Cat life best life

We have just finished the fourth week of class. It is Friday, and so Ryan will spend an hour or so excitedly tweaking a very complicated spreadsheet he made to keep track of finances and forecast future expenses. The kittens have opened their eyes and are beginning to get playful. We can now take them out for a few minutes before they begin to complain! We think Mtombe the cat has been having stomach problems. We only know this because on a few occasions she will come up to Ryan and Meow incessantly until he follows her. She will then lead him to a field dig a hole and demonstrate her inability to poop. This has provided quite the spectacle for many people and they like to laugh at the silly M’zungu watching his cat poop. It seems that things keep getting stuck and a good belly massage seems to get things moving again. (as she also proudly demonstrates)

After three weeks of being on the island we finally visited a beach to swim. We went to Mango Drift again to enjoy their pizza. It was beautiful and peaceful as ever, so far removed from the rest of the island. We went the weekend before to Ulisa bay to pick up some pottery Sasha finished, which was a small bowl with mountains. To remind ourselves of home, it says “PNW- Not all who wander are lost”. It is so small, that it is now perfect for M’tombe to drink from.

We took a different route back, and found some boys playing with bows and arrows they made for themselves. They let us have a shot, Ryan tried to decide if it would be a good idea to teach them how to build a trebuchet.

Police came to brief the students on laws, how to avoid trafficking, abuse, and more. Usually the students sit under a large tree in the shade for school wide presentations, but it began to rain very heavily so we all took shelter in the cathedral. As always with these things, the teachers sit in a line facing the students at the front. We were unhappy with the hour and a half of Chichewa that we had to look interested in, but we put our church-going skills to good use. Usually in church however, Sasha draws and Ryan tries to memorize Chichewa for this one we had the eyes of the whole school on us.

Before we came, there was Joanna who spent 6 months here. Before her, there was Derek and Katherine who have spent some recurring time here. He is now a priest, and she is almost a doctor. By most measures, they seem far better volunteers. They even brought us some cheese and lots of vegetables. Our meals have been significantly better with their shopping run. They were able to shed some background and history on events and reasons people did things, and told us about the placenta pit. Its locked away, and when someone has a baby you just toss in the placenta. They don’t want to burn it per cultural beliefs.  There are covered over toilets everywhere, you dig a dirt hole, make cement walls, then fill it up. Once full, you add concrete on top and leave it. Now, they are everywhere and they are running out of room. There is one toilet remaining, and they do not want to dig more as they wish to get flush toilets. The placenta pit is near one of these toilets. One pit is full, and the second is halfway full.

The government came by a few years ago and built a beautiful mortuary at the hospital.  But the power is too expensive, and so it sits dormant. Same with the blood bank. For now, when someone dies the family brings cloth, then takes them home in the cloth all within 24 hours.

We have now moved to the mothers union guest house and it is a much smaller space, but also significantly newer and nicer. We will probably stay here for the remainder of the term and hopefully move back to the bishops house in May. It is still very near the school, though on our way to class we have to hop large puddles of water at times. When rain has been bad, there are often only one or two other teachers present. Going to and from class, teachers often bring an umbrella. When it isn’t too rainy, we just go for it. Its still warm enough, and we dry quickly but people are always shocked to see us with no umbrella. We have stifled the temptation to explain the old Seattle trope, “Umbrellas are for tourists”.

Thursdays are club days, and while each teacher has their name down for a club, there has not been a meeting for any club in the whole time we have been here. So we decided to make our own. We couldn’t decide on any given club, so we are going with all the clubs! Each week, we will do a different one. One day is art club, next is drama club, debate club, perhaps yearbook club. Our first meeting was wilderness club, and we just set up the projector and watched the first episode of “Our Planet” in the classroom. 96 students squeezed in to marvel at it. They loved all the parts involving Africa and the flamingos- cheering on the wild dogs. Once it switched to polar bears and breaking ice, most had left. By the end, only a few students remained. One asked “That ice breaking- what was that all about?”. Climate change is difficult to describe to a people who have almost no influence on it, but who will probably be affected the most. The average Malawian emits 200 times less CO2 than the average American. They do know of course about climate change, but the visual of miles of ice breaking off into the ocean is new.

We taught one of the teachers a cardgame, and now he comes around often to challenge us. He has begun winning as well, so we taught him a new game to throw him off. He is beginning to win at that too! We will need more people, and perhaps begin a game night.

Years ago, Sasha worked at an infectious disease lab. When she told the PI of that lab where she was going, he was very excited. He wants us to interview different Malawians about the effects of HIV/AIDS and how it has changed throughout the past few years. We began finding people to interview, and everyone is extremely well educated on it.