I met an engaging young Malawian man on the plane trip from South Africa to Malawi. His name was Nyson. Turns out he is a clinical officer for MSF (Medecines Sans Frontiers/Doctors without Borders) for the Thyolo Hospital in the southern region. I had him teach me some Chichewa (which I had been minimally studying), but of course I’ve forgotten nearly everything. We chatted on and off for the duration of the 2.5 hour flight. He asked me about how the US likes having a black president, the cost of renting a home in the US, the cost of buying a home in the US, and what the main source of income is for the US. I was stumped. Of course to me, the US is such a large and diverse nation of so many differing political opinions, incomes, homes and possible home prices, I couldn’t begin to intelligently respond. Not that that stopped me from making stuff up - all presented with the caveat that "It depends on where you are...." But what is our main source of income? It was at that point I told him I should have done some studying before I came, as I was not in the least able to answer his question. I think for a man who comes from a country that relies most heavily on tobacco and tea, he doesn’t understand how I can not know what my country goes to the bank with. Intellectually I know he knows that the US is big, etc - he was clearly an intelligent person - but in his gut, his experience, his "world" if you will, is far more limited. It was an interesting exchange. He also chatted up the Japanese gentleman to his right, inquiring about which direction he was reading his book (bottom to top and back to front). He was just one of those gregarious, curious people. What a nice introduction to Malawi. I asked him what his favorite thing about Malawi was. After a very brief pause, his reply was this: "Peace. We are a peaceful nation. We will always help each other, if someone needs something. And we are very welcoming. People are always welcome in our home, and in our country. We are glad you are here. We appreciate all the things that people like you do to help us here in Malawi." I gave him the candy from my in-flight lunch to bring home to his four year old son, also named Nyson. It was a charming welcome to Malawi.
And then we got off the plane.
Customs was easy, if not effusively friendly. Then we had to wait for and retrieve our bags. Picture this: Take your average baggage carousel, pint size it by about 1/3, and place it up against a wall with only about 3 feet of clearance at one loop end. Hide the rear 1/3 of the other loop end behind a wall. The effect is that now you have less than ½ of the rotating "belt" which is available for viewing and retrieving the merry-go-round of luggage. Then place another wall approximately, oh let’s say 6 feet (or 5 people deep’s worth) away from the main length of usable carousel, so that effectively now there is a short hallway of access. Now slowly parcel out the luggage from not one, not two, but three arrived flights (of full 150-ish passengers). And put nearly all of those passengers at the limited access carousel vying for their luggage. It was a mass of surging, tip-toe standing, reaching, bobbing and weaving humanity with no regard for personal space. I have christened it the Mosh Pit of Baggage Retrieval. Happily, it was not every man for himself. As the belt slid by, the cry of "That’s my bag" would have a chorus line of arms trying to grab the elusive bag as it docilely slid by, only to finally be plucked up 5 people away and awkwardly handed back, bucket brigade style, to its rightful owner. Once the dizzyingly repetitive parade of luggage finally presented your own bag, with the help of others as previously mentioned, you then had to squeeze your way through the bodies pressing forward, like salmon swimming upstream to spawn.
Although I feel I made several new friends at the baggage carousel - between the commiserating, the weightlifting, the stepping on and being stepped on, all with a smile - and the ridiculous sojourn in Joberg (although, again, I feel a strange kinship with Alfred, our usurious porter), I am going on the record with my first hardline recommendation for anyone considering travel to Malawi: Only Bring Carry-On.
We finally arrive after a short drive - on the wrong side of the road (can you say Former British Colony) - at Wendels Lodge. An idyllic haven where our group has taken over 6 of the 7 rooms. There are two great dogs - Mufasa (a golden retriever) and Shotzie (looks like a shepherd mix). I miss my dogs. It’s just lovely here - go to the website (www.WendelsLodge.com). It really is like that. The proprietors are Tom, a German ex-pat master chef and his wife Mel, native of what used to be Rhodesia. We had a short afternoon respite followed by a large, delicious and filling American-style dinner. We set off tomorrow morning for a 2 hour drive to Luzi Hospital (where GAIA recently built a maternity wing), which is almost to the Zambia border.
And so ends my first night in many back in a bed. And my first night of several to come under mosquito netting. And my first night in Africa.
No comments:
Post a Comment