What's in a title?

21/4/13

Didn’t I say I would do a blog post this week? And I did. YES.

The past 2 weeks have been quite busy: at TST we’ve been doing lots of Maths tutoring. One of the Malawian volunteers was leaving so the kids got sweets and the adults had a party of sorts. Basically, we were all herded to the ICT room, where music was played and everyone started dancing. I was trying to imagine my old teachers at Meldrum doing this, but couldn’t. It was a great example of how different the culture is over here; Lou and I are so used to it that it doesn’t take us by surprise nearly as often, but this certainly did.

That day we also had an Italian woman visiting TST. Mary Cristina’s French was better than her English, so when Edwin asked her to introduce herself to the TST kids, she spoke in French which Louise translated to English which then Edwin translated to Chichewa. I was really cool to witness – it made me ashamed that my French is still miles better than my Chichewa after being immersed in the latter for 7 months.

At home, the water was off again. The entire village was dry for 3 days – the longest we’ve ever had to cope without. While this doesn’t seem like a long time, even with water stored up we all really struggled. We never know whether the water will be off for 2 hours or 2 days, so we are conservative of every drop. Bucket showers are seen as an unnecessary luxury and the toilet only gets flushed once a day (with used dish/clothes washing water). This is hard enough with 2 people, but Georgia was also staying with us. We made it fun however, as it became a bit of a competition to see who could use the fewest dishes in one day. On the bright side, electricity has been really good recently. Although, given the chance, I would definitely swap no water for no power. I hadn’t washed my hair for 6 days when the water finally came back on.

Last week I accompanied Louise for the Street Child Ministry before church. The street children are welcomed into the Pentecostal Church where they all sing together and play some drums. I found it really moving to witness all these children united by their faith. Then Pastor Francis comes through to preach to them in Chichewa, before they receive mandasi and sobo (round doughnuts and fruit squash). When I was briefly around for the Street Child Ministry on Easter Sunday, I had noticed Saidi – a TST child who had run away a few weeks ago – and I had asked him why he wasn’t at TST and whether he wanted to go back. While I couldn’t get a coherent reason out of him, he and fellow TST-runaway Esau said they wanted me to take them back to the centre. I told them to meet me outside KFC the next day at 10am, but they didn’t show. I wasn’t altogether surprised – add the fact that these kids had no way of telling the time to Malawi’s tendency to be late and there was next to no chance of the kids making an appearance. Last week, he looked even worse than before – absolutely miserable and not even joining in the singing and clapping. So I decided to take him back to TST there and then, before I lost sight of him again. Esau also found his own way back the week before. The change in Saidi is almost indescribable. He is always delighted to see us, throwing himself into the work we set him and, most importantly, happier than we’ve ever seen him. If I leave Malawi achieving nothing else, I will be satisfied. All children should have the chance to be happy. That is one of the many things that TST gives these kids.

So yeah, climate change is messing us around. We’ve had far too much rain, way too late, and now we’re ranging from having November-esque heat to nights where we can see our breath in front of us! What is this?

So Georgia left us last week. It was sad, especially because she’d been living with us for the past 2/3 weeks. And with Steph gone home, it’s just Matilda, Louise and I left of the Baluti/Nancholi crew. But we shall prevail! (What we shall prevail, is still unknown.)

I don’t have any pictures! So here’s a picture I took of Steph’s exposed shoulder after I claimed it for Narnia.

TTFN

Anecdotes

We came home from work last week to find three kids playing outside. They had pair of rollerblades and two of them had a skate each, skating one-legged-ly alongside the wall. The third kid looked just as happy as he pretended to skate in his flip-flops.

When washing the dishes after we make nsima or phala, I always poke the dregs down the plug hole. Louise is constantly paranoid that the sink will block and I always wave her away saying ‘Nsima/phala is water-soluble! It’ll be fine.’ Well, I managed to block the sink. However, I simply unscrewed the U-bend and emptied it, feeling like a pro. 

Apparently I am doing a monthly blog - it's April now

7/4/13

Eeeee, when did I last clock in? 10/3/13? Okay, what’s happened since then?

Well, it’s the school holidays at the moment, so there’s been no Nama Simba for two weeks. This unfortunately coincided with our Project Trust Desk Officer visit. So we couldn’t show her the work we do at the nursery. We did still take Kate to TST, however, and showed her where we live. It was really great to see her again and give her our feedback on our year so far.

Kate’s visit happened to be right after my parents came to Malawi. After I met my Mum and Dad in Lilongwe, we spent two nights in Central Malawi at the Tongole Wilderness Lodge – luxury with a capital L. An entire ‘River Suite’ to myself, complete with a bath the size of a small swimming pool. The lodge was built near an elephant river crossing, so it was not uncommon to see elephants going for a dip. I even got to see a wild leopard tortoise! Since I’ve been fascinated by tortoises for as long as I can remember, it was definitely the highlight of the trip. I then took my parents to Blantyre to show them around, before we went down to spend two nights at a tea estate in an area called Thyolo (Cho-low). It was hard saying goodbye to my family knowing I wouldn’t see them for another 4 months, but my current mantra is ‘less to go than has already been’.

Our friends who we used to refer to as the ‘Nancholi girls’ have all moved out of Nancholi. It is the nearest village to Baluti so we could really easily see them, as they were only a 30 minute walk away. However, as Matilda has moved in with some friends she works with and Steph has gone home to England, Georgia has moved in with Lou and me. It’s really nice to have her around, and she also shows her gratitude towards us by buying us doughnuts and jelly beans. J Georgia will be leaving us soon, however, to go back to the orphanage so volunteers at in Tanzania. It will be really hard to see her go – the ‘Nancholi’ girls have been our closest friends while we’ve been out here and she will be sorely missed.

This Easter Sunday, Georgia and I went with Louise to church. She goes to a Pentecostal Church in Blantyre that also runs a project for street children that Louise helps out with. I’ve always said that I could come along just for that, but when I looked in and saw a tonne of kids who had run away from TST, it was so demoralising. These are children who couldn’t take living in an institution, because of the routine or the rules or any other restriction that they don’t have to deal with on the streets. I tried to convince each of them to come back, but they all had ‘good’ reasons for leaving and couldn’t be swayed. It won’t stop me trying, though.

Speaking of TST, we’ve been pretty busy this week with the kids being off school. The kids just shout ‘MASAMU’ (Maths) as soon as they see us nowadays and we are often swamped from the minute we get there until the minute we leave. It’s such a contrast from the first 6 months – it makes me wish we had had only been spending the afternoons there from the beginning. At least next year’s volunteers will find it a bit easier to find their feet with our advice.

This week has been tough water and security-wise, but we should get it sorted before I next write a blog post. However, this month I did find a chitenje I’ve been looking for since I came to Malawi, which was great. I was so happy, it was unreal. The simple pleasures…

I know I joked that I would hopefully get another video of the house up before April… but I have failed. I apologise. It’s been a busy month etc. etc., but the main reason is that I hate editing and I couldn’t be bothered. HOWEVER, I do have some adorable pictures of our new kittens (well, 7 month old cats) called Lightning and Mantha (Chichewa for cowardly). ENJOY

Okay, I will do a blog post in 2 weeks. I have told you now, so I actually have to follow through with it. Otherwise, you must all berate me and make me feel small.

TTFN

(Btw, everyone who hasn’t already should watch Pitch Perfect – it’s hilarious. Other films I have watched this month that I recommend are Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Taken (because it’s hysterical) and Amelie. That is all.)

I made my Dad a video for his birthday that we 

intended to feature the kittens wearing party hats. 

They didn't make the cut.

 ^ This is a spikey cucumber

                      Tongole Wilderness Lodge

Huntingdon House on Satemwa Tea Estate

Sorry!

End of Week 12 - this is just a little note to say that I am still alive!

Again, the transformer is down in Baluti and no one knows when it will be working again. Water is also being more temperamental than usual. Life is tough at Casa Lou and Cat, atm.
So I'm sorry I have been unable to post anything recently but no electricity means no laptop or internet at home.
Here's some pictures from this weekend - fellow volunteer Georgia enlisted our help to take the children she works with at Open Arms Infant Home to get ice cream at Kips', which was really great. I've also got a photo of our group (minus Georgia :( ) about to go out to Doogles. I look terrible in both photos, but everyone else looks great, so that's why I'm putting them up.
Apologies for lack of information, will do a real blog post when we get power back at home... if we get power back at home. XD
TTFN

Sung, Stephanie, crazily happy girl, Louise, Matilda and Walter

WE CAN COOK AGAIN!

End of Week 10 and we have electricity again!

We’re nearing the end of November and I truly can’t believe it. Project Trust have often told us that the first two months are the hardest (obviously) and after that, time flies. This has definitely been true for us – we keep turning to each other and going ‘How is it nearly December??’

The past two weeks have been eventful to say the least. We were invited by Mary (our unofficial host who manages the nursery) to her house to see how the local doughnuts are made and to sample them with tea. We even got to watch MBC (Malawian Broadcasting Corporation) and catch up on local and international news.

Louise and I both had bouts of illness, so much so that we actually took her to a local hospital. It was confirmed that she most likely had a stomach bug and she got antibiotics. It was a bit of a scare, however, as Malaria is really common here and it shares symptoms with so many other illnesses. Luckily, she was given the all clear and we were able to continue work as usual. When she was feeling really lousy, I went into work by myself for the first time. This was both weird and strangely exciting.  I learnt, then taught, long division, had really lovely chats with the kids and did an ICT lesson by myself. I’m really starting to get to know the children, which I love. It’s great when I remember their names, or chat to them in my very limited Chichewa.

The rain has been interesting as the Malawians seem oddly defeated by it. People don’t walk in it, choosing to huddle under stalls and around buildings, so we get some really odd looks if it comes on when we’re walking home.

Louise when the power came back.

While the water has been on and off as usual, we heard a bang when the power went off two weeks ago. The next day I stayed home to look after Louise, hoping it would just come back on as usual, but it turned out there was a problem with the transformer in Baluti so the entire village had no power for 10 days. Other than our own personal inconvenience, there was no electricity to power the maize mills that are perpetually humming around the village, the shop keepers couldn’t use their fridges, the barbers couldn’t use clippers or charge phones (most barbers offer charging your phone while you get your hair cut) – there was not a lot of income coming into the village. The provider of electricity in Malawi, ESCOM, has an awful reputation as the country is plagued by black outs and they certainly proved their inadequacy, in our eyes. However, the power is back – the maize mills are humming, music sounds all over Baluti again. And now we can cook!

We went with some friends to a quiz at St Andrews’ International School – or SAIntS for short, I thought this was the cleverest acronym in existence. Was such a laugh, had a fantastic curry and came fourth (the winning three teams comprising mostly of teachers). Also went to an ex-pat Christmas craft fair the next day and had a cream soda snow cone! Cream soda is one of my new found loves, including phala and Fanta Passion.

Louise and I finally got to meet the other Project Trust volunteers who live down South, as they came up to Blantyre to renew their visas. It made us realise how lucky we are to have Matilda and Steph so close, they’re only a 30 minute walk away! Plus, they have kittens!

Got a video of a rain storm that I hope to get up soon and I finally have a picture of Louise and I dressed as Mario and Luigi. Hooray!

TTFN

Quotes and Anecdotes

Catriona: Sukulu? (School?)

David: No.

Catriona: Chifukwa? (Why? Or literally For what reason?)

David: Palibe fukwa! (There is no reason!)

I noticed that Malawians often ask when we ‘knock off’ when asking when we finish work. While I’ve heard this at home, I didn’t really understand why it’s such a common phrase here. Then I found verb in the Chichewa book, kuweruka – literally meaning ‘to knock off.’ I find this really interesting, it may just be me.

The kids here often use bottle caps to count with in Masamu (Maths), but if they don’t have any they just use their fingers, like at home. But if they need to count above ten, they continue counting with their toes. Vito once actually stopped to take off his sandals in order to finish his sums.

The kids all wear donated clothes that come from all over the world. Distinctive t-shirts that I’ve seen:

-          I recognised the logo on one that was a supermarket chain in The Netherlands

• A Twilight t-shirt
• Football shirts – mostly Celtic for some reason. I can’t decide whether this means they’re the most popular or whether the fact these t-shirts are being donated means the team is losing popularity. Also England, Arsenal, some Spanish team, Edinburgh and Aberdeen!
• Scotland Rugby shirts
•  A yellow one that reads Gordon Schools Volley Ball Team, Huntly. That was surreal.

There are some words in Chichewa that are borrowed from English, but spelt like Chichewa. It’s hilarious. Pronunciation is really different here – the vowels are more like French and pha is just ‘pa’, tha is ‘ta’ but cha isn’t ‘ca’ and sha isn’t ‘sa’. I get very confused. Also, keep in mind that R and L are pronounced the same.

tiyi – tea 

buledi – bread

anyezi – onion 

shuga – sugar

petulo – petrol 

sopo – soap

buku – book 

windo – window

diresi – dress 

kompyuta – computer

benki – bank

ofesi – office

sukulu – school

chenje – change

Immanuel

On my walk home from TST the day Louise stayed home sick, I was greeted by a young guy called Immanuel. He was 22, but still at school (age isn’t really a big thing here when it comes to placing kids in school). The guy’s English was really good, so I just got chatting to him.

Immanuel: So are you married? (We often get guys ‘proposing’ to us, so this wasn’t a surprise. My story is that I am, have been for a year (but no kids yet), and my husband lives in Scotland. This is literally the only way to get them off your back.)

Catriona: Yes, I am.

Immanuel: Oh. Well, I want to marry a white woman.

Catriona: I see, why is that, exactly?

Immanuel: I just love white women!

Catriona: That’s interesting, Immanuel, because I know many people who want to marry white people because they think they have money.

Immanuel: Money? What?? No! Of course not! I just love white women. I really love white women.

Catriona: I think you should marry someone because you like their personality, not just because they are white.

Immanuel: Ah, but you see, black women… they’re just so chatty! They don’t stop talking! But white women… ah, they wear skirts and they have legs…

Catriona: Immanuel, you know, where I come from, you have to be careful saying things like that because it’s quite racist… (etc etc etc)

He then asked me if I lived alone and I said no, I live with my friend Louise.

Immanuel: Is your friend married? (Louise doesn’t like lying about the marriage thing, so we always say she wants to be a nun.)

Catriona: No, but she’s going to be a nun.

Immanuel: Why?

Catriona: Well, she just loves God.

Immanuel: Yes, well I love God, you love God, we all love God!

Catriona: Yeh, but she REALLY loves God.

---

Later, we’re coming up the the market.

Immanuel: So, why don’t you have babies?

Catriona: Well, Immanuel, in Scotland you wait until you’re, like, 30 before you have children.

Immanuel: Is it your husband? Can he not, uh,  ‘produce’?

Catriona: Uhhh, yeh, he can…

Immanuel: How do you know if you don’t have babies?? Do you want me to speak to him? Tell how it’s done?

(At this point the conversation kind of ended as I couldn’t stop laughing.)

The rain is here!

End of Week 8, it has officially been two months!

We’ve be so busy this week, but I feel like I have absolutely nothing to say!

Nama Simba wasn’t very eventful this week. I did feed a child phala for the first time. Most of the children are old enough to feed themselves, but this was one of the younger ones and she kept missing her mouth. I also discovered that the children that I thought were called Loofa are most likely called Ruth. It gives you some indication of how people speak here; even when they speak English it is often a challenge to understand.

This week we spent a lot of time doing Maths lessons, helping to assess the abilities of 4 new children that have joined TST. I actually had to teach Louise how to do long multiplication – she’d been taught a ridiculously complicated method and therefore had no idea what the kids were doing. I also got to teach algebra! I love maths so much, it’s insane. We also taught ICT again. Precious, who didn’t know how to use a keyboard when we started, was typing his name by the end of the day. It’s amazing how fast these kids learn, it makes us so proud.

On the 31^st of October we had rain. And I mean real rain, torrential thunder storms that leave you soaked in minutes. As there had been no sign of it when we left the house that morning, we walked home in the wettest conditions in months with no coats or umbrellas. Two men saw us going in our gate, soaked to the skin, and applauded our efforts. The mornings have started to feel very cold since the rain has arrived and while on a hot day a cold shower is very welcome, this morning I was rather glad I could use the fact that we had no water as an excuse not to wash.

This Friday we went to a friend’s Hallowe’en party as Mario and Luigi. We were very proud of the costumes we made on such a low budget. I even had to stitch Louise’s hat by candle light one night when the power went off. I am extremely dedicated to fancy dress.

Mairi will be happy to hear that the Quotes and Anecdotes section is back this week. I may leave it a bit longer before writing another blog post, so I have more to say next time.

I will try to find some pictures of our Mario and Luigi costumes on Facebook – TTFN

Quotes and Anecdotes

We thought we were going to be teaching a lesson on conjunctions, so we started writing out example sentences using and, but and because. All I could think of was really depressing ones about the kids, like: I want to go to school, but I can’t afford an exercise book, My parents have passed away and now I live on the streets, I have attachment issues because I was sexually abused when I was young. We decided these were not quite suitable.

This week I fell over spectacularly, and skinned my hands, while trying to show the kids the lotus position to prove that I was Buddhist.

Louise: I was going to mark Mary’s work, but her head’s in the way and I don’t want to wake her up.

A turkey (nkhuku tembo) wandered into our classroom this week. While the kids just ignored it, I attempted to chase it out whilst doing my amazing turkey impression. There were two Malawian volunteers just outside the door, who gave me extremely weird looks.

There was a window sticker in one of the minibuses that read: STOP GOSSIPING OTHER PEOPLE MIGHT BE RELATIVES INSIDE.

During our ICT lesson, it started raining. I ran to the window to see, only to hear Louise tell some of the children: ‘Come on, sit down. I’m sure you’ve seen rain before.’

We met 7 year old Chippy on our walk to work, so we took him back to TST with us. He was slow and kept stopping because he wanted me to carry him. People kept asking him if he was okay, because it really looked like we were doing a Madonna and kidnapping him.

We were passing a market and the stall owners kept trying to get our attention when one man shouted: ‘Madam! Orange!’ I took it really offensively, thinking it was a ginger dig, but he was just selling oranges.

"Hey Louise, it's snowing at home! And I'm sunburnt."

End of Week 7, still no rain.

It’s really getting ridiculous. They had rain on the 5^th of October last year! Darn climate change.

This week hasn’t felt as hot, but that could just be a bit of acclimation on our part or because we’ve decided to avoid walking home during peak times if we can help it. It has been over 40°C this week.

Back to Nama Simba on Monday, a lot of kids were absent because it was a holiday for some of the local schools and they were staying at home with their older siblings. This made our attempts at teaching much easier, plus our Chichewa is definitely improving, so we were able to say ‘Where is A?’ (A ali kuti?) and they could attempt to point to it on the poster. Few were successful, but they gave it a good go. Also, the feeding centre has just gotten a bit of extra funding and the screams of delight that come from these kids when presented with a plastic spoon was absolutely adorable. They also got a bucket with a little tap attached, so Lou and I no longer have to pour cups of water over the kids’ hands in order to get them washed. Now we have both hands free to make sure no one budges the line or to stop Katherine beating everyone up.

More teaching at TST this week – I really think Lou and I should get medals for improvisation. We literally get told what we’re going to be teaching while the children are sitting in their seats waiting for us to begin. Sometimes we get given a book that has a chapter on the subject, other times we just wing it. This week included articles, as in A, An and The. Louise looked them up in her Chichewa to English book, so we could explain using some Chichewa examples, only to find the sentence “it’s important to mention that there are no articles in Chichewa like the English ‘a’, ‘an’ or ‘the’.” Very helpful. Even though this was a lesson for the older kids, most had severe trouble understanding that an is only used before vowels. By the end, we had one guy who understood and I just said to him, ‘okay, now explain it to everyone else!’ It’s fairly demoralising.

My best improvised lesson was probably when we were asked to teach latitudes and longitudes. I found this extremely entertaining, as I literally don’t ever remember learning this and I kept getting the two confused. Edwin told us not to go into as much detail as in the chapter – he gave us a book, thank goodness – but just to explain the difference between the two, and to go over the Equator, Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn and their functions. As he walked away, I turned to Louise and said ‘The tropics have functions?’ It was not in book and I swear their only function is to confuse all students who learn about them. Anyway, I still don’t know. I did do some pretty amazing pictures of the globe on the board, earning my first compliment concerning my artist abilities since my mother once told me that my crayon drawing of an elephant was ‘quite good’ (in an extremely surprised tone). Mum, you may not remember this, but I certainly do.

We also did the alphabet with Standard 1 – 4. This had to be the most fun I’ve had teaching since I got here. We decided this would be an oral and aural lesson – as none of the children had a pen or paper. Still, we made it exciting. Like when we couldn’t think of a simple English word beginning with G (being put on the spot for every letter is HARD) and we got one of the girls up to the front called Gertrud. Who needs visual aids?

We also did a fair bit of weighing. Millie is able to get Pranziquantil for all the children, as practically everyone has Bilharzia, but we need to prescribe according to weight. Again, the children’s fascination with a set of scales was extremely endearing. They also loved finding out another thing about themselves. Chimwemwe (15) was proudly telling anyone who would listen that she is 51kg. Also, we were able to say that no one was underweight. I wasn’t sure about Precious Meki, but then he is always on the top of the pyramid in the acrobatics, so I suppose he needs to be light. I still kept telling him ‘kudya nsima kwambiri’ until he was sick of hearing it.

We went to the cinema on Friday, had pizza and went to Doogles again. It was really good fun, met up with some friends and we met some new people – a guy called Harry who has Aberdonian roots! He’s moving back there and was asking what I thought of Robert Gordons and whether Highers were difficult! Bless. The next morning we went to a local pool and I had one of the best hot showers of my life.

We’re still meant to be going to do community work around Baluti with Mary, so that’ll hopefully happen this week. It’s nearly November! I can’t quite believe it. I heard about Scotland having its first snow while rubbing cream onto my new acquired sun burn – while I’m feeling more and more comfortable here, the contrasts with home are becoming more prominent and we’re both starting to worry about how difficult it’s going to be deal with going back home.

I’ve noticed that every week I seem to have a new complaint – cockroaches, then the heat – well, this week the new problem has been water. We’ve had more problems with people taking water from our outside tap (it’s not public, Mary pays for it) which not only stops any water reaching our house, but they often drain us dry. This means no water for the kids at the nursery, either. Also, often there’s no water in the whole of Baluti and while we always have water saved for emergencies, we don’t know when we’ll have water again so I don’t like to waste it on a bucket shower or washing my clothes. This week, the water ran out in between washing my clothes and rinsing them. So I had soapy clothes. Woe is me.

So that’s life with me. I have no quotes this week as I haven’t been writing in my diary and I’ve forgotten everything funny that’s happened. I’ll cover the witchcraft issue next week, watch this space.

TTFN, see you in November.

More pictures from the coffee morning from Steph's camera. The bottom one is Ruth photo-bombing. XD