Buying supplies for the house:  We went into the town one day to buy supplies for the house.  Really it turned into Laura and I just handing over money to the wonderful Cosmas and him going to get this.  Purely a practical move – he knows what he needs and a white face just makes prices soar in most circumstances.  So this meant Laura and I had plenty of time to explore, picking up extra groceries and making friends.  Our favorite new baby to play with is Doreen, the daughter of a man selling lumber.  We wandered into his stall in an attempt to avoid the sun, so he laid down a mat for us and we perched ourselves on the timber.  Of course the baby was in my lap within moments and we spent a good long while playing with her.  And then when we went back a few days later, we somehow ended up there again.  Shocking!  She’s just adorable and such a happy, contented baby.  I was able to make myself entirely too useful at one point – While driving the truck, I cut a corner too short and ended up with one wheel suspended in thin air in a ditch. Awesome.  Of course this meant there was nothing to catch traction on, so the guys had to get out and lift the truck and shift it onto the pavement.  Driver extraordinaire! 

Exciting shopping moment:  There was a 50 kwacha discount on spaghetti!  (Roughly 20 cents) Of course this meant that we stocked up, buying 5 packages.  :) 

House construction update:  Very upsetting moment when Cosmas and Singuini told me I couldn’t come to the land/house regularly anymore.  I must explain that they’re coming from a place of love and helpfulness on this.  And I want to respect their requests because they’re the ones having to deal with the obnoxious people who are trying to gauge me out of money simply because I’m a foreigner.  But it still hurts me and upsets me that these people are going to be my neighbors and yet they’re still trying to suck as much out of me as possible.  Particularly laughable since I am very likely the poorest mzungu they will ever meet.  I make less than half of what even the government teachers here make!  But of course they fail to consider that possibility.  Anyways, I was barred from the land and Mr. Singuini so graciously picked up the task of walking there daily to get a progress report and let me know how things are going.  So kind of him.  Still upset though.  And Banda was utterly outraged, which I appreciated more than he’ll probably know.  He was all set to march down there, camera in hand to take pictures, ready to give them a piece of his mind.  But fortunately they’re letting me come every few days – just only for big events now.  So I got to come when the foundation was finished and then when the walls started to go up.  So I’m contented with that I suppose.  As long as I don’t think too long about the reasons behind it.   

More positive update:  Like I mentioned, the foundation is poured and the walls are starting to go up.  The back wall is half done and they’re put up the front door frame.  It’s just bewildering how fast they go!  I’m used to American standard where it takes months or even years to complete a house!  Granted the whole house is about the size of my parents’ living room, but I still think it’s impressive.  When we went to see the foundation for the first time, Laura and I freaked out a little bit.  Well moreso me probably.  Pretty sure it was written all over my face.  It was just so tiny that we weren’t sure a double bed would even fit in the bedroom, much less a set of drawers!  But then we stood over it and it looked better from that angle.  And when we went the next day when they had the foundations laid for where the walls will be, it looked even better.  Still tiny but livable which is all I’m going for really. 

Football news:  Chelsea beat Manchester United!!  Big deal since Man U. is having a great season and Chelsea’s has basically imploded.  Alas I did not get to watch because the staff room’s tv signal was out. 

Worst day of the month:  Pretty sure.  I don’t know, maybe I should go back and read my old posts to verify, but I don’t really want to remember those days anyway.  All I know is that this day was terrible.  It started out with such potential too.  As a member of the Chaminade planning committee, I was on the food subcommittee, so our first task was going into town to buy all of the groceries for the day’s 600 guests.  This actually sounded like fun to me because it was going to be with Mbale and Kaunda, two of my favorite people and I always love a good market day.  Except for that I forgot the level of indecision and inefficiency that often pervades activities here in Malawi.  Somehow I ended up being in charge of all the money.  Awesome.  So I got to work and of course none of the money was ready.  Spent 2 hours running back and forth between both schools, trying to wrangle checks out of people and having the right people sign things.  All things that should have been done beforehand by…say.. the financial person for the schools?!  But whatever, I finally made it all happen and we were on our way to town.  Had to go to the bank to cash the checks, so I suggested that the other teachers take the cash that we did have and start buying things.  I mean they’re grown men.  I’m 23 years old, cannot speak the language, and still have a very limited understanding of how market bargaining should work.  Seems logical that they go for it and start on things while I go to the bank.  But for some reason that suggestion only earned me a look that said I was clearly insane.  What, divide and conquer?!  What an insane idea.  We should all stay together in a little group, discussing every minute detail multiple times, taking 5 HOURS to complete a shopping trip that Laura and I alone could have done in 2.  I love both of them dearly and I kept reminding myself to breath and not get frustrated but by the end of the day I was just about ready to rip my hair out.  I’m gonna keep that in mind next year and refuse to be on the committee like all of the other MIRACLE teachers did this year.  No more getting thrown under the bus for me. 

Holiday fun:  Fortunately we had a holiday the following day!  It was very nice to just hang out and relax after that chaotic day.  Got to go see the house construction and then we stopped at Gondwe’s on the way home for a mineral.  Laura and I had a great time forcing Banda into a photo shoot and taking video confessionals of him.  We were going to also go to a concert that night at Planet K.A. which I was stoked for since the last concert was a blast… but alas it was pouring rain, so we failed. 

Chaminade Day:  The actual morning of Chaminade Day unfortunately started out just as chaotically as the shopping trip had been.  Out of the 6 committee members… I was the only one there that morning.  2 had gone out of town for the whole day.  2 were MIA.  And Kaunda was late.  It’s a good thing he showed up eventually though because I was woefully ill-equipped to deal with the fact that the firewood guy never came or to force the assigned women to cook when they were refusing to do so.  I decided that since the women were refusing, I would suck it up and go to the kitchen myself.  So even though I don’t know how to make most of the things they were preparing, I joined the Hotel & Catering students who were doing the bulk of the work.  Not gonna lie, I was thrilled when the ladies acquiesced somewhat and agreed to help supervise.  I ended up having a BLAST though!  Laura and I started out cautiously, learning how to chop cabbage and new ways to dice tomatoes and onions.  Spent hours doing all of that prep stuff, loving the opportunity to hang out with the madames and the students.  It was truly lovely to be a part of that sub-community on campus.  I also got to learn how to make hot cabbage – one of my all-time favorite meals!  I was a bit nervous because I was preparing it for 70 people in one huge pot and I was terrified that I’d ruin it.  But Cathy supervised me and I managed it all despite having aching arms from stirring such a large quantity. So proud of myself!!  And apparently the other teachers were very impressed, ticking off the Malawian woman’s qualifications box of being able to help the other madames cook for large parties.  I do believe I will volunteer myself for the job next year too!  I had way more fun talking with the women and preparing food than sitting through some boring speeches.  A great morning and a well-needed reminder of why I love Malawi.  Side note:  Laura and I have been talking a lot about this lately.  With all of the frustrations, it seems easy to get down in the dumps.  But Malawi never lets you stay upset with it for long.  It always finds a way to woo you back into loving it.  Be it a great conversation or an adorable kid or a learning moment or a random visitor.  There’s always some wonderful moment just waiting to pop up.  More Chaminade Day:  After lunch was ready, I was free as a bird!  Thoroughly enjoyed eating lunch in the courtyard with Banda and Kalua.  Cabbage was a smashing success and we were treated to an obscene amount of beef and even chicken!  Met Mrs. Kim, the opera singer from Korea who has occupied the former volunteer house.  Lovely lady and she even invited us to lunch next weekend (though we are having to reschedule).  Was a bit disappointed because the teachers’ football game was canceled due to time restraints.  I was really looking forward to watching the old teachers run around.  But the students’ game was fun to watch although it unfortunately ended in disarray as a fight with the referee broke out.  Disappointing to see students acting that way.  But the sitting and watching was fun.  We were with Beams which is always a blast and Vitu came to hang out with us too, spending the whole time lounging on our laps.  Except for when he abandoned me to go sit with Banda.  Although mine was the lap he fell asleep on lol so I was in charge of carting him home.  Carried him all the way home, his dead weight like a sack of potatoes, but my stubbornness won out of course. 

Little blessings:  Oh how I sit here giggling to myself about the pun.  Because Vitu is short for Vitumbiko which in English means Blessings.  So anyways, we were met with one of those Malawian blessings early one morning as Vitu and his relative Monica arrived at our doorstep lugging a basket of maize.  Vitu so adorable as he tottered along trying to lift the basket that was probably half his weight.  I didn’t want to assume it was a gift and I didn’t want to offend by trying to pay.  But unfortunately I only know the word for gift, not “to buy.”  So I pulled out my Peace Corps Volunteer Chitumbuka workbook and found the translation.  Loved the flash of excitement that lit up Monica’s face when we both realized it was a gift.  We didn’t have much in our house by way of return gifts, so Laura gave up one of her chitenjes for Vitu’s mum and I filled a bag of candy for the kiddos.  Hopefully my broken Chitumbuka was enough to convey how grateful we were to their family and how much it made our hearts swell. 

Minor medical emergency:  In the midst of an African thunderstorm with booming thunder and torrential downpour, I attempted to close the windows in my bedroom.  They’re not like American windows but are luvres.  So basically rectangular pieces of glass that are moved by a lever.  But sometimes they get stuck.  So I was pushing on one of them in addition to pushing the lever.  Bam.  Glass broken and my hand gushing blood.  Everywhere.  So I go running into the bathroom and stick my hand under the faucet.  Thank God we had running water that afternoon.  Laura said I freaked out… AKA I got really quiet and closed my eyes.  She was great – called Jim right way – he’s a nurse – and gave me a new white shirt to use to apply pressure.  He came over a few minutes later (despite the pouring rain – love him!) and checked it out.  Fortunately it’d clotted by that point so we could see it wasn’t too deep.  No stitches required and he put on some iodine and Neosporin and a bandaid and pronounced me fine.  I’ve just gotta keep it clean and dry and it should heal up in 4 days or so.  Hurts like the dickens whenever I stretch the skin too much, but I’m grateful that it was less serious than we originally worried.  Rather terrifying moment as I laid down to take a nap and the blood pressure of failing to keep my hand in the air resulted in the wound reopening and blood gushing everywhere again.  Oh and when I went out to greet Cosmas and in the span it took to walk around the house, I began dripping blood again.  Fantastic.  Fortunately I made it through the night without any more mishaps though.  Whew! 

Vegetable taco masterpiece:  Laura was a dear and ended up cooking dinner for us that night.  Mastered the art of chipate making and we figured out how to boil maize and make the wonderful vegetable tacos that Alick and Vicki always made for us.  Fabulous dinner – one that will be repeated many times I’m sure! 

Thanks Universe:  I should’ve known that the Universe would never send me a right-handed boy to love.  Spent a year and a half thinking Banda was right-handed.  His one flaw lol.  But seriously, on my list of goofy things that I’d love to have in a boyfriend, left-handedness is right up there :)  Along with twin-hood and red-headedness.  But some things have to be abandoned right?  Anyways, I was struggling to wash dishes left-handed in an attempt to avoid further bleeding and he was amused because apparently he’s a pro at using his left-hand.  So after some follow-up questions from me, I discover that he is in fact one of those Malawians who were forced as a child into right-handedness!  As a kid, he always tried to eat and write with his left hand but his mother forced him to change.  So now he only writes and eats with his right and does everything else with his left.  What are the odds of that?!  I knew the Universe was lookin’ out for me lol.