This morning I woke up early to visit the seamstress to get a tote bag and shirt made. She opens at 8am andI wanted to visit her before Charles came to pick us up at 9am. As I was eating breakfast the advisors were having coffee and then all rushed up the hill.
Patti told me that Liz’s family friend who had been staying with her husband called this morning and said she needs to come home because her husband is in the hospital and not doing very well. Apparently the friend took him to the hospital in the middle of the night and the doctor said if she had not taken him to the hospital he would have died. His body is rejecting the kidney. So in under an hour Peter arranged a car and found a flight out of Lilongwe. It’s comforting to know that if you need to leave, people will help you find a way quickly. Jennifer Jones was going to ride with Liz to Lilongwe and at the last moment Brian went along so Jennifer had someone to ride back with. They left before 9am and she is going to catch the 2:45pm flight. It will still take her a couple days to get home and I sure hope she can get there fast. It was sure lonely today on the bus without 3 of us. We are a group and we look out for each other so all day we have all been worried sick about Liz, Brian and Jennifer. We haven’t heard from them yet.
As Krista and I entered our classroom we noticed things looked a little different. Kids were outside hanging out. We looked in our classroom and they greeted us but we couldn’t find Macdonald. They said he was around here somewhere. We looked everywhere but finally found him on the other side of the school. Next door was less organized and we soon found out the teacher was absent again. So the students were hanging out all day with nothing to do. We walked around working on inequalities with the students and we heard some commotion outside, apparently the kids told us there was a fight from the other standard 6 class that doesn’t have a teacher today. I don’t think it lasted very long nor was it physical but the kids were eager to watch. However, they didn’t seem to think it was anything out of the ordinary.
I worked with one of my favorite tables in the back and they helped me learn some Chichewa. I am an awful student- they are so patient with me. They decided to write down the words in Chichewa and English on a piece of paper to give me. They made me read aloud each word. I think they are expecting me to study and know the words when I come back… Uh oh!
I asked the group if they knew anyone that wrote with their left hand. They said they are taught to write with their right hand and it isn't a choice. I did find one boy who knew of someone who wrote with their left hand.
Lauren and Sarah had two totes full of books for their class to look at but they are donating the books to the orphanage on Saturday. So they let us borrow the books to take to our class today. We passed them out and they had enough so only a few students had to share. I was looking forward to this activity because I wanted to see how well they can read something that is unfamiliar to them. I went around to some of the tables and listened to the kids read to me. Each and every student wanted to read to a teacher and it killed me that I couldn’t listen to them all. They want to learn and they want someone to sit next to them and explain to them things they don’t understand. For the most part they are excellent readers and they sometimes pronounced things differently because of their accent, but they read the sentences very well-much better than their writing skills. One little boy called me over to ask what “ice” was and I explained it to him. He asked “like a freezer?” so I think he understood! He was reading a book about the 12 months of the year and the different seasons. They were very interested in how the tree leaves fall in autumn and the ice and cold in the winter. The same little boy called me over again and pointed to the wolf in the “Three little pigs” book to ask what it was. The wolf had a long nose and was wearing clothes. Another girl asked what a frog was because she didn’t recognize the animal because it was in a t-shirt and shorts. He continued to read, “Three little pigs” to me and after each page I would explain the story to him. They could all read but I’m not sure how well they were interpreting their stories.
We collected the books and went outside for break. Macdonald set up a jumping game. First the girls went because they don’t jump as far as the boys. There are 3 sticks and you can only land in-between the sticks once as you jump past the others. It’s a big “no no” to touch the sticks. The girls did great!!! They would start really far away for a running start! It was a lot of fun but Krista and I were scared they were going to ask us to try. Thankfully they didn’t. The boys went next as the girls cheered. These kids are so athletic! Macdonald said they call it The Champion Game.
I am so impressed with how involved Macdonald is with his class. I honestly don’t think it's just because we are there, I think he really does enjoy being with the kids. He is the only teacher in the whole school (even when VT students are here) that comes out and plays with the kids at break. He is trying to learn each and every game we teach them and gives his students high 5’s when they jump really far!
Next, we taught them the limbo and they were very familiar with this game. Most of them bent forward to go under the stick but who cares ☺ We attempted to teach them a relay race by lining them up in 4 teams and they all had to race to me and back. First Krista had them hop on one foot and then she showed them the crab walk. It was difficult for the girls because they were in skirts but they were good sports. Before we knew it, it was noon and we headed back. Macdonald brought us a watermelon from his uncles’ garden! HOORAY! We are so excited for some watermelon-it’s the first gift we can actually eat. Other kids brought us banana’s, groundnuts, popcorn and sugarcane. We will pass them along to Tenison in the morning.
As we ate lunch in our MIE room, we chatted about our pets at home. We all miss our dogs and cats! Krista shared her chapter about Civil Rights. At 2pm we walked to another room at MIE to listen to a professor at MIE explain his TALUAR concept. It stands for Teaching And Learning Using Available Resources. Basically, he showed us teachers are able to make posters out of wheat bags, use coffee as paint, and use bottle tops and toilet paper rolls for counting. He was a very funny man and we enjoyed listening to his stories! Even though the idea is to use available resources, none of us saw any of these concepts being used in our classrooms.
We quickly went to town to get water and exchange money for our safari trip tomorrow. We came back to Annie’s and had dinner. I had chicken Maryland with mashed potatoes and green beans. How American is that!
It’s 6pm and we are winding down for the night. It’s usually that way most nights. We are going to pack for our trip tomorrow and finish some blogging. I’m looking forward to the safari tomorrow and the advisors said we will stop in Liwonde which has the best place to shop for local carvings. Good thing I got some more money exchanged!
I decided to use my 1 hour internet card from Peter tonight. I was able to post blogs up until July 1st. So I’m still about 7 days behind. I talked to reception to find out if they have reset my account yet and they promised to have it set in the morning. Hopefully it will work except we are leaving and won’t be at Annie’s Lodge until Thursday.
I got online and IMed a friend and asked her to call my dads cell phone to tell him to get online. He didn’t answer! He answered the house phone and got online so we could chat! My mom was at work. He said it would have been at the gym but he happened to be home waiting for a package. Good timing! My hour sure did go by quick.
Brian and Jennifer got back around 7pm tonight. Liz is in Lilongwe staying at Peter’s Lodge. Thank goodness for Peter. They didn’t make it to the 2:45pm flight. She is taking a South African flight out of Lilongwe tomorrow and will land in Charlotte. Since she’s from NC, that’s actually better then going to Dulles. Brian reported back to us that Liz’s husband is now in stable condition. Brian and Jennifer are glad to be alive. Apparently they had a very eventful drive to and from Lilongwe.
I think I have talked about the road blocks with the police and our bus is always waved on so we never have to stop. Apparently most of the police stops are corrupt, and Brian knew that because he had driven to Lilongwe with Peter. The driver of the car had never left Zomba, so he was very unfamiliar with everything. He didn’t know how to handle himself at a police stop but Brian knew he had to pay the cops off to let them go. Since there were two whites in the back, they tried to hide because they will raise the price if they see Americans. Brian was okay with paying them off because he was only going to be here for another 2 weeks but the driver can’t get a reputation for paying cops off because they will stop him and expect money all the time. He needed to learn to talk his way out of it. They got stopped twice and each took a significant amount of time. So they were running behind.
And then since this driver has never been outside of Zomba, he really didn’t know how to drive and hit a pothole so of course they got a flat tire. The driver didn’t know how to change a tire so Brian had to do it. Liz and Jennifer stayed in the car so they didn’t attract attention. They didn’t have the proper equipment, so the car fell off the jack. Apparently it was a nightmare. Once they got Liz to the airport, there was no way she could make the 2:45pm flight and it was full anyways so standby wouldn’t have worked.
It’s very important to make it back before dark, but Brian and Jennifer didn’t. Brian said the driver didn’t use headlights and when he finally did they pointed to the ground anyways. It was pitch black and Brian thought for sure they were going to hit a person, goat or another car.
We all knew how great Charles is, but after hearing that story we are even more grateful for how well he takes care of us. We really aren’t experiencing some of the realities of this country. Maybe our view of Malawi is a little bit sheltered.
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