Settling into a routine
Posted on: 14 Feb 2010
After
a month and a half things are settling into a routine, at least on
teaching days. We get up at 6, throw a log on the wood stove and make
porridge or eggs and coffee for breakfast. Then Ralph and I cycle the
3-4Km up the path through Mwaya village to the main road, past the
primary school and the villagers; thatched huts, running a gauntlet of
small children who, as soon as they see a "Mzungu" (white man), rush
out to wave and shout. They have a variety of English greetings, which
include "hello" and "What's your name?" - or in fact more often "what's
my name?". It's not clear whether this is unfamiliarity with pronouns
or whether they have just learned it phonetically and trot it out
parrot fashion. Likewise, cries of "give me money" may genuinely be
assumed to be a standard greeting. The Malawians are very friendly, and
adults also greet and are greeted with a set of stock phrases in
Chitonga that we have all learned.
We then cycle up the main road
through Matete, which is tiny (for those who know Bangula, that is a
metropolis compared with Matete, which has about 5 tiny shops). By now
we are seeing the Kapanda pupils in their blue uniforms making their
way to school, some on bikes but mostly on foot.
Kapanda
has three forms (there are 4 forms in the secondary school system, but
Kapanda is only 3 years old. It will have a form 4 next year) with
about 40 children in each, and five teachers. Sally Msiska is the head
teacher, and teaches English, so I spend most of the day with her. I
started off just observing, but then graduated to teaching one or two
English lessons most days. I'm very glad to have Ralph there as he is a
professional teacher and we observe each others lessons and he gives me
useful tips. However, in the last few weeks I have, with some
trepidation, taken on the task of teaching Form 3
Romeo and Juliet. The school curriculum is going through some
major
changes at the moment (hence the peculiar last-minute change of term
dates), and one of the changes is that English literature has become a
compulsory subject at MCSE, the certificate of secondary education,
equivalent to our 'A' levels. There are four set books, three in modern
English by Malawian authors, the fourth being Romeo and Juliet.
This
seems to be utter insanity. The kids, for whom English is, at best, a
second language, cannot hope to understand the language of 400 years
ago, and the
teachers likewise. On top of which, what earthly use will it be to them
in adult life, when what they actually need is a good command of modern
English. However, ours not to reason why, so for the past month I have
stopped teaching the other classes, and now teach three double periods
of Form 3 Eng. Lit on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. I have used
the spare time to produce a 6 page summary of the entire story in
modern
English (kindly printed out 35 times and shipped out by Gaynor
Asquith), and rather than try to battle through Shakespeare's iambic
pentameter with them, I'm using this to give them the idea of what
happens in what I hope is an interesting way. I started off by dividing
the class into Montagues and Capulets and taking them outside for some
street fighting!
The
secondary school day starts at 7:30 and continues until 14:00 with just
two 15 minute breaks. It is a hard day for both pupils and teachers,
but is the only practical way as many walk an hour or more to school
and going home for lunch is not feasible (until Kapanda was built by
Ripple many of the children had to walk 2 hours or more to the nearest
school).
After school we cycle back to Mwaya, where Agnes, Geddess
and Harry "Hamster" will be washing up, washing clothes and cooking our
supper respectively. Hamster in particular is a real character
who mutters in a mixture of broken English and Chitonga. He prepares
the meal but goes home before dark, leaving Agnes to heat it up and
serve it, but he is a very good and conscientious cook, and someone
always has to sample the food before he leaves to check that it is
good, which it always is. Our diet is fairly simple, and largely
vegetarian. Agnes bakes bread rolls every other day. Beans, a strange
margarine called Blue Band which doesn't require refrigeration,
tomatoes and rice can be bought at Nelson's store in Matete. Vegetables
are bought from the Green Shop in Mzuzu once a fortnight and either
delivered or picked up in Benji on the monthly trip along with any more
fancy items. A lusty song from the lake at dawn indicates a successful
night's fishing, and the fishermen will often offer us first refusal.
Harry's catfish pie is a welcome addition to the menu. And of course
there are always Mangoes - or rather there were. Sadly the mango season
came to an abrupt end around the first week in February, and the
familiar crash of the windfalls on the kitchen roof fell silent. We now
have to actually pay money if we want mangoes.
As
well as school we are encouraged to provide extra-mural teaching to the
children and the community. I give computer lessons on Tuesdays,
English on Wednesdays and on Thursdays we host the "Ripple Debating
Society". Malawians are keen debaters, and are well able to argue
against their own beliefs to provide a balanced contest. Last week I
chaired a debate on corporal punishment and other topics have included
polygamy and gay marriage, a ot topic in Malawi at the moment as an
openly gay couple have recently been imprisoned, an event which I
believe even reached the British House of Commons.
We eat about six,
as it goes dark, either in the kitchen, or if it's fine on the "deck"
overlooking the lake, finish of the day with a game of cards, and are
mostly in bed by 9 where we fall asleep to the sound of crickets, frogs
in the lake, and fruitbats, which sound like a squeaky wheelbarrow.
All
in all we are pretty comfortable at Mwaya. The chalets are good, and
the staff look after us well. Cooking is done on a wood burning stove,
which can make some dishes a little hit and miss, but Harry produces
delicious evening meals, and the girls have manged to bake some
excellent cakes and crumbles.
Weekends provide an opportunity to
venture further afield. There is Kande Beach, which is 20 minutes up
the road on a matola (minibus). 
Kande
Beach itself is very much a tourist resort - locals are actively
excluded, which we find slightly distasteful, but we can get internet
access, free access to electricity to charge our various batteries, as
well as a good (meat!!!) meal and a beer, and chill out on the beach.
There is also a very good wood carvers' and painters' stall, and I have
bought a painting to adorn the chalet and also commissioned
double egg cup.
Megan finished her stay and returned to the US
a couple of weeks ago, so for her final weekend we all spent a
long weekend at Nkhata Bay, which is a much bigger resort an hour or so
up the lake. (This also gave us the opportunity to extend our visas,
which can only be done in Nkhata Bay or Mzuzu). Nkhata Bay is a
bustling lakeside market town, with a lively tourist industry. We
stayed at Mayuka Village, a basic but comfortable lodge right on the
water's edge. The food was excellent and I managed to buy some clothes,
and also took an wonderful boat trip down the shore to do some
snorkeling and also to see a pair of Fish Eagles (called Tony Blair and
Barack Obama) which will fly very close to the boat to pick up fish
thrown into the water by the boat drivers.
I have also had a bit of
good news - it seems that the last week of term is taken up with exams,
so I am not needed and can take some time off. This coincides with
Gaynor's Project African Wilderness Ambassadors' trip, which involves
several of the UK volunteers joining her on a trip to Mwabvi and a
quick tour of the high spots of Malawi. They arrived on Monday 9th and
stay until Thursday 17th I managed to get a bus all the way to Blantyre
on Friday (in a country whose petrol prices are roughly the same as in
the UK, you can travel 300 miles on a bus for £6) and down to Bangula on
Saturday. I am writing this in the dormitory block at Chipembere Camp
and marveling at how it has changed since I lived here with Chris and
slept under a mosquito net tied to a tree.