Blog entry Nkhata Bay
Nkhata Bay
So it was Val’s birthday on the 19th of June and we went to Nkhata Bay to celebrate. It was unbelievable. It was a little paradise village with grass roof huts. Quite a change from our day to day in Mzuzu. Our huts were on the shore of beautiful lake Malawi. You can see Tanzania and Mozambique in the distance and silhouettes of fishing canoes, basically hollow tree trunks, going back and forth. A great night was had the first night in Mayoka village. The lodge is mostly used by backpackers and volunteers. The next day some of us went on a boat trip. We saw sea-eagles, went cliff jumping and had a game of volleyball. The boat trip didn’t agree too well with some of us! Jamie had a great weekend and managed to get the e-mail addresses of no less than three different women. Sure fair play to him sure. We watched the sun rise over the lake on Sunday morning. A site to behold.
Vwaza Marsh
To continue our weekend trips we made a visit to Vwaza march, a nature reserve north of Mzuzu. Even John decided to come along on the trip. On the journey down John told us about the tutsi flies whose bites can cause a potentially fatal condition called sleeping sickness. Just after we arrived one of the feckers bit Jack
We stayed in huts, once again, on the shore of a local hang out for some of the hippos. We had a long meal and an interesting debate started up, covering everything from gay adoption to nature vs nurture to Fr John’s interpretation of God. James, Jack and Rosanne stayed out on a hippo watch. Of all the animals in Africa, hippos kill the most humans. The hippos let out a few grunts and eventually we ran away in fear of coming between a hippo, whose weight has been a topic of hot debate ever since, and the water. We concluded that the night sky was the clearest and brightest with more stars than any of us had ever seen. The next day we arose early in the morning and went on a walking tour, with a guide, who had a gun! The walk was grand. We were very excited about breakfast though. We did see many Mpala and a load of hippos. The main goal of the trip was to see a few elephants. Before we left the park we decided to go for a drive in one last effort to see an elephant.
Success! As we were driving back out of the park John suddenly, dramatically brought the car to a halt. Up ahead we could see the large grey behind of none other than an African elephant. After she (we presume) crossed the dirt track road she was followed by a calf and then (we presume) a big bull elephant. We began t a approach and heard the elephants give out a cry as they disappeared into the thick bush. We drove to the watering hole, alas we saw no more elephants. We drove home content with our weekend, although Jack tragically lost his camera. Everybody was affected by that loss.
The next day we sat in on a meeting of the board of directors of Ungweru. Twas a good experience or all of us and was quite interesting. We got a good luck of the functioning of the organisation.
Luwawa Lodge
Luwawa Lodge in Viphya National Park was our destination this weekend. We were only there for one night but we managed to get a lot in. After lunch on Saturday we went for a four hour hike to the top of a hill. The showers there were the best we’ve come across in Malawi – it’s the small things that can make a weekend! We had farmhouse chicken and mash for dinner, followed by chocolate cake and custard…couldn’t have asked for anything more. Jack played a few songs on the guitar while we sat around the fire before going to bed.
Up at seven o’clock the next morning, we left the lodge on bikes shortly after eight. The road to the waterfall was fairly flat to begin with, but it wasn’t long before we reached some nasty hills. The map of the route was a bit dodgy but a teacher travelling to a primary school in a nearby village showed us the way. When we arrived Jamie tested the water, but decided it was too cold to swim in.
We didn’t delay in getting back on the bikes for our return journey as we our lift home was waiting for us back at the lodge. We hadn’t gone a hundred yards though when Jack pulled up with a flat tyre…disaster! Some would say that taking some shaky-looking rental bikes on a four hour cycle over dirt tracks without any repair kit was a stupid thing to do…and they’d probably be right. Anyway, we decided to split up, Jamie and I going ahead to the lodge, with Rosanne and Jack following on foot. Nearly two hours later, after a lot of puffing and panting, Jamie and I arrived back. George, the lodge owner, grudgingly agreed to go out and collect the others. Not long afterwards, we were packed up and back on the road to Mzuzu – knackered, but happy.
We would like to also tell James to stop plagiarising our blog for his own personal gain. If he thinks it’s funny it’s not and we all think it’s very petty of him.
Volunteering Work
The volunteer work is going well. Our projects are all finished or in their final stages of completion.
Val and Deirdre finished their work in Temwanani, managing to paint all the classrooms and paint some learning aides on the walls. The kids were very excited when they arrived in on Monday morning. New stools also got the kids’ pulses going.
Jack and James have been working tirelessly on their web-design course and many a lesson plan has been created. The students were each given a project. Real clients were provided for each student fro whom they were required to build a website. There were some initial hiccups with the clients. Some of them didn’t seem interested in getting a website for free for some reason but everything seems to have been smoothed out. Their projects are due on Wednesday and each student will give an in class presentation of their completed project.
Jamie and James have been working on the computer lab. Updating all the machines, ridding them of viruses and networking the whole lab. They’ve been in their till all hours, missing meals and the whole lot.
Rosanne had been working solo since Cormac left, quite frankly he was holding her back so its been a positive he deserted us for Cape Clear. At the moment Rosanne is working on all current requests by members of the community for assistance. A daunting task due to the quantity of requests and the lack of a filing system ended up being an eye opener. The Work the different self help groups are doing is an inspiration. Rosanne is working on an application form as part of implementing a new system for requesting assistance from Ungweru.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Monday, June 16, 2008
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