The First Two and a Half Weeks
So my ambitions of writing every few days have been scuppered by a number of things.
Mostly, however, by the fact that I’ve been bombarded by so many new things and experiences that it’s beenhard to move from a state of information gathering to one of information processing.
I reckon I’m probably not at that stage even now but I thought I’d give a brief summary of what’s been happening over the last couple of weeks since we arrived here. Albeit without much commentary on what any of it means!
Week 1: Welcome to the Warm Heart of Africa
As soon as we stepped off the plane in Llongwe and met the guys from AYISE, who had just driven 4 hours to come and collect us, we realised this was going to be a very friendly place. People in Malawi are quick to tell you that it is the warm heart of Africa and it definitely seems that way. People are quick to say hello and have a chat with you in bars, restaurants, in the supermarket, on the street and pretty much anywhere.
We were driven to the guesthouse we are staying at which is settled right in the heart of Namiyango, a small community in Bangwe township which is part of the the larger city of Blantyre. It’s great being bang in the middle of the community in which we are working as this gives us the chance to get to build relationships with the people who live around us. The people here are keen to find out what the purpose of our trip is and just to have a chat.
The first week was spent in orientation sessions with the AYISE employees. The orientation program was probably the best I’ve ever been through and it was certainly the most informative. I learned more in those four days than I probably did during my last four months of university 
It gave us the opportunity to learn about the history, politics, culture and also a bit of the language of Malawi (Chichewa). The folks who were taking the program were fantastic. Some of the most genuine people I have met. It gave us a good chance to get to know them and I know we’ll end up developing great relationships with all of them.
Sadly the brother of one of the AYISE staff members passed away during the orientation week and we were invited to the funeral. This was a sad event and we felt for our friend who had lost his brother. His brother had been related to the President of Malawi and so he, along with the Vice President and many members of the cabinet, were in attendance. The whole thing was recorded
for state TV and we were told later that we had made a brief appearance in the crowd by someone who had been watching it at home. It was all quite surreal.
All in all the welcome we received from the folks here was fantastic and helped us to settle in very quickly.
Week 2: March of the Azungo
The second week saw us begin our placements in the local schools. We had been divided between 4 or 5 schools in the local area. I am working in a school called Chiedza (Light of God) which is about 15 minutes walk from were we are staying. The walk to school is quite hilarious. The kids in the area go a bit crazy when the see white people (Azungo) and scream and shout and run over to us.
They are very eager to say hello and ask us our names. Sometimes they do it in English and sometimes we try to do it in Chichewa. We have to get our practise in somehow!
The first day we went to visit the school was probably the crasiest. When the kids saw us through the window they all jumped up to the windows and started yelling “Azungo, Azungo”. It was all a little terrifying!
The first week of teaching went well. The first couple of days we were shadowing to get a feel for how the lessons are tackled and also devising a timetable with the teaching staff. I’m teaching English, Social Science and Science and Technology to Primary 5’s and 6’s. The class sizes are about 60 - 70 so it can get a bit crazy but they are surprisingly well behaved for such large classes. It does makes it difficult to do a lot of the activities which we would like to do with them. Games and groupwork can be quite difficult to co-ordinate. It’s also tough at times to give the students who are struggling the extra tuition they need.
At the end of the week the Director of the school took us and many of the teachering staff out for dinner which was a fantastic reminder of how friendly and welcoming the people of Malawi are.
Week two saw us planning many of the extra activities we want to get involved in. AYISE has a fantastic youth center nearby and we plan to use this as the vehicle of many of these projects. We have been in discussions with a local welder and a builder to get a quotation for building
a play park for the younger kids in the area. We have been told that this will likely be one of the first public pay parks in the area so we are very excited about that prospect. Second to that we are beginning a Young Enterprise program tomorrow. The aim of which is to provde some of the older youth with the fundamental theory and basic skills of entrepreneurship and small business development. This will be the program I will be most involved in and so I’m very excited about it. On top of this, various members of the group are planning things as far ranging as drama groups, a local Stomp group, HIV/AIDS awareness programs and Big Brother and Big Sister mentoring schemes.
We have a meeting with the current AYISE members this afternoon to discuss these projects so hopefully that will go well.
At the weekend we headed off to the Mulanje mountains, only a 45 minute bus journey away. Despite nearly being sent back by an immigration officer for not carrying our paspports (apparently an illegal offence here) we made it safely. Mulanje is the largest mountain in Central Africa and is very impressive. We though it would be foolish to tackle the entire thing on our first trip so we went on a couple of smaller hikes instead. On the first day we went to the waterfall and pools which was spectacular (pictures to follow). It was also the coldest water I have EVER been in!
It was well worth jumping in for a swim though, despite losing sensation to most of my body!
Monday was Independence Day (45 Years) and there were celebrations at the local football stadium. When we arrived they had stopped letting people in so we hung around and watched outside for a bit. Then we headed to a friend’s house to watch the celebrations on TV. It was fun to be part
of these celebrations, albeit in a very small way.
So that brings us up to date (more or less). There are so many other stories I would like to tell but I wanted to get the main jist of what we’ve been up to. Hopefully I will start writing more in the coming weeks and will be able to expand on things a bit more. Until next time, be well.
