Very long update - sorry! but many new experiences

Hello everybody,

Wow it has been some time since I last had the chance to write to you all. My parents left 3 days ago and it is back to normal life now, but then with money *big smile*
So much happened this last 3 weeks, but I’ll start with the regular activities.
Opa, wat leuk om van u te horen!!! Ik hoop dat de fam. Van Tuijl het een beetje voor u kon vertalen.... Ik zal alles voor u vertalen als ik terug ben en nog veel meer vertellen! U krijgt snel een kaart terug van mij. Heel veel liefs!
I got some cards, 2 from my parents from France, one from Rebecca, one from my grandfather, and one from Jeanine. Just today I got a card from my parents again, a card from Maaike from her camp and a card from Peter & Gerry-Anne :) It is so nice that you are all thinking of me!!!
It took all of them 4 weeks to get here…. Even though I would still like to get many cards, I would advise to not send me any cards after the 25th of September, because I’m afraid they will not reach me while being in Malawi. You can just send them to my Dutch address. Hahahaha!
The weather here is very hot, but in the afternoon I take a cold shower and then it a cold shower is lovely!

The nursery: The amount of children is rising again now the primary school has started again, but some of our regulars (and the once who knew all the songs/poems etc. the best) have now gone to primary school. It is pretty sad, because it takes a long time for me here to have the children get used to me and now, for the last two months, I’ll have to start all over again. Awh well, a new challenge we shall call it *wink*
There were some things left behind by Nelleke and Charlotte and mother Krista who were here the last 2 months for some time. For your information: Nelleke, your things will be given partly to the teachers and the rest we will find a nice way to distribute it among the children.
Charlotte and Krista your things are at the nursery and the toys and balls are used a lot.

The library: First of all I would like to thank the people who have donated money for the library! I was just amazed by what you have given us to start this project! I am very grateful for it! From the money the bookcase is being made, the door is fixed and more bags of cement are bought to finish our plaster work. We are now trying to set a date for the opening of the library, which should be in 3 weeks *very big smile* At least I can now be sure I am here to see the opening of the library.
Solister, the executive director of the Mwalukavichy youth club, has met the PEA together with me, so now he is properly introduced. She also said again that she wants to work together with the youth, for example she wants certain sport and other activity days and she has promised to give Solister a librarian training in Mzuzu. Now when discussing everything with the youth club members again, they have expressed their concern about what will happen if the PEA is changed. Therefore, we are going to have a contract of cooperation. When discussing this with the PEA she was also very willing to have such a contract so that is nice. She even went as far as to say that they should have a library bank account with both the PEA’s, Head teacher and Solister’s signature! Besides Solister there will also be a Head Librarian from Luviri primary school. This gives me a lot of trust for the continuity of the project! But one never knows, so I will be moderately enthusiastic.
Thursday I will have a meeting with Mariska, and I hope she is also able to give us some tips and tricks on how to get this library to be self-sufficient and growing.
If anybody still wants to sponsor a book, we still need to buy secondary school books which the children can use.

Now as you all know my parents were here last week, which was very nice and I enjoyed it a lot. It also gave me the chance of being a tourist in Malawi. My parents came on Monday around 4 PM and they had brought a lot of things. Books and other necessary things (like pens/pencils/sticking tape etc.) for the library, cheese (old Amsterdam) and Dutch candy (spekjes, dropjes, stroopwafels en stroopkoeken), and some convenient things which I forgot… It was all so nice and it really gave me some new energy! This might sound weird, but you get a little bit of your own culture back during such a week and even the cheese helps with that. Now I am letting everybody taste these delicious Dutch sweets and cheese. The drop (liquorish) they don’t really like, but the sweets and cheese they LOVE!
The Tuesday we had a calm day so that they could rest a little bit, because on Monday they had to drive for 6 hours to get to Luviri. I showed my parents the Eva Demaya Centre and introduced them to everybody. In the afternoon I walked to the river with them, which is not really a river anymore and we had some time to talk things through.
The Wednesday my mom went to the nursery school with me and my father spend some time at the clinic with the clinical officer (a little bit like a GP) there. In the afternoon I took them to the houses of the people I stayed with some time ago. Now they could really see the Malawi villages and houses. And the surrounding there is just beautiful!
On Thursday we went to Vwasa and left at 6 AM. This is one of the smaller wild life parks. It is actually pretty big, but they only show you a small part. In the beginning we had to stay inside the car to avoid the Tseetsee flies. Very soon we saw a running Impala… beautiful! Then we saw a herd of water buffalos and we could get out to take some nice pictures. In the background mama saw an elephant with her binoculars (verrekijker). Unfortunately it was the only elephant we saw, and we mostly saw its less interesting side; its butt. After that we saw more impala’s, some ‘wrattenzwijnen’ (I don’t know the English word, but they are like Poemba from the lion king), kudu’s, several monkeys and at the lake there were many hippo’s. We could walk all the way to the lake to see them, which was amazing! When we reached the hippo’s side I went on the back of the car for a short while, which made the experience a little bit more real… Then you don’t see them through the window, but just next to you! Our guide, with a gun, sitting next to me to protect me.
At the end we had a drink with an extraordinary view of the lake and then we went to Rumphi were we visited the local hospital. The hospital might be a little bit small to our standards (some have to share a bed), but nobody sleeps on the floor and the hospital looks and smells clean. A difference with the Netherlands is that the female and male patients are split up, which has to do with the culture here. Men and women who are not husband and wife don’t sleep in the same room.
On Friday we went to Chintedji (I don’t know if I spelled it right), which is a village next to the lake. Since my parents like luxury, and I was also looking forward to a nice shower and a ‘normal’ toilet, we went to a lodge which had a private beach. It was beautiful and I got my shower and toilet *smile*
We just took things easy and enjoyed the lake/beach and each others company.
The next day it was time to say goodbye as I had to take minibuses and a matolla to go back to Luviri and my parents were going to Lilongwe.
Both the minibus as the matolla driver tried to let me pay more then the actual price… Yes, I’m still a ‘rich’ Muzungu *sigh* The matolla ride I really did not like. A matolla is a truck with an open back, where they try to stuff as many people in as possible. I was very afraid that with one of the bumps the driver would not be able to handle the car and we would tumble over, but luckily we didn’t. The only time I fell was when I jumped out of the matolla. And instead of laughter I heard: pepani (I’m sorry). But I hope they had a good laugh when they got home.
My father and mother took my first disk with pictures home, so if you want to see me again, go visit them :)

Besides this, I wanted to let you know some cultural things I’ve learned when peace corps volunteers were staying at the Eva Demaya Centre. First of all they were a really nice bunch and I will stay in touch with them and hopefully I can stay over at one of their houses in the weeks to come.
They were going to see the king of the Tumbuka region (the paramount chief) and I could join! Some things he said:
- He wants us to teach the children respect for the elderly, and the children should not come in the bedroom of the parents. The last things is cultural, but he could not explain why it is so bad, he only knows it is bad.
- He wants to uphold the tradition of the dowry (huwelijks schat). He explained the dowry as: you don’t steal from a shop do you?
- He only has one wife and this was because he thinks that should be enough for any man (later on I did hear he had many girlfriends and many children with them).
- He wants his daughter to be the next king and he tries to stimulate that if the first born child is a girl, she becomes chief and not the first born son who is 2nd or 3rd born.
- Rumphi district (incl. Luviri) has the highest literacy rate in Malawi.

As you might imagine the fact that he wanted to fight for the dowry and his explanation of it was a little bit hard to swallow for our western minds, but Mr. Bwati (our Malawian manager) explained it as follows:
The dowry is a social rule, which makes the marriage legal. This means that the wife’s eldest son will inherit the land when the husband dies (the children are only recognised as his as he paid dowry) and people know what to do with the remains of the wife when she dies. She will then be buried at the house of the husband. In other words: It gives structure.
After hearing this it is a bit more difficult to condemn the dowry…..
Other things I learned:
- In the south a men marries into the family of the wife. Due to that the men are not responsible for the children, but they still earn the money leaving many children in poverty.
- Homosexuality does not exist, but men can have sexual contact (and women also), but this is seen as friendship, not love. Of the gay couple which was arrested earlier and then released, one has now married a lady and got a huge amount of money from a wealthy business men to support this decision. And for Malawians this again shows that homosexuality does not exist, they were just friends.
- The government fired a part of the cabinet (most of them northerners) and replaced them by southerners. Reverent Nyondo of the Livingstonia church was arrested because at the funeral of one of the fired men, he had a heart attack a week after he was fired, said some things which were anti government and was arrested for that. In first instance he was also denied bail, but in second instance he was released.
- One of the peace corps teachers told me that in the Malawi culture as a woman it is hard to express your love to a boy. It is the pride and prejudice style: you can look at him, and blush when he is around. And he has to take the initiative to talk to you….. Due to this it happens that people marry people they don’t love (for those who don’t understand how that can happen: read pride and prejudice).
- I have realized that there are things I don’t like about the culture here and at home and I think that if we would meet half way we would have the perfect culture. But I have also learned that what makes me happy does not always make the people here happy. And I don’t know what exactly would make them happy (they do complain about the work they have to do at home and that their husband keeps the money). They are fighting themselves to create a better future, so that they can live their lives their way, and whether that will be with or without dowry, with or without many babies and things we would see as abnormal is their decision. As long as they are happy!

I also had my first little conversation in Tumbuka with some children here and I have already made some children happy by looking at nursery books and a book my mother brought me: the cow who fell in the canal, which is a book about Holland. So nice to see it.
Vincent has left us for 4 months due to health reasons, so I had to say goodbye to him. Mr. Mukandawire is now in charge and he is also an excellent cook, but a more stiff man.

Nature wise: we had a little earthquake last Saturday… I had a little scorpion (which hurt the most and is now dead) in my room and my father also had one. We had a walking stick (literally translated, wandelende tak) and a duizendpoot (don’t know the English name) in my room so I am seeing all Malawi has to offer *wink*

That is all for now. My apologies for writing such a big blog…. I hope you have enjoyed it.
See you all in less then 2 months!

Love nienke