My new home – well, not quite yet….

Monile mose! That means hello everyone in Chitumbuka. So I’ve finally arrived in Chitipa, my new home. It was a two day journey in the end, with lots of stops and for the most part it was quite comfortable. The only hard part was the road from Karonga (which is 100km away from Chitipa), which isn’t paved, so it was over 2 hours of bumping along before we finally got to Chitipa. Although I was picked up in Lilongwe at 10 a.m., we didn’t actually leave til 1, as we had to make several stops and visits in town. We were quite cosy in the car as there were four of us in the end, and we kept stopping on the way for the others to buy tomatoes, cassava, potatoes etc, which they somehow found space for in addition to all my things!




My ride to Chitipa





Vegetable buying pit stop

My colleague, Derrick, is quite a character – he likes to talk, but mostly in Chichewa, so I wasn’t able to follow the conversations – when they occasionally explained what was so hilarious, it was invariably something to do with love, marriage, etc :) Derrick also finds it impossible to pronounce my name properly, though I must have repeated it at least 20 times – he insists on calling me Dhalin (which is somewhat understandable as the ‘r’ and ‘l’ are interchangeable in the local languages), but for some reason he can’t seem to remember the final ‘i’, so he ends up calling me something that sounds very much like ‘darling’ – I wonder how many people’s darling I’m going to be here in Chitipa!!

But before I tell you more about Chitipa I should just say that I completed my motorbike training and qualified for a licence. I did have one fall, though, and after that I was quite scared and didn’t want to get back on the bike – but, my trainer was very sweet and took me on a little excursion to see the place where Madonna stays when she comes to Malawi (we happened to be in the area!). They took one look at us in our biking clothes and me with my bloody knee and covered in dust, and wouldn’t even let us buy a drink (it’s that kind of place). Anyway, I did eventually get back on the bike and after practising starting and stopping (which is what I find most difficult), I felt a bit more comfortable. It’s going to be tough going alone, with no one to help if I have a problem, but I’ll get there I hope!

Back to Chitipa. When we arrived at my house, we found it still empty (I’d been warned by another volunteer here, Sparks, that the furniture was taking some time) so we just dropped off some things and they took me to Imogen’s house where I’ll stay until I can move in. Imogen is away in Mzuzu for orientation in the hospital there until December, so it’s no problem for me to stay in her house, although I’d really like to get settled as soon as possible. Unfortunately the water supply here is quite poor, the water only flows for about 2 hours during the day, so I have to fill up buckets for the evening, and it means the toilet doesn’t flush, of course (something they don’t tell you before you get here)! It’ll take some getting used to. I went over to Sparks’ place the first evening, and he really lives the luxury life – he’s got a TV, DVD player and playstation, and he has a proper kitchen, which he doesn’t even use as he doesn’t cook!



My house



What will eventually be my living room...



And my kitchen...


I’m not expected in the office til next week, so in the meantime I just have to be patient and wait. There’s a national conference for all the VSO volunteers next week by the lake, so I’m really looking forward to catching up with people and also meeting all the others. I’m not looking forward to the journey down again, but I guess it’s another thing to get used to!


A few photos of Chitipa (I'm having trouble uploading....)