no nannys

Regular readers will remember that I once said that we would never have a dog or a nanny. The dog arrived months ago and as I write rampaging around my garden are 3 nannies, our housekeeper (Dorcas) and 6 children!! I am embracing the benefits of life here and letting the kids get on with it. It still feels odd and I do find myself making tea for all the nannies!

 

I am actually borrowing a friend’s nanny for a day next week as I have a meeting in a museum 3 hours drive away so we are having a team night away.

cute

This our youngest taking part in her nursery end of term play!! She was the youngest participant and looked this serious the whole way through. Notes to those threatening me with cruelty: I didn’t even know what role she had before we saw the play.

at the top

I have had a weekend off from kids and climbed Mulanje. This is the highest mountain in this part of Africa so am feeling quite chuffed and very stiff! It was an amazing experience, we did it in style, with porters carrying our kit (including a bottle of wine) and reached the mountain hut at about 4pm on Saturday and enjoyed a gentle stroll to admire the sunset and the full moon.

On Sunday we set off to meet what's known as the jungle route down. This was an incredibly steep descent with quite a bit of scrambling but it was using different muscles to the uphill of Sat! I read Samuel 22 v 31-37 yesterday and understood the last verse "you broaden the path beneath me, so that my ankles do not turn over" many times on the way down the path suddenly narrowed and we were grateful to get to the bottom unscathed!

living today

Our eldest began the day by asking if we were going to England today. I think that she is still processing saying goodbye to her friend, it is especially hard because most of her friends have already left for the UK and we keep talking about when we go. I am going to make a conscious effort for us all to enjoy today and the next few weeks "before we go".

I expect that most of us live life planning what will happen next instead of living today. Malawians take this to the other extreme, we find that our staff don't like to plan for next month or next year, they're just trying to get through this week. Our cook regularly runs out of staple ingredients or I find that we've had no cleaning stuff for a few weeks because they don't tell me until after it has run out.

road trip

The photos were taken on our way to Nayla Park a lovely wildlife reserve only an hours drive away. However the story is about our road trip to Lilongwe: everyone says that it’s 3 hours drive (4 tops) from Blantyre to Lilongwe, we’ve never found this to be true. Our first experience was when we arrived in Malawi and the journey took all day because the driver didn’t have all his paperwork, got stopped for speeding as well as a regular stop by the police! This time the journey there was quick and uneventful, we met the friends who were leaving for the UK and after a night in Lilongwe set off home about 10.30am. We thought that we’d found a short-cut out of the city, which proved to be wrong and was a route that we’d used before and it’s really slow, we were driving two cars back so there wasn’t time for any nifty map reading. I had the easy drive listening to BBC world service whereas the doc had the air/con and the kids! Driving long distance in Malawi is quite tedious as the roads are reasonably good so you get a good speed up then you get stuck behind a slow lorry or reach another village and have to slow down and then there’s the speed traps. We both got caught at a speed trap one behind the other and pulled over. I was trying to impress the cop with my Chichewa and southern African driving licence in the hope that he might be lenient but he explained that we would both be paying the fine. I went to check the video footage (essential as it’s quite common to be accused and find that you weren’t caught) but there we were both speeding. I came back to the doc to find him deep in conversation with the policeman about his medical problems and a long conversation later our fine was reduced from 10,000 MK to 2. I’m still not sure what the doc agreed to but was relieved at the lower charge as we didn’t have enough cash to pay the fine and buy lunch!

uk

We are counting down the days until we fly to the UK (in Aug); the doc has 3 weeks work in Liverpool so we are able to come for 5 weeks. Preparations are underway: there is a long list of things to buy (a year’s worth of clothes & shoes), the docs samples are about to sent, I have been booking in with the relatives (fitting round busy schedules & trying not to do the 2,000 miles driving we did last time), organising staff and bills here as well as leaving things ready for some doctors who will be living in our house. The doc’s samples take a few weeks to get to the UK, they travel in luxurious dry ice via South Africa and London before arriving in the lab in Liverpool where the doc will do some fancy tests.

 

We’re looking forward to chocolate, catching up with friends and family, not sleeping under mosi nets and long evenings (playing croquet on the lawn). Living here is an amazing experience and there are some aspects of life that are great but if we could move back to the UK tomorrow I would.

No blog

No blog, that's what happens when you have visitors. We're really
enjoying our guests but everyday life gets put on hold. The doc was
reluctant to go to work and the errands seemed endless. It's been
amazing spending time with friends that know us well and continuing
conversations that we began years ago; I still find it hard having
only new friends.

Our current guests include two kids under 3 so they have proved that
it's very possible to travel to Malawi with kids! Watch this space for
a guest blog from one of our visitors.