Camp Sky

Sometimes you get to teach students who you can tell are always thinking; only in Malawi have I ever felt bad for those kids. One of my students, Ken *, is one of those kids. Ken reminds me of a close friend back home, or at least, the fifteen year old incarnation of him. I don’t know why; maybe it is his smile, or the way he lingers over the Encyclopedias in the Library, poring over articles about foreign countries.
It takes a while to ‘crack’ a classroom, especially one where nobody speaks English, but Ken made it easy for me when I started teaching last December. I could glance over into the back corner where he sat, his head ranging about above his peers, who would inevitably be hunched over their work, weather they understood or not, and he would shoot me looks that clearly said ‘they’re lost’, or ‘speak more slowly’- and at rare times, a slow deliberate nod when they understood.
Another student who made an impact on me was Olivia*. I noticed the way she stood, I liked that she held her arms akimbo, she was one of the only girls I had met at the school who isn’t afraid to stand up straight, and with the way her ears stuck out, she reminded me of a pitcher. When I started in December her English wasn’t great, but has since improved dramatically. She comes into the library at every break, often with a question. When she arrives it is usually with a whispering posse behind her who watch as she walks up to my desk with an open book and asks a question like ‘what is in the middle of the earth?’ This sends us on a frantic search for books with pictures of volcanoes and diagrams of the earth’s crust. She was the student who sold me Hector the puppy for three dollars, and, poor girl, reminds me a lot of myself.
I take my bike into town every Friday, and pass groups of students on the way. They shout greetings at me and scatter out of my way as I go by. On one particular trip into town, Ken came to talk to me while I was buying a pumpkin from the vegetable stall. Always polite and smiling, Ken told me that he was going to visit his father in the hospital, and that his mother was already there. I didn’t realize at that time that in Malawi, people only go to the hospital to die.
The following Monday, I taught my lesson as usual, and Mondays are never good. I teach the first period of the day on Mondays, so students come to class late or tired. Most days the room is not swept on time, so I need to wait until the dust settles before I can teach. This Monday was the same as the rest, so I left annoyed. I was halfway across the yard to my desk in the Library where my mug of coffee waited when I noticed Olivia tramping down the hill behind me, her coltish limbs flailing.
“Miss,” she shouted “wait wait” I stopped to ask her what she wanted, expecting some whimsical question about lightening or the changing of the seasons. Instead she said: “Don’t yell at Ken today. Yesterday he lost both his parents, so if you see him, and his head is down, he is thinking of his parents.” Before I could respond, she turned heel and plodded back up the hill.
Ken still comes to class every day. He is polite and works hard. Olivia still asks questions, and has made her way through our best science and animal books. I enjoy teaching them, but I know that these kids have the cards stacked against them. I decided to invite both of them to Camp Sky, the annual summer camp Peace Corps volunteers in the Education sector organize. It isn’t much, but maybe the encouragement will be good for them, because I have to believe that education in Malawi can work.
Every successful Malawian that I have ever talked to about education has cited the impact of a single person or event to their success. Last week, while I was helping out with training in Dedza, I talked to one of our language trainers, Dinah, about her own experience growing up in Malawi. Her father was a teacher, and he decided to send his daughters as well as his sons to school. Her aunt advised against this, echoing the public sentiment that the girls would only go to school and become pregnant, but her father said he needed to be able to look his daughters in the eye and say he tried. Dinah went on to finish her education, and now has a job teaching Chichewa to Peace Corps trainees. She told us that with her first paycheck, she went out to buy sugar, soap and bread and brought it to her aunt and gave it all to her, saying “here, this is the pregnancy I came home from school with”. Her aunt cried, and now encourages her own granddaughters to go to school.
While I was in Dedza, I also got to meet William Khambwa, also known as ‘The Boy who Harnessed the Wind’. William’s family could not afford to send him to school, so he spent his teenage years studying on his own using books from his community library. During a drought, he decided to try to build a windmill so his family could irrigate their fields. His community thought he was crazy, but he was able to use a windmill to generate electricity for his home, which attracted international attention, landing him a scholarship and a book deal. We wanted to get William to come to Camp Sky so he could speak to the students, but he starts as a freshman at Dartmouth soon, so he couldn’t make it, and came to speak to the Peace Corps trainees instead. I wasn’t expecting him to be shy like my students, but he was. He stood in front of us, talking about his engineering in terms that were far over my head, but he did it in a way that was gracious and calm. We asked him about his plans for the future, and he talked about his plans for attaining his degree in Electrical Engineering, and his hopes to work in sustainable alternative energy fields. He runs a camp for children in his community so that they can make their own windmills, and has since sent his friends and family to school. What would have happened if not for that Library?
I suppose that’s the thing about Peace Corps, or maybe about life in general. You never know what the event will be that will be the catalyst for change, and it is selfish to demand that you see the world improve before your eyes, but you have to keep trying anyway. I think that Olivia and Ken can really do something great for Malawi someday, but life isn’t going to be easy for them. Going to this camp could really make a difference, maybe the goat dissection my friend Jenn has planned will make Olivia decide she wants to be a doctor- or maybe Alexis’ writing classes will inspire Ken to become a journalist. I don’t know what will happen, but these kids can show me if I let them.
Today Ken and Olivia came to visit me in the library to talk about what to pack for camp- they are both bright with excitement. I told Ken about William’s windmills, and loaned him my copy of The Boy who Harnessed the Wind, hopefully we will be able to visit the original windmill during the camp. The two were so happy that I didn’t want to tell them that we are in desperate need of funding for Camp Sky.
I’d love my students to have a chance to attend, if you would like to help, please follow the link below if. My students and I send a ‘Yewu Ukongwa’ to you for reading.
*Names have been changed (mainly so that ‘Mericans can pronounce them)

Camp Sky

Damnit. I wrote an exceptional post about my students this week- really top stuff, the kind of thing that I'm sure would make people cry. Or maybe it would just make my mom cry... if you are sleep deprived, maybe you'd cry. Point is that I forgot to load the post onto my flash drive. Hopefully I can put it up tomorrow.

Maybe I can sum up: Camp Sky needs money. I have two wonderful students to send, but our funding is in jeopardy. If you can donate, please follow the link below. Tear jerker to follow tomorrow.

http://www.friendsofmalawi.org/grants/how_to_donate.html

Back at Home

So I'm back home in Chintheche. I was waiting for my water to boil for coffee when I was bothered by this awful grinding noise- it was my hot plate officially shitting out on me. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm a peace corps volunteer, I don't need a hot plate, but damnit, I'm not feeling good, and I don't have a charcoal burner or a kerosene stove, and I'm on some antibiotics with questionable side affects, so the last thing I want to do is go out rousting for wood. Blargh.

I hopped on my bike and went to the town 20 minutes away, but all the shops that sell hot plates are closed, so now I'm at the internet cafe surfing my troubles away.

The President's Luncheon was really cool- the food was great. The menu listed beef, curry chicken, fish, and beans under 'main course'. We all wondered if that meant we would have to choose beef or chicken or fish or beans- luckily, this is Malawi, so we got heaping portions of each, which we devoured. There was also endless wine, champagne, beer, and Armarula (a kind of bailey's only flavored with a fruit that only grows in Southern Africa). We sat through some speeches, and Bingu called us all his children, which is too bad for him, because now we'll all be asking for packages from him every few weeks. Then he called us all out onto the dance floor where we tore it up, Bingu and his wife Callista included. I was proud of us, because we all kept it together until after we took a picture with the President. Once Bingu left though, it was all over, the dancing, oh, the dancing.

Being PCV of the week was awesome too- Esther and I were in Mpalale again, and it was great to see my host family again. Bruce, who was a puppy while I lived there, is now a full grown dog! He followed us all around the village for the entire week, and was just all around cute. I feel bad that I didn't take him back when I was a trainee, but I'm trying to convince one of the newbs to take him to site. The trainees were all so cool, we had a great time- I can't wait to work with them for the next year and a half.

I can't believe that I've been here for almost 10 months, time really goes. Sometimes it is rough being here while my friends and family are all back home, and missing out on things like the family reunion really sucks, but I'm glad to be here. I know that this is where I need to be.

Bingu Woyee?

Hey guys! I am currently in the Peace Corps offices waiting to take the lot of us to the State House to eat with the President of Malawi. Woyee!

Off to help to train the newbs!

It is weird to think that soon I'll be a second year, and that we are already training the replacements for my friends in the year ahead of me. Of course, the school calendar changing makes it extra strange, because the new group came early, so in actual fact, I won't be a 'second year' until September. Still- people are going to be asking me for advice about Malawi. Strange.

Never Don't Go

I never thought of myself as the type of person who would get into an abusive relationship. I once dumped a guy for excessive bickering and have a joke that I like my men like I like my coffee: sweet, short and weak. Of course, this is not true, I actually like very bitter coffee, but that’s beside the point. I recently realized that I am actually in an abusive relationship with my profession.
I love teaching- I love being in the Peace Corps. Sure, sometimes I go home to my little house where termites are eating my walls and I don’t have a toilet and feel so homesick that I want to cry (and often do), but you just don’t know what it’s like with us. Sure, it sounds bad, but you don’t know how things are between us, really. When it is good, it is really good. I have heard the exact same sentiment echoed by people in bad relationships- when it is good, it is really good.
So, for those of you who wonder why I am still here after reading about my Life Skills class, here is a story about something good.
Last weekend was the 4th of July, so nearly every volunteer I know was in the capital for a barbeque at the ambassador’s house. We booked every bed at the two cheapest lodges in town, and gave them a hell of a time trying to stock enough beer for all of us. When it came to deciding where to go for the night I believe the term ‘herding cats’ is apt.
One group wanted to go to the Casino, but my friend Alexis warned against it.
“Why not?” I asked
“Well, I guess it depends” she said “If you like slutty dancing, and bad music you might like it… when I was there last, the music was all ‘untz, untz, untz, untz,’ and everyone was dancing like ‘ah, ah, ah, ah,’… it really was a one time thing for me”
As amused as I was by Alexis’ full body interpretation of a night at the Casino, I decided to take her advice and investigated the next major headliner of the night, some place called ‘oasis’
“What is there to do at Oasis?” I asked a second year
He just looked me in the eye and shouted “OAISIS”
“Yeah, but is there dancing, is it expensive?”
“Oh-Ay-Sissss”
“Ok, but where is it even?”
“OASIS!!!”
I decided that Oasis was too intense for me, so I went with the group heading out to the Karaoke bar- we hopped in taxis and were off. When we got to the hotel housing this Karaoke extravaganza that was so highly hyped by the only person who had ever been there before, our taxi driver tried to negotiate for a higher price than the one he had agreed upon when he was trying to get us into the taxi. Nope. Sorry dude. Next time you negotiate a price, make sure you are happy with it before you take the inebriated people to their destination. We’re already here- see ya.
The hotel was dead. Like, really, really dead- as in only one member on staff kind of dead. We asked him about the Karaoke, and he smiled and led us up the narrowest stairwell I have ever been on into a private room with a television.
I don’t know about you, but to me, Karaoke is best done in front of a large crowd of people for maximum embarrassment- not in a small room with only people who already know you… what was this? My family reunion (actually… it felt a lot like that, to be honest).
We all giggled about this for a little bit, and Meg said that actual Karaoke bars in Tokyo were in single rooms like this, but I still thought it was strange- that was, until the music started.
Zeb did a move familiar to me as ‘the around the clock’ to get things started, and then all hell broke loose, and we danced like a bunch of 12 year old girls at a sleep over. Someone accidentally broke a glass during a spirited rendition of something like “Tutti Fruti”. It was all over when “A Whole New World” was chosen… aw shit, that’s my jam. Meg cited it as a perfect example of “never don’t go”- and I had to agree.
The ride back to our beds was possibly even more fun as we blasted into “A Whole New World” again on the back of the police pickup truck that agreed to ferry us home. My Detroit Tigers hat flew off, but I didn’t mind too much- there will be more hats.
So for all of you out there who are worried about me- don’t, there will always be dancing. For any of you prospective volunteers trolling around on ‘Peace Corps Journals’ looking for some advice, here it is: never don’t go.

Camp Sky

Camp sky is a 10 day camp that Peace Corps volunteers put on for our students. One boy and one girl from each CDSS get to go, so if you want to help out some of the kids I've written about, please follow the link and donate. Something as small as 20 dollars can make a kids' week! (forty would help us feed them)

http://www.friendsofmalawi.org/grants/how_to_donate.html