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