged stuff, Pam was more adventurous and spread the unknown knob on her scone and was surprised to find that it was infact garlic butter. This is the same hotel that has been known on more than one occasion to server ham and cheese croissants on pain au chocolates!

 

So as in Europe it is the same in Africa and Sunday followed Saturday. It started with a bang when the fire the guards set to burn stuff ( they burn everything over here. Bunch a pyromaniacs the lot of ‘em. All our rubbish gets burnt in a pit in the ground.) but they hadn’t known about the plastic water pipe underneath. I’d like to say I saved the day but really it was one of the guards John, who with nothing more than a strip of rubber and a crisp packet (empty) bound up the leaking section. I did find the stop cock that turned off the supply that allowed him to perform the same trick on the second leak which occurred moments later.

 

 

Disaster averted we went clothes shopping. Here is the market that we ventured down and of course you are white and so must visit every single shop. We do get harassed quite a lot out here and surprisingly prices seem to multiply when we appear.  Most, if not all the clothes at this particularly market, are second hand and I think come from charities across the world. Not sure on how they end up being sold for profit over here but there you are. I found a very nice pair of shorts that I liked but declined due to the fact the man wanted £10. He did try and convince me that they were genuine Abercrombie and Fitch, but I did have to point out that they were in fact genuine Abercrombe and Eitch.

 

One last issue that is slowly but steadily raising its head is the weather. Not the rain, more the lack of rain. After the post with the picture and all the water and the big downpour, well everyone planted their seeds expecting the rains to come but no more have. There is the first murmurings of drought and prices of food are already starting to rise. The sad truth of it is that a lot of families out here rely on the country’s ability to produce maize. That coupled with the cash gate scandal – the ‘alleged*’ government theft meaning that a lot of foreign financial aid has stopped coming into the country it could be a testing few months.

 

*this is to ensure I don’t get deported or jailed. What!? It works for Have I Got News For You!

 

STATMAN

Amount of money the government allegedly* stole – 14 billion kwacha (24 million pounds)

Number of notes the Salvation army hit – ½ - not half a note in the whole time we were there, half the notes they attempted.

Cost of our fancy pants lunch - £12

Height of the maize – 1 foot

Height the maize should be – 3 foot

Months since I was last clean shaven – er when did Graham get married?? 

Cheese and wine

4^th December

 

Okay. Apologies for not posting yesterday. The simple truth was that all of yesterday was spent in one of three positions. 1 – lying down in bed. 2 – sitting on the toilet. 3 – kneeling down in front of the toilet. Yes it has finally come around and got me. The good Doctor has diagnosed it as viral gastroenteritis, to you and me it is plain old D&V. So yeah yesterday was fun. I am still off work today but having managed 6 chips and a piece of bread at dinner yesterday I have moved on to the heady heights of toast today. Checkazee me! I won’t be posting any photos of yesterday you’ll be glad to know.

 

2^nd December

 

Another one bites the dust. This week saw the last remaining volunteer leave the construction department. I am on my own in that office now, well the only mzungu, the others work at the children centre. It was sad as Malcolm has put a lot of effort into the projects and will be missed. So on Tuesday we went out for a leaving meal to a very nice pub called the Village Green where we sat outside in the evening heat and eat and drank. Then on Thursday night one of the expats who he had helped invited us round for dinner, where the starter was a cheese course. Now you may think this strange, but let me tell you good cheese, I mean proper cheese is hard to come by out here and expensive. Man was that a treat for us!

 

 

Saturday we had another braai for one of our friends here. Some twenty or so Malawians descended on us for beef  burgers and chicken kebabs.

Pam also managed to retrieve from the post office her birthday parcel from our friend lisa in the UK. It has only taken two and a half months and the woman in the post office asked why we had taken so long to collect it! We only found out that day but it had been in the post office for 10. The cheek of it. But due to the magazines we are all up to date with the gossip as it was two months ago!

 

Two more skype firsts for us. My brother, Simon and his wife Alison and their gorgeous little boy Sebastian tuned in for a chat. He has grown so much since we left it is untrue. And then Pam’s Dad and Helen called us Sunday to tells all about planting garlic and the hazards of an untidy garage.

 

Christmas has come. We went to a carol concert on Sunday by the Blantyre Musical Society. Some very lovely singing, amazing harmonies, and some unbelievable high notes hit, but enough about my participation! No seriously they were very good and lovely. The orchestra was a little bit more hit and miss, mostly hit. The young musicians were, well they were very enthusiastic and energetic.

We have even put up our Christmas tree. Yes it is a baobab and yes some of the decorations are coke bottle tops. I only hope that the Royal Mail forwarding service includes telling Santa where to go too...ho ho ho.

 

 

One of the funniest things to happen is an incident with Pam. So for a bit of context because people don’t have cars here they wave at you to stop for them to give them a lift somewhere. If you have a very big truck you can get up to, oh I’d say around 200 Malawians in the back of one, well at least they think so. So when Pam stopped at the top of our road to plug the iPod in she couldn’t really blame the guy who jumped in next to her for thinking she had stopped for him. He asked her was she was going to Blantyre, to which she replied ‘er yeah sure,’ and gave the man a lift!

 

We have also invented the new game of flip flop golf. It is a very simple game. Select a hole, we used the porch of the main house. Choose the boundaries of the fairway, trees and paths are usually good. Then see how many ‘wangs’ technical term here please, it takes to kick your flip flops onto the hole. I won by the way, 20 strokes to Pam’s 21, but the bigger issue was the 6 year old Yammie who didn’t fully understand the game or have total control over his pink trainers. We had to spend the next 30 minutes and two guards combing the garden in the dark to find one of his shoes.

 

Here's a big moth.

 

Oh I am a genius as well! So our milk keeps going off because we only really use it for Pam’s tea. What a problem, there must be a solution I hear you cry..........Well there is! Milk cubes. Yes you pour the milk into ice cube trays and freeze it. Then when Pam wants a cup of tea badda bing.

 

STATMAN

 

Hours this week without water – 24 hours

Hours this week without power – 32 hours

Books read so far – 21 (between the pair of us)

Colour of the pool – brown see item number two ( the filter pump ain’t work)

Number of flying ants in the lounge – 8

Number of flying ants killed by a swot wielding pam – 8 (African flying ants mind you, I reckon their wings could break your arm!)

Number of milk cubes required for the perfect cup of tea – 2

I'm singing in the rain...

25^th November

 

And the rain rain rain came down down down. I wish I had put something out to see how much came down, but wow did it pour. I watched a wall of it come over the hill by our house. It then marched across the field next door and at one point it was raining four houses away but not at our house. And then the heavens opened. It only lasted 20 minutes of so but that was enough. We are not into full blown rainy season but we are at the start of it. All the farmers, which in Malawi is everyone, have been planting the maize in the fields, which in Malawi is anywhere there is soil.

 

The week did not start very well for me on the work front. One of my site managers had his finger ripped off by a 360 excavator. I was not there at the time and have asked my safety officer (who is little more than a storeman) for a full report. But by the sounds of it a truck was stuck in the mud and as the chain was being attached the driver was a bit too keen. He has lost the fourth finger of his right hand upto the first knuckle.  I am trying to implement new safety measures out here but it is difficult. I will not give up though.

 

Friday night we were invited to Pam’s consultants for a braai. We met some expats who knew all the other expats and were told about all the different parties and groups that hang out together and have been invited to another party next week. Not sure if we are going or no, it is fancy dress.

 

Pam had a good attempt at washing all our whites. Trying to remove the dust and yellow stains of deodorant. She succeeded in turning some of the whites pink. We are not quite sure how as all that was in the cleaned bucket was bleach and clothes. And the other mystery was some have gone all pink, some have pink splodges and some are untouched and are white – still with yellow stains. If anyone has any answers please feel free.

 

In order to get some peace and quiet we took a trip to Liwonde National Park this weekend. Staying in a thatched chalet on the banks of the Shire River. We took a game drive in the afternoon, with more expats who knew the expats from the previous night – it is all very insular here. We saw a big herd of water buffalo and lots of antelope type stuff. There were three big herds of elephants, but too far away in the river for us to get to. Pam made do with telling me all the different types of birds that were flying around. We also took a big detour on the way back and all we saw was the African Tree Squirrel. No-one had the heart to tell our guide that it looked very similar to the more common grey squirrel that are treated like vermin in the UK.

 

After a very nice communal three course meal we had a few drinks and then off to bed. Only I was woken up in the night by the number of Mosquitoes inside the net. Oh my life. I tried to ignore them but the damn things were buzzing in my ear. So Pam woke up to me jumping round the bed trying to kill as many as I could with the lamp on. Despite her protests she joined in until we got them all. Not before I, diving heroically to get a particularly evil looking mossie, managed to split my pyjama bottoms right up the crotch. Well naturally that made it all the more imperative to get them all!

 

The next day, having broken sleep, started at 5.45 for our canoe safari. We were informed that in the river there would be hippos and crocodiles. For those that know my recent history with rivers and canoes can understand that , and no joke here, for the first 45mins I was petrified and every time the bloody thing rocked I grabbed the edges. But eventually I grew to deal with it and manned up so that I could enjoy the birds, the ruddy big hippos a mere 10 metres away. Crocodiles that slithered into the water from the bank as we paddled past ( I say we, the guide in the front paddled and the boy who stood at the back poled).

 

We did see the elephants in the far far distance but the guide told us it was too dangerous in that area. The crocs were too big. But he either changed his mind or didn’t care as we paddled right up to them. When he suggested we could stretched our legs on the bank next to them the boy behind rattled off something to which our guide suggested we stayed in the boat. A good thing too as we then heard the sounds of an elephant eating a baobab tree. My confidence in the guide to a bit of a dive.  But we lived to tell the tale and I can say I managed to stay in the boat this time!

 

And so I have picked up my new bike. It needs a bit of tinkering, but I will soon be charging around the mountains of Malawi once more sweating my arse off!

 (This is the Wolf Spider that was in the house).

 

STATMAN

 

Amount of compensation for finger – 16,000MK ( about £30)

Number of Mosquitoes killed at 2am – 12

Number of bites Pam suffered – 24

Number of bites Christopher suffered - 5

Number of animals seen at Liwonde – 15

Elephants (biggest herd was around 50), hippos, crocodile, (bloody scary when they disappeared) buffalo, kudu, sable, impala, water buck, bush buck, yellow baboon, mongoose, warthog, monitor lizard, wolf spider and the African tree squirrel.

Number of birds seen at Liwonde – 30

                                                                                Canaries, pin-tailed whydah, blue waxbills, village weaver, marico sunbirds, greater blue-eared glossy starlings, tropical boubou, rock thrush, pied crows, southern ground hornbill, lilac breasted roller, pied kingfisher, giant kingfisher, ring necked doves, francolin, African fish eagle, brown snake eagle, guinea fowl, crowned plover, African jacana, spur winged goose, glossy ibis, African spoonbill, openbilled stork, cattle egret, little egret, great egret, squacco heron and reed cormorants. There were lots of LBJs as well. (Little brown jobbies).

Food glorious food

18^th November

 

 

So not much has happened this weekend. England lost the rugby and it’s still hot and sunny over here. Average daily temperature I would estimate at 35.

 

So I have decided to tell you all a little about the food over here, I don’t believe I have gone into it in any great depth.

 

On weekday evenings we have a man who cooks for us. Our meals can vary but the usual dishes are beef and rice, chicken and rice, chicken and chips and spaghetti bolognaise. The chicken is usually either stewed in tomatoes or bbq outside and the beef is always stewed. Every meal and I mean every meal is served with a side salad and usually a dish of cabbage or peas. This menu is quite westernised except for the fact that everything is cooked with about a litre of oil. Apparently it is a status thing. The richer you are the more oil you would use and as we are white our cook seems to think we would enjoy a lot of it. We are going to have a word with him. So that is weekday evenings.

 

In work I am given lunch at that is a bit more Malawian. On Tuesdays it’s chicken and rice, Wednesdays eggs and nsima (pronounced seema) and Thursday is beef and nsima (pictured).

How to describe nsima. So the way it is made is a start. Take maize and grind it into a flour. Take the flour and add water then boil in into oblivion until you can only just stir it. It is bland, white and kind of has the texture of play-dough. To be fair it is fairly inoffensive and with a good sauce I don’t mind it.

 

At the weekends we fend for ourselves so this weekend Pam and I cooked a roast for everyone – a bit of comfort food.  Including Yorkshires!

 

On the drink side Carlsberg is everywhere due to having a brewery here in Blantyre and is by far the most popular and cheapest drink. Malawi Gin and Malawi Vodka are apparently not bad but I am not a fan so couldn’t common. Lager is the only beer you can buy, there are no ales sadly. But you can get more expensive European and South African imports.

 

There is a traditional drink here called Chibuku. This is fermented maize that is served in a carton. It is also known as ‘Shake Shake’ as when you drink it you have to shake the carton to make sure all the lumpy bits are mixed in. Hmmm how to describe shake shake. Imagine you have eaten a bowl of cornflakes with way too much milk in it. Now imagine you’ve thrown that up into a carton. Then left it in the sun all day. Then you drank it! Yep that’s it. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m sure if you were brought up on the stuff it would taste nice. But I wasn’t. So it doesn’t. Minging would aptly describe it.

 

Stuff I have yet to try but are available over here are mice on sticks and tiny little minnow type fishes that look urm interesting. Also here is a man with a sack of potatoes on his back! ( I still can't work out why the blog reverts photos to the way they were taken even though the photo file has them vertical. Any geeks who know please let me know!)

 

The goat curry I had in the first week of being here was very nice.

 

As for take away food, there is no decent Chinese. The Indian restaurants (2) are apparently really nice, as are the French and Italian. We have only been to the Chinese. The take away pizza is also very good. McDonalds has not made it to Blantyre, neither has Burger King. KFC has but a meal will set you back 15 pounds. Yes you read that right 15 quid. As you can imagine we have not had one of those either.

 

STATMAN

 

Number of pages views for the blog – 1669

Number of average readers per week – 28 (I have tried to work out the most likely 28 but gave up)

Number of posts – 12 (including this one)

Number of countries being read in – 4 (UK, Germany, Malawi, and USA. Thank you to the person in Alaska who is reading as well!)

Two months......

12^th November 2013

 

So today is two months. Two months since we landed on these shores. Except Malawi doesn’t have shores, well it does but only to lakes not to the sea. But it does have a navy! That is just in case Tanzania invades.

Enough of this drivel I hear you say, what have you done this week. Well I shall tell you. Thursday we went to a leaving do at one of the lodges. I was bored one night and produced a music quiz which went down well, except there was not a Malawi round. But hey ho.

Friday night we went to the bonfire party. I had to explain to the Malawians in work who Guy Fawkes was and why we celebrate a failed attempt to blow up our politicians. We came to the consensus that in this day and age we should commiserate it instead. So the display was at Blantyre sports and social, where the upper echelons of Malawi society and ex pats hang out. We had a bonfire that they lit with a hefty amount of petrol, a guy who went up very nicely, and a bloke with a box of matches to light each firework. To be fair the fireworks were pretty good, even if the display was a bit stop start. The kids loved it as well, screaming each time one went off. I think it is fair to say that it was the first time I have been to bonfire night in shorts and a t-shirt though J

 

The only downfall was the fact that the security company were only there for security not for car parking. They told us quite a few times as we, and most others remonstrated with them whilst the entire car park was blocked in by each other. It was chaos. Some people trying to get taxis, they road in and out was blocked. We thought we needed at least three cars to move, until the owner of the steel work contractor showed up. He owned the twin cab 3.0l Toyota Hilux next to us. It is a massive car. So he says welcome to Malawi, jumped it in and squeezed it down the side of the fence and a guard house! Everyone stood and watched and said he won’t fit through there. But he did and he was gone. Right I said if he can get that tank through there I can fit our little Rav 4. Guess what.....Ha no I didn’t crash it I got it through and we got home.

Saturday came and Pam was working the whole weekend so I did what any good bloke should do and went to the pub to watch the rugby. This time I managed to find a bar with two TVs so I didn’t upset the locals. The Welsh contingent turned up with shirts and confidence....oh well.  Also I made a fatal error during the rugby. Our neighbour received a call from Martin (remember him the mad cyclist from last week) asking if I wanted to go on a bike ride on Sunday. I politely said sure, one of Pam’s colleagues had just bought a bike from him and was going to. I said come round whenever and we’ll go. I distinctly remember not say please show up at my door at 5.30!!!

Yep apparently 5.30 is the best time to go cycling as it’s not too hot.

So I woke up got dressed, we fixed my bike a bit making sure the brakes sort of worked and off we went.

Now you may need to look back a few posts to the very pretty picture of the landscape on the way to Majete. We went on that road, but ah ha, I thought this is the same as before and I asked if we were going down down down to only turn round and go up up up!

Yes was the answer so after 15km down I turned round and came back. Will (the muppet) wanted to keep going. All the way to the bottom, about 1500m drop. Then had to come back. I was safely in the pool at my house before they finished and I felt justified that someone else had fallen for Martin’s wily ways. He told me with great delight how he killed Will on the hills. To be fair I had try to warn him how fit and nuts Martin was. I guess he knows now.

 

And so onto Monday where I did very little. Bit of work and a bit of play. Oh I bought a new mountain bike as well. So for those that know it is a second hand, still good condition, Claude Butler hardtail MTB. Guess how much, a little under 60 quid. Bargain!

 

Today in work I have realised I don’t have enough money, people or skill sets to accomplish the stuff that the management want me to accomplish – bit like the UK really.

 

STATMAN

 

Firework display – 20 mins – not bad for here

Time spent waiting in carpark due to being blocked in – 30minutes – again not bad for here.

Number of times Pam was called up in the night – 3

Distance I cycled – 36km

Distance Martin and Will cycled – 80km (ha ha ha)

 

Time taken to upload the blog - 28 mins hence no pictures, I just not sure it could cope.

Rugby and beer (photo added)

due to it being Africa there will be no pictures until tomorrow. The internet in work has broken and so this is from home and pictures kill our costs. Thank you for your cooperation.

 

 

4^th November

 

New month. Another one down. Where to start this week. At first I thought there wouldn’t be much to talk about on this weeks postings because we had nothing organised. But of course something always crops up.

 

So last time we spoke I told you I was off cycling with Martin, who is one of the national coaches. Well as you are reading this I survived but only just. So Tuesday evening I went round to Martin’s house where he got changed and then suggested a gentle 10k ( he normally does 40 to 50 each morning). I stupidly agreed and so off we went, he with his very nice hard tailed mountain bike, me with my cobbled together bike I found in the shed. The seat is too low and I have since discovered the brakes don’t work – it seems to be a common theme out here!

So we start down a bumpy path, then down a dirt road, then down a concrete road, back to dirt again. You may have noticed the same thing I did after around twenty minutes. It was all down hill. Quite a steep hill. I politely enquired whether our 10k was a nice circular route? It was not. Martins plan was to turn round and cycle back up. This revelations was at the same time the cow walking back up the hill passed out, keeled over and died of exhaustion. No I’m not joking it genuinely did! Not to appear too ungrateful I agreed we would go to the next bridge and turn round.

Well I beat the cow. That is the only thing I can say. Martin calmly cycled up the hill chatting away, to problem at all. I wheezed half way up the hill ( yes Mum and Tina, I had my inhaler and no it didn’t help!) and then had to have a rest. At one point I had 3 year olds running alongside laughing at the poor azungu (white man) dying whilst trying to cycle up a hill. We also found a trail of blood which after the next bend we realised was the cow, now on a cart being pushed by a bunch of villagers. Spurned on by the thought of a similar fate, and also my pride which was taking a battering I decided I would cycle passed them. Which I did. Right around the corner where I promptly got off and pushed the thing!

When we eventually got home my shirt was soaking, it was about 28 deg I reckon when we went out. But I have also discovered that Mountain Bikes are much cheaper over here and may be investing if I can find out how much it is to get it flown back!

 

Wednesday was the last day for my architect Pamela, who is has gone from 38 degrees ( that was Sat) to the 8 degrees of Glasgow! So anyway she was leaving Wednesday and decided to having leaving drinks...as you do. One crate (20 bottles) of fanta, one of coke, and two of greens (Carlsberg). I had spoken to our foreman and asked him to come up with some pretence to hold the work force back and so at 4.30 Pamela turned up with the drinks. What she, and to be fair I, had expected was to put the crates down, everyone comes across and takes a drink and we all stand around and have a chat.

No. What happened was they were all sitting round in a giant circle. The crates were put in the middle with Pamela on a table and Vaida (HR) took a register inviting people to come up one at a time to take a drink. To make matters worse it turns out most of our work force either don’t drink or didn’t want to in front of the bosses. Fanta ran out first, then coke, and we had a full crate of greens left. It was intimated that some may have thought it a test to see who drank and then they would be fired. I swiftly step into the breach and had a beer to demonstrate this was not the case but to now avail. It was by far the single most awkward thing I have seen out here! I now know what not to do when I leave.

So Pamela is the one sitting on the bench and the construction team can be seen in the far distance. The guy in the yellow shirt was official bottle opener!

 

So Thursday some of Pam’s colleagues had organised a good old fashioned pub quiz. The teams had to be mixed due to a variety of nationalities, so Pam and I were split up.  Initial Pam’s team won, but then the MC forgot to award my team our bonus points so we won. Until we got the papers back and one of the other teams couldn’t added up and Pam’s team won...again.

 

And so onto Saturday. Well there was a rugby game. Australia and England. Now I have only found one Australian so far and she’s not that into sport, which is disappointing. Anyway Malawi and all Malawian sports bars are obsessed with English Football. They all support one of four teams; Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and of course Man Utd. So we thought hmm best check if our local, which only has one TV, will show the rugby. Felix said of course as long as it doesn’t clash with his team Arsenal. It didn’t so at 4.00 four of us went to the bar. At 4.30 Felix turned over the Chelsea match even though it had 3 minutes left to go and the locals were not happy. I told him to turn it back until it was finished and then we settled in to watch England beat Australia. I also had to explain the rules of rugby to the 20 or so Malawians in the bar who had no idea what was going on. It also meant that we missed most of the Man U game, but the three goals were scored at half time in the rugby and so no-one really minded .

Sunday was spent recovering from Saturday as it has been a while since I have drunk and I decided to stay and bond with the locals. One who had a great affinity for tequila! A dip in the pool the next morning did wonders!

 

STATMAN

Rugby Score – Eng 20 – 13 Aus

No of Aussies that might read this – 1 Hello Jannette J

Actual Km cycled – 6

Number of Malawians that understood rugby after my explanation – 1

Number of Tequilas drank – 1 too many.

Science experiments conducted – 3. An empty coke bottle will fill up and the right itself  if placed in the pool.  The empty fanta bottle will fill up but then upend itself and float in the pool. And the three surface storm water drains where we live are not connected.

 

 

Weddings and BBQs

29^th October 2013

 

So this week there has been two overriding themes. Firstly Peter’s (my boss) son’s wedding and Pamela leaving.

We will start with the former. We were invited to the wedding, only the evening reception. The actual wedding was supposed to take place at 9.00 in the morning. At 10.40 the service began (my neighbour braved it and went). After about 20 minutes they were told it was likely to last 1 and a half hours so they cut and run.

We arrived at the very exclusive Mount Soche Hotel in Blantyre dressed to impress, promptly at 6.20pm for the sit down meal at 6.30pm. Guess what – we were the first to arrive. So in true British style we absconded to the bar. Slowly people arrived and by 7 we decided to move into the room, decorated in a typical wedding style except for a couple of items. One the giant white sofa up on a stage in the middle of the room and two the table at which were 8 or so people with big red name badges round which stated ‘Cashier’ on them.

Now we had been warned about this. The custom in Malawi is that gifts are give in the form of cash. The method of this given is that you get invited up to dance with the couple and as you do you throw your small denomination notes into the air. The cashiers collect them all up, take the ‘wedding tax’ amount for the government and the rest goes to the couple.

So when the MC invited us all up (at 8.00) for the dance we dutifully got up, followed the conga line that was there and we are ready prepared 20 kwacha notes ( 4pence) we dutifully threw them in the air.

What we had not been warned of is that people dance to different times. So the first one was everyone, an introduction. The next was the different clans. The next friends on the grooms parents. We had to get up at this as we were invited by them and had to throw whatever else we had left.

We had also thought that because we were British we would buy them some champagne. A little something. I then made the mistake of asking my boss when was appropriate for is to give this. Oh he was delighted and told the MC to make a special announcement just for us to present this. So up we jumped again and I handed a big shiny bag to the groom as we all danced around again and yes threw more money.  The cashiers were scooping up handfuls and bowlfuls of cash. I imagine it is a little like Vegas!

I reckon there must have been around 30 different ‘dances’ and the one upmanship of people throwing the most was clearly evident.

Somewhere in the middle of all of this we had a very nice buffet meal and champagne and prayers and speeches.

We decided to leave at midnight even though I was itching to find out the total. If I do I will let you know.

 

And so to Sunday where we had Pamela’s leaving braai (African BBQ). There was food galore and beer, and wine, and sangria. And Pam (my pam) made some awesome cakes, one with Africa painted on, the other with ‘Pamera’ spelt out. For some reason Malawians think Ls and Rs are interchangeable.

She has been presented with a Malawi flag in our assembly. The construction choir (a choir sings every Monday morning) sang ‘Flower of Scotland’ – she Glaswegian – although no one had taught them the additional rugby elements. I didn’t think it appropriate to add them in.

And today we had a farewell lunch and she was presented a massive picture frame with her name (spelt wrong) and the dates of her stay engraved into it.

Personally I will be sad to see her go as she has been a source of previous knowledge for projects, and a good sounding board for frustration in the construction office when dealing with the politics and culture out her.

This evening I am embarking on my first cycle ride with a man named Martin. He used to cycle for Malawi and he cycles 50km each morning for training. We are going mountain biking .....it could be interesting.

 

STATMAN

Styles of money throwing at wedding – at least 10 the most impressive was the bridemaid’s who tried to throw it as fast as possible.

Money raised – don’t know but I reckon it a couple of million – bear in mind most notes were 50s.

Number of guests we had to dance infront of – circa 300.

How bored the happy couple looked by the end – very

Burgers cooked at the bbq – 20

Flies at the bbq – MILLIONS

And finally the current mosquitoes score is

Mosquitoes 7 Christopher 12 (just hanging on although the bite on my knuckle smarts!)

Walls, roads, and Lake Malawi (photos added)

Monday 21^st Oct

 

(Photos will be coming, I will update tomorrow when I have downloaded from the weekend)

 

Well what a week. So after a lovely five day weekend I returned to work with a bang on Wednesday. The particular bang in question came at around 4.40pm just as I was leaving the office (we finish at 4.30 here on account that the lights get turned out at 6. No really it is dark at about 6.05) and it can be attributed to Jimmy the Rasta, now named Jimmy the Reprobate, driving a dumper truck through a wall. A big wall. Massive cracks, knocked over a pillar. So I spent an extra twenty minutes taping off the stairs that now had a large wall looming over them. Jimmy claimed the brakes had failed.

 

Thursday morning arrived as so did the sight I got as I arrived at work. Our lorry embedded in the wall the other side from the one Jimmy demolished. They couldn’t hit the same bit could they. Guess what! Brake failure again. Now you may think that was all the incidents of Thursday bit no. It gets better. We have recently taken delivery of a JCB 360 for work on the football field opposite the centre. So at around 10 o’clock when everyone has a break our driver and the guard go for tea. But the school next door also has a break. I kid you not there was around 50 kids playing in and around our 21 tonne excavator. Some were on the arm others in the bucket. When the driver returned fortunately the kids scrambled off the JCB but continued to jump on the piles of dirt he was digging, but don’t worry the driver carried on. I have changed my goals since being here. Rather than finishing the projects on time and budget it is now not to kill anyone!

 

 So Friday came and so did our weekend trip. Everyone in Mtisidi, in a convoy of three cars, drove to Cape MacLear the southern side of Lake Malawi. It was 6 hours of dodging chickens, goats, potholes, cows, cyclists, people and crazy drivers but it was worth it!

Smikey, our neighbour in Blantyre, grew up there and his family prepared a feast for our arrival of Msima (spongy maize stuff) rice, chicken and Kampango – possibly the nicest fish I have ever eaten!

The next morning Lake Malawi was on our doorstep. It is amazing. The calm blue waters, the clear blue sky. Chris and I made the decision early that we would be adventurous and hire a kayak. On hearing the price of a kayak we opted for the cheaper Malawian dug out. It is essential a giant tree trunk with a point at both ends and not much in the middle.

We soon realised why the dug outs were sooooo much cheaper. Firstly you sit on two very narrow edges of wood. Then you wedge your legs into a very narrow space into the boat. Now for those that know my build – it isn’t slender or small. And this boat was clearly made for Malawian thighs! Next is the powering of said tree. We had two paddles, both wood, both different sizes. But not to be deterred by all of this we set of for a small island about a mile out. I reckon the reason that they hired out this particular log to tourist was due to it being built wrong. Would it go straight......would it #%&£$!

 It would have been quicker to swim. I know this because it took us an hour and a quarter to get across, numb arse and burnt backs included, and the nutter who swam it that morning did it in 45 mins. We were over taken by one Malawian on his own!

But it was worth it for the snorkling and satisfaction. Loads of sicklids (sp?) pink, blue, yellow, silver and black. We got the hang of it on the way back, it only taking 30 mins.  That afternoon I learnt the game of Boa (sp?) in the Gecko Lodge with the aid of Jim and a few carlsbergs.

We also sat and watched some kids (Smikey’s nephews) none older than 12, completely embarrass us with their boat skill when they nicked our dug out and took it for a spin.

Sunday morning  the others decided they wanted to go to the island, but being the wusses they are we got a motor boat. And guess who also went swimming in Lake Malawi! Yep one Pam Dawson . And I mean totally swimming. Out of her depth swimming. I wasn’t allowed to leave her side, and it was in water you could see the bottom of but very proud of her!

We then on to feed the fish eagles, watching them take the little fishes we threw straight out of the water. Five in total – Eagles that is, we threw way more fish than that.

 

Then for further frivolities a few of us dived off the boat and found some rocks to continue diving  from.

The journey back was much quicker at 4.5 hours due to using a tarmac road not the one that’s closed and you have to drive in the dirt. I can definitely say Lake Malawi will be visited again.

 

 

Today has been a quiet day working through the first draft of my new novel. Pam is on call for the first time today. 24hours. Essentially she was in work normal time this morning. Will be home at around 10pm tonight and if all goes well won’t be required until 6am tomorrow. If it doesn’t go well she can be called in at any time tonight.

 

STATMAN

 First Draft words: 95k

Amount of blisters from paddling: 2

Animals hit on journey: 0

Things nearly hit: 2 cows, 2 goats, 1 chicken and a broken down truck in the dark!

Mosquito bites: 5 –they got me! After 6 weeks they finally got me!

Fresh mangoes eaten: 1 so good.

Cost of fresh mango: 2p

Types of Carlsberg drunk: 3, green, brown and black.

Average temp for the weekend: 34ish.