Visit to Ireen's village (Chemussa)

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  Blantyre, Malawi
Monday, September 29, 2008

I tried to upload pics again but the internet is just so slow that the pages never load.  Sorry, I will keep trying.  Maybe one of these days it will work....So the trip to Ireen's village was absolutely amazing.  When we arrived on the outskirts of the village, she warned me that many of the children have never seen a mzungu (white person) before.  The village consisted of mud houses and very tiny cement houses with no electricity or running water.  There were no roads, only dirt paths with raw sewage running down them.  The houses were so close together, you could touch the next door neighbors.  It took almost 1/2 hour to reach her house, so along the way, everyone was shouting "mzungu, mzungu" and staring at me.  Some of the kids would come up to me and stroke my leg or hold my hand.  They were all so amazed.  It was adorable.  Ireen's family was so happy to meet me and guess what....They told me that I am the head of their house!  LOL.  I am right up there on the wall next to Jesus Christ.  There's a big picture of him and then me on the left and me on the right.  It's really pretty funny to see.  I sat and chatted with her kids for a while and the whole time, the neighbors were coming and going, wanting to shake my hand and say hello.  At one point there were 21 people in this tiny little house, all staring at me.  I took some pictures of that!  I wish they would upload.  After we left there, we went to a bar and I bought Ireen a Shake Shake (their local beer) in order to cure her hangover from the day before.  Then we went to her mother in law's house which is in the middle of nowhere.  We needed to walk through farms and over mountains to get there.  It took over 1/2 hour from the main road.  Again, there are no roads there and the views were amazing.  The village is set in the middle of farm fields where all of the houses are made of mud with straw roofs.  It is really pretty.  The houses have dirt floors and no electric and they need to go to the river to get their water.  Once again upon arrival, there were a ton of people waiting to meet me.  We stayed there for a while and then headed back home to find out that the lady that worked the gate at Open Arms had passed away, so that was sad.  The other night, Ireen was really upset and she wouldn't tell me why, but then we were watching the news in her bedroom and she told me what was going on.  The prices of fertilizer have gone up from MK4,000 to MK10,000 per bag and she wouldn't be able to buy it this year.  She needs two bags for her farm in order to grow maize.  I told her I'd pay for a bag and she refused, but I am going to surprise her tonight with MK20,000 to buy both bags.  That is more than she makes in 2 months.  If I don't do it, that would mean that her family would go hungry this year, so I really, really want to help them. 

I started boiling the tap water and drinking it on Friday night.  It tastes so bad but I haven't had any access to bottled water lately, so I have no choice.  So far, no sickness!!  You are all going to be really surprised when I tell you what I ate the other day.  Are you ready for this??? It was rice mixed with cream of mushroom soup, tuna fish and zuchini.  Interesting, huh?  It was actually pretty good.  I hope everyone is doing well.  I'll write again soon!!

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