Monille, muli uli? or Hello how are you?
Its a couple of weeks since I got back from visiting the colonel in Malawi. The country and the holiday were not quite like anything I've experienced before.
The first thing that strikes you about Malawi is how friendly the people are - not just those trying to sell you stuff. This is summed up by the handshake which has a kind of grasp in the middle of it which makes it less formal and more familiar.
The other thing that hits you hard is how people make do with so much less than we are used to.
Craig, Claire and I went on Safari across the border in Zambia. Along with seeing lion cubs and having elephants tramping through our campsite and rooting through the bins, one of the highlights was being taken by our guide to visit his wife and family in his village.
Now I would think that a safari guide is pretty well paid by local standards. Millions of people in the region survive on less than a dollar a day - he made many times that in tips from our group. Yet his house for his family of five or six was a hut about the size of my living room with a straw roof. Mindblowing.
One of the different things was getting the chance to meet locals and see development work in action. I spent two hours outside a maize mill out in the sticks listening to people debate how and if it could be made to break even or whether it would have to close. It was more interesting than it might sound.
NASFAM, the farmers organisation Craig works for, seems to be in a bit of a mess at the moment caught between being a money making enterprise and a kind of subsidised farmers club. The farmers lack the business sense to make their projects work while people at head office with business sense are too caught up in their own empire building schemes to do what's best for the farmers.
Craig's job as regional office business adviser is to give business sense to the farmers and common sense to head office. I suppose if it was easy they wouldn't have bothered flying him from the UK to do it.
After a trip to the Lake of Stars music festival with "whinging Aussie" Vern (top bloke but not happy about the Ashes) it was down to beautiful Nkhata Bay for some quality diving and r&r by the lake.
The lake is the 3rd biggest in Africa and is home to many of the tropical fish you see in fish tanks at home. As part of the East African rift valley, it is 100s of metres deep in places.
Then it was back to the capital to stay with Kate, another VSO who seems to run an unofficial volunteers hostel and is now Craig's adopted sister. One last night on the locally brewed Carlsberg specials (5% not 9%) and then it was home.
It was a great trip I'd recommend to anyone. It was particularly nice to catch up with the colonel, talk rubbish, get leathered and (of course) whup him at pool.
Craig asked me to tell you he misses you all and says hello.
Nice
