Buckets are the New Sinks

My training group has now been in Malawi for four months! It seems like much longer, because we've been so busy. I am in my sixth week of teaching, and settling in nicely, I think.

School is going well! My Form 2s (sophomores) just finished a pretty gruesome Roald Dahl story -- it required explaining taxidermy (the story was 'The Landlady', if you're curious) which was definitely news to them, but I think they appreciated it. Nothing like blood and guts to get the kids reading. On Thursday all fifty or so of them checked out books from our library, my very first project at site! I'm pretty proud -- we have maybe 500 books, organized into Junior Fiction, Adult Fiction, Academic Textbooks, Academic Workbooks, Teacher Resources, Periodicals, Reference, Biography, Sociology, Poetry & Drama, Anthologies, and History. Whew! It was a lot of work getting it all cleaned, alphabetized, labeled, categorized, alphabetized, indexed, and listed, but it's almost completely done! Yay! I just hope the students use it as much as possible. We've had training sessions now on How to Use a Dictionary, How to Use and Encyclopedia (we have 2 incomplete sets - an incredible resource for a Malawian school), How to Use an Index and Please Don't Totally Screw Up the Books. My Form 2s now have 3 weeks to write a book report. Only one of them has ever read a novel before.

A couple of kids got Nancy Drews, or Babysitters Club-type series books, but I personally was most amused by the cadre of popular boys who all wanted love stories. They asked me to pull out some romances for them, and the first book officially checked out from our library was a pink-covered, heart-adorned, cherub-gamboling paperback called Forever Angels #4: Ashley's Love Angel, which was checked out by a very sturdy class monitor who the same day got in trouble for fighting (the fight was, surprisingly, unrelated to his book choice). It's nice that these kids really are free from some of the gender stereotypes we have in America, but it did make me laugh.

In Form 1 History, we've finished the Development of Man and spent a little bit of time on Ancient Egypt -- they had NEVER HEARD of the pyramids, thank goodness we have some old National Geographics so I could show them pictures -- and on Friday, for the unit on the ancient kingdom of Ghana, I had quite possibly my proudest moment as a teacher. Since they seemed to be having some trouble understanding exactly how the kingdom became wealthy with so few natural resources of its own, I made them have Trading Day. Half of the kids were Ghanians, half traders from the middle east, with one brave volunteer as King of Ghana standing in the middle of the class. They were each given seven dinars (pieces of paper), and materials to trade, depending on where they were from (gold, salt, ostrich feathers, gemstones, pottery, and silver, all represented by various trash from around my house, like foil). They had to pay export and import taxes to the king every time they crossed the 'border.' The kid with the most money at the end won some M&Ms -- they were very motivated by the promise of American candy. I expected this to all blow up in my face, to be unable to make the kids understand the rules, and even if they did understand the rules, for them to not understand the connection to Ghana. I expected a 40-minute period of free-for-all mayhem punctuated by foil missiles hurtling through the air and and 50 kids screaming in Chitumbuka. But... THEY GOT IT. I'm not sure anybody who is not in the education system in Malawi can understand how proud I am of this. THEY GOT IT! The girl who won had turned her 7 dinars and two pieces of salt into 43 dinars and one ostrich feather. It was the best imaginable use for those M&Ms, and I have never been so happy to give away chocolate.

At home, I am getting better and better at carrying water (the #1 most difficult thing in Malawi) and lighting a fire (the #2 most difficult thing in Malawi). I'm still not good -- I still, like the weenie American I am, use TWO HANDS to steady the bucket of water on my head, unlike most Malawian women -- but I'm getting better. In no time at all I fully expect to be jumping hurdles with 50 litres intact on my head. The water is even more necessary now than it has recently been, since Malawi is suffering a drought, especially in the south. This is now the rainy season, meaning typically the one time of year when everyone can eat regularly, but the drought means that soon a lot of Malawi will be starving. Officials are just hoping that it breaks soon, and unofficially I am hoping so too, both for my neighbors (excuse me, neighbours, this is a former British colony, after all) and my own garden, as well as an end to the RIDICULOUS HEAT. My garden is surviving okay though so far -- my beans are growing so fast I half expect a giant to climb down them any minute -- and though my cilantro has all passed on to the Great Garden In the Sky, my many squash plants are thriving. Just pray for the basil to make it through.

ALSO -- new environment people coming soon -- I don't know if anybody is reading this who wants packing advice, but before I left I definitely wished somebody had posted some on his/her blog, so here you are.

1. Tent and sleeping bag. Bring them! You will want them. Every time you travel and stay in a city, it's much, much cheaper to camp than to rent a bed (sometimes free since you're Peace Corps). Also, when you're visiting other volunteers, you'll want something to sleep on, especially if there's a lot of you in one place and there's not room for everybody in the house. I would also definitely consider a sleeping pad.

2. Bring as much as you want. A lot of PC people say, "don't bring much." I disagree. The only time you'll have to lug all your own stuff is when you're going to Staging. When you get to Malawi, there will be people at the airport to help you, and you'll never have to move it all again by yourself until you move to site, when you move it from the College Storage Room into the back of a truck (maybe 15 feet) and then into your front door. So don't be afraid to bring a lot. Also, I know the limit is technically 80 lbs, and who knows if you'll have the same situation at the airport, but my luggage was never weighed at any point in time. So if you want to live life on the edge it might be worth risking bringing an extra couple pounds.

3. Pillow. Peace Corps does not give you one, which is weird, since they give you a mattress and sheets. So I'm really happy I brought mine. Definitely worthwhile.

4. Camping chair. Likewise. Comfortable furniture is hard to come by and IMPOSSIBLE to transport. Obviously, not essential, but I sit in mine every day and everyone is jealous and threatens to steal it. Really.

5. First Aid stuff. You don't need it. Peace Corps gives you a LOT of stuff, and a LOT that is not on that official list on the website (including broad-spectrum antibiotics and other prescription business). I would, however, bring a hefty supply of any prescription drugs yu take regularly, because otherwise you have to rely on Peace Corps a)being willing to give you the same one you're taking now and b) having it in stock all the time.

6. Seeds! You can get tomatoes, beans, and a few other things here, but it's nice to have herbs and other vegetable seeds you can't get, like eggplant, carrots, or spinach.

7. Computer/external hard drive. We've all been trading music and TV shows -- sorry, International Copyright Laws -- and it's very nice to have some new things. Also, I am using my computer to do my school's registration, which is required to be computerized, despite the fact that most Malawian schools do not have electricity, much less computers. So you'll probably use it for other things too, besides mindless entertainment.

8. Other stuff I'm really glad I brought: a good kitchen knife, school supplies (markers especially), cards, my contacts (you're not supposed to wear them, but try watching your feet while carrying water on your head while wearing glasses, it's impossible), sunglasses, cheese packets from macaroni & cheese (pasta is widely available), Clif Bars, sports bras, good non-stick frying pan, headlamp (ESSENTIAL), Tupperware.

9. Stuff I wish I had brought: travel-size toiletries (you really want to lighten your load when you have to walk a couple miles to get to your campsite, plus shampoo, toothpaste and things are very easy to find -- but no contact solution in the entire country), more good knives, cumin, a spare headlamp, a solar charger.

10. Stuff I brought and probably should not have: socks (I never wear them, ever), silverware.

I'll try and keep thinking of helpful things. And about clothes, for girls -- really, they're serious about the skirt-length thing. I can wear skirts that go just below my knees, but no shorter, and I am actually at a pretty liberal-minded site. I do wear trousers at site, but not jeans, because they are too tight, and definitely not to school. Also, go for things that dry fast. I brought a long knit dress that I really like, but it takes so long to dry when I wash it that I just never wear it. I do wear tank tops, especially because my site is so hot, but I still can't wear them to school, and again, I live in a pretty liberal place, so I think maybe farther away from the lake even tank tops would be too much. All that aside, you can wear whatever you want in Lilongwe, Mzuzu or Blantyre! They are impervious to Azungu Shock in the cities.

That's all for now. Wish me luck with exams in two weeks, and keep on mailing me things! I'm sorry if I don't respond -- but I'm sending Positive Thought Waves in your direction(s).

Pictures

Posting pictures does not appear to be working. Sorry! I will try again soon.

Kuno ku Chitimba...

I have now been living at site for one week and two days! And I have not yet starved to death, contracted cholera, been attacked by monkey(s), or eaten all of my Reese's Pieces. So far, so good. Chitimba is lovely. I'm going to try an upload a picture as proof:

And that's just the sign! If you were standing where I was when I took that picture, and turned left (east), you would see Lake Malawi, a freshwater lake so enormous that most days you can't see the mountains in Tanzania on the other side. If you walked south a bit and turned right, in about two hours you would reach Livingstonia, the original site of the missionaries in Malawi. And if you kept walking south, you'd be in Chitimba village proper, just over the Rumphi-Karonga border, and now my home for two years. YIKES.

We are now officially Peace Corps Volunteers! The day of swearing-in we kept joking about finally receiving our superpowers -- it is kind of funny how PC coddles us for 10 weeks and then drops us in the middle of nowhere. I am pretty excited about "defending the Constitution" -- as I swore to -- in Chitimba, though. I'm not really sure what that means, but by golly, I will make everyone here acknowledge that presidents must be over 35 years of age. Here's my amayi (host mom) with me at swearing-in:

The first week at site has been a challenge. My electricity hasn't come through yet -- my most optimistic guess is New Year's -- and so I've been cooking with charcoal. It's REALLY HARD to light charcoal without lighter fluid. There's a paraffin shortage in Malawi right now, so I've been consigning the environment to perdition and using plastic to light my stove. Essentially I've learned that I should start trying to light it about four hours before I actually want to eat. But! I'm looking forward to getting creative with the few ingredients Chitimba has to offer -- tomatoes, mangoes aplenty, rice, and a few onions. I bought wheat flour in Lilongwe, so tortillas are definitely in the offing. Meanwhile I've been embarking on some serious DIY projects: curtain sewing, shelf-building, path-paving. The workmanship isn't exactly exquisite, but nothing has fallen down yet. This is the beach that's about an 8-minute walk from my house.

And here's some pictures of the inside of my house. My bed used to be under the window with the blue curtain. Then it rained.

I tell you what, this rainy season means serious business. There is no glass in any of the windows in my house, so my books have their own little plastic shelter which will hopefully protect them. Everything else can just deal. On the plus side, rain means a couple fewer times I have to go to the borehole and carry water back on my head. I can carry about 15 liters now, but it sloshes everywhere. Yesterday I was trying to put a full bucket on top of a rolled-up chitenje (piece of fabric) on my head, and I kept knocking the chitenje off. My arms aren't quite long enough to lift the bucket from the top, but it didn't occur to me, because I am a dolt, that I could lift the bucket from the bottom. So instead what happened was that I made two iwes (children) who were laughing hysterically at my efforts come and help me. As they balanced the bucket on my head, though, the chitenje slipped, and they were instantly soaked. I felt bad about it, but it's so hot here that they probably enjoyed it. I know I spill so much water every time I carry a bucket that it's practically a bath.

School! Form 2 (sophomores) started this week, but Form 1s will have to wait until January, since we don't have their exam results yet and Christmas and New Year's are school holidays. I don't think anybody was prepared for the new school schedule, including the national exam people -- nobody can actually start on time because they don't know who has passed. So far my kids are learning poetic terms -- it's slow going, but it's on their exam, so hopefully now they can identify rhythm, rhyme, simile, metaphor, and alliteration. One of the best things about Chitumbuka (the language here) is that there's so much alliteration -- everything has to agree in a sentence, and the way you make things agree is by adding the same prefix. Everything's a tongue twister. It's kind of great.

On the whole, I am very excited to get going with the work I'm doing here. I'm sure that Chitimba will soon seem like home, and that one of these days I'll finish these stupid curtains. In the meantime, there's always swimming in the lake to keep me cool, and slightly less dirty.

Happy holidays! Keep me posted on your lives!

At long last...

Happy belated Thanksgiving everyone/anyone who reads this! I am in Lilongwe, waiting for PC transport back to Dedza, about an hour south of here. Yesterday I arrived in the capital from site visit, which means I have spent about 30 hours on a bus in the past 6 days. So far, it seems worth it -- my site is gorgeous. It's at Chitimba, on the border of Rumphi and Karonga district. I traveled there with my headmaster, Chance, who was gracious enough to let me stay in his house during my visit. And then I got to see my new house and explore around Chitimba. The house is enormous. Visitors are always welcome. AND I have electricity! So I lucked out. No running water though. But the electricity is especially welcome, because it means I can have a fan. It's really really hot. It's about a 5 minute walk to the beach, and I have plans for some beachside ukulele-ing.

Funny story: so I was wondering what Malawians wear to go swimming, and I asked my headmaster. He said, simply, "Pants." Naturally I thought, that makes sense. Malawi is a very conservative country (I'm supposed to wear skirts below the knee at all times), and I don't think people have the income to buy scuba suits. I was forgetting, however, that this Malawian conservatism doesn't always follow my American logic, and that, more importantly, "pants" in Malawi means underpants. The next day I wanted to go into the lake, so my headmaster's lovely wife went with me. We got to the sand and I took off my wrap, revealing my "sturdy one-piece" that the packing list had instructed us to bring. The headmaster's wife looked at me, laughed, and promptly stripped down to her undies. Malawi is a confusing place sometimes.

So for a quick sum-up of the two months I've been here:
We've been in PST, or Pre-Service Training, which means we are not officially Volunteers yet. We will become Volunteers on Dec. 9th. So my training class of 20 has been having a lot of language classes, a lot of technical preparation, and a lot of excitement when the mail arrives. Speaking of which, I have a new mailing address! It's on the sidebar. So we had homestay for 6 weeks, where we stayed with village families and taught at the local school. It was an adventure, mostly because of the lack of communication ability. My family spoke nearly no English, and my Chichewa is not quite up to par, so there were some funny moments. I taught Form 1 (freshman) English at the Katsekaminga Community Day Secondary School -- their essays were, at times, hilarious, and at times, very impressive for kids who have never owned a book. [Sidebar: I'm definitely looking forward to working on the library in Chitimba -- there's a bunch of books that a previous Volunteer got sent to the school, but right now the kids can't access them because they're not organized and they're all in the staff room, where the students are not allowed to go. It is strange to be allowed in the staff room, actually -- a lot of my students will be my age or possibly older, since often they break off in the middle of the school year to help with the farming or other work, and then finish the following year.]
After homestay was over, which was both sad and relief -- it was hard to never decide what was happening to me, but my family was incredible -- we had a week back at the College of Forestry. We got our bikes (they are hardcore), went to Ed's, the bar down the street, hung out a lot, and forgot a lot of the language we'd learned in homestay. It was a good week. Up next: language intensive, which for us Chitumbuka speakers is in Rumphi boma (boma = city). Then, we're back in Dedza for a few more technical wrap-up things, and then it's off to site! Then I'll start teaching English to freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, in classes of about 50. Yikes.
It's definitely exciting.

Should roll out now, but I hope I can post again soon, and I miss you all!

Four hours to go....

We are in Philadelphia, having finished staging, learned that we cannot date spies and that we cannot post the locations of other volunteers on our blogs. Apparently Peace Corps is full of state secrets. In a little less than 4 hours we will be leaving the hotel on a bus, traveling a few hours north to JFK airport in New York, and finally taking off for Lilongwe (via Johannesburg). It is very strange that this is happening at all, much less in the middle of the night. Luckily everyone in our group of 21 seems pretty flexible so hopefully it will all go well.

I probably won't be able to post for another 3 months after tonight, but when I do, I can promise lots of information about training and all that stuff. Write me a letter!

Things I Didn't Know About Malawi

Sydney Bristow probably compiled these all by herself: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/mi.html

Life expectancy at birth: 43.82 years
(Malawi is ranked 216 out of 224 in terms of life expectancy. The U.S. is ranked at 50, behind Bosnia-Herzegovnia, Israel, pretty much all of western Europe, and Macau at the #1 spot. The nations that have lower life expectancy, in descending order: Djibouti, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Mozambique, Lesotho, Zambia, Angola, Swaziland.) But back to the country at hand --
HIV adult prevalence: 11.9%
Literacy: 62.7%
Population: 14,268,711
Area: slightly smaller than Pennsylvania
Population below the poverty line: 53%, or 7,562,417 people (I did math!)

80 lbs., 107" and a possible hernia

Packing list! If anybody's interested. The Peace Corps restricts us to 80 lbs. and 107 inches (height + width + length), so obviously it's all subject to change, probably until the moment that I actually depart. Comments and advice always welcome!

Clothing and OMG SHOEZ
Northface rain jacket
Zip-up fleece
2 calf-length skirts
1 ankle-length skirt
2 calf-length dresses
2 edging on not-quite-long-enough dresses
liberal interpretation of the packing guidelines
1 ankle-length dress
1 pair jeans
1 pair water-resistant zippy pants
4 tank tops (various colors)
3 short-sleeve t-shirts
2 long-sleeve t-shirts
3 blouses
1 pair Bermuda shorts
1 pair athletic shorts
long underwear
1 pair pajama pants
1 cotton slip
2 sports bras
4 regular bras
SO MUCH UNDERWEAR
5 pair socks
2 swimsuits
black tights
scarf & mittens
baseball cap
running shoes
Chacos
Rainbows
Teva flip-flops
frumpy orthopedic teaching shoes
gray ballet flats

Now that I typed that out, it seems like really a lot, but it's all squeezed together in those vacuum-packed thingies.

Machines, aka things which will become useless probably very soon
netbook & accoutrements
DVD reader (since the netbook doesn't have a CD drive)
DVDs
solar charger & attachments
wind-up alarm clock
headlamp
small LED flashlight
spare AAA and AA batteries (lithium)
spare headphones
iPod & accoutrements
1 wattage converter
3 plug adapters
Steripen

Food-Related Items
chef's knife
paring knife
small cutting board
whisk
kitchen shears
spatula
salt & pepper grinders
travel French press
2 boxes Clif bars
1 small jar creamy Jif (I hear moms love it)
1 medium tupperware
6 packs Annie's cheese mix
Propel vitamin water powder
2 Nalgenes

Things Made of or Related to Paper
3 folders
lesson planner
grade book
small spiral
journal
comfort reading: Wives and Daughters, I Capture the Castle, James Herriot's Dog Stories, The Horse and His Boy
crossword book
Sudoku book
Lonely Planet Southern Africa
ballpoint pens, mechanical pencils
4 Sharpies
craft scissors
Scotch tape

Toiletries (the Peace Corps provides us with some stuff, also)
small bottle of shampoo
Dr. Brommer's all-purpose soap
1 tube toothpaste
4 toothbrushes
floss
1 tube moisturizer
2 deodorants
razor and spare razor blades
small Cetaphil facewash
small Aveeno sunscreen
Off bugspray
1.5 oz baby powder
makeup, very basic
1 large hand sanitizer, 2 little ones
2 bottles contact solution
8 boxes spare contacts
2 contact cases
2 pairs glasses
1 pair prescription sunglasses
1 pair regular sunglasses
baby wipes
Medical kit: Dramamine, Midol, small pack band-aids, small Tylenol, Lunesta, Orajel, Afterbite, various things -- PC gives us anti-malarials, cross your fingers for Malarone
fingernail clipper
travel toilet paper (6 packs)
3 cherry Chapsticks

Entertainment & Gifts
ukulele
ukulele music: Joni Mitchell, Crosby Stills & Nash, Dar Williams, the Dixie Chicks, Johnny Cash, Eric Clapton
extra strings
picks
pitchpipe
embroidery threads (for friendship bracelets)
cards (1 regular, 1 UNO)
4 boxes crayons
beach ball
bananagrams
sparkly stickers
2 UT baseball caps
cheepy earrings

Things that Don't Really Fit in Another Category and yet Don't Have Enough in Common to be Their Own Category
REI 2-person tent
lightweight sleeping bag
camping chair
1 roll duct tape
eyeglass repair kit
sewing kit
safety pins
jewelry
bobby pins, rubber bands, headbands
3 bandannas
twin sheet set & 2 pillowcases
Camp towel, washcloth
pillow

Things that I am Mailing to Myself
More Clif bars
Reese's mini peanut butter cups (I don't care if they melt - I'll drink them out of the package)
Spices: vanilla extract, seasoning salt, Italian seasoning, chile powder, dried rosemary, cinnamon
birthday candles
non-stick frying pan
deck of cards
powdered drink mixes
mini speakers
binder clips
construction paper
markers
more deodorant: always super, never superfluous

Still in consideration (besides all the above, some of which will probably have to be 86ed): dish towels, travel Scrabble, frisbees.