Owen, my electromagnetic friend.

I met Owen on the road two weeks ago, not far from my point of departure. People stop me all the time. “I can see you are strange. I want to know you.” This guy is super tall, with big white buck teeth and is usually dressed in a stylish sweater vest or snazzy wool sweater. He speaks incredible English and he told me it’s because he’s from Zimbabwe, whose English curriculum (and education system) is one of the best in his opinion.

He’s a physical sciences teacher at a private school down the road. I’ve met a handful of physical sciences teachers and I love them because we can chat about integrals, elements, pollution, climate change- you name it- and they love it just as much as I do. Turns out, this guy was educated in aviation electronics and specialized in radio communication. Said he wishes he could teach only teach about radios. I asked him to tell me everything he knows about radios, because I’m a little bit obsessed myself.

We chatted for at least 30 minutes (being late for work is not out of the ordinary for me). Me throwing questions at him and him enthusiastically answering, dumbing down the vocabulary and concepts so I could hang on. He told me he has a book that I should read and that he’d drop it off for me.

I biked to work that morning with enough energy from that conversation to carry me through the entire day.

He showed up at my work the next day with a folder in hand. He told me he couldn’t find the book and then pulled out three double sided hand written pages explaining the basics of radio technology full of labeled block diagrams- all from memory. I was taken aback. He’s an absolute gem.

The other day I was hanging out at home with the kiddies and he showed up at my house and we chatted on the porch for over an hour talking about Zimbabwe’s education system/economy/industries/land rights, Mugabe, Botswana’s diamonds, South Africa’s unfriendliness (in his opinion), his family, his dreams. We seriously hung out. He came to my work yesterday with seven more pages of notes on radio technology. He’s officially my bro.

He’s living with his aunt and uncle right now about 7 kilometres from Mkanda (where he teaches). He bikes 7km to and from work every day. He got hired at this private school but the headmaster has failed to pay the teachers in over 2 months now because his tobacco crops didn’t do well on the auction floor. The students pay K3000 per term (3 months per term), there are 90 students and the teachers are supposed to receive K60000 per month. The economics don’t even make sense. With that model, the headmaster wouldn’t even be able to pay two teachers without losing money. I think he’s “employing” four.

Owen wants to move to Blantyre in September, when the school year finishes, and start a business manufacturing and selling electronic school bells. This would be tremendously beneficial because the children run all over the place, sometimes return, sometimes don’t and sometimes people forget to ring the bell to get back to class. All of the bells are electronic is Zimbabwe and he says Malawi is chaotic. He’s such a smart man. I’m sure he’ll do it and become a rich man.

I’ve made so many friends here! When I think about leaving, I have to fight back the tears. I have no idea how I’ll be able to leave my folks in the village. I’m so happy I didn’t move to the boma. My Chichewa has improved and as a result, my relationships have become so much deeper. Monica, my host mom who is actually more like my host sister because she’s only 23, and I are like two peas in a pod. After almost two months, people see me as a person now and not a whitie.

I’m going to leave this place kicking and screaming, or crying my face off. Probably the latter.

Love kate