So Long and Thanks for all the Nsima

I fly to Joburg in a couple of hours, so I thought I would write one final blog from Malawi. (Although, I'll still do a few more entries as I travel).

Last Thursday we had a little farewell party for me with the senior staff and teachers at MCV. Actually, I threw the party for myself, since no Malawian could afford it. Some of the staff made some nice speeches thanking me, and a good time was had by all.

Friday was my last day at MCV. We had a closing ceremony for the school year, and a few students made nice farewell speeches to me. While saying goodbye was a little sad, it didn't really get me down since I know I'll be back.

The last 5 days I spent on vacation in Nkhata Bay. I stayed at Mayoka Village again, and met many travelers and had a great time. I even met some Ithaca College grads who knew some Canandaiguans. (Their names were Will, Mary-Ellen and Brendan, for any Ithaca grads reading this.)

I also took the Ilala (the ferry) one last time to visit a very remote beach paradise up the lake at Usisya. There was virtually no one there (except for a British guy who was volunteering in Usisya), and after waking up in my little thatch chalet on the beach I was able to pluck a few mangoes off the trees for breakfast. After spending the night at Usisya I hoped back on the Ilala to Nkhata Bay.   (The pictures are both from Usisya, the first one is the view from my chalet, the second one is the lounge area.)

Right now I'm in Lilongwe at an internet cafe, and I'll be making my way to the airport soon. After a couple days in Joburg I'll be off to Namibia.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!!

Fundraising

For anyone who reads the blog but isn't on my email list, I wanted to make a quick fundraising posting. (sorry for all of you who already got the email.) I'm trying to raise money for teacher salaries next year. We will need about $40,000 total, for 13 teachers. I am hoping to raise $15,000 by January, through small individual donations.

If you would like to make a tax deductible donation, please…
Make check payable to: Malawi Children’s Village and designate the check for teacher
salaries at Gracious Secondary School.

Mail to: Conor Brady
4140 West Lake Road
Canandaigua, NY 14424

Or donate online at www.malawichildrensvillage.com
When donating online, please designate for Gracious Secondary School, by putting Gracious Secondary School in the “in honor of section.” We hope to update the website soon to have a proper field for designating money when donating online. Also, if you donate online, it would be a big help if you could email me, to tell me, so I can make sure the donation was properly designated.

Zikomo!

Koche Hill Primary

The other day I went with Felix (our assistant director) to visit a couple primary schools. Koche Hill Primary School, just a few km from MCV, is typical of most primary schools in Malawi. It has about 150 kids in a typical class (with one teacher). As you can see in the picture, they are also short on classrooms. Three of the classes are held outside. Often during the rainy season, these children have to be sent home because there is nowhere to teach them. I hope to find a school in the U.S. that can "adopt" Koche Hill. (MCV has already helped numerous primary schools through this school-to-school strategy.)

On our way back, Felix was nice enough to give some of the students a ride home.

Ending Days

With only two more weeks until I fly out, I think it’s safe to say that this will be one of my last blog entries from Malawi.

We had our last football game of the year two weekends ago against Koche Hill. I am still confused as to whether the Koche team consisted of mainly students with a couple villagers thrown in, or simply all villagers. Some of our students insisted that they were all villagers. The Koche Hill headmaster and the villagers/students insisted that they were students. Accurate information is hard to come by here. Either way, we had fun, and won 2 to 1.

We had one last quiz competition Saturday. It was fun once again, though I can’t really think of anything interesting to report. 1B defeated 1A for the second time in a row. I’ve been busy reviewing the year’s work with my kids, getting them ready for the test next week.

Tomorrow is my last day of actual teaching. Next week students will be taking exams, and on Friday the 16th our school year ends. After that it’s vacation once again! I fly to Johannesburg on the 22nd, spend 2 days there, fly to Namibia for a 4 day desert safari (which should include sky diving), and then head down to Cape Town for two more weeks in South Africa. And then, on the 13th of December, I’ll be headed back to the States.

On a side note, it's been extremely hot lately. This is the hottest time of year in Malawi, right before the rains come. It rained a lot a couple weeks ago, and some people thought the rains were here, but now it's looking like that was just a tease. The rains normally come at the end of November. Everywhere you look you can see men, women, and children busy cultivating their fields, so that they will be ready to plant when the rains come.

Sports Fields

We hired a bulldozer, and have begun flattening a large track of land which will be used for sports fields. With the new fields Gracious will be able to host its own football and netball matches next year. In the future, we hope to develop other things on the land like basketball and tennis courts.

Liwonde

Last week saw a plethora of azungu at MCV once again. Board members Bob and Cindy were here along with four other western NYers. I joined them for entertaining games of cards a couple of nights at Palm Beach, and on Monday I skipped school (gasp!) to join them on a trip to Liwonde National Park.

Liwonde is Malawi’s most well known game park (if anything in Malawi can be considered well known), and is only about a two hour drive from Mangochi. We went for a boat game drive in the morning, had some lunch at Mvuu (hippo) Camp, and then went on a 4x4 game drive. We were all impressed with the amount of wildlife we saw, especially on the boat ride. We got to see crocodiles, hippos, warthogs, a few different kinds of antelope, many varieties of birds, and of course, elephants. I was impressed with the size of the crocodiles. I was hoping some would feast on what looked like a buffet of warthogs and antelope on the river bank, but I guess they weren’t hungry.

I think everyone’s highlight was seeing two ndembo (both with heads still attached) out for a swim.

Some Cape Maclear Pictures

I went to Cape Maclear again a few weeks ago, and somehow never mentioned it on the blog. Not much new to say about Cape Maclear as it was my 6th trip there. I went by myself, but met an English guy named Tony who I hung out with most of the time. Mostly I just relaxed on the beach, but I also went for a hike in the hills that surround Cape Maclear. Tony and I got thoroughly lost on the hike but still managed to see some nice views and get back safe.