homestay in an african village

Hello everyone- so I survived my night in the deep dark bush of Africa- when the sun sets, it is pitch blackness.

The hut I stayed had a single candle, we stayed with a young family with four children under 5. Luckily, I had a translator staying with me- as we had many visitor's to the hut that night with many questions about why I am in Malawi, what does Canada think/know about Malawi,when will I come back.


An elderly women took my hand and made me give her my word that I would not forget about them when I return to Canada... just a tad bit of pressure.


In the the 2 room hut, we were given one whole room, where I am sure the kids normally slept.

I stepped outside in the pitch black and the stars were the brightest I have ever seen. Bed at 9:30pm, probably an earliest record for me.

The funniest part of the night; I was asking Amon, my translator, what was the noise coming from the corner of our room. A chicken, he replied, very nonchalantly, me thinking it was in a sealed pen took my flashlight out, only to see a chicken simply sitting in the corner of the room, no pen. I was then told that in the middle of the Fertilizer bags I was sleeping next too, was also another chicken.

Cut to 5 am and me feeling something running across my feet, suddenly awake, looked up to see the chickens standing at the door, like a dog, wanting to go out. For the next hour, I was awoken again by little chicks walking around the floor, then also a stray dog wondered in as well. Helped with some chores and then headed back to school for our last day of teaching this school.

So that's one to scratch off the life's need to do list.

As I was working as a Teacher Facilitator this week, these are the teachers I spent many many hours discussing their challenges. They are given very little curriculum to teach the students about HIV and very few resources, they even asked me, so humbly, if I could leave them a bottle of glue, that is how few resources they have to work with. This picture shows them singing and dancing for the students.

When I first met the woman in red, I asked her name, she told me Ann, I then told her that my mother's name was Ann and she said "Therefor, here in Malawi, you are my son". Today at lunch I mentioned that the necklace she was wearing was very pretty. At the end of the day as we were about to leave, she came to me with the necklace in her hand and told me to give to my real mother......... And you have to have imagine, these people have very few possessions. I thanked her but told her I could never accept such a generous gift. These people continue to amaze me every day.

That's all for now. Hope you are all doing well.
Tisomo

Written By:
Jason Doucet, Volunteer, Malawi January 2010 Development Team
14 January 2010