Call me Ishmael.  The young man managing Venice Beach, a joint family venture, didn’t hail from Moby Dick but was one of the reasons we decided to stay put when petrol became scarce country wide.  Ishmael and his staff (David, Paul, Muso x 2, Anna, Gren, Tiger and even ‘Cheese on Toast’) were helpful and genuine, creating a little bit of serene paradise along the lakes edge.  Two kms from town, we would walk in to shop at the small local market or eat a tasty lunch of sima (corn meal), red beans, greens and Irish potatoes, drizzled with spicy fresh tomato sauce, at the Kingfisher Eatery.  We became friends with many of the vegetable and fruit sellers, getting an extra potato or hand full of beans thrown in for ‘good customers’.  A ramshackle affair with jagged tin roofs, crooked tables and pounding music; only the smiles outnumbered the smells wafting by the meager produce of the day.  This was the heart of town, the pulse easily missed if racing by in a car.  Getting a ride home on the back of a bicycle, until the sand got too deep, was an option, and don’t forget to grab an ear of fresh maize roasted over the fire along the road.  Bags loaded we were ready for another 3-4 days of international gourmet cuisine in lakeside ‘Che Maari Safari ‘.

Walking to or from Monkey Bay town was always an event.  Visiting with the women at the well drawing water or interacting with the endless children trailing along we heard a funny story after several little two year olds in succession ran away from us in fright.  Seems when the children wouldn’t go to sleep at night, instead squirming and causing a disturbance in the otherwise quiet hut, the parents would warn them that they must be quiet or they would put them outside and a ‘muzungu’ (white person), would come along and steal them.  Our reputation precedes us.  Racism taught early.  Wonder if white parents worldwide ever warn their bad children that they would be stolen by black people lurking in the bushes?  We have heard over and over of children of many countries being scared into better behavior by warnings of witches or demons or animals lurking outside waiting to get the ‘bad little boys and girls’!  Great way to make them afraid of the dark.  In this village you could put your sleeping mat out in the sand and not a person, black or white, would bother you. 

As we witnessed a boy running around with a large dead monitor lizard on a string were also told that most snakes or lizards were filled with demons and promptly killed.  Isn’t fear/superstition great?  Better the energy be focused on the real danger hiding in the reeds on both sides of the bay, the haunts of cantankerous hippos, snakes and crocodiles.  But have no fear, local animist herbalists will mix up a concoction or conjure up a spell to ward off any dilemma you are facing.  For a fee that is.  Church or state – money talks.  

Further along you would cross the dirt runway of the airport.  We were lucky enough one afternoon to witness the weekly landing of the small Cessna type plane.  Appearing to have misjudged the approach it buzzed overhead just feet from the ground.  As it circled then bumped to a stop it was explained that the first run was just to scare away any animals on the runway.  Glad they don’t have to do that at O’hare Airport!    

Marching across the flat land leading up to the hills from the lake are groups of enormous baobabs.  The trunks on these beauties measure up to 30 ft in diameter.  Native to Africa, baobabs are only seen in Malawi, Tanzania, Mozambique, Madagascar, northern South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and  strangely in northern Australia, where Africans sailed thousands of years before.  There is a humorous story of how God, in a hurry, got mixed up and planted the trees upside down, with roots in the air.  Standing naked for the world to see, with only a few scattered leaves to protect their dignity, each tree has a personality of it’s own.  Walking by these giants we often circle them, pat their bottoms, and laugh at the personality traits that jump out:  ‘Bob’, ‘the General’, ‘the salsa dancers’, ‘Siamese twins’, ‘Baby Huey’, ‘knarly rasta man’,  ‘the Baroness’ and ‘bare-naked lady’ to name a few.  The list is only limited by your imagination.

Malawi seems to straddle time.  In the drier inland areas life continues much as it has for centuries.  Men hunt or fish as women draw and carry heavy water on their heads for miles.  That done they hoe the fields, pound maize or cassava into flour, gather indigenous plants to make into relishes or medicine, then cook for the family over a wood fire.  As in most countries in the hope of making money, the men often leave for the cities and are faced with the rude awakening of urban life.  At least back home in their rural village they can feed themselves, have quality family time and live with less stress.  Even with their meager existence, villagers often have less diseases than the rich men’s diseases prevalent  in the more ‘developed’ countries.  

Most Malawians are small subsistence farmers with the country’s large farms exporting tobacco, tea and sugar.  What was a thriving export ground to a halt recently by the thoughtless actions of the current president Dr Mutharika.  Petrol shortages have slowed transportation and raised prices.  Although we had to be flexible in our plans, lack of petrol allowed us to slow down, stay put, getting a closer look into Malawian village life.  Every cloud has a silver lining. 

Only the escalating prices are felt in these remote villages where politics and turmoil never seem to change life much.  Politicians come and go and they remain poor.

During the colonial period Malawi was incorporated into the Federation of Rhodesia.  Independence came under the leadership of ‘life’ President Banda in 1964.  Malawi held its first democratic elections in 1994 with current Mutharika leading almost 50 years of democratic rule.  Supposedly his first term was successful but something has soured in the last year, as is the case often in Africa.  Five months ago he closed down all the Universities because they were pointing out his decline.  The British Ambassador was summarily kicked out when he was quoted as saying that Mutharika was “acting like a dictator”.  No longer ruled by the colonizing countries every economy in the world is still tied in to the international business Forex system. 

Severing the ties with the E.U. has crippled the countries’ exportation, with the kwachas useless out side Malawi’s borders.  Without currency for trade, petrol is a rarity nowadays and as transportation costs rise so do prices in general.  To top it off  Britain just stopped millions of dollars of annual relief aid.  We all wish we could take back actions and words done in anger, but unless the president makes amends he is taking Malawi down the tubes along with his puffed up ego.  Oh and did we mention that as the people suffer the president just purchased a $150 million jumbo jet – which due to lack of maintenance is in Europe being repaired.  Complaints are valid and change is coming.  We even thought that by encouraging poor internet service, communication amongst citizens is difficult.  Without the web, finding the real truth is limited to government propaganda worldwide.  While visiting Malawi the tension grew and demonstrations turned into riots with looting and burning.  Eighteen people were killed by soldiers.  As villagers gathered around the booming transistor radio across from the front gate, the President was calling for citizens to pull together.  Enough is enough and the opposition gave the president 21 days to clean up his act.  If not, the demonstrators are returning to the streets and warned that they will not leave until he does.  Visas expiring and bad or cold weather gets us moving on.  Civil unrest also catches our attention. Guaranteed we will be long gone before the show down date approaches.  Growing pains of yet another struggling African country.  Power corrupts and so the story repeats globally.

And so it goes…………………………………..Next month the forgotten country of Zambia. Until then let’s take a walk outside the box.  You never know what you will discover or who you will meet.  Thanks for keeping an open mind as you join us on our journey into the unknown.  Glad you stopped by.   Keep in touch – we love hearing from you!

Take care.