A Tricky Bantu Language Indeed

This post is primarily to share some things about the Chichewa language.  As such, no new picture album to share, but just a couple of quick notes.  I went to the DMV again the other day, and three hours later finally had my temporary drivers licence (the actual card should be ready for me to pick up within a couple of months).  The three hours involved many, many more queues, five of which were for a road test that I didn’t have to actually take but for which I still had to pay and go through the processes.  Another quick note is that the term at EBCoM has now ended, and the students have gone home for the break.  I thought it ended fairly well, but I was definitely glad I made up some course evaluation forms for the students, because the resounding feedback was that the lectures were difficult for them to follow!  When I had heard that general report part-way through the term, I made some changes and thought I had changed things well enough, but it turns out I really need to work hard at simplifying, slowing things down, and discerning how best to present the material to the students and facilitate learning.  There is a 4-week break between terms.  In this time, I will be doing a couple of day trips, will go down to Johannesburg, South Africa for a week-long theological education conference, and work on preparing next term’s courses, which for me are John and 1 John, Doctrine of Last Things, and continuing Introduction to NT Greek.  All the lecturers get a lighter load in the 3^rd term because most of the 2^nd year students are away for a term-out ministry assignment, which puts them in different ministry placements around the country. 

A few students on their way home for the break

One other random thing I thought I’d mention as I’m going to a conference in a couple of weeks and as I’m in a context where there is a deep hunger for, but generally lack of resources for good theological education, is to encourage you to take advantage of the opportunities that are available to you.  Regent College (where I did my graduate degree in Vancouver), for example, has excellent week-long or 2-week courses throughout spring and summer.  If you have any desire, whether personal or vocational, to learn more about any number of subjects related to the Christian life, including Bible studies, theology, art, history, missions, church leadership, spirituality, marketplace theology, etc., than do check out http://summer.regent-college.edu/.  Just a little plug; anyway, on to the main feature.

Since a couple months ago I have had a new private Chichewa tutor.  The one I had just up and went away for several months, so a new one was needed.  We meet twice a week for an hour each, and I am making some progress little-by-little, or as one says in Chichewa, “pang’ono-pang’ono”.  Turns out, however, that Chichewa is really quite a complex language.  Pronunciation is thankfully quite manageable, since, unlike English, it is actually consistently phonetic.  The main tricks to catch are that “l” and “r” are pronounced pretty well the same; “i” is pronounced like the long English “e” (as in teeth), and “e” in turn is pronounced like the long English “a” (as in ate); “c” except as “ch” doesn’t exist, and “th” is pronounced as just “t”.  Another important trick to note is that all syllables must end in vowels.  Just as Malawians feel they have not eaten a meal until they’ve had nsima, so they feel a word just isn’t a word without a vowel at the end.  For words designating things not native to Malawi, Chichewa has adopted the English word, though not without Chichewa-izing it.  Sometimes you see a word and have no idea what it means, and it’s not until you pronounce it according to the rules above that it makes sense.  You can probably very well figure out the meanings of the following words by sounding them out: “botolo”, “bukhu”, “tchalitchi”, “nyuzipepala”, “ofesi”, “khitchini”, “dokotala”, “kalipentala”, “thebulo”, “kalasi”, “kaloti”, “kabichi”, “anyenzi”, etc.  For those who figured out 13/13, Congratulations!  For the rest, the answers are at the bottom of this post.* 

Lest you think, though, at this point that Chichewa is easy-peasy, let me introduce you to the complexity of noun classes.  Whereas English has only one noun class, you might be familiar with the fact that French has 2 based on gender (masculine and feminine) or that German has 3 (masculine, feminine, and neuter).  For Chichewa there are 6 MAIN noun classes and additional minor ones!  Furthermore, these noun classes are of central importance to each sentence since you generally can’t even say the verb of a sentence until you know the noun class to which the subject belongs.  All adjectives, verbs, and several other components of each sentence have to agree properly with the nouns to which they connect, making sentence construction a rather complicated task. 

Additionally, verbs are such that subject-agreement, tense (past-present-future), object-agreement, voice (active and passive), mood (statement of fact, command, statement of possibility, etc.), and plenty more, are all indicated by adding components to the verb itself.  So, what might take numerous words in English can all be said in a single, though very complex, Chichewa word.  For example, “Sindidzachigulabensoko” means “I will still not buy it there again” (si=not; ndi=I; dza=will; chi=it; gula=buy (the actual verb); be=still; nso=again; ko=there).  Needless to say, when people speak very fast (which they all do), it can be hard to catch and place everything. 

I’ll conclude this blurb on the Chichewa language with one more thing that I’ve found tricky to learn: locatives.  In English, we have 2 main words that locate things, “here” and “there”.  In Chichewa, there are 12 main words!  They are composed by combining one of “in”, “on”, or “at/toward” with one of “where I am”, “near where I am”, “a distance away from me, though still visible from where I am”, or “that place that you know but is not within eyesight”.  Plenty to consider before opening one’s mouth. 

So, all that is to say, feel sorry for me, don’t judge me if I don’t speak fluent Chichewa after 2 years, and please pray for me.  Thanks for reading.

*Answers for the Chichewa-ized English words: bottle, book, church, newspaper, office, kitchen, doctor, carpenter, table, class, carrot, cabbage, onions.

Paper Sunday

I think I am getting into the bad habit of having to start all of my blog postings with apologies for not posting earlier.  Perhaps next time will be better, but no promises since it will probably only result in more apologies.  Anyway, apologies.  My lack of writing, however, has not been because of a lack of events to report. 

Things have been going pretty well as far as the classes I am teaching are concerned.  The term is quickly coming to an end and this week I will be giving both of my classes their final exams.  A not so great thing happened when I received the term papers – keep in mind, these are my first classes of my own and the first papers I have received to mark.  In the very first paper I looked at, I found plagiarism!  Certainly not the kind of thing you want to find anywhere, but especially not at a Bible college.  In coming to talk with some of the other faculty, though, while there is still little excuse for this particular student, it was explained to me that a little bit culturally, and more because of lack of study skills and educational background, the ills of plagiarism really aren’t ingrained even with EBCoM stressing them.  It is not natural, for example, for some students even to use quotation marks when quoting from the Bible.  Besides the plagiarism issue, I have found the writing level of many of the students to be quite low.  At least until I get the lay of the land a little more, though, I am grading the students according to their ideas rather than the poor grammar with which they seek to communicate them.  However, one bright point is that as I read their English, I am seeing more and more how Chichewa grammar works!  (In about a week I will give another short post describing a little more about the Chichewa language.)

A very unfortunate circumstance that rose up a couple weeks ago, was a one-day student boycott of classes because of a lack of funds for food.  As I mentioned in the first post, the students are in charge of their own food and to this point they had been managing on MK1,100 per student per week.  Food prices have gone up, however, and they were finding it difficult at that rate, such that they didn’t have enough money to complete each week.  In actual fact, though, most students receive at least 20% more money for food from their sponsors, but unknown to the sponsors, were not using all of it for food.  When the 1,100 proved to be insufficient, the students decided that a strike would be the best way to bring about a quick and favourable result.  Well, it can be an effective way, but it is certainly not a Christian way to deal with trials.  Sadly, there had been precedence for this sort of action in the past, which is why the school had chosen to put students in charge of their own food to begin with.  That the students would resort to this very poor display of Christian character has been very troubling for the faculty and for the sponsors of the students.  I mentioned in the last post that the school’s Spiritual Emphasis Days had been on “Show Me Your Faith”, taken from the book of James.  Though the students seemed to be very receptive to it at the time, evidently, it did not sink in to affect their actual behaviour when hardship arose.  The material needs of the matter have been met by an anonymous donor through the end of the term (though with somewhat of a lingering question mark over next term), but the spiritual matter will take quite a bit more time to address, especially since the material needs have been more than met for this term, which reinforces the effectiveness of bad behaviour.  Through this issue and generally, I have been coming to see more and more that quick money, while it can relieve the giver’s conscience, does little to change hearts.  It has been a huge issue, and I have not explained it in its entirety, but it has definitely been troubling, discouraging, and brought some unwanted tensions into relationships with the students.  Your prayers over the whole situation would be much appreciated.

This event at EBCoM occurred also around the same time that students at the polytechnic university in town were holding protests and strikes over financial issues.  In Malawi’s history, such student protests are not uncommon at all.  It is also very interesting and probably no coincidence that in the very core cultural narrative of the struggle for Malawian independence centred on the politico-religious figure of John Chilembwe, this same attitude and justification of protest, resistance, demand, and force stands strong.  Such matters show that there is a much wider cultural and social trend that Christians have become caught up in as well.  (though in this, Malawi is certainly not alone).

Anyway, let me shift on to lighter matters.  Just a quick note that I have not yet gone back to the DMV.  I have been avoiding it for obvious reasons, so my report on Operation Malawi Drivers Licence, Part II, will have to wait.  I now move on to the key feature of this post, which was much more enjoyable to experience than the last posts key feature.

Last Sunday I experienced my first Paper Sunday, which is also known as Big Sunday.  This is when a church holds a special and very fun and entertaining fundraiser.  The “paper” refers to money in bills as opposed to coins – getting into the big money…well, not really.  The smallest bill is MK 20, the equivalent of about 15 cents.  One of the churches that I had been to before (and is one of my favourites), Mpemba, was holding a Paper Sunday, so I made plans to go.  I also brought along an American named Tracie who’s only here for 2 months and was itching to experience a Malawian church before she leaves.  Paper Sunday was definitely a cultural experience for both of us! 

Thankfully we had been warned it was going to be a long day, though at no point did it feel too long.  We picked up the pastor and his wife, Richard and Nora Zibophe, on the way to the church at 9:30, and we didn’t leave until around 5:30!  How, you might ask, can going to church be an 8-hour day?  Well, this is how:

Although we arrived at 9:30, and church was supposed to start at 10, as is prone to happen in African churches, and especially this Sunday as odds and ends needed to be sorted out, church started late…rather late…well over an hour late.  The person who was supposed to preach didn’t show, so I was asked to preach, and thankfully I have learned to come prepared for such things by keeping a couple extra sermons in my Bible.  The service itself was shorter than usual with no offering, no choirs, and I was asked to do a shorter sermon.  After the service, though, the festivities began right away with an offering being taken by a boy as he sang with an amazing voice.  After that there was a competition of money for a clock, with the church divided into four according to where people lived.  The group that gave the most got the clock.  Through this part, and pretty well everything that followed there was an MC who had so much energy and was hilarious to watch.  

The Master of Ceremonies of Paper Sunday

 The church wanted Tracie and me to be our own Team Azungu vying for the clock.  We put money in the pot, but told them to divide it between the other four groups.  The money was counted by three people sitting around a table to do all the money counting through the afternoon – quite a job.  After one of the teams won the clock, there was a break for lunch, which was also part of the fundraising.  They certainly weren’t trying to break anyone’s back, though, because I got a very filling plate of nsima and beans with some vegetables on the side and a glass of tobwa all for MK 70 (roughly 50 cents)!  The meal was delicious and very satisfying, putting people in the mood to be generous in the continued festivities to follow.  While lunch was going on, tickets could be purchased for the raffle to be held later (MK 80 each).

Coming back into the church after lunch, it was now time for the auction.  It differed from most every Canadian auction I’ve seen on 2 accounts.  First, the items up for auction were by no means rare novelties, but every-day items like sugar, soap, a few bottles of Coke, and matches.  Second, unlike auctions as I imagine they are done most everywhere else in the world, in these, it was not just the highest bidder who had to pay.  Bids were made by actually putting money into a basin, and all the money stayed there.  Plus, people didn’t need to match a bid before they could raise.  If one person started at MK 50, another person would only need to put in MK 20 to take it, not MK 70.  If two parties were vying for an item and then one dropped out, any other person could jump in with a mere MK 20 and take it all despite the others having each put in MK 300.  So, it was a little chaotic, and people were adding to the chaos/fun by trying to take the item before the bidding was finished.  I did manage to win the bid on one of the bottles of Coke, though, which was very refreshing a couple of hours later.

Abusa Zibophe (right) in a bidding match over a bottle of Coke

After the auction was the time for choirs.  You might be thinking, “oh nice, a musical interlude between the fundraising,” but oh no, it was very much a part of the fundraising.  In a regular church service, there are usually a couple of different choirs – often a women’s choir, youth choir, and/or Sunday school choir.  They sing a song as they shuffle up to the front, sing a song or two at the front, and then go back down.

But on Paper Sunday, for as little as MK 20 you can make pretty much anything happen.  The women’s choir started and somebody paid to have a man join them up at the front and do the dancing/actions with them.  Then money was put in for another man to join them.  I thought this was absolutely hilarious until money was paid for me to go up front and join them!  I could have paid to refute the request, but decided to humour the congregation with some bad azungu dancing before paying to sit back down.

 By this time, however, the youth choir was itching to get up and sing, so they paid for the women to return to their seats, but the women paid to refute, then the youth paid more, and then the women again, but finally the youth overcame.  While the youth were up a man paid to pretend to conduct the choir, which he did with great exuberance. 

Then a woman paid to play a drum with the youth choir, which she did quite horribly but hilariously, and somebody else in the congregation quickly paid for her to go back down.

Somebody paid to have Tracie and me go up and join the choir.  Since I had been up already, I paid to refute for myself, but also to ensure that Tracie still had to go up.  The women’s choir wanted another turn, so they paid to take the youth choir down.  They didn't last long before they were taken down by the youth choir once again.  The choirs were definitely the most entertaining part of the whole afternoon.

After the choirs was the raffle draw.  There were quite a number of items.  I ended up winning a bucket and Tracie a basin.  There was also laundry soap and plates to be won, and the grand prize was a radio.  The raffle marked the end of Paper Sunday, and when all was said and done they had raised about MK 7,500.  We then completely packed our vehicle with people from the church to drop off at various points along the way.  We ended up at the Zibophe’s house where they very generously gave us each a couple cobs of fresh maize, a pumpkin, and fresh guavas all from their own field.  I got home at about 6 and was thoroughly beat, but had an absolutely tremendous day!

I think that is plenty for this blog post.  I had planned to include a little thing on the language of Chichewa, but don’t want to make this one too long, so I’ll post it in a week or so to space things out a bit.  Just one more thing before signing off.  Some of you may remember that in my first upload of pictures, I had a picture of EBCoM’s chapel, where right at the front was a picture of a white Jesus.  It’s not only not historically accurate, but also quite an unhelpful picture for African indigenous Christianity.  Before coming out here I had seen very striking pictures on the internet of a black Jesus.  That, of course, is not historically accurate either, but since the Gospel reaches out to all cultures and part of the reason for God becoming man in the first place was to reveal Himself in a way that people could identify with and understand.  Anyway, the website is jesusmafa.com, which has pictures of a Cameroon Jesus.  I printed up one of them and brought it to a Malawian artist to basically copy while adapting it to make it more Malawian.  This is the result, the story of Mary and Martha.  I like it and hope to get more pictures done.  Perhaps I can start a trend, which I think would help evangelism as well as peoples’ general perceptions of Jesus (not the God brought/imposed from the West, but the God also of Africans).

Oh, right, and more pictures can be seen here (http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034923&id=180500047&l=90487545a8)

One Queue After Another

Apologies for a little delay in writing, and in advance for the fact that I have only a few new pictures to share.

     The term has been going very well so far and I am really enjoying teaching.  This week I am guest-lecturing for a few classes in Church History and teaching on early monasticism, which is reminding me how much I absolutely love Church History and wish I was teaching the whole course.  However, I am also enjoying teaching Doctrine of Scripture and Greek, and will just have to be patient for September, when I get to take up some Church History courses.  I have needed to realign some of my expectations for my classes since for Doctrine of Scripture the level of critical thinking, background knowledge, and fluency in English cannot be assumed, and for Greek the difficulty of learning a third language through one’s second language is showing itself.   Happily, though, I am quite free to go at the pace of the students and linger on certain things since there is not a set amount of content we have to get through.  

     The past two days were the college’s Spiritual Emphasis Days, which are a set of two days once a year when classes are put aside and the college comes together for spiritual renewal.  This year, one of the lecturers, Abraham Folayan, preached a series on the theme, Show Me Your Faith, taken from the book of James.  He and his wife, Ruth, have been long-time lecturers at the college, but in April they will be retiring and moving back to Nigeria, which will be a great loss to the school and they will be greatly missed.  The Spiritual Emphasis Days, though, were truly wonderful, challenging, and encouraging.  

     Speaking of departures, this past Saturday SIM Malawi had to say farewell to a dear missionary family, the Hannahs.  Ryan Hannah has been the Director of SIM in Malawi for many years and his wife, Heidi, the Personnel Coordinator.  I have really enjoyed getting to know them and their three kids over the past months.  They have felt the call to minister in a different area, though, and after some months back home in the USA, will be moving to Thailand to be missionaries there.  A couple of weekends ago we had a huge farewell weekend.  Most of the SIM missionaries across Malawi came to Blantyre, and we had a big party on the Saturday.  Including children, there were 70 in total at the party, and it was really great to meet all the missionaries that I hadn’t met yet.  Then on the Sunday there was a huge and long 4-hour church service and there were tons of people there from all over.  

     The rainy season continues, and I got some good video of what it can be like.  It’s really not as bad as you might think though, and the joy of cooler temperatures (even to the point where I can sleep well at night without a fan on me) far outweighs the inconvenience of potentially being poured on and getting one’s shoes muddy.  I don’t know if it has to do with the rainy season, but I thought the ants, though still around, had been more-or-less contained.  Last night, however, they seem to have come back with a vengeance, and some of a new, red, variety which are much more resilient to being squished.  Seeing them around is well enough, but when they start dropping on you from the ceiling or getting all in your coffee maker, it gets to be a little much.  So, I’ve sprayed Doom all around (though not in the coffee maker) and am probably doing myself no health favours by breathing it in, but whatev’s.  Oh, and speaking of Doom, my nice wicker furniture, despite being varnished, has somehow attracted some pesky termites.  The chairs are nowhere near damaged yet, but I see little trails of sawdust, which betrays the termites’ work.  I’ve sprayed the chairs with Doom a number of times, and have seen some dead termites, but the little piles of sawdust continue to form :(

 

Close to EBCoM there is a hill with a big cross on the top.  The local Catholic Church (with a sponsor from somewhere else) has put it up there with a nice hike going up.  Along the hike they have the 14 stages of the cross.  I’ve been meaning for some time to go up there, and finally went this past Saturday with a group of missionaries.  We had a gorgeous day for it and the view from the top was tremendous.

Panorama of the view from the cross

     So, now it’s time for the feature of this blog.  It is a lengthy story (and sadly no pictures), but it was definitely lengthier experiencing it, so I want no complaints.  I have now been here for 3 and a half months.  My Canadian drivers licence lasts me for 6 months in Malawi (I think...I’ve read/heard somewhere that it might only be 3 but am opting for ignorance – I’ve not yet had to show my licence to a police officer).  After that time is up, I need a Malawian one.  I had to wait until I received my Temporary Employment Permit (TEP), which arrived early January, before I could go in to get my licence.  Having received that, I decided to get the ball rolling on the Malawian DL earlier rather than later, especially since I’ve heard some horror stories about the length of time and the process for getting one.  I had heard that it can take 3 full days of standing in queues and jumping through hoops and meeting unexpected hurdles like the power/system going down right when you approach the counter, etc.  It turns out that the horror stories are well founded.

     I went to the Department of Motor Vehicles at the end of January, which I later found out was a bad idea to begin with since there were tons more people trying to get stuff done before the end of the month.  Things in Malawi like the DMV bear the residue of the Imperial British system of things, which is more concerned with orders and structures than practicalities.  So, at the DMV there are many different rooms, counters, and queues, each one with a specific duty and that duty alone.  A drivers licence, however, requires many duties to be performed, and hence, many lines to be joined.  Furthermore, there is no rhyme or reason to which room performs which tasks, and while the rooms are numbered (bear in mind, the number is not always posted at the room), the room numbers do not correspond to the order in which the rooms actually appear.  I was forewarned also, that the room somebody tells you to go to may not actually be the room you’re supposed to go to, and so to keep asking where you ought to be and if you’re in the right line. 

     So, on a Friday morning, bright and early, I made my way to the DMV, arriving at 7:15 because it opens at 7:30 and I was told an early start can potentially save you an extra day.  When the gate opened, I asked the first official which room I should start in for a Malawian drivers licence, and he said Room 3, so I lined up outside that door.  I also asked other people in the line if this was indeed the line I should be in, and they confirmed it (I say “line” loosely because until the door actually opened people just stood/sat outside in no actual order that reflected the order in which they arrived at the door).  Well, this particular door on this particular day did not open for another 45 mins.  When it did finally open and I got through the line to the counter, I was told that I must begin at Room 2!  So, I found Room 2 where the line was thankfully shorter, and when I got to the counter and showed my passport, TEP, and Canadian drivers licence, I was told that I needed a copy of each of those, but that the photocopier at the DMV was down (I had copies of my passport and TEP, but not of my Canadian DL).  So, I had to leave the DMV and find a place where I could make a photocopy.  I found an internet café soon enough that had a photocopier, so made a copy and headed back, went to Room 2 again, showed my papers and received a form to fill out.  I filled out the formed, joined the queue again, and then got my next instructions, which were to go to Room 3, Room 4, Room 6, and then back to Room 2.

     At Room 3 the lady wrote a long number at the top of my form (I imagine it was important for something) and then sent me to Room 4.  Room 4 is for the cashiers, and by far has the longest queues of all the rooms.  The line went well out the door, so joined the line.  It was here that I especially noticed that Malawians do not line up like Canadians – with a bubble of no-touchy space around each person.  Malawians line up right next to each other so that you’re either in continual contact with each other or with the slightest of movements you brush up against and bump each other (and this when it’s hot and breathing space would be most welcome).  Well, it was like that until we got to the room itself (which took about an hour), but then it turned to full-on squishing – like riding the 99 B-Line bus in Vancouver at peak-hours.  Inside of Room 4 there were 6 regular counters and 2 teller counters.  People were moving from one to the other and for some lines people were walking in directly from outside and joining (without waiting in the really long queue that I had been in), so I feared that I had waited so long for no reason.  I decided it would be best to stay behind the person who was in front of me, despite some of the other lines being shorter.  This turned out to be the right choice because counter 3, which the long line from outside was queued for, though it didn’t say it anywhere, was the quotes line, which was the first stop.  Here I was given a piece of paper indicating how much I had to pay at one of the two teller counters.  The other 5 lines were for some other purposes that everybody seemed to know (despite nothing being posted anywhere).

     So, I finally got my quote – MK1,270 (which seemed low to me…less than $10) – and lined up in the teller line.  This line moved horribly slow, and I soon found out that the system was continually up and down, which was slowing down everything.  When I was fourth from the counter, the teller took her lunch break :(  I wasn’t about to give up my spot in line, so I continued to wait.  It was then that I noticed that one of the guys in front of me looked just like a black version of Patrick Stewart, which humoured me quite a bit and the time waiting went by faster as I remembered good Star Trek episodes, only this time with a black Jean Luc Picard.  The teller came back from lunch, and eventually I was able to pay in those moments of the system being up, and finally got out of Room 4.  I decided that it was high time for me to have my own lunch somewhere.

     When I got back from lunch, I looked for Room 6, but could not find it anywhere, so asked somebody, who took me to a room that I would not have found on my own, and definitely had nowhere posted that it was Room 6.  This was the room for getting my photo taken and fingerprints done though there was nobody actively taking photos or fingerprints.  There was no formal queue, but seats around the room, and like before, the order that people sat in did not reflect the order in which they arrived.  After close to an hour of waiting a lady came in and sat at the computer for a bit and then left again saying the system was still down.  She came back again a little later and said that we should go because it was near closing time (3 pm) and the system was not coming back up, but that they would be open the next day (Saturday) from 9 to 12 and we could come back then or on Monday.  I had other commitments each day the next week, so I decided to come back Saturday morning, and hoped that I might make quicker progress with fewer crowds on a Saturday.  I was beat after a close to 8-hour day of standing in queues!

     The next day I arrived shortly after 9 and went straight to Room 6, where the system was up and there was only a short wait so that I had my photo taken and fingerprints done within half an hour.  Then I was told to come back on Monday when Room 2 would be open.  Aarg!!  But I inquired whether there was nothing more I could do that day, and the lady said that Room 2 was closed, but if I talked to Abambo (Mr.) Mbame, he might be able to help me.  I sought him out and eventually found his office, but he wasn’t there.  Another guy – very obviously Christian from his Holy Bible prominently placed on his desk and a couple of posters with Scripture passages on them – took a look at my papers and informed me that in the system I had not yet paid.  I had been unaware, but apparently after paying at the Teller the previous day, I was supposed to go to another counter (Counter 5) in Room 4 to show that I had paid and receive a different receipt for it.  So I did that now, and got that receipt.  I then went back to the guy, and he put a checkmark on my paper and told me to go to the quotations line (Counter 3) in Room 4 so that I could get another quotation to pay another MK2,000 (the first payment of MK1,270 was for an Aptitude Test that I never actually had to take, but still had to pay for).  So I got my quotation, lined up again for the teller, went again to Counter 5 to show that I had paid, got another receipt, and brought it back to the guy who was helping me but was not Abambo Mbame.  He signed the piece of paper, put my thumbprint on it, and then informed me that this was now my Learners Licence and that after 29 days I could come back to get my full licence (and I am assuming with exciting new queues to line up in and bills to pay!).  When I asked why I couldn’t get my full licence right away since I have a full and recognized Canadian DL, he said that Jesus, though he was divine, came to earth and started out as an infant (with the assumed logic that despite having my full licence, in coming to Malawi, I need to start as an infant of sorts).  It was noon, the DMV was closing, and I had done all I could to this point, so I went home.  Day 2 of Operation Malawi Drivers Licence complete, I will just have to see what exciting adventures lie in store when the 29 days are up…maybe it will include a road test, maybe an aptitude test, most likely more money, and definitely more queues!

     So, as promised, a very long story, and I have definitely come to appreciate Canadian systems and procedures, and especially the novel concept of taking a number and having a seat.  That concludes this blog post.  A few more pictures can be seen here (at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034481&id=180500047&l=f1c49a6afa). Thanks for reading.

p.s. For those inclined to prayer, I think the Islamic world could really use a lot of prayer right about now.  I’m sure most of you are keeping an eye on the things that are going on in Egypt, as well as Tunisia and Sudan, etc.  Also, in Malawi there seems to be a lot of spiritual warfare going on among the missionaries to the Muslim Yao people in and around Mangochi.  There seems to be sickness after sickness among the families there and trial after trial.

Christmas in Malawi

My Christmas corner

     Apologies for not getting an update out before Christmas as I intended, but at least now I can report on Christmas!  It was a rough go getting into Christmas mode, but I did eventually do it with the help of a purchase of a nativity set, a birthday and Christmas package from my family, and downloading some Christmas carols off iTunes.  On Christmas morning I went to church, and attendance was sparse at the 8 am start time, but at least by 9 it was full.  Malawians don't really celebrate Christmas much, but the MKs really helped make it more Christmasy with some carol singing and a drama/puppet/presentation.  Some cold drinks (fanta & coke) and cookies were served at the Church after the service.  For Christmas lunch I joined another of the SIM missionaries and three Malawian families, plus a few more individuals for a typical Malawian Christmas lunch: Chicken and rice!  It was a wonderful time.  The kids made some bracelets, the adults played a game (similar to mafia), and we all enjoyed good food, drinks, and company.  

Also for the party, I made some tobwa (a maize flour and millet drink fermented one night).  I had the delight of a first taste when I was down in the south of Malawi in the Nsanje district.  Most of the missionaries don’t like it at all because of its thick and grainy consistency, but I love it and it was great to learn how to make it.  A guy named Luka showed me the process.  His family was at the party and as of mid-December he is also employed by me a couple of days a week to help out with odds and ends.  My hiring him helps both of us out quite a bit – he could use the money and I could use the freed-up time.  He helps with laundry (which, done by hand, I’ve found takes an awful long time), does some cleaning, helps me with Chichewa, and most importantly, does some baking for me!  For those of you who know my Mom (and my Oma for that matter), know that I have been brought up eating delicious baked goods.  Even when I was living in Vancouver I stayed well supplied with buns and cookies from home.  While there were some cookies in the Christmas package that I received, my time in Malawi was looking to be one largely deprived of excellent baking.  That was…until I discovered that there was this guy named Luka who bakes a mean scone and who was working for one of the other missionaries, but that that missionary was leaving in December. 

Luka washing some clothes

(On a stewardship note, it is much more satisfying visibly contributing to a family’s livelihood with paying for services than using the same – or rather, more – money for a washing machine and/or buying baked goods from the supermarket)

     But anyway, time to get back to Christmas things.  On the 27^th the SIM missionaries in Blantyre had a big Christmas party with a gift exchange and an amazing ham-meatballs-potatoes-cooked vegetables-stuffing-etc. meal!  I know I’m living in another context, but it was still very good to have a western-style Christmas party.  I made tobwa again for the party, but among the missionaries it wasn’t nearly so big a hit (I think only 3 of us like it).  Oh well, plenty of leftovers :)  For New Years tomorrow night, one of the missionary families is shooting off a bunch of fireworks, which should be a fun celebration.

The Christmas feast at the SIM party

     While Christmas isn’t associated with snow and cold weather here in Malawi, it is associated with rains.  The rainy season is now in full swing, and it is worth explaining a bit what that looks like.  It does not mean it rains all day, every day.  Most of each day is still bright and sunny, but there are more clouds, the wind has picked up, and almost every day there are thunderstorms and often at least one intense period of rain.  While the rain may last only half an hour, in that half hour it rains a days worth of Vancouver’s constant drizzle (there might be slight exaggeration there – I haven’t actually looked at the stats).   Needless to say, one does not want to get caught outside in it.  You can usually just wait it out and then it’s fine and sunny again, but you pretty much have to plan and take an umbrella or rain coat wherever you go.  Driving in the muddy conditions has also been quite an experience.  SIM has a short-termers vehicle that I can pay to use, which I have done a little bit.  The roads out here are bad to begin with – tons of potholes, etc. – but when you add the rain/mud factor, it renders some roads simply impassable.  I got stuck in a hole where the side of the road had eroded the other day, which was a little distressing, but I did manage to get out in 4-wheel drive without being towed.  For the most part, though, I am enjoying the driving out here – driving on the left side of the road, using roundabouts, having to be cautious of pedestrians all over, crazy minibus drivers, etc.  On a more sober note, though, with the muddy conditions, there are also accidents and about a month ago quite close to the college a truck lost control going down a hill, hit a couple of children and missed the bridge at the bottom.  The driver and the children died.  

The rainy view from my window.  Glad I was inside for this one.

     A completely different aspect of the rainy season is the increase in bugs, snakes, and spiders.  For the first number of weeks of the rainy season, it seemed like a plague of flying ants at night.  They are called ngumbi here.  They were simply everywhere and I was quite annoyed by them until I found out that they are tasty!  The students caught thousands of them.  They’re good fresh - just pluck off the wings - or they’re even better dried up and fried up – delicious!  

Ngumbi!

  They’re a little like bacon bits, and are good on their own, with nsima, or I also found, make a mean addition to a salad!  The spiders and snakes are not out in full force yet, but I’ve already killed a couple of small snakes, and do not enjoy the thought of having them around.  

 With the rains also came some relief to the high temperatures that we were experiencing here.  It can even get down in the lower 20s C.  It can also still get into the mid 30s though.  The other thing, especially just before or after raining, is that it gets extremely humid.  Plus, with the freshly cleared air I’ve found the sun to be more scorching and I've gotten burned even with only a little exposure to the sun.

     On the 20^th was my birthday and for the afternoon I had invited the faculty and staff at EBCoM to come over to my place and celebrate with a sort of combo birthday/Christmas/house-warming party.  A couple days earlier I had finally purchased a locally-made wicker furniture set for my place.  I bartered a really good price for it (I will talk another time about the joys of bartering here).  I was supposed to pick it up in the morning of my birthday (bringing my seat-count from 3 to 7).  It wasn’t ready yet, though, and had to come back an hour before the party was supposed to start.  I still had to wait a little bit, and then it started to pour, so we waited for the heavy rains to pass, and then I had to make two trips.  So I ended up being wet and late for my party.  Plus, the power ended up being off all day so the batter for a cake that I had Luka make a couple days before and hoped to bake that day, couldn’t be bake, so I had to go out and buy one quickly.  When the party finally got started though, it was a great time.!  That evening I was invited over to a missionary family’s house for supper and then we were joined by another missionary family for cake.  It was a wonderful birthday!

     Anyway, I think that will conclude this post.  I've put up more pictures and they can be seen here (at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033813&id=180500047&l=f2003bc546).  Happy New Year to all of you … or I should work on my Chichewa and say, ndikufunerani Chaka Chabwino Chatsopano!

Greg

My Village Experience

    Well, greetings again from Malawi!  Things have continued to go very well here.  I have just finished a two-week intensive course in beginner’s Chichewa and am jumping right into – probably a little prematurely – another two-week intensive course, but for intermediates.  I have been keeping busy, though things are at a relaxed pace, and I think I’m getting more sleep than I have in years!  I’m slowly adapting to the Malawian way of being a morning person (to take advantage of the cooler temperatures in the morning and the fact that it’s light out before 5 am and dark just after 6 pm).  Most of my time is designated for language learning, but I’ve really enjoyed getting involved in the life of the college more – I even guest lectured a couple of classes in Church History (talking about Early Church Apology and Heresy), which was a true delight.  Anyway, I will talk about other stuff at another time, but for this posting I want to tell a little bit about my week-long village experience that I was heading out to when I posted last.

     I stayed in a village called Banga outside of the city of Salima in the central region of Malawi (close to the lake, but I still have not seen the lake).  When I arrived in Salima I stayed the first night (and the last night after my village experience) with an SIM missionary couple – Paul and Marilyn Barr.  I really enjoyed my brief time with them and hope I make it back up to visit some other time.  I also met a short-term SIM missionary couple from Switzerland – Reto and Anja Widmer – who, we found out, are actually friends with some good friends of mine from Regent – small world!  

The Makhutcha Family

     In the village I stayed with the Makhutcha family.  He actually graduated from EBCoM a couple of years ago and is now the pastor of 5 churches in the area.  You may think 5 churches is a lot for a pastor to manage.  Well it’s true – though I’ve heard of a pastor covering over 10 churches.  There are several factors to the problem: in the first place, there are simply not enough trained pastors to cover all of the churches.  This is not because there is a lack of people who want to be trained and become pastors, but because there isn’t enough money to have them all receive training (each person at EBCoM is generally sponsored by their denomination, meaning the denomination pays the tuition and living costs and the students pay a MK2000 registration fee each term).  The problem becomes more complex though in the fact that the village churches tend to be smaller, and one church would not be able to support a pastor financially.  As it is, 5 churches struggle to support one pastor.  So there’s no easy answer.

     Anyway, back to the village.  The Makhutcha family is wonderful and they were so warm and friendly and hospitable during my week-long stay with them.  They have four children and one more on the way: Hannah, Esther, Joshua, and Gile.  The father’s name is Augustine, which is an awesome name, and I would have loved to call him that, except that the norm here is to not use adults’ first names.  Generally people are called by their last name, or, for him, Abusa (pastor).  I never actually found out his wife’s first name, because it’s expected that I just call her Amayi (Mrs., woman, or mother).  Of the family, only Abusa Makhutcha could really speak English (but he, very well), and it was a little early in my Chichewa learning, so for practical as well as cultural reasons, most of my time and communication was spent with Abusa. 

The Makhutcha Family.  Left to Right: Joshua, abusa, Gile, Hannah, amayi, Esther

A Typical Day

     So what did I actually do in the village?  Well, it’s one of those things where there is so much to tell and I can’t possibly cover everything, and yet, I didn’t actually do much at all.  Village life is much more laid back than life in Blantyre (which, compared to North America is already very laid back).  To give an over-generalized day, I would get up by 6, sit for a bit until they told me water was ready for a “bath” (a bucket of water), have my “bath,” sit for some more, have breakfast with them (though the kids were usually gone by this point since school starts at 7), and return to sitting with Abusa.  Then somebody would come or we might go to someone’s house, and we would sit and chat, maybe have a few mangos.  If it was an eventful day we would walk about 1 km to the market and pick something up for lunch.  Eventually at 1 or so we would have lunch, followed by some lounging (in other words, sitting) with the family (the younger ones would be home from school by lunch time) and maybe listen to the radio a bit.  Then somebody might drop in or we might go to someone’s house and sit and chat and probably have some mangos.  If it was an eventful day we might have another errand – like recharging Abusa’s cell phone in the market (since the houses don’t have electricity), where there is a shop with either a generator or solar power or something.  Then eventually dinnertime would come around, and we would have dinner and then lounge around (usually outside in the moonlight) with the family until between 8 and 8:30, and then it’s pretty much bedtime. 

Inside the house, which consists of this room,
a couple of bedrooms, and the back yard
(where there's the "bath," outhouse, kitchen, and chicken coop).

An Explanation

     Okay, okay, so it’s slightly exaggerated, but you would be surprised how little.  You probably won’t feel sorry for me, but a lot of the sitting tended to be on rather uncomfortable chairs, and so after a few days my butt was really getting quite sore.  The wicker chairs seen here, for example, look comfortable enough, but they had posts awkwardly right under the seat so that I continually needed to reposition myself in them.  But anyway, I suppose that it is now my task to convince you that the whole culture is not just terribly lazy.  Well, in the first place, do remember that it is a relationship-oriented rather than task-oriented culture.  But probably the most important piece of information is recognizing that it is a very seasonal culture and I was there during the very tail-end of the dry season, which also means the very hottest time of the year.  With temperatures in the mid-to-high 30s and perhaps higher, and with no electricity for fans or A/C, and the mode of transportation being walking, one can begin to sympathize with the situation.  Plus, almost everyone in the village earns their living by farming, and at the end of the dry season it is mostly a matter of just waiting for the first rains.  People might work 2-4 hours in the morning (when the temperature is tolerable), preparing their fields, but planting doesn’t begin until the first rains.  My little glimpse of village life was also skewed in that I was staying with a pastor, whose work is largely relational – visiting people, sitting, and chatting – rather than working by cultivating land or selling produce, etc.  Also, up to this point I have really only given the man’s side of the picture.  There is a very strong division of gender roles in Malawian society, and part of that says, men do not get the water, do not do laundry, and do not go anywhere near the kitchen.  So, from my perspective at this particular time of year, the women were doing much more work than the men (especially considering they do often do a little bit of field work too).  Anyway, react to that information however you will. 

Amayi cooking up some nsima in the kitchen, which is outside in the back yard

     But as I said earlier, while we didn’t actually do a whole lot, there is so much that I experienced and so much that I simply don’t have the time to report nor do you have the time to read…after all, none of us are presently living in a Malawian village :).  So what I will do is touch on a few things, but leave most comments and anecdotes for as they come up in pictures, which are available here (http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033392&id=180500047&l=ef14f33bc2).

Pastoral Affairs

     A key aspect of why I went to the village in the first place was to gain some insight into the kind of context that most of the students who graduate from EBCoM will be going into.  For this the trip was extremely helpful.  I not only got to see what a pastor serving in a village lives like and what he does, but I also had some really good conversations with Makhutcha about the challenges he faces, issues that have come up in his churches, and what sort of things he’s doing to address them.  In every account I found Makhutcha to be very wise and approaching matters with the right attitude and motivation, which was really good to see and gave me a lot of encouragement to witness some of the fruit of the work of EBCoM.  While recognizing that EBCoM can’t take all the credit, if this is the kind of person the school trains and sends out, I am proud to be a part of the ministry!  Without giving too many details, some of the issues he faces involve church elders not cooperating with each other and/or the pastor; people jumping from denomination to denomination; people not coming to church (for months!) because of unrelated things (e.g. land disputes); people backsliding from active, church-going Christianity; illness and death; preference of music (hymns vs. praise chorus); the association of Christianity with a moral code (legalism – especially not drinking or smoking) instead of the Gospel; and – especially in this particular area – the practice of witchcraft, tribal identity tied to traditional religion, and peoples’ fear of breaking away from these. 

     A couple of the afternoons I tagged along with Makhutcha and a few of the elders on house visits.  This was mostly for people who hadn’t come to church for a while or where there was a particular need for prayer – e.g. sickness.  There would be some reading Scripture, encouragement or exhortation depending on the situation, and then prayer.  I didn’t understand a whole lot as it was all in Chichewa, but it was really good to observe.  In the 2 days I would say we visited between 15 and 20 different houses.  At each place as we approached, one of the elders would call “Odi” (equivalent of knocking), to which, if someone was home (which they almost all were), responded “Ee” (“yes”).  The host would then bring out a mat and/or if they had any, some chairs.  As the azungu (white person), I was always given a chair if there was one, even if there was only one.  To refuse it would be disrespectful.  After we were all seated, the host would come and greet each person individually either with “mwaswera bwanji” (how has the day gone so far?) or with “Muli bwanji” (how are you)?  To which the respective responses are “ndaswera bwino, kaya inu” (it has gone well, and you?) or “ndili bwino, kaya inu” (I am well, and you)?  People were incredibly surprised that I could say the greetings, and impressed that I “could speak their language,” even though the greetings were close to the extent of my ability.

     You will see more about church on Sunday in the pictures, but just to say that as the azungu, it was expected that I would preach.  Thankfully I anticipated this and Makhutcha confirmed it earlier in the week, so I had some time to prepare something, and was able to address some of the above concerns relating to fear, power, and identity with Eph. 3:14-21.  I actually preached on this same passage at the wedding of my good friends Chris and Laura Madge, but as you can imagine, the sermon was very different.  Makhutcha encouraged me to take some pictures during the service, and so I also took some video.  Here is a clip of the youth choir singing.  In a church service there is a time for choirs to come up and sing some songs.  There is usually a women's choir, youth choir, and children's choir, and they rehearse during the week for each Sunday.  This service, though, there was only a youth choir.  Pretty well all the choir songs I've seen involve some movement - I think if they are working songs, travelling songs, etc.

I also took some quick video during some of the praise and worship chorus (notably different in enthusiasm from the hymns).  Here is a glimpse.  

Food

     I ate very well and never got sick when I was in the village.  Meat is not a regular meal, but they showed great hospitality in having meat three different days – pigeons, goat, and chicken.  The pigeons were contributed as a gift in light of my stay from their landlord, madala (a name of respect given to an elderly person).  Here is a picture of me with him:

Chicken is an assumed meal for a very welcome guest.  It doesn’t matter that some other meats are better.  If I was an honoured guest and only staying for one meal and was served pork, beef, or guinea fowl, I would get the hint that I was not very welcome.  I was very happy, then, to be served chicken.  Besides these dishes, other relishes that I had through the week were tomato and cabbage, pumpkin leaves, beans, and black-eyed peas.  They generally served two relishes, which was a real treat and not too common.  The relishes, of course, were generally accompanied by nsima, though they did serve rice a few times as well.  Breakfasts were tea and masikoni (an adaptation of the English word, scone – basically sweet buns).  Snacks either with the Makhutchas or when we visited other people included mangos, cassava root, mangos, freshly roasted peanuts (so freshly roasted, they burned my non-Malawian hand!), oh, and did I mention mangos?  It is mango season, and they ate mango after mango, as many as five in one sitting, one after the other, and we’re not talking the small mangos either.  Both because they’re difficult to eat and because I didn’t want digestive problems, I couldn’t keep up with them, and maybe had half the mangos they did.  They were delicious though!

Well, I think I’ll leave it at that for now, and let the pictures (here) do a lot more of the talking.  I plan to post again before Christmas since there’s been lots happening.

Greg

The First Update

 Arriving in Malawi

     It was a long journey out to Malawi.  I first had a one-week orientation with SIM Canada in Toronto, and then flew from there to London to Johannesberg, South Africa to Blantyre, Malawi.  In all I was in the air for 20 hours and on lay-over for 14 hours.  I arrived at noon on Oct. 20^th with all my luggage (which is a rarity I’m told) and thankfully it was clouded over, and so a little cooler.  The rainy season has not yet started, and things will cool off a bit when that comes, but for right now it can get to high 30s with humidity on the rise.  It is rather uncomfortable often, especially sitting in a crammed minibus and waiting for it to fill all the way up (but more on the minibus experience another time), or during any of the scheduled or unscheduled power outages when the fans don’t work.  But all-in-all I am adapting a little and sweating more.  

Chileka International Airport

First Impressions

     The first thing I observed about Malawi as my plane was coming to a landing at Chileka International Airport was that the ground is very red.  It is the end of the dry season and the clay earth is very striking.  I had the distinct feeling, I’m not in Canada anymore.  This feeling was confirmed again and again as the time went on.  The trip into the city was perhaps the most striking as we drove through what looked like slums, but were simply townships.  Everybody seemed to be outside – children, adults, men, women – and there was so much activity.  The houses and shops were very small and typically very makeshift.  Poverty is so rampant, and its amazing, saddening, and humbling to see how little people live with.  I’m sure the reality of the poverty will hit me a lot more as the time goes on.

     Another very obvious sign of not being in Canada anymore is the fact that I’m surrounded by black people.  Vancouver is very multi-cultural, true, and if I was living in Asia, I probably wouldn’t bat an eye, but I really am not used to seeing many African faces.  Plus, I stick out a whole lot.  I am, first of all, a fair bit taller than the average Malawian, but much more, my skin colour will never let me blend in.  I have but to walk off of the EBCoM (Evangelical Bible College of Malawi) campus and I’m given special treatment, approached by people (sometimes for money, sometimes just to talk), and continually greeted by the shouts of children, “Azungu [foreigner], how are you?”  I, of course, entertain them and respond, “Very well, thank-you and how are you” to which I typically get giggles and then the next child saying, “Azungu, how are you?” and on and on.  A lot of people here generally seem to expect a thumbs-up from a white guy.  I don’t know who started that, but sometimes I help perpetuate it.

The SIM Team and my Transition

     I have been very well treated by the SIM Malawi people and they are making the transition very smooth.  It is a great mix of people here in Blantyre with people from Germany, the UK, America, the Netherlands, Australia, Switzerland, and now me from Canada.  For the first few days I was staying in the new SIM guesthouse (which is super nice and a good option if anyone wants to come visit me J) until I got together all I needed to get started at my place at EBCoM.  For almost the whole first week I had most of my meals taken care of as well, being hosted by each of the missionaries here.  Another aspect of the smooth transition is the fact that I do not have to jump directly into teaching.  I will start teaching in January, and for that semester it will only be one course before getting into the full swing in the semester starting in April.  There are several reasons for this – not just to help me out with a stepping stool since I’ve never taught or put together a course.  These first few months are designated for language learning and cultural orientation.  I will be teaching in English, but the idea is that I won’t be an effective teacher unless I understand where the students are coming from and whom they are in turn going to be ministering to.  Language is a vital entry into understanding how a culture thinks, and so language study will be helpful on more fronts than just helping me get around town better.  Furthermore, showing a genuine effort at learning Chichewa is a huge thing in Malawian eyes, and it will be and already has been an important component of building relationships with the students.  Plus, Malawi is a relationship-oriented rather than task-oriented culture, and so my time is actually more valued in building friendships than diving right into teaching.  So far I have seen a lot of how surprised and appreciative they are of my trying to learn how to say things in Chichewa as well as the fact that I eat Nsima (more on that below).  I have a private tutor, Paul, whom I’m meeting with for Chichewa lessons, and starting Nov. 22^nd I’m taking a two-week intensive Chichewa course.   

Paul, my private tutor for Chichewa lessons

     Part of the cultural study/orientation includes my going on Monday up to central Malawi just outside of Salima to live in a village for a week with a pastor.  This will be quite an intense experience (i.e. no electricity, indoor plumming, etc.), but it will really help give me a sense of how most of the country lives, and the kind of contexts that most of the graduates from EBCoM will be going to.  It will help me know how to better equip the students.  There are also some other trips in the planning for visiting other areas of Malawi and also seeing what SIM is doing in different areas.  Besides all the cultural and language study, once I find out what course I’ll be teaching in January, I’m sure preparations will also take a good chunk of my time.  

Getting Set Up

     After the few days staying at the SIM guesthouse, I moved to my new home on the EBCoM campus.  It’s not only new to me; it’s actually new – never lived in.  As such, though, it came only with a fridge, a stove/oven, a wooden chair, built-in closets/shelves and desk, and a bed.  The rest was/is for me to supply, so I have been slowly picking up things to make it livable and home.  The trick is, while some things – like locally grown food – are really cheap, anything imported is really expensive, and it is painful to, for example, pay close to $100 for an AVS surge protector and a powerbar or $10 for a small, plastic cutting board.  When those prices are in Malawian Kwacha (the Malawian currency, which is roughly $1=MK150), one gets slightly overwhelmed.  To make the shopping experience even more interesting, almost no place accepts payment in plastic, only cash.  Furthermore, in order to prevent further devaluing of the currency, Malawi will not print higher bills, which leaves the highest denomination, MK500 – the equivalent of $3 or 4.  Now, thankfully I didn’t have to do it, but just think about buying something like a car with only $5 bills!  Deep pockets and cargo pants come in really handy here.  I still haven’t purchased a couch and easy-chairs, which will be very helpful for when students and other visitors drop in.  Anyway, getting set up has helped me to see why SIM’s expense estimates are placed as high as they are.   While I complain, though, the reality is that I can still pay the price whereas the vast majority of the country can’t.  Only a small minority would actually be able to afford a car and face the problem of paying for it in MK500 bills.  The rest walk or take a minibus.

My building at EBCoM.  I am in the last three windows on the top right

Life at EBCoM 

     One humorous thing about my home at EBCoM is the new building I’m in is actually the girls dorm.  I have a separate suite within it, but it’s an odd set up, and I don’t have a private entrance or anything.  At the first chapel that I was at, when I was introduced and the principal said that I was living in the new building, everyone started chuckling.  In addition to dwelling among women, I’m also getting used to dwelling continually among ants.  There are loads of other bugs too (like cockroaches, mosquitos, and spiders – not sure if some of them have been poisonous or not), but there are ants simply everywhere – and this even before I brought in any food.  I think I’m winning the battle against them, but they just keep coming and choose to die all over my floor so that a couple days after sweeping there are literally hundreds strewn about again.  

A small glimpse of the ants, now deceased with the help of the aptly named insect spray, Doom

     I’ve been getting quite well involved with the life of the college despite not starting to teach until January.  A couple of weeks ago there was a Sports and Fellowship afternoon in which the students played against the staff.  The women played net ball (it is similar to basketball), and the men played football (soccer).  The staff lost pretty decidedly in both, but good fun was had by all .  

Staff in the red, students in the blue

     Another thing that I’ve been doing for getting involved (and will continue to do throughout my time here) is having lunch every day with the students.  Now, I will need to explain a little bit about the food here.  The staple food is called nsima and it is corn flour and water mixed to a consistency a little thicker than porridge.  To eat it, one takes some nsima in the right hand (and it’s hot!) and works it around in the one hand to form it tightly together and then picks up some of the relish (ndiwo) with it.  The relish can be made of any number of things including beans, spinach, chicken, goat, fish, egg, etc.  Anyway, nsima is quite bland, very filling, and most Azungus tend not to like it.  The Malawians, however, love it and eat it every meal (though breakfast is an adapted recipe to make it more like porridge.  Something different like sweet potatos can also be had instead for breakfast).  Malawians don’t feel like they’ve actually had a meal until they have their nsima.  I actually reasonably like nsima, which the Malawians are surprised and happy to see.  The way that the food works at the college for the students is that the college supplies a couple of cooks, but the students organize and purchase the food together themselves.  Because finances is a real factor, they make it as cheap as possible and alternate between three relishes – beans, spinach (with an egg), and dried fish.  Admittedly, they are not the best tasting relishes, but they satisfy.  For lunch on Wednesday they splurge and have rice (with beans) instead of nsima.  For a week’s worth of food though, each student pays only MK1,100 (a little over $7)!  Since I’m only having lunches with them (2 meals of nsima would be pushing it right now for me, so I make my own breakfasts and dinners), I pay MK500 per week.  Besides the actual eating part, having lunches with the students has been great.  I’m actually the only staff person who has any meals with them right now, and they really like having me there.  It’s been fantastic getting to know them, though really challenging remembering all their non-western names.  I think these lunches will also be super helpful for my language learning as I’m hearing Chichewa all the time and they are eager to teach me new words.

Nsima and dried fish.  Many Malawians eat the whole fish - bones, head, fins.  I'm not there yet with the bones

Things I’ve Done that I Oughtn’t Have

     Life in Africa is quite different from Canada, and there are certain rules to follow for the sake of health and safety.  I have not exactly been the most diligent in all of these, and the following is a little list of no-no’s that I’ve done:

a) sleep without a mosquito net

b) drink the water unfiltered (I was a guest at a pastor’s house and didn’t want to offend him)

c) eat fresh vegetables not soaked in potassium permanganate (I didn’t actually get the stuff until a couple weeks ago)

d) wash and then air dry my clothes and wear them within 3 days without ironing them (to understand why this is a no-no I must explain the curiosity of the Mango Fly.  This fly lands on wet clothes and lays eggs, especially in the seams.  If the clothes are worn without having been ironed or before having been completely dry for 3 days, the hatched mango worms will burrow into a person’s skin [I’ve heard it’s painful].  Anyway, to get rid of them one suffocates them with Vaseline and when they poke out, one pinches them out the rest of the way.  Thankfully, I didn’t get any mango worms from my gamble).

e) walk home after dark (there is actual considerable danger at night of stray dogs, more snakes and insects, and being mugged)

f) ride in a vehicle without a seatbelt (this will, actually, be a daily risk I take with riding the minibuses, which do not have seatbelts except for the driver)

g) have windows open that don’t have a screen over them (I don’t have screens and it gets very hot, even at night)

h) talk to strangers (JOKING – this is certainly not a guideline, and the Malawians are so friendly and eager to talk to an Azungu [foreigner].  Talking with the locals is encouraged and is good fun)

Praise the Lord that I’m still in full health!

Random

     If you thought Canadians were bad with being politely apologetic (e.g. saying “sorry” when someone bumps into you), Malawians will say “sorry” if they are walking with you and you trip, slip, or drop something – as if they bore any responsibility for my clumsiness.

That wraps up this first post.  There is tons more to say, but I need to leave some stuff for later.  I plan to post at least once a month at the start, so check back or subscribe.  If you have any questions about life in Malawi, feel free to ask them by commenting here or by e-mail, and I’ll try to write about it.  The first batch of photos can be seen here at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033072&id=180500047&l=30ec42c336.  Just a quick note about photos.  You will have to be patient with me as far as seeing a huge number of photos.  Malawi is a culture that is not nearly as warm to photographs.  It is very rude to just be snapping pictures of people you don’t know or only know a little bit.  Permission is pretty much always required.  Plus as far as buildings and stuff one needs to be careful because it is actually illegal to take pictures of government buildings, bridges, etc.

Wow, congratulations if you’ve gotten through the whole thing!  I’ll try to keep them shorter but frequent.

Greg