Summer Break

It is summer over here so we are on break from school until January.  The Montfort Fathers have a house on the lake that we used for a couple days so we managed to swim a little.  The people living around the lake are used to visitors and are ready to do business.  They even set up right on the lawn and wait for you to come out to buy their wood carvings, paintings, and necklaces.  I enjoy looking at the carvings and paintings, but I wasn't really interested in buying anything.  Since they are very persistant once you show any interest, I tried to keep my distance.  One night a group of kids with some homemade instruments came and played a few songs for us.  Now that I am back in Balaka, I am starting to setup everything I need for Computers and Science class to run smoothly next year.  I will not be Math and Economics in the college next year, but the clubs are moving into the actual timetable and more emphasis will be put on attendance so I guess its like I am becoming the Drama teacher.  I am also opening the computer lab so local students can come and use them over break.  My hope is to have them a little more familiar with how they work before classes begin.  So far, few have actually come, but it is summer break so I'm not too surprised.

Dentist

I have always been a little unsure about going to the dentist here, but it has been about a year and a half since I've seen any dentist so I thought I should at least have a checkup.  Plus, Ewa and Gary went and said that it was a good set up so I decided to go.  I have to admit it went really well.  Once he pulled out all of my teeth with a rusty pair of pliers, he hooked me up with an excellent set of wooden dentures.  The splinters are kind of a pain, but over all they are functional and a pretty good look for me...Alright, so it wasn't that bad.  The Italian mission across town have set up a few clinics: General, Heart, Vision, and Dental.  The dental clinic was very well supplied with all of the modern dental equipment and the dentist seemed very capable.  Gary even recently entrusted him with a root canal which is alright so far.  As good as the dental practice was, it still had a few distinct Malawian qualities.  I walked up to the building a was greeted by a couple of guys sitting on the bench outside.  Just inside the door, I asked the receptionist if I could get a cleaning.  She gave me a confused look and yelled out the window to the guys on the bench.  One of them said "Sure, as soon as the mopping is finished."  So I went back outside and waited with who I now knew as the dentist.  After a few minutes, I was shown into a typical looking dental room including the chair, tools, sinks, cabinets, and even the radio playing in the background.  The dentist took a quick look at my teeth and found two small cavities (no x-ray required) that he could fill as long as I had time.  There was no dental hygenist so he went right on with the cleaning.  Somewhere in mid-cleaning his cell phone rang which he didn't hesitate to answer and make another appointment for tomorrow.  He also had a few short conversations with people passing by.  He moved right on to filling the cavities and since he didn't have an assistant, there were frequent trips to the cabinet and out of the room to get everything he needed.  After everything was finished, I waited while he put everything away.  He came back with the book and I paid my bill right there.  I was beginning to wonder why he even had the receptionist.  Everything went well and ended up paying 2300 Kwacha for everything (about 18 dollars).

Rainy Season

We are entering the rainy season.  It isn't full on yet but it rained a few times last week.  It keeps the dust down and it is clowdy at least part of the day cooling it off a little bit...not much but a little.  The last rainy season was not rainy enough for the corn crop.  The reserves are already running out and the prices are getting too high for most of the people who really need it. T he families in the villages work their own fields and depend on growing enough for the whole year.  Many of the people around us expect to run out a couple of months before the next crop comes in.  A few weeks ago the president officially declared a national emergency, and it is expected that 4 to 6 million people won't have enough food this year.  We've been helping out our workers loaning them money to buy the bags of corn they need and we now have plans to buy as many bags as we can to help our workers and others around us.  The parish here also does a lot of work to feed those in need.  We've offered our help but they seem to have the help they need already.  The biggest difficulty is finding the corn to buy.

Ramadan

I guess that is spelled right.  I assume it is just as it sounds.  Anyway, the month long Islamic fast just ended this month.  Why do I care?  Well, I didn't take too much notice during Ramadan.  A few of our students are Muslim so instead of forcing everyone into the dining hall on my lunch duty, I had to excuse the Muslims since it wouldn't be very nice to make them sit there while everyone else eats.  Other than that i didn't matter that much until we were invited to the house of some of our students to celebrate Eid.  It is the end of Ramadan when the fasting is over and everyone gets together for the express purpose of eating.  It is very similar to celebrating Easter at the end of Lent.  Now I expected to go to our student's house and enjoy a nice Malawian meal with family.  That wasn't a wrong expectation, but it also wasn't exactly right.  Instead of the small get together at a small house it was a huge get together at a big house.  We pulled in the gate and parked in the driveway.  Rita and Monica, the students that invited us, told us to go around back while they put their stuff away.  In the back a tent was set up with a bunch of tables, chairs, and stacks of plastic plates.  A group of people sitting on the back patio called us over as soon as they saw us coming.  They greeted us and immediately offered sodas.  In the mean time we sat and talked to another Bakhita student that was there.  There were four students total.  I don't know their exact relation but as far as I can tell they were some form of cousins.  She explained the family relationship of everyone as they arrived to the party.  Uncles, aunts, cousins, wives, grandmas, grandpas, grandpas' brothers, and so on.  If you've ever experienced a holiday with my family, that is a pretty good comparison to what I was unexpectedly thrown into.  The food finally started coming out of the house in tubs and we were invited to help ourselves and sit anywhere we like...so we did.  I think I ate four different types of rice, potato salad, rib-like meat, spicy mangoes, and even desert.  After the meal, we stuck around for awhile and talked to a few grandmas and maybe some great aunts and uncles.  We were even invited to stay at several people's houses if we should ever need a place to stay in Blantyre.  The whole thing was very unexpected and very surreal.  At least someone in the family had some money for the house and all the food so it might not have been very representative of Malawi as a whole, but it was fun to see an entire Malawian family in action.