Not necessarily the best selling technique

On Saturday we travelled up from Cape McLear to Lilongwe and after finding the bus station and then the VSO guest house I got settled in. On Sunday I decided to investigate the market in Lilongwe, and after successfully negotiating my way there via public transport (minibuses) wandered round the market to have a good look at the second hand clothes section. This is absolutely huge and sells a very wide range. One of the local traders was trying to interest me in purchasing some dresses, but really rather lost a sale after telling me that this particular dress would be OK as it was made for fat people and would therefore fit me. I wouldn't mind quite so much but having lost over 10kg since arriving here I wouldn't have necessarily classed myself as fat, maybe a touch over weight, but really, fat was pushing it! I said that I would think about it and come back to him. He then hunted me down at some of the other stalls and in the end I had to say no to his very kind offer, despite assuring me that he would give me a very good price.

Zomba Plateau

After leaving Mvuu we headed on back down the road to Zomba where we were staying 2 nights on the plateau. We arrived in Zomba and decided to try our luck in finding this cake shop which we had both heard about and had come highly recommended to us from separate sources. Our sources were correct and had a lovely lunch there and a delicious pudding of meringue with strawberries and ice cream and fruit coulee. We then headed on up the plateau after picking up Peter and his wife (they look after the cottage we were staying at) it was a rather tight squeeze in the back for them as they had to share just one seat as the other was taken up with all our paraphernalia. It was a steep drive up a very winding road but well worth it, and just very grateful that we had the car and didn't have to walk up it. The views from the front of the cottage were breathtakingly beautiful, you can see for miles and could even see Mount Mulanje in the distance, and it is easier to see in person than via the photo I admit.

It was extremely chilly being up that high and we were very grateful for the fire that Peter lit for us (it seems to becoming a theme having fires lit for us, although employing a plastic bag technique I had managed to get the breakfast fire going at Mvuu prior to the camp staff coming to help). We did manage to end up reeking of bar-b-que afterwards though as the wind kept blowing smoke into the house, so we would have to keep opening the door to let the smoke out, rather negating any warmth from the fire. Our fire the following night was much more successful though. We were also treated to a power cut on both nights for a couple of hours which is why it all looks rather glowing in the candle light.

On the Wednesday morning we headed off on a walk around the plateau, having procured a map from the nearby hotel, and deciding that we therefore wouldn't need a guide, off we trotted. What should have been an hour's walk to the Williams falls became a 2 hour walk. Obviously the map when it said go straight on really meant turn right, but this finer point of Malawian map reading was lost on us. A short detour through the woods, across dale and river and we ended up back where we had started none the worse for our slight diversion. We did make it to Williams falls though, possibly not quite as spectacular as had been anticipating but still a really lovely view and a lovely walk.
We then walked around to the dam and then down the mountain via a very steep path, how this poor man managed to carry this wood all the way down was beyond me, I was having enough trouble not going down on my backside as it was.

This is the view from the top down to the bottom larger dam.

We left on Thursday morning ready for sun and relaxation at the lake side. There was extremely low cloud though on the way down from the plateau which made for an interesting driving experience, and when we arrived at the lake clearly someone had forgotten to put the sun out as it was cloudy and overcast all the time we were there, so we just had to make do with relaxation. Managed to watch the football match at Hiccups bar although why we bothered I am not sure as the result was pretty dismal. The world cup is being shown everywhere, so if you want to try and pretend it is not happening there is no chance. Wimbledon doesn't seem to be getting a look in, can't think why!

After plenty of relaxation it was off to Lilongwe were I was going to be spending the next week on a training course. All in all a really lovely week off.

Liwonde National Park

I thought it was about time that I had a week of holiday having been here now for over 4 months, so persuading one of my fellow volunteers to join me, we set of to Liwonde National Park. We were booked into Mvuu camp, which is very beautiful and sited on the shores of the Shire River, in the heart of the national park. To get to it you have a 23km drive through the park, or you can go the shorter way round and drive through 8km of country road (for country road read dirt track) and then get a lift across the river in one of their boats. We tried both approaches, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Mvuu consists of a lodge, fixed tents with proper beds etc and a camping area. We were in the camping area where the water hogs kept us company.

We eventually arrived there after a couple of excursions up the Balaka Road, got our tents up and then proceeded to cook our dinner after the staff very kindly lit the fire for us.

On the Monday morning we took a 2 hour boat trip up the river,

this is Danger our boat driver and tour guide. I just love the Malawian names, although Danger is not necessarily the most inspiring when you are going near hippo's and crocs in a small vessel, but he was lovely and looked after us really well!

On the boat trip we had close encounters with the hippo's, which were numerous but rather camera shy, as everytime we approached them they ducked under the water.

We did manage to see one out of the water though.

We were also fortunate enough to see a small herd of elephants by the side of the river,

the occasional crocodile

and a monitor lizard.

In the afternoon we decided to drive around the park ourselves and came across lots more elephants, what we should have done though was ask what to do if an elephant looks unhappy and starts moving towards you in a threatening manner, do you stay where you are or reverse slowly away in an unthreatening manner. We opted for the reverse slowly away in an unthreatening manner, and stop taking photo's, this appeared to do the trick, well not appeared really as it actually did do the trick, and the elephants turned round and carried on grazing. We were really lucky to see so many different herds of elephants, as I know previous people have only seen evidence that they have been there via large dung piles. Elephants are my favourite large animal and I was very content just sitting there watching them going about their business, many of the herds with young ones of different ages.

Be very grateful that I am not putting up the probably rather unnecessary 200 plus elephant photo's taken, I really must get round to weeding them down a bit, as possibly even I won't want to sit through a slide show of 200 pictures of elephants.

We saw plenty of gazelles and antelope etc. One of the advantages of a digital camera is that you can take absolutely loads of photo's in the hope of getting that really good shot, imagining that you are David Bailey etc, it is also a bit of shock though when you realise that you have a picture of a gazelle with it's head in just ever so slightly a different position 5 times in a row, and none of them particularly well focused, easy decision though then which ones to delete.

Although the park does have zebras and black rhino they were in a separate enclosure which can only be reached on the official game drive and by paying extra money, being cheap skates or rather volunteers who have learnt to be frugal with their money we didn't avail ourselves of this opportunity. Also they do have some lions and leopards but they were not in the areas of the park that we visited despite our best viewing efforts. The following morning we left Mvuu and headed off back down the road to Zomba.

A quick update

So it has been awhile since I updated on my different antics here.

14^th May was a bank holiday so we went to the lake again for the weekend. Whilst there went for a walk up to otter point and went snorkelling there, the water is so clear, you can see all the snails which are probably going to give you Bilharzia, as well as loads of colourful fish, sadly no otters – they knew better than being out in the mid day sun.




Otter Point
Otter point is part of the National Park, and within the park there are loads of monkeys, so spent some time watching them play with each other in the trees, which was really entertaining. There were lots of baby monkeys and they were very lively and mischievous.

Have spent quite a bit of time at the Road Traffic Department getting the permits for my car and also converting my driving license from an English one to a Malawian one. It has proved to be a rather time consuming process which involves lots of queuing, in lots of different rooms on lots of different days. In total it has taken me 6 days over a 3 week period to get it all sorted out, and during the various visits have managed to go in and out of 6 different rooms 24 times. For those that know me well, queuing has never been my forte, but I am learning the art of propping up walls here for long periods of time.

There have been various leaving parties that have been attended over the past couple of weeks, so am finding more and more nice restaurants in Blantrye, just can't afford to go to them very often, but it does mean that just as you start getting to know people they leave.

Work has been going well, supervising the students on the wards, planning lesson, teaching and sorting out various projects to be undertaken over the next year or so.

And just for a change we moved house again two weekends ago now.