Last night on my way back from Samfya on a crowded bus. I checked my cellphone which indicated it was exactly the time i predicted, 2:38 am. Seconds prior, a video came on the screen, yes in africa- buses do have mini tv screens, and at 2:38am, as with the previous 4 hours and the next 4 hours, the bus conductor would play very loud ear crushing gospel music with the combo mix of nigerian movies. For those who have ever travelled to southern africa, they will know these movies well. Nigerian movies are characterized by bad acting, witch craft themes, shouting throughout, hilarious special effects, ultra close up shots, oh and also very loud shouting. I had sat through my fair share of Nigerian movies at that point, as most zambians have come to think of it as their hollywood equivalent, but at that exact moment, “ndifuna ukulala” - i wanted to sleep. I asked the guy next to me, why? especially as this same fellow had said they would probably turn it down at 1am. He chuckles. “..thats how things are”
As I have realized before, in the 5 hours waiting for meetings to happen, my bus being impounded at night in a random village, bribing traffic and immigration officers for ridiculous fines, and bureaucracy which has you in 6 different offices and then finds you back where you started, and the clouds of never ending flies in malawi - thats how things are - there is a sense of surrendering yourself and letting go whenever possible in my experience here - if you can’t do this, don’t come to africa.
Mama Malawi
Around the world and back these past four months. This month you could say things have cooled down a bit. As you may have forgotten, I am still Team Leader of SCORE Zambia - what that means currently is 10 volunteers, from 6 countries placed in 8 communities all over zambia. They will be here for 1 year time, with their contract finishing in June 08.
After the General Orientation for volunteers in cape town - I came back to zambia with them all to do my own zambia specific orientation, mostly discussing sport, politics, history, language, health concerns and reporting specific to their work in Zambia. Then came drop offs in the volunteers many communities. After I arrived back in one piece - the past 3 months monster was over, it was time for a break with my flatmate irish Adam and his visiting friend Casey took a much needed break to Malawi - specifically Cape Maclear on the southern end of Lake Malawi.
Malawi is made up of many tribes, but mostly the Chichewa - the language, Chewa, is very similar to Nyanja what they speak in Lusaka - which was great for Adam, who had memorized all the nyanja swear words already. Malawians are great truly friendly people. In terms of friendliness, I will make a brief comparison
Jo’burg and some parts of south africa - Toronto and Ontario
Zambia - the Maritimes
Malawi - Newfoundland
- if you know any newfies, you know what i mean by this.
Lake Malawi is beautiful it is true. It makes up most of malawi, dried baobab trees fill the rocky and rolling hills that lounge next to the expansive lake. Dug out canoes, women washing clothes, fishing nets and kids playing make up most of the beach coast line. While snokeling, thousands of multi coloured small fish pick at the rocks, purple, orange, stripped oreo. I relaxed. Other than the break in Canada, which was part work related - this was the first non SCORE work related trip or leave I’d taken since Christmas. Deserved and needed - i hiked, snokeled, canoed, swam and ate fish on the beach everyday. No crocs where I was, but many hippos further along the lake as i found out. Did I get any parasites from this lake water? hrmm..so far so good.
Commercial Sex Work
Last weekend I stood in a room of 25 commercial sex workers, my volunteer and her colleague- and told 15 of them to go home. I suppose this was a strange situation for the lone male - but I did what I had to do.
SCORE has recently started a partnership between the Kwenuha Womens Association (KWA) in Livingstone. KWA is a faith based organization that aims at the rehabilitation of commericial sex workers (CSWs) that surround livingstone. The town lies in the centre transit point between Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe - adding it being a tourist capital - creates a situation for the highest numbers of commercial sex workers in Zambia. I will also mention that more then 2/3 of these women are HIV positive. The difference between prostitutes and csw , to my knowledge, is based on poverty, hunger, and desperate need to support dependents- basically these women have ventured to CSW because there is nothing else - a quote from the KWA womens- AIDS may kill me in months or years, but hunger will kill me and my family tomorrow.
Ah so what am i doing again in this room of 30 CSWs? The whole 3 year program comprises formal education, income generating training, skill development in agriculture and sowing, psycho social support and one more interesting addition - sports. This is SCORE steps in, and myself will be managing parts of the sport specific training. My scandinavian volunteer will be managing most of the sport project by living and working with KWA directly in Livingstone, and I will aid with managing the program, budget and facilitators from Lusaka. Unfortunately as this was the first workshop, there was a miss match between the budget and program plan. The budget had planned for 10, but my volunteer invited 30, which was great, but due to a few management/funding miscommunications, the budget stayed - and the 3 days workshop on organizing sport activities were only to fund for 10 participants x 3 days of food. Shame, but it is still just the beginning and there are bound to be a few hic cups at the start.
The Victoria Falls - wonder of the world
Indeed a wonder. During the workshop I had time to check out the Vic Falls, in one of the best times I have ever seen them before. Previously there had been far to much water following the rain season to see anything - now it was perfect. My volunteer and I also got a “illegal” tour from one of the locals, taking us to Angels Armchair. To get here you have to cross the river that will be flowing off the cliff, following it to the edge to find a mini waterfall and pool just before the real waterfall. There you can swim, sit on the edge, check the view and try not to fall.
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