My New Home

I'm all settled into my site now. I came into "town" (Lilongwe) today to meet up with some friends. We're all headed over to the lake for the first time tomorrow for a nice little XMAS vacation on the beach. Maybe I'll put up some pics of our adventure later on.

Anyways, I really like my site. Although it's relatively close to the capital, it's a very rural location. The closest source of electricity is 6k away (at another PCVs house, she was lucky enough to get a solar panel). The closest trading center, Mitundu, is a 15k bike ride away. This is where I will probably have to buy the majority of my food, and it is also where I can either catch a minibus or hitch a ride in town. As for the area around my site, it's pretty flat with lot's of farmland (at least during this time of year, while we have plenty of rain and the land is green, it sort of reminds me of Iowa).

The two big crops in this area are tobacco and maize (the people in my area were very disappointed to hear that I don't plan to plant either of these in my garden). I live near a smaller trading center which basically consists of a pair of very small general stores and a pair of tea rooms. The people in this area live in small villages, consisting of about 5-15 families (~6-13 people per family). Each little village is made up of extended family. The way this works (to the best of my knowledge) is that when a marriage occurs, the husband will move into a new home in the village of the wife.

My language is improving rapidly. As I said earlier, I’m in a very rural area. This means that very few people speak more English than “Hello!” or “Give me my money.” (no kidding, this is how they say it-it’s hard for me to take a beggar seriously when they use this gramatically poor phrase). Therefore, I’ve been speaking lot’s of Chichewa and making a fool of myself. Everytime I leave my house, I feel like the freak show at the circus, but I’m getting used to the confused stares and the “Azungu, Azungu!” (which roughly translates as rich, white, European) chants by the children. I have convinced these lille rascals to call me by my actual name.


My house is brand new. It certainly wasn't constructed with extraordinary craftsmenship, but it's better than anything I would have expected three months ago. The roof leaks when the wind is out of either the north or the west, but we plan to get this fixed...sometime. This is my backyard, with the chim (aka toliet) on the right and the entrance to the bafa on the left:

This is my kitchen/sitting room:

and my bedroom:


Some of you (Josh) may be looking for cheap ways to call me. The cheapest thing that I know of is a website called skype.com. I think it's like 13cents/min, although you have to make the call through the computer rather than an actually phone. It must be fairly simple to figure out because even my mom and brother were able to get it going;-}.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season. I’m starting to miss home, but I am truly enjoying my time here. Each day provides some interesting moments.

I’ll leave you with a pic of the most interesting critter I’ve seen thus far. I also have some pretty big spiders in my house.

Officially a PCV

I am now officially a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV)! I have completed training, and on Friday I will move in to my site/village. I’m looking forward to moving in so that I can unpack all of my junk and get everything organized. Living out of a bag is fun for a while, but after a few months it becomes a hassle, especially when you continue to accumulate more and more junk.

Here are some pictures from the Swearing In ceremony at the US Ambassador's home near Lilongwe:

While we were waiting for things to start, the Ambassador's dog, Atlas, provided some entertainment.

Next, we have (from left to right) the Peace Corps Malawi Country Director Dale Mosier (he will be ending his service as CD of Malawi in the next few days after six(?) years hear in Malawi), yours truely, and the US Ambassador to Malawi Peter Bodde. That tie of mine probably deserves an explanation. To start, you must know that short, fat ties are very fashionable here in Malawi. Wanting to fit in, I went to the market one day trying to find one. After digging through some piles of clothes and asking around, I found this lovely tie for under 1USD.

This is my language class with our trainer, Matthews, looking confused.

Last, here is the always entertaining Harry (our trusty driver whom will be delivering me and all of my belongings to site) and myself.
I have never been one to get very excited about ceremonies, but this was nice, and at the end of it I felt proud to be a new member of the Peace Corps. I shouldn't forget to mention that the food afterwards was fantastic. I ate way too much, but I felt that it was neccessary for me to take advantage of the situation since I will be diving into the village lifestyle soon I village lifestyle where quantity of food is more important than variety and quality.

On a different note, I am starting to miss some of the comforts of home, but at the same time I am thrilled to be here and everyday provides new excitement. The next few months (the beginning of service), are what most PCVs call the hardest so I’m trying to get mentally prepared for that. It will be a huge social change for me once I get to site since I have been living closely with 21 other trainees for the past few months. We have developed good relationships with each other, and I think it will be a huge shock for us all once we are alone at our respective sites.

Nevertheless, we are making plans for Christmas so that a bunch of us can get back together and share our horror stories from the first few weeks at site. Right now it looks like we’re going to head over to the lake for a few days of relaxation on the beach. I expect the homesickness will really set in once I get to site with Christmas coming up, and thus it will be nice to reconnect with some other Americans for a few days.

To anyone that is reading this: feel free to contact me. The easiest way would be through email. Notice that I have now posted my phone number; texting is fairly cheap, and it is free for me to receive your phone calls. Also, notice that you can post comments on this blog and . Finally, please tell me what you want to hear about on this blog. Right now I’m just rambling on about what I think is interesting, but if ya’ll want some other details just let me know.