Malawi

We arrived in Blantyre greeted by a blistering heat, unyielding in intensity. The luggage is transferred from the plane by a trailer towed by a motorized cart and dumped unceremoniously on the tarmac, adjacent to a token bit of greenery planted outside what proved to be customs and passport control. I wait in the shade, while Tony(hatless and therefore vulnerable!!) scrutinizes the four or five sweeps made by the trailer...to no avail, yet again we have a piece of luggage missing!

We are the last to join a queue lined up at the baggage claim counter (obviously this seems to be a regular occurrence!) and by the time we filled out forms etc, we were the last to leave the area. By this time whatever authority to hand in custom forms and to have passports stamped had moved on, so we walked out into the arrivals area, unsanctioned as far as procedure went!.

We are met by the childhood friend of John and Gilbert Nayna, Jacques Marriott aka Jack, his daughter Paola and grandson Sean. Pastor Nelson"s son, Innocent, was also there to welcome us. We were to stay with Jack and family until Pastor Nelson arrived back from PNG Rally, in a couple of days time.

Jack, Sean and Paola

Jack and Paola are the most hospitable people, pretty much along the lines of the Nayna families, so therefore it didn't take long to feel at home, particularly myself who promptly fell asleep , on and off , for the next two days. ( I was happy to be able to share the secret of sleep with Jack, who came down with whatever it was, a couple of days later:).

Jack is a great story teller...and over, what turned amounted to be five days!!, we heard some fascinating, and enlightening tales.

• On the Saturday before our arrival, a friend of Jack's had been killed and mauled to death by his six Rottweilers. Not only mauled but dismembered and eaten, so that only 20% of his body remained identifiable. This obviously DID NOT endear me to Jack's Rottweiler, even though it was small and appeared friendly, who was I to determine the terms of friendship?
  
• While we were there Paola, who works at a local private school, told us that on an excursion to a local wildlife reserve that week, a water buffalo had wandered onto the path that the children were walking on. A parent realized that the buffalo was readying itself to charge and he told the children to run. He also ran, but tripped over....lucky apparently, as the buffalo only managed to gore and tear down the backs of his legs, damaging muscle and tissue.!! If he had been upright the animal would have gone through his back into his lungs and chest and maybe heart!! Public liability indemnity for school excursions takes on a whole different perspective in Malawi:)

Malawi is a Third World country which only achieved Independence in the 1960's. Poverty here is endemic as you would expect. There is little work for those who are uneducated and education has no immediate value to the family. It has a cash economy(very hard to get use to when we are so geared into a credit system), and is a subsistent lifestyle. Trading Centres are widespread, crammed with stalls of produce eg eggs, live meat,veggies and fruit; locally made goods eg sauce-pans,knitwear,fabric; coal made from burning wood; sticks, reeds for thatching; anything that is not used for living is sold for cash to buy more useful goods.

Malawi landscape
Village
Trading Centre

The main modes of transport are walking and cycling..the sides of the roads support a heavy stream of pedestrians carrying produce on their heads, babies on their backs;and cyclists with loads of wood and coal piled high, on their way to the Centres. We even saw a live kid (goat not child!!) strapped to the handlebars, hanging upside down, on it's way to someone's dinner table!!

As we drove around we saw billboards advertising the prevention and treatment of HIV and Aids; in just about every community, whether large or small, there is a clinic to provide services for families and victims; billboards also publicize the government drive to encourage parents to register their children, in an effort to have a formal record for schooling. It is law for children under 14 to attend school, though lifestyle and distances from schools, make it impractical for the majority of villagers.

Buildings which are not surrounded by walls topped with shards of glass embedded in them, razor wire atop, spikes or other deterrents are the VERY RARE EXCEPTION! Everything is gated with guards, some with weapons; there are armed police and military everywhere you look. Paola says that , when you build in Malawi, you build the wall and gate first, and guard it, then build the house!!! Jacks house has, within it's own compound, wire on the top, gated with a guard; the bottom verandah surrounded by a grille which is padlocked, to protect the main entrance to the house; inside ,upstairs where the bedrooms are, there is a metal gate across the stairs, which is also padlocked! Apparently living conditions are so dreadful that violence is on the increase.We met people from South Africa, Malawi and other places...all saying the same thing...violence is rife, be careful - a bleak picture indeed.

Jack's verandah

Even though conditions were challenging...the heat, communication, adapting to"Malawi Time" ( ten times slower than Fiji Time!!), maintaining a cash flow -as Visa was the preferred option and we have Mastercard- overall I enjoyed our visit there. The cultural differences are enormous; living conditions cannot be compared - poverty is everywhere, yet people are so industrious in their endeavors - no such thing as the dole here!!!- you work to eat and to have shelter. Families are everything- any income buys the necessities which are shared amongst all; work is distributed between all members, even young ones often mind the babies while mums out in the fields, and grannies do their bit as well. It certainly was enlightening and enriching trip which I wouldn't have missed for anything, though at the time aspects were very confronting.