last time on the internet for a while.

Mwadseka Bwanji? (your morning how?)

I've stayed in a rest house the past two nights in Mkanda because I didn't have a family to live with but now I do! My co-worker, Mr. Katundu (Mr. luggage), took me under his wing and found me a nice family to live with and I am moving in tomorrow night. I am living with the Traditional Authority's (TA- the chief of the zone) nephew who is regarded as a TA. I gathered he was an important man because his phone was ringing every 10 minutes when we were with him. I'll be living with him, his wife, sister and 2.5 year old daughter. I'm stoked to be living with a wee lass of 2.5 years.

Tomorrow night, before I officially move in, I have to smudge my room in front of who knows who! Smudging is when you take sand, add some water and rub it all over the floor. Then, you take a rock and scratch it into the floor. This is to make the room "smart and clean" or so Mr. Katundu told me. He's insisting that I do it so I can get the most Malawian experience. Jolly Ann and I made it super clear that I wanted to get a Malawian cultural experience to my co-workers and family so many people are going out of their way to help me learn the Malawian way. For example, last night, we went for dinner at another one of my co-workers house. He came with me to the bore hole and I carried water back to his house on my head. Children laugh at me all the time. I freakin' love the kids.

Flag is the guy who had us over for dinner last night. His real name is Chipi Mbendera, but mbendera means flag in chichewa and EWB volunteers have called him that since the beginning of time. He is a UN volunteer and is probably about 25. When we were at his place, I felt as comfortable as I would in a Canadian living room. He is highly educated and keen to learn about everything. He digs science like I do and we talked about fire for a little while. I'll be riding on his motorbike next week to visit different towns around Mkanda to meet extension workers.

I figured out what my job is today. We had a meeting in the morning and outlined my employee's expectations and mine. There are five tiers to the CLTS system in Mkanda. There is

1.       UNICEF who gives money to the government

2.       The district government (the district assembly)

3.       The "task force" of Mkanda, who organize all CLTS doings in the region

4.       Facilitators of CLTS, who are health workers paid by the government

5.       The villagers

Mkanda is the first district in all of Malawi (and the world) to start a task force. The task force is about 5 or 6 members of the community who organize and drive CLTS in the area. Because this is the first one ever, we want to make sure they are supported and reaching their objectives, to make model task force for other districts to copy.

My job is to work with the district assembly, the task force and the facilitators to make sure the CLTS program in Mkanda is running efficiently and everyone has the skills they need to reach their objectives. I'll spend the first few days getting to know the task force. I'm hoping to meet with every member to talk about their relationship with the district/extension workers and figure out how they operate as a team. Then on Wednesday of next week, I jump on a motorbike to meet all of the facilitators and figure out the support they receive from the task force, the challenges they're facing and the skills they feel they need to be better at making communities open defecation free.  

I'll only be living in Mkanda until July, so I have a lot of information to gather and workshops to plan before then. Eek! But I'm super excited about it, so it's not too stressful. I'll move to the boma (the city) after that and work directly with the district assembly to work on their management skills.

I hope that gives you an idea of what I'm going to be doing. I'm only just figuring it out myself.

The TA Zulu (chief of the Zulu zone) died last week so tomorrow I'm in the boma for his funeral. This is a rare occurrence so it's a unique cultural experience that I'm going to check out. A nice family I had dinner with last week said that I was welcome to attend and I could bring my video camera if I wanted. I don't know if I'll have the guts to get footage but I'm definitely attending. Apparently, when a chief dies, he is placed standing in the corner at the back of the funeral service and then is buried sitting down. I imagine the service will be hours long, so that is what I'm doing all afternoon tomorrow.

I'm feeling very happy. I love Mkanda and the people I'm working with. I'm struggling a little bit with the food, but I expected that. I'm going to coat everything in hot sauce from now on to mask the flavour. Language is a minor challenge but I will learn very soon. I know that I'll be able to connect to people so much more if I start understanding and speaking Chichewa. I've arranged for a school teacher to teach me every day. I need to learn the language fast because I am missing out on conversations every passing day! These are just minor things.

What I love most about living here is that everyone visits all the time. Nobody is ever alone. Families are so big and communities are so close that visitors pop in and out, conversations are happening everywhere on the road and you can hardly get to work without being stopped 5 times for a conversation. I love it! I hope to bring this way of life back to Canada. This is the kind of community Canada needs more of!

I should hit the sack because I'm waking up at 5:45am to leave for the boma.

Pitani Bwino (go well).

Love kate

first day on the job.

Today is my first day on the job. I've been meeting handfuls of people in the Mchinge district at the hospital and around the community. Jolly Ann, the long term EWB volunteer that I'm working with, has introduced me to many of her friends and it's been a great day.

For lunch, we went to Jolly's friends house and I made nsima for the first time. We got it all on tape!! You'll be seeing it in September!

The internet here is in a small shop with one cord and it is an hour away from my village. I'm not sure how well I'll be able to communicate for the first month but I'll send letters. Please email me your addresses if you'd like a letter. I've written many letters already but I have no addresses!

I'll keep in touch as much as possible.

love kate

May 22- lessons from the first day.

Key learnings/realizations from today:

People will laugh at me when I try to speak Chichewa. Even if they are fluent in English, have confidence no matter what.  Some people from the village we encountered do not speak English well and in order to hear their stories, learning the language is very important.

Bartering tip: say "No, I can get it over there for much less," and then offer a price.

I am officially everyone's sister- "Hey sister"

For a country without garbage collection, it's not as polluted as I expected. Garbage is gathered on the ground and burned in communities. Sometimes you drive past the odour of burning plastic and you can see fires in the distance, but the air isn't too bad and the grass is as green as it gets. My exposure to the country is not too great yet, and I'm sure I'll be talking about this more.

12% of Malawians tested for AIDS is positive. A 51 year old woman named Grace talked to us tonight about AIDS. She is living positively and is a leader in her community for admitting she's positive as there are many misconceptions and stereotypes about getting tested and being positive. She talked to us about how it is transmitted, perceived, treated and also about the ABCS: Abstain, Be faithful, and use a Condom. I left this session feeling hopeful because she is such a powerful woman who is leading by example and feeling like if there are more people like her, that AIDS can be overcome. I never imagined hearing about AIDS from an African, but it was a very powerful moment.

I am a little bit upset that I'm not working yet.  We were having dinner tonight as a big group and I looked around and realized that it's almost been a month since school ended and I'm extremely eager to finish training and start my job. This is partly due to the volcano and partly due to having enough time to train the group going to Ghana, and I can totally understand why logistically this makes sense, but I want to get to work! That's not to say that I'm not enjoying my time where I am and in this company, I just feel guilty.

 The market isn't half as stressful as I expected. It's actually extremely exciting.

Key questions from the day:

Why am I embarrassed when I tell someone I'm working for an NGO?

How is the water monitored and treated in Lilongwe (the capital city)?

When will people stop yelling Mzungo (white person) at me? Answer: Never.

How can I connect my chapter to what I'm doing? I ask this question every day. I'll probably sit down and do some real strategizing in a week's time when I'm in the village without electricity J. If you guys have any tips, pass them on!

What will my village be like? Who will I live with? How will I integrate? What will the food be like? Will I have my own bed?

Stories:

The market is a collection of wooden posts and tin sheets, muddled together into a configuration of outdoor shops and paths. I was walking in a narrow path on red soil and a man sleeping on a pile of blankets he was selling saw me and shot straight up onto both his feet and said "white body white body". It amazed me how fast that sleeping man stood up.

A couple stops down from his were stacked wire crates full of chickens. Some of them looked like they were in rough shape and I felt bad that they were cooped up in that heat waiting to be purchased and then… I ordered chicken tonight at a restaurant for the protein and I knew I was eating those chickens. Somehow, I don't feel too guilty about it though. Eating meat here is completely different than in Canada.

I'm feeling very happy. I've had an obsession with Africa for four years now and I couldn't possibly be happier in this place. I am in absolute heaven and can't wait to learn more of the language. Today we learned lots of Chichewa. I'll write a lesson for you, but for now, I will leave you with sigulabwino (have a good day). I am eager to get to work and a little nervous about moving to the village. I am much less nervous about meeting my co-workers and host family now that I've met a handful of Malawians and know how nice they are.  I wish I could share it all with you. I am going to try!

Love and kittens,

Kate

 

 

May 21- Arriving in Malawi.

First day in Lilongwe, Malawi, Africa, World, Universe.

I was absolutely elated driving into the town of Lilongwe from the airport.  At certain points, I thought my heart was going to jump right out of my chest and go running for the Malawian hills. Seeing the landscape and the women carrying baskets on their head while listening to dandy krazy in a mini-bus was so damn real. I've dreamt about this and seen it in countless images, but I'm actually in it. Indescribable.

Flying to South Africa was the incredible. I put on some African choir music (Ladysmith Black Mambaza- Greatest  Hits) and watched the sun rise over the horizon for two hours this morning. As the clouds across Africa diminished, I began seeing landmasses, lakes and mountains become illuminated and it was Africa! Holy shit- this is it!!!!

I sat beside a super nice Malawian woman on the plane from South Africa to Lilongwe.  She asked for extra water from the stewardess, gave it to me and told me that there will be bottled water in a larger town near Mkanda, Mchinge district and that I should stock up. I said thank you, but I'll be living with a family and doing what they do to for drinking water. She was awesome and told me all about her family which I really appreciated. I was just a nervous Mzungo (white person) and she made me feel right at home.

I stepped off the plane and ran to the washroom in the Lilongwe airport.  Found a washroom with no toilet paper and realized that I'm not in Kansas anymore.  Thankfully, my co-worker gave me a roll of pink toilet paper (it comes in colours here!!!) to carry with me at all times. Thanks Jolly Ann!

Six of us went for dinner tonight with a sweet family in area 25, Lilongwe. We're staying in area 3 so we drove west (towards Zambia) for quite awhile on a red bumpy dirt road. The drivers of the mini bus gifted us five long stalks of sugar cane (nzimbe). We peeled the bark and chewed off big chunks and sucked back the sugar juice and watched as the houses and people on foot and bicycle passed by. What a sweet moment in time.

The family we ate with fed us nsima and five relishes. Nsima is the staple food of Malawi and a derivative of it is found in many African countries under many different names. It is made by boiling water, adding maize flour slowly and stirring until it reaches a thick enough consistency to make into balls. You take an nsima ball and dip it in a relish to eat it. The relishes we tried tonight were beef, mustard, pumpkin and pumpkin leaf, bean and "Chinese". Not so sure what the last one had in it, but I assumed it was cabbage and kept on chewing.  Beef was my favourite which is a huge surprise because eating meat was one of my biggest fears about moving to Africa (I've been a vegetarian for 4 years).

Silvia was a girl about my age and she loves to cook so we had a grade A meal.  The long term volunteers told us that that kind of selection and flavour will be hard to come across in village life. One vegetable and meat relish is typical. There was also a kitten running around the house named Sasha and I couldn't keep my hands off her, even though my contract tells me not to play with animals. Who can resist a kitten?!  We all had an awesome conversation about agriculture, electricity and water in Malawi, jobs, music and Chuck Norris (apparently he is a big star here).

I'm currently tucked under my mosquito bed net, thinking about the half moon that is sitting high in the sky, and eager to start another day tomorrow.

I feel so alive!

Love kate

Arrived in Malawi

Muli Bwanji family and friends!!!

We've arrived in Malawi and it is unbelievably beautiful here. It is
true when they call it the warm heart of Africa. We're staying at a
hostel called the Golden Peacock and doing the last of our training.
We had a session this morning on learning Chichewa (Muli Bwanji?- How
are you?, Ndili Bwanji.-I am good, Sugulabwino- Have a good day...)

We spent the afternoon at the market in Lilongwe bartering for flip
flops, work shoes and cell phones. Mom, i found a nice pair of work
shoes for 500 Kwacha= $3.60! I have a cell phone but am in the process
of figuring out how talk time works and how I can get the best deal
for international phone calls.

My co-workers and I are having an amazing time and can't stop smiling.
I have so much to tell you. I will write it all in my next blog post,
but I only have a 10 minutes before dinner starts and I wanted you all
to know that I'm safe and happy.

I'll post my phone number this evening along with much more!

I hope you are all doing very well.
love, peace and nshima,
kate

stopped by the mighty volcano.

Volcanoes to you all!

Last night we ventured to the airport to take flight for Lilongwe and found out after getting through security that it was canceled due to the volcano ash. It was a real bummer having to turn around and make our way back into Toronto. We've re-booked and we'll be flying out on Wednesday and arriving in Lilongwe on Friday.

Because I don't have anything interesting of my own to share, check this out. Duncan McNicholl is a long term EWB volunteer and one of his blog posts was recently recognized by AidWatch (a website that seeks out up and comings in the development sector). This is the second EWB blog post that has been recognized by the sector in the last few months. Good job EWB!

hope you're doing well!
love kate

ps. Thank you for all of your comments Kevin! I'm stoked that Malawi was invited to G20.

2 days to go!

Ladies and Gents!

We leave in two days. Holy smokes I'm excited!!!!!

Last night we had no homework so we had some time to relax and get to know eachother. The result? These awesome photos. We're wearing our snazzy new rebel pilot helmets for the motorbikes that we'll ride on the back of this summer.

Enjoy!
Love kate

Peace Corey.

hey dudes!

back again, reporting from the EWB house in Toronto, Ontario and what a crazy place this is. I feel super close to all these JFs and after three days I truly feel like a 13+ piece family.

On the first day, things were a little quiet, a little reserved, and not too eager to share during sessions. But yesterday morning I noticed a huge difference and I knew it was going to be a great day. When we were all making breakfast, there were elbow nudges, jokes, conversations, laughs. The difference in community in just 24 hours was night and day.

As a result, my learning has skyrocketed. I'm not too hot a learner when I'm in big groups, but it really doesn't feel like that anymore and we're all 100% engaged.

Today was a phenomenal day for learning. We started off by doing a scenario exercise. It was a role playing activity of a community meeting involving the community and the NGO wanting to improve the community's economic situation. I was the lucky duck who pulled the chief card so I was facilitating the meeting. I knew I was in for a challenge because I'm not the tough guy or assertive type of person, but I did my best at a Ghanaian accent.I feel like I'm expanding my comfort zone every minute.

Somebody was playing the role of the EWB volunteer on the NGO side and it really opened my eyes to how we'll be perceived when we're working. The director of the NGO only liked the EWB volunteer because it could result in funding from CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency) and another person's role was to ignore the EWB volunteer because they thought they knew nothing. Perhaps these are realistic, perhaps not, but it will be in the back of my mind when I'm in district meetings and meeting new people. The exercise also helped me think about decision making in a community and the ambiguity or lack of information that is available when making a decision. I'm sure I'll have to make a lot of assumptions this summer when making any kind of decision.

Later in the afternoon, we had a session on economics and gender. In the econ session, we mapped out the systems in our own country and then looked at a model for sustainable livlihoods. I learned that in the context of Malawi or a rural African country, we'll have to look at things like social networks, relationships, government, the skills and knowledge of people, natural assets like land or rivers, physical assets like houses or schools and financial asssets like access to credit or money in order to start understanding the economic system. I probably will only begin to understand these systems by the end of August.

Our last session was a discussion about gender. We talked about risks and roles related to each gender when living in Malawi. We talked about how the Malawian men will flirt with us all the time, the excess of marriage proposals for both women and men, and the role that each gender plays in the household and workplace. Apparently, in a workplace, the hierarchy of power is white man, white woman, black man, black woman and the way you are treated depends on where you are. Some female volunteers talked about how they were treated like men in the field and women in the office. Very interesting. I'll keep you posted on my observations.

In the household, we will likely play the role of the guest for the first little bit. Volunteers typically have to ask to learn the customs of cleaning, laundry and cooking and men are typically not allowed to do some of these things. Hopefully I'll be able to build the trust and relationships with my host family and become more than a guest quick. That is one of my greatest hopes.

Last thing I have to say: this conversation got me thinking about who I want to live with and I decided that I'd love to live with lots of women and children. I receieved an email today from my co-worker who is going to help me find a place when I get there. She also told me I start work on the 24th of May. My first day of work is in 12 days. What a reality check!

I have more info for you about my living situation but I feel I've written a lot for now. You can check out my town on google mapshere.

I wish i could tell you more stories but I have to go work on a CLTS presentation.

One more: Parker told me my necklace was "peace corey" and that I shouldn't wear it. This was when 5 National Office staff lined us up and judged our outfits.

All my love and everything I got,
love kate

Predeparture Training Pt. I

DUDES!

Thoughts and Stories

Here is my journal for the day before and the first day of predeparture training.

Day Before:
i've arrived to pre-departure training and it is wonderful here. we all made a massive vegetarian chili dinner with biscuits and we've been here since 4pm. by now, we've all grabbed our bunk in the EWB house and had our first session on overseas logistics (insurance, entry visas, allowance and money, etc). tomorrow the fun actually starts. starting tomorrow we have ~16 hour days.

tomorrow, we're doing morning introductions, hopes and fears, lunch one on ones, what is poverty/development, intro to rural livlihoods, learning journal, dinner at the ethiopian house and an EWB's vision workshop with george. what a day! i'll be fueling up with a fresh cup of fair trade java in the morning, that's for sure.

earlier today, i was feeling extremely nervous about all of this. it is actually happening. saying goodbye to my family and tony really made this journey into something a lot more real. now i've settled into this house and the people are so awesome and so nice, those nerves have disappeared. i have an open heart and open mind and i'm ready to get started!

the gang is made up of equal parts girls and boys. there are only three people going to zambia this year as an interesting fact. nobody is going to kitwe (tony's town). the rest of us are heading to malawi. me and a guy named stan from windsor are the only ones working on CLTS. everyone is in the same boat as me in terms of preparation and i'm feeling pretty happy about that.

We have had a fun night and now it's time to get rest for the long day tomorrow!

Day 1:
Feelings upon waking up: rested and excited. I had a really great sleep on the top bunk in a room of 10 JFs and surprisingly, there was not snoring or late night conversations. I'm sure that will change one of these nights...

Some major questions and learning from the day:
If development is inevitable change, whose change is it?
If I impose my own values into decisions that I'll make this summer, it might not be in the best interest of rural Malawians. I have to be empathetic, understanding and have an open mind.
Is development happiness or economic security? Are they the same thing? What about long term vs. short term development? What kind of work are we doing?
Integrating into rural Malawi is not about losing yourself. Don't overstep your limits!
If international development is such a heavily criticized field, why is EWB any better?
I have to push myself out of my comfort zone in order to expand it and learn.


Some explanation on the sessions we had today:
Hopes and fears- We all wrote down, you guessed it, our hopes dreams and fears for our placement this summer. We only had time to review a few so we talked about learning chichewa (the tip is to hire a school teacher as a tutor!), connecting to your counterpart in an open, honest, mutually beneficial way, feeling like a family member vs. a guest in your host family, connecting the chapter in an effective way, not having the skill set that your APS/partner require/expect and being paralyzed by culture shock. It smoothed out some feelings I'm sure we were all having.

What is poverty/development- This was by far the most challenging session of the day. The objectives were to identify our personal definition of poverty and development, share it with others and open our mind to new ideas and definitions. Our chapter spends a lot of time defining poverty but I have never discussed the basic "what is development" in the company of EWBERS. My small group concluded that development is the inevitable change that is neither positive or negative. The general group talked about this for an hour. Really thought provoking and interesting session. What is your definition of development?

Intro to rural livlihoods- In this session, we learned about the six things that affect rural livlihoods: the household and the gender relations within it (productive and reproductive), agriculture, religion, culture and beliefs, assets and capabilities and the effect of macro trends. Then we did a case study of a particular household and addressed each of these things within it. If you want to learn more about this, hit me back and I can send you the case study.

Dinner at the Ethiopian house- If you haven't had Ethiopian food, you gotta try it! 'nuf said.

It was a long a lovely day. The folks around here are amazing people and I encourage you all to check out their blogs at the bottom of this page.

On another note, please send me feedback on my blog. I already know that my posts are too long but I'll work on being more concise!

see you in the future!
love love love.
love kate!

Job Description and Nyanja

Hey folks!


Work and Approach
So, as you know, I'm moving to Malawi in about two weeks and the excitement builds every day. Right now, I'm knee deep in documents trying to get as prepared as possible for pre-departure training which starts on the 10th. If you'd like to join me, there are all kinds of resources at this website.

So, as this website alludes, I'll be working on a Community Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) project. This means that I'll be working on the sanitation side of things, mostly to do with the health effects related to open defecation. CLTS is "an innovative methodology for mobilizing communities to completely eliminate open defecation (OD). Communities are facilitated to conduct their own appraisal and analysis of open defecation (OD) and take their own action to become ODF (open defecation free)." I'm not yet sure of my exact partner organization or job description but I will be doing some of the following things:

-Peer-coaching a district officer counterpart
-Attending lots of CLTS meetings in the village with district extension staff
-Running workshops for teams of extension staff before and after meetings – repeatedly – to facilitate max. on-the-job experiential learning
-Supporting districts in improving planning, execution, and human resource management processes
-Helping counterpart write an article for S.H.i.T.S. or a longer stand-alone article about a special/personal aspect of their CLTS learning (esp. management techniques)
-Organising a district’s CLTS “data” (quantitative and qualitative). Help the team set goals based on what’s been accomplished (and failed with) so far. Taking inventory (participatory) of what the district doesn’t know about its CLTS but wants/needs to know. Coaching to find a feasible way to collect this info.
-Helping counterpart write a profile of the overall district’s CLTS program to help them (a) build support among key people in the district – Members Parliament, Traditional Authorities, District Commissioner, District Planning Director, District Education Manager, District Community Development Officer, District Health Officer, etc. and/or (b) get additional funding for CLTS if they want to.
-Interviewing field staff about their experiences with CLTS
-Strategising ‘next-step’ interventions for their district, or for the CLTS support program as a whole – e.g. ideas as to how UNICEF could better support the district


Connecting to Malawi
I'm also about to dive into some language learning. The languages spoken in Malawi are English and Chichewa (aka nyanja). I hope to get a nyanja tutor when I get settled but for now, I hope these phrases will help me on my way.

Ndipunzera Chinyanja: I am learning nyanja
Sindilankula maningi: I cannot speak a lot

Go ahead, say it out loud! You can also learn at this amazing website. More language updates to come!

Also, if you're looking for more ways to connect to Africa, please check out the tab with African jams and film recommendations. I filled it up with mp3s and trailers to some awesome movies.

Keep eating the fruit!
love kate