Game Count Part 2: Transect Walk

October 6-7

Honestly I wasn’t looking forward to the transect walks this year.  The water hole count was so amazing, there was no way the transects could compare.  Not to mention last year’s walks were really really hot, people ran out of water and food, and got lost. 

The drill was that we hike a transect the first day, and sit in a hide down by the river the second day.

For our 10.5km transect (which probably turned out to be more like 15km because we didn’t know where we were going) we got in the vehicle at 4am in the morning and hiked from 5:30am – 9:00am.  I wasn’t a fan of waking up so early at first, but it was a blessing in disguise because we finished the hike before it became deathly hot. 

The hike was essentially a bust as I had anticipated.  We didn’t see much of anything; a few impala, bushbuck, warthog, roan antelope, and lilian love birds.  But what do you expect when you’re trudging loudly through the bush?

And of course no story in Malawi would be complete without its transport troubles.  We waited 3 hours before being picked up in a truck with not enough space because one of the groups found an impala that had died that morning and loaded it up in the back row of the truck.  The rangers cleaned and boiled it up for us for dinner.  The impala was a dark meat that was very tender and chewy, and tasted a bit like beef.

Later that evening we were visited by the US Ambassador and her husband.  She recognized us as Peace Corps volunteers and shared a few pleasant words with us.  But half of us (including myself) didn’t know who she was.  At the time, she was just the nice woman who interrupted my turn in Dominion.  And my friend next to me was embarrassed because he didn’t have his shirt on. 

Went to bed, but woke up to a lion roaring, circling the camp looking for scraps.  No one died (or saw the lion), but the guards were all around the camp with guns in hand.

The next morning we were up again at 4am for our turn to sit in the hide.  Turns out by “hide” they meant 8km hike.  It was okay though because we got to see some cool things, like recovering a wire snare laid by poachers (which started a discussion about poaching and corruption in the park), a massive hippo skeleton, a 2-day-old bushbuck (who clumsily bounded right up to us out of the bushes), croc tracks, turtle shells, hippo, elephants, waterbuck, bushbuck, warthogs, impala, roan antelope, water buffalo, sable antelope, and lilian love birds.

We got back to camp (after only waiting an hour this time), packed up.  And after a lost transect group was recovered, we loaded up the truck and headed home.  There were about 40 volunteers all trying to get to Lilongwe, creating an Amazing Race scenario that my travel partner and I won – the finish line being a shower at the lodge.

Sidenote: PCV’s aren’t eligible for Amazing Race.  Probably a good move for them because PCV’s would crush it every time!

College Fair

Last month Education USA hosted a college fair in Mzuzu.  Six other northern volunteers and I represented our alma maters and educated over 450 Malawian students on what it’s like to study at a university in the states.

There were a wide range of students who came.  Some very ambitious students wanting to know how to become brain surgeons and judges, and others who asked: “what do I do here?”.  Some teachers weren’t much better, responding to that question with: “you’re here to collect the flyers”.  But that’s why I was there, to help clear up simple questions.

Other questions I was asked frequently were:

What courses do you have? 

It didn’t take me very long to memorize UC Davis’ four colleges, and if they offered accounting (they do).

What about scholarships?

Thankfully there was an entirely separate table I could refer them to.

What do I need to do to apply?

English competency exam, SAT score, and MSCE scores.

Though my favorite question was probably: “I want to major in sociology; what is sociology?”

Overall it was a good day connecting with kids and feeling helpful.  Not to mention the free lunch that EducationUSA provided for us!

And this here is why UCD is awesome.

Joan bubbly as ever.

Melissa and Jay nomming the free lunch!

Andrew dropping knowledge.

Epic Fails

Maya Lau notes how coping with failure is under appreciated quality, and how Peace Corps facilitates coming to terms with, and growing through failure.  Here’s a quick list of all the things that I’ve failed at in Malawi, making me a great job candidate:

 

Projects

 

·         FSEA (Future Scientists and Engineers of America)-like program at CDSS (afterschool program to inspire and introduce science and engineering skills: no interest)

·         Teach at  CDSS (high school) (previous experience with pcv teaching at school didn’t go so well)

·         Tutor at CDSS (students quickly lost ambition to seek out a tutor, language barrier)

·         Women’s empowerment club TGSS (private women’s high school) (administration uncooperative)

·         Gender and Development Camp 2012 (not approved by PC)

·         Permaculture trainings (insufficient training sites, resources)

·         Fruit tree budding and grafting training (after submitting a grant, I deemed it unsustainable)

·         Tree nurseries (lack of motivation)

·         International/sustainable markets for LUSO (still looking for partnerships)

·         Getting my soap group to take good business notes (cultural differences)

·         Borehole beautification (complicated village dynamics)

·         Home Based Care for HIV/AIDS patients training for Village AIDS Committee (insufficient leadership in community)

·         Hiking local mountain (forestry officers are either too old to hike a mountain, or too afraid of snakes)

·         Vegetable gardens (harder than it looks)

·         Artemesia cuttings (problems establishing roots in cuttings)

·         The Maru’s cichlid research program (replaced by voluntourists)

·         Local language (plateau-ed)

 

Other

·         Falling out of a matola (its fine, we weren’t moving yet)

·         Getting electrocuted by lightning (don’t sleep on the ground during a lightning storm!)

ANAMED

Action for Natural Medicine (ANAMED[cite]) is a project started in Germany.  The founders have found have been researching local medicines in the tropics, and promoting them in the villages as an alternative to the health centers in Malawi.  The knowledge about medicinal plants has faded away throughout the generations in Malawi due to poor record keeping methods, and the perception that western culture is progressive and right, and African culture is outdated and wrong.

 

                The health centers in the villages often run out of supplies and aren’t easily accessible.  Health centers are supposed to be within 7km of every trading center, but that can be a far walk when you have malaria, and can’t afford to pay for transport (fuel prices keep rising, difficult to generate income), and don’t have a bike.

 

                ANAMED provides an alternative to the current health centers.  Natural medicine gardeners will always have a supply of medicines, and can sell medicines to people in need.  Back in May Peace Corps provided an ANAMED training for volunteers and a counterpart from their village. 

 

                I’ve recently been approved for a grant to promote ANAMED in my village.  Yesterday I received 15 artemesia seedlings, and I am heading to the Natural Resource Center in Lilongwe to buy 2kgs of morringa seed. 

 

                Artemesia is a shrub that treats malaria (among other things).  By making a tea from the leaves you can extract the oils in the plant with the medical properties. 

 

                Morringa is a tree with very nutritious leaves.  The leaves can be dried and made into a powder, and served in several ways like putting it in a tea, or poured over a dish.  This plant can help the malnourished and people living with HIV/AIDS, but is also just a great way to get more nutrients.

 

                I’ll be allocating these two plants through women’s groups and village AIDS committees in my area as per the conditions of my grant.  The groups are very excited at the opportunity of growing natural medicines, and are more excited about the opportunity to sell them. 

 

                Of course a sufficient amount of education is needed about identifying and treating diseases, and natural medicine is only an alternative to lack of access to contemporary medicine. 

                My counterpart is leading the promotion and education of ANAMED in the village, and is emphasizing to the groups to consult health workers first before making their own diagnoses’, and I is supplying them with proper ways to harvest, prepare, and correctly dose treatments.

 

                So far this is the first successful project I’ve been a part of, and has made me feel good about being here – like it’s all been worth it.

Animals for Africa - Love Made Tangible

I've previously posted about the Voice Flame Writers who came to Malawi to promote creative writing amongst women students last year.  Well one of the women who visited last year, Robbyn Alexander McGill, had inspired a women's group in my village to make stuffed animals of Africa as a way to support the women, vulnerable children, and orphans in my village. 

And her work isn't just limited to my village, she's doing similar things in other parts of Malawi and Uganda.  Please take a moment to check out her work at these websites and help spread the word: Animals for Africa- Love Made Tangible, IndieGoGo Campaign.

Hot Rainy Season and Beekeeping

After a long time waiting, the rains finally came in late December.  But it isn't quite what I expected.  It only rains about every 4 or 5 days, and sometimes its just a quick 5 minute session.  The farmers in my village (down at the lakeshore) don't seem too worried about it though.  Most of them planted cassava (a drought resistant crop, and the staple crop in the region), and the maize from genetically modified seeds designed for quick growth, are both doing just fine.  But up it in the mountainous village of Chikwina (Stacey's site), rain is less common.  As Stacey's neighbor put it "we're crying for the rains to come".

A good friend in my village tells me that many areas in Malawi are experiencing conditions similar to Chikwina's, and predicts that there may be a dought this year.  If this were to happen, it would severely affect the central and southern regions who plant almost exclusively maize crops, and not drought resistant crops like cassava. 

But all throughout Malawi, the rains have energized the villagers into bustling farmers, starting their work in the fields at first light, and continuing until dusk. Since most of the farmers in Tukombo are women (who are in charge of house chores), they use the last bits of sunlight to draw water from the bore hole, pound the cassava root into powder to make nsima, and cook dinner.

Since most villagers in Tukombo are busy in the fields preparing their food for the year, they have little time to listen to me talk about the benifits of planting trees.  But there's one group who still finds time to enjoy the forest reserve.

They are the Tukombo Beekeeping Club, and they are by far my favorite thing about Tukombo.  They are a group of about 10, but only 2 or 3 regularly show up to the weekly meetings.  I joined them last week as they went to harvest from some of their bee hives. 

The trip started when Mr. Nkhata came by my house to pick me up on time (which is actually a couple hours early in African time).  We to each members house in the group, informing them that it was time to start the meeting.  I asked him why they couldn't just meet somewhere at a scheduled time.  He's tried it before, but the other group members think he's trying to get out of his responsibilities as secretary, and think he's being lazy, so as an example of protest, they don't go to the meeting.

But this time around, we gathered 4 men and 2 women, and proceeded to check the hives.  The first 3 hives had been invaded by ants, eating all the honey and causing the bees to flee the hives.  The fourth hive had bees but no honey.  And finally the fifth hive looked promising.

The two women started a small fire to be placed in the "smoker" (a small tin cylindar used to generate smoke) which would be used to pacify the bees.  Meanwhile 2 of the men were putting on their bee suits and explaining to me how the bees were very aggressive at this hive, especially the soldier bees guarding the entrance to the hive (2 small holes designed to allow bees to get in and out).  Sometimes the bees were so aggressive that they'd follow the group several meters, stinging them the whole way.

Everything was set, and the 2 men went in.  One of them constantly generating smoke, and the other taking out the honey combs which grew on easily removed wooden slats on the top of the hive.  After about 15 minutes, they walked back to the group with a large bucket full of honey combs.  The woman closest to the bucket reached in to get a taste, but as quickly as she stuck her hand in the bucket, she pulled it out and quickly jumped up and started running away, yelling something in chitonga.  Then the next woman grabbed the whole bucket and started running for her the house.  Then we all started running after her because she had the honey!

By the time i got to the house, all the bees had left and everything was fine.  We then sat around in a circle, washed each others hands, and each took pieces of the honey comb and ate the honey.  It was the honniest honey I had ever tasted, it was so good!  There were also little pockets of a bitter taste.  Mr Nkhata enlightened me: "yea, those bitter things are the larvas.  They taste good if you fry them up in oil and add salt".  I might believe him if that wasn't how they cook all their meals.  Still, the honey and the experience were quite enjoyable, and I can't wait for the next harvest!

Hot Season

Its been hot-dry season since the end of September, so understandably projects in the village have been slowing down.  Not just the projects, but a general malaze has taken over the village.  Its too hot for people to do anything, they'll just nap for hours under a mango tree and wait for the reprise of late afternoon to do all their house hold chores.  So as far as projects go, I've just been doing my own individual projects (which includes helping a PhD student with taking some lake survey data -- awesome!).

November has brought with it humidity and thunderstorms at night.  The thunderstorms are are amazing to watch over the lake, but the humidity at night can be almost unbearable.  But hot-dry season is also mango season!  There are 4 or 5 large mango trees at my house which means there are always mangoes around, but that doesn't guarantee you'll get a ripe one (people are always coming over and taking mangoes, even if they're unripe!). 

The idea of property rights are a bit different that what I'm used to in the States.  It seems to be that all people are entitled to any fruits from any fruit tree.  It reminds me of the saying that explains how property rights matter as much as people want to respect them, and only apply when you can enforce them.

But other exciting things have happened in November, like the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Peace Corps and USAID.  It was a formal evening event at the Embassador's house.  There was catered food, live music, and many important dignitaries to shmooze with.  It was a good time.

The weekend after that a large group of us helped the Liwonde Park staff with a big-game count.  Stacey Neilson and I spent the first day on a 12km transect walk, and the second day in a hide near a water hole.  We saw more diversity of animals during the walk (including a run in with water buffalo, during which our guide shot his M-16 to scare them away as we ran the other way), but saw large groups of fewer animals while I was sitting in the hide (where we found an elephant!).  I brought my camera, but wasn't able to get any good pics.  It turns out all of those animals are really fast -- probably evolution or whatever.

And I just came back from a Thanksgiving getaway where a group of us met up to indulge in the good ol' American tradition of over eating.  Yes, even in Africa we managed to stuff oursevles to the brim with some well cooked Thanksgiving favorites. 

So now Stacey and I are preparing to seek out a couple permagardening experts, and learn what we can from them for the next few days, and take those skills back to site just in time for rainy season (starting in mid-December).  I can't wait, it should be a good time.  I'm sure they won't be afraid to put us to work.

'Till next time, take care all!