After more than a week back at Likulezi I am well back into the rhythm of the Day/ Night cycle of my living...having re -kindled the little forgotten habits necessary for my sojourn here in the bush.
Im awake at around 6 am...at least an hour after the villagers in these parts who have already worked their fields while I doze on. Never good in the morning I hear Mpaha arriving from his village , chopping firewood and clattering around, sweeping and making breakfast. Breakfast for me is rice porridge mixed with banana with a sprinkling of powdered milk ....watched by a few monkeys sitting on the gatepost.! This of course is luxourious living for the people of these parts would be lucky to have some nsima left from the previous day or maybe some sweet potatoe. This year being particularly difficult since the crops have been decimated by the winters floods. Tea is my biggest luxury and comfort and I have a big flask which sits on my table to give me a necessary boost throughout the day.This same flask is carefully stored away when I leave and reappears on my table on my return here yearly...even though I would have forgotten all about it. Its not common hereabouts for people to drink tea...tea leaves are a luxury so tea to them is hot water and sugar...itself also a luxury!
All the staff have arrived by 7am ( 4 in all) and there are always stories from the villages...from villagers battles with guards over making charcoal to (most likely true ) to 3 boys being killed by ants (doubtful!)...but there never seems to be a dull moment...if not seen by me since the nearest village is about a kilometre down the track.
Since Friday is designated while Im here as orphan family visiting day so we set off on the motorbike ...me on the cushion to protect someone not well endowed from all the bumps ( the cushion is a bit of an embarrasment for Julius).. but still it appears though I myself would have again forgotten its existance. We had decided to visit 3 families and update the orphan photos but life is never so simple and the tracks to the houses were so hazardous due to the decimating floods of this year that we only managed to get to 2. Even the motorbike couldnt negotiate the boulders, broken bridges and slippery sand and so we spent much time walking and balancing on rickety bridges while women below washed clothes and I hoping that I wouldnt land on top of them. But anyway bad as the journey was it was worth it to visit these resilient families.
The first family was headed by Roseby....a grandmother herself ....caring for her own blind mother and 7 orphaned grandchildren. Of her own 8 children only 1 is still alive ...this being the Lost Generation due to AIDS. But Oh......I was humbled by her sheer resilience and accomplishments. There she is with all this burden......husband long dead...and she had year by year saved what she could from her tomatoe sales and managed to build a very decent house with iron sheet roofing. This was verified by the blind old mother who nodded in appreciation as she told us how she managed. She had also been using her permaculture skills ( taught yearly to orphan families by the project ) and made a success of the venture.
Our second family was in such a remote area that we had to get a little boy ( a very clever litlle fellow ) to guide us while sitting in front of julius on the bike since the tracks to the village had almost been obliterated. But these peole were really impoverished.. the chief dressed in a ragged ladies blouse rags .. a clever and literate man. By the time we did manage to reach the house we had a following of about 50 children all gathered along the way . This lady...” Mwandida”.. also a grandmother was keeping 4 orphans. Of the 15 of her own children only 2 still alive......that same generation wiped out! We took the photos of the orphaned children and also had to take photos of the follower children, the chief and of course Mwandida herself just so that no one feels excluded. Its really painful to see these children so full of life, joy and intelligence and to wonder what sort of life they can muster....it is to be hoped that some will be lucky because its lucky they would have to be in order to surmount the difficulty of emerging from dire poverty such as this.
And so we arrived back to the centre to transfer the photos to the computer...(here at the centre we have electricity ..though intermittant ) and to chat to chief mangoza who is the orphan programme coordinator about our visits. And so on to our place 2 kilometres up the mountain track with the majestic mulanje Mountain ahead of us..... hot and dirty to a welcome lunch prepared by Mpaha...nsima, Beans and turnip leaves...and I of course had my cup of tea.
And now its dusk and all are gone back to their villages and I here alone ...well not really since we have 3 watchmen who are sitting out on the front balcony in the shadow of the great mountain... chatting. Im sitting at my round table writing this and enveloped by the symphony of the bush...the singing of the crickets and the occassional bark of a hyena and the comforting chatter of the watchmen....and suddenly the extra little comfort of a text from my sister. These watchmen have been with us for years and even though Solomon looks like hes on his”last legs” and can only limp along I would hate to lose them...I know them too well by now. They never want to give up work because that means back to dire poverty and so they usually die on the job !! Its a dark night but star spangled...the stars seem so big and bright here and some nights I lie in my hammock and enjoy the spectacle. But tonight I'm tired ...soon I will go inside . I'll chase all those little fellas out....its a pity I'm not an entomologist...I would be most happy!...I'LL make sure none have got into my bed and them ill snuggle down under my mosquito net and have the luxury of a read by candleight...and then zzzzz.
Im awake at around 6 am...at least an hour after the villagers in these parts who have already worked their fields while I doze on. Never good in the morning I hear Mpaha arriving from his village , chopping firewood and clattering around, sweeping and making breakfast. Breakfast for me is rice porridge mixed with banana with a sprinkling of powdered milk ....watched by a few monkeys sitting on the gatepost.! This of course is luxourious living for the people of these parts would be lucky to have some nsima left from the previous day or maybe some sweet potatoe. This year being particularly difficult since the crops have been decimated by the winters floods. Tea is my biggest luxury and comfort and I have a big flask which sits on my table to give me a necessary boost throughout the day.This same flask is carefully stored away when I leave and reappears on my table on my return here yearly...even though I would have forgotten all about it. Its not common hereabouts for people to drink tea...tea leaves are a luxury so tea to them is hot water and sugar...itself also a luxury!
All the staff have arrived by 7am ( 4 in all) and there are always stories from the villages...from villagers battles with guards over making charcoal to (most likely true ) to 3 boys being killed by ants (doubtful!)...but there never seems to be a dull moment...if not seen by me since the nearest village is about a kilometre down the track.
Since Friday is designated while Im here as orphan family visiting day so we set off on the motorbike ...me on the cushion to protect someone not well endowed from all the bumps ( the cushion is a bit of an embarrasment for Julius).. but still it appears though I myself would have again forgotten its existance. We had decided to visit 3 families and update the orphan photos but life is never so simple and the tracks to the houses were so hazardous due to the decimating floods of this year that we only managed to get to 2. Even the motorbike couldnt negotiate the boulders, broken bridges and slippery sand and so we spent much time walking and balancing on rickety bridges while women below washed clothes and I hoping that I wouldnt land on top of them. But anyway bad as the journey was it was worth it to visit these resilient families.
The first family was headed by Roseby....a grandmother herself ....caring for her own blind mother and 7 orphaned grandchildren. Of her own 8 children only 1 is still alive ...this being the Lost Generation due to AIDS. But Oh......I was humbled by her sheer resilience and accomplishments. There she is with all this burden......husband long dead...and she had year by year saved what she could from her tomatoe sales and managed to build a very decent house with iron sheet roofing. This was verified by the blind old mother who nodded in appreciation as she told us how she managed. She had also been using her permaculture skills ( taught yearly to orphan families by the project ) and made a success of the venture.
Our second family was in such a remote area that we had to get a little boy ( a very clever litlle fellow ) to guide us while sitting in front of julius on the bike since the tracks to the village had almost been obliterated. But these peole were really impoverished.. the chief dressed in a ragged ladies blouse rags .. a clever and literate man. By the time we did manage to reach the house we had a following of about 50 children all gathered along the way . This lady...” Mwandida”.. also a grandmother was keeping 4 orphans. Of the 15 of her own children only 2 still alive......that same generation wiped out! We took the photos of the orphaned children and also had to take photos of the follower children, the chief and of course Mwandida herself just so that no one feels excluded. Its really painful to see these children so full of life, joy and intelligence and to wonder what sort of life they can muster....it is to be hoped that some will be lucky because its lucky they would have to be in order to surmount the difficulty of emerging from dire poverty such as this.
And so we arrived back to the centre to transfer the photos to the computer...(here at the centre we have electricity ..though intermittant ) and to chat to chief mangoza who is the orphan programme coordinator about our visits. And so on to our place 2 kilometres up the mountain track with the majestic mulanje Mountain ahead of us..... hot and dirty to a welcome lunch prepared by Mpaha...nsima, Beans and turnip leaves...and I of course had my cup of tea.
And now its dusk and all are gone back to their villages and I here alone ...well not really since we have 3 watchmen who are sitting out on the front balcony in the shadow of the great mountain... chatting. Im sitting at my round table writing this and enveloped by the symphony of the bush...the singing of the crickets and the occassional bark of a hyena and the comforting chatter of the watchmen....and suddenly the extra little comfort of a text from my sister. These watchmen have been with us for years and even though Solomon looks like hes on his”last legs” and can only limp along I would hate to lose them...I know them too well by now. They never want to give up work because that means back to dire poverty and so they usually die on the job !! Its a dark night but star spangled...the stars seem so big and bright here and some nights I lie in my hammock and enjoy the spectacle. But tonight I'm tired ...soon I will go inside . I'll chase all those little fellas out....its a pity I'm not an entomologist...I would be most happy!...I'LL make sure none have got into my bed and them ill snuggle down under my mosquito net and have the luxury of a read by candleight...and then zzzzz.
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