Merry Christmas - all the. Way from Malawi

Merry Christmas to all. I hope everyone had a very nice christmas amongst their loved ones. This year I spent my first christmas away from the family, well my Muzungu family (means white person in Tumbuka). I spent my christmas together with friends and my mufipa family (means black person in Tumbuka). I want to share my experience of a malawian christmas with you, so bare with 

My Friend with the days biggest catch

So I start on the 24th, just because that is the day I celebrate christmas back at home. As there have been several cholera cases, I was working part time on the 24th, which was fun. Having a meeting about cholera with an NGO, I went on to the carpenter, who built 15 benches for the church. These benches should ensure that everyone is able to sit on benches and noone has to sit on the floor. I only organised the buildings of these benches, but the actual donation came from a family friend in Austria. So anyway, the benches were brought to the church as they should be ready for christmas service. As christmas is on a monday this year (I mean malawian christmas people celebrate on the 25th) the benches were already used for the sunday church service. I spent the rest of the day going around, talking to friends and just enjoying a sunday afternoon without having to do any work. A very good friend, who is a fisherman, called me at lunch time to come down and pick a fish for me to cook and eat. The fish he gave me was my christmas present from him, which was really nice. I cooked this fish in the evening so that I was able to have my own christmas meal.(See the picture below) In the evening I contacted my parents and grandparents in Austria just to wish them a Merry Christmas and to be able to see their celebrations. I gave my neighbour, which I see as my malawian Mum, a present for her and her family. The reaction I gained from them was so special as they had not expected it and they were so grateful for the kind gift. I just made me feel like I had made the correct decision of giving something back after their family has helped me settle in to malawi so well. Anyway, I hope that in the new year I will do a profil about my neighbour so that you can understand who my 'Malawian Mum' is. 

My Neighbour with her Son

 The next day, Christmas day itself, it started off with church. I went to church to keep my tradition going, however, sadly there had not been too many people attending the service with me. So then after church, I met my Host and was suddenly told that we had a meeting with MSF (Medicine Sans Frontiers) about Cholera. As Cholera does not have a break, I decided that I would not take a break either, well except for maybe a little bit for christmas. Anyway, after we hadf about a 1 hour 30 meeting about Cholera, I finally was able to go home. I helped my neighbour cook the food for lunch. Cooking together was something I have to say I really enjoyed. As well, to ensure that the people I live with and am friends with enjoy the day, I ordered two crates of soft drinks to distribute. SO I had a christmas meal together with my 'Malawian Family' eating rice with chicken, which here in the rural areas of malawi is a very very good meal. I thoroughly enjoyed just sitting at home eating and talking to each other, having fun. After lunch, they presented me an african cake, which they gave me a piece for desert, but me being so full from the meal, I was not able to eat anything. In the afternoon, I went to a patient that I heard of from a friend to check the status of him, as I wanted to make sure that he was helped as well. The rest of the afternoon I spent going around to my Host's family and friends, sitting together with them for a soft drink and just talking. To see the reaction on some of the faces when they got a few sweets was just so nice, as it gave me the impression that this gift made their day a lot better. 

Christmas Service at the Catholic Church

Lumbani (My neighbours son) and me (I look like I just got out of bed)  

I want to wish every reader here a Merry Christmas. I hope you enjoyed your day with you family and/or friends and you were able to spend this quality time the best way possible. I can say this in the name of all of the people in Ngara village:  

WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!  

Another Country off my bucket list

So I can say I have been to Tanzania. 

From the 29th to the 30th of December I went to Tanzania. Not because of the fact that I went to visit anywhere but because my residential permit had run off, I had to go out of the country for a day and then enter Malawi again. Anyway, what happened was on the 29th of December I met my new assistant country manager in Karonga and we went togeteher to Songwe Border, which is the closes border to where I live. When we arrived there, we met an immigration officer, who was a friend of my assistant country managers, who was going to help us and guide us through the process. So what happened was that we first went to Malawian immigration and then did the paperwork to exit the country. After that we crossed the bridge and went to get a visa and at the Tanzanian side. We were helped throughout the whole process by a Malawian immigration officer. We spent the afternoon then in the lodge where we were going to stay at over night with immigration officers of both side, talking and drinking. I was pretty fun to see how much fun the officers were when they had a few beers to drink. We spent the whole afternoon, from 12pm to 8pm at the bar with the immigration officers talking and drinking. At the end of the day, I have to say I throroughly enjoyed the experience with the officers as it showed me how friendly and how nice they were. 

The next day we decided that before we went back over to Malawi again, we wanted to go and see the market in Kyela. My neighbour had told me that the market in Kyela was the best market in the north and you could get so many good things there. She wanted to take me at some point during my placement so that I would be able to see the Tansanian side. Going there, I was definetly able to see a difference in of how the whole market was set up. There was more products and better quality products there for a cheaper price. I would have bought something if I would have Tanzanian schilling. However, sadly, I was not aware that we would be going there so in the end I said at some point I would go back so that I could get the things I needed or wanted from there. 

SO to conclude, I have to say I definitely noticed a difference between the two countries, even just at the border. Tanzania has so much more product to sell at a cheaper place and looking at the houses there, people are better off. However, in terms of friendliness, Malawians are definitely friendlier. As well, the difference in the amount of english people know is definitely varied. In Malawi, nearly everyone is able to understand english and at least talk a little bit, but in Tanzania I noticed not too many people knew too much english, so to talk and communicate was a lot more difficult. In terms of feeling safe, I never felt threatend in Tanzania, but  at the same time I never felt safe either. So in the end, I was happy to get this experience about the difference in life there is between the two countries.