Another quick hello

All is well in Zomba. I am in my second week at work. I am still meeting a lot of people including a bunch of expats. There is a great mix of people working here.

This year is going to be a lot different from my first time around in the Peace Corps. Malawi is not quite as developed as Bolivia, but here in the city working with the city government there is a lot of work being done and there are resources available to get some work done.

I am still working on settling into my new home and workplace. Today I will be riding along to the city schools to pay for the orphan and vulnerable children to go to school for the year. I am looking forward to seeing more areas of the city. I have basically been traveling back and forth to work along the same route.

This weekend I will be heading to the capital for 4th of July celebrations at the US Ambassadors house. It should be a great time to meet the other peace corps volunteers in Malawi. The 6th of July is the Malawian Independence day and I am planning a bike trip up the Zomba plateau that has been warming welcoming me for the past week.

More to come soon...

Agogo

A woman marries.
She has four children that survive until adulthood. Her husband is married to another wife and lives in the other household. The woman leaves the man and raises her four children, paying their school fees and caring for them while working a full time government job.

Her children have children.
Her oldest son has six children, but his wife dies and he does also. The children move in with their grandmother and aunts. Her other children, all girls, have five more children between them all. The girls are educated and get good jobs around the country. Then a daughter dies suddenly. A woman, now a grandmother to eleven children, is left with two daughters.

Her friends consul her.
“I am sorry for your loss”, “she was a bright girl”, “I am so sorry” they say. She grieves saying that she wishes her children would not die before she. The women tell her that it is the will of God and that she must carry on. To her remaining daughters the women say “you must look after your mother”, “this loss is most hard on her”.

A woman looks me in the eye.
In the midst of her loss, I am welcomed into her home. She introduces me to her family and friends. She teaches me new sayings in Chichewa and counsels me on gardening. She does so with a smile on her face and an interested tone in her voice. I see strength in her and wisdom. She is not a rock solely enduring life. She is far to supple for that. Instead she has allowed herself to be molded by the passing of time and events. She has grown like a tree from rocky soil and bent by strong winds, yet she is the root support for her family. She shelters them and holds them close.

She still flowers and her warmth is felt by those around her.

Zomba

This week I was sworn in as a Peace Corps Response volunteer by the US ambassador to Malawi and began my year long service in the city of Zomba. I was excited to hear that I would be moving to Zomba as everyone was saying it was a beautiful place. I also knew that there was a plateau to the north of the city that would be great to hike, bike and climb. (The trout fishing is supposed to be very good also, so come on down dad!) It was the capital city of Malawi during the british colonial rule so there are broad treelined streets, colonial styled buildings and even a golf course that runs through the center of town.

I arrived yesterday afternoon and have not had much time to explore, but I am quickly falling in love with the place. My house is a few kilometers east of the city center in a well planned community called Matawale. It is small house surrounded by a brick wall and has a small front and back yard. I have electricity and indoor plumbing that includes an electric water heater for hot showers! It has a living room, dining room, kitchen, bathroom and three bedrooms. I am working on getting some furniture, but once I do I will be well equipped for visitors. There is even a great view of the plateau from my front porch, which is a great place for the morning cup of coffee.

There was a Peace Corps volunteer living in the house before I arrived, and she had made friends with the neighbors. So the first night I was here 12 year old Kenny came over to say hello and welcome me to the neighborhood. Tonight I was invited over to his house to say hello to everyone. They were all very nice and have lent me a shovel and hoe to work on my garden. Kenny walked me around the block to show me where the local store was located and then over to his aunt's house so that I could see the proper way to plant a garden. I am hoping to get to work on my garden this weekend.

Today was also my first day of work at the Zomba City Assembly. Malawi is working on decentralizing their government by giving more responsibilities to the 28 district assemblies and 4 city assemblies. One of their main roles is to coordinate the country's response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. I have been placed with the Zomba City Assembly to assist them with their HIV/AIDS strategic planning, coordination of stakeholders and monitoring & evaluation systems. I met some motivated people at the office today that are going to allow me to really enjoy my job over the next year. After only knowing each other for a few minutes we were able to share some of our experiences and analyze some of their current challenges and frustrations. I am sure that it will be a very trying year, but the fact that I am in it with some folks that really care about the work they are doing will mean a lot to me.
The city assembly is near the center of town and right next to the state house. It is situated on the hills coming down from the plateau and surrounded by tall trees. The front steps go down to a small stream running around the golf course. The banana trees and greenery give the place a tropical feel. As I said, it is an easy place to love.

I am hoping to make a trip to Blantyre city this weekend to visit one of my colleagues and buy some things, bike up the plateau and start the garden, so I will write more about this amazing place soon!

The land of acronyms

I am swimming in Peace Corps alphabet soup. Here is a quiz for everybody...
PST
IRC
PCRV
EAP
And some global health soup too...
PMTCT
PLWHA
OVC
MCP

ANSWERS
Preservice Training
Internal Resource Center
Peace Corps Response Volunteer
Emergency Action Plan

Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (of HIV/AIDS)
People Living with HIV/AIDS
Orphans and Volunarable Children
Multiple Concurrent Partners

And that is just the beginning...

Quick Update...

Flew into Lilongwe on Monday and went to the Peace Corps office to meet some people then we drove out to the training center near Dedza and the border of Mozambique. We spent the first two days learning Chichewa and Peace Corps' HIV work. Then we spent two days at a home stay in a nearby village with more Chichewa practice and some focus groups to learn more about how HIV is affecting rural Malawians. We made it back to the training center on Friday in time to watch the first World Cup game and cheer as South Africa scored the first goal. This weekend we are relaxing a little and plan to head to the market this afternoon.

All is well. We will be deciding where we are going tomorrow and will meet out counterparts on Tuesday. I'll write more soon.

The Next Chapter

“Where exactly is Malawi?”

This has been a very frequently asked question over the past month and is as good as any place to start, so let's begin there. “It is a small country nestled among Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia. It is landlocked, though there is a lake that runs along over half of the country.” It seems to be considered part of both Southern and Eastern Africa. Known as the “warm heart of Africa”, I have yet to hear anyone speak badly of it. Geologically, Malawi resides within the Rift Valley, which provides the iconic plains of Africa and the mountains I crave. Historically, Malawi was formerly known as Nyasaland when it was a colony of Great Britain. I could continue, though you would be better informed by reading the wiki entry for Malawi.

“What are you doing there?”

This question is much harder to answer. “Well”, I would say, “the Peace Corps is sending me to serve as a Peace Corps Response Volunteer tasked with providing HIV technical assistance to a local branch of the Malawian government.” When that answer elicits an odd look on the face of my questioner, I would explain that the national government of Malawi has developed a National Action Framework to respond to the HIV epidemic with the support of the international community. The Peace Corps has developed a partnership with the government of Malawi to help strengthen the management, program monitoring and reporting of the District Assemblies to better respond to Malawi's generalized HIV/AIDS epidemic. So then the question becomes, “So what are you actually going to do there?” That is when I simplify it by answering “I am going to work in a government office from 7:30 to 4:30 Monday to Friday and try to help people fulfill their work responsibilities by providing them with the skills and resources they need, so that they enjoy their work more in hopes that they will make sustainable gains against the HIV epidemic!” What a cool job, right!?! And that is just the beginning...

Before I continue to speculate on everything that I am going to do over the coming year, let me briefly review where I am coming from for those who have not heard from me in a while. Back in 2006, I moved back to the US from my Peace Corps service in Bolivia. I spent a winter on ski patrol in Maine and applying to grad schools. When spring rolled around I was accepted to George Washington University's Elliott School for International Affairs in their International Development Studies program. I spent that summer in France learning the language and visiting friends and famous places. In August I moved to DC and got a development internship with a small nonprofit while I started classes. The course work was great, but writing grants and asking for money was not for me, so I left the internship and was hired by La Clinica del Pueblo, a community health center. There I worked with a group of health promoters and held community health fairs to screen the Latino community of DC for health risks and get them into the health care system. In the summer of '09 I finished my MA in international development and global health studies.

My experiences in Bolivia, grad school and La Clinica all fed my interest in health systems strengthening, a concept based around the idea of aiding countries to develop their health systems to respond to all their health concerns (often compared to vertical programs targeting specific diseases, though this is extremely oversimplified). My thesis work in grad school exposed me to Africa, and a cursory review of available jobs and all the African novels that I was reading convinced me to branch out from my work with Latinos. At about the same time I received an email from a Peace Corps recruiter who asked me to consider a Peace Corps Response position in Malawi. Well, if you read the wiki entry on Malawi, I don't think I need to do any more explaining. The position was a great fit with my qualifications, and people kept telling me what a wonderful place Malawi is.

So over the past month I worked hard to leave my program at La Clinica in good shape and in good hands. I sold my motorcycle, got someone to replace me in the house, had three farewell parties and packed up everything for a move back to PA. That is where I am now. I have three packs sitting in front of me, a plane ticket for June 6th, a stiff new passport and one last farewell party planned for tomorrow night with my family. It all marks the closing of one chapter of my life and the vast possibilities for the next one.

This blog is meant as a means of sharing the personal and professional adventures that are to come. It is also a means for me to digest all that I am about to experience. I invite you all to read, reflect and comment on where ever this blog takes us.