last days with Andrea and back to daily life in Blantyre

It has been a while! It is already weeks ago that Andrea has left and I miss her still! Every now and then I find a little piece of paper with a little nice sentence on it, she hid them all around the flat and I still haven´t found them all. Our last days we spent together just flew by so quick, especially because I had to be back at work and we only had the evenings together.

I think she made the best use of her time checking out Blantyre´s stages (unfortunately the only one you can find is damaged with a broken roof since 2 years and no money to be repaired), sights and even went with a friend to a primary school a bit outside of Blantyre.

Of course we also met our Israeli friend Orr again for some drinks in Doogles and had great fun just the two of us cooking Nsima and watching movies. It were some great last days and I miss her terribly! Its unbelievable how fast 5 weeks just flew by. We traveled together to Lilongwe and saying good bye at the airport wasn´t easy as we both know it will be a while until we meet again. But she loved Malawi and maybe can come back again next winter. We even met a German midwife at the airport also going to Addis Abeba so at least she had some company.

After that I spend another day in Lilongwe with Mark and my volunteering friends based there. We had movies and Pizza, just the right recipe to make me feel better, Mark is so much fun its impossible he wont make you laugh. Sunday I made my way back to Blantyre together with Raz who was also in LL to visit his brother.

And then just after another week of preparing lectures and getting the final timetables and preparations ready, the students FINALLY arrived!! 50 of them, men and women, all of them quite motivated and interested. So finally my real job here started and I already had two lessons with them, they seem to be really nice! I started off with a few really boring topics like History of midwifery and legal/ethical issues and then an exciting one: sexuality. But they really worked with me and seemed to enjoy the lessons as much as I did. So all being nervous for nothing (as always) I actually start to really like this teaching business 
This week I will start teaching some more interesting topics: physiology of labour! I can´t wait, I love this topic! So I hope they can take over some of my enthusiasm but of course it is really a different thing looking at what you teach and then the reality of it. I think it is quite a difficult one to give them on the one hand all the information about for example pain management and one-to-one care but then on the other hand knowing in reality there is no way they can put this into practice. The question is, should I still teach them about it or just don’t waste too much time about practices they will probably never come across. I think it is still good for them to know at least what could be done, especially the midwife-client relationship and the one-to-one care! In the end no matter how busy it is and how understaffed the hospital is, still it is each of their own responsibility to give the best care they can and have a good relationship to their clients. The situation is horrendous as it is already why making it even worth by acting like a brick stone when it comes to interpersonal skills. Hope I can get this point across..
I read an article in the nuisipepala (newspaper in Chichewa haha) the other day about how the Nurses and Midwife Council of Malawi now started to close down Health Clinics and wards and even Colleges because of lack of accommodation, hygiene, equipment or low work standards. I´m not sure what to think about that! I mean in the end it is the government´s responsibility to provide all these basics but on the other hand I think it is good that the council starts putting up stricter rules for standards, work environment and education. But it is always just the tip of the iceberg which is paid attention to, the real problem for me seems to be the culture and beliefs of most of the Malawians and of course the lack of education which brings a problem in understanding the whole picture and also in developing higher standards. In the hospital I think this can only start changing when people realize that it´s not only money and working hours which make them suffer, no it´s also the patients who don’t give feedback. They never complain! So there is no conversation between patient and care giver and with that you can never develop any further. Yeah one problem leads to the next and it will for sure take a few more years for Malawi´s health and education sector to reach some goals and make some obvious difference. But raising awareness is the first step in the right direction, on any topic you want to think of. As soon as you know that there´s something wrong there is no turning back or ignoring the problem. For me that’s one of my aim, to make the students understand that they are the ones who can make a change!
But enough about problems, what else happened in these last few weeks?

Today Ash is moving in with me and Janet, yesterday was his leaving party from Ntcheu and it was a good party! Bob Marley´s birthday and dancing to reggae tunes under the stars in his garden, how much nicer can it be? I even came across a bottle of JURA whiskey, guess who I was reminded of?
But I am so jealous, these Malawians and their dancing skills, wow! No matter what song, there´s always someone having the best fun dancing with one leg up, ladies shaking their round bums and men starting the craziest moves across the dancefloor. The longer the party the wilder it gets but it always looks as they´ve never done anything else before! Its amazing!

Friday was world cancer day and Nikki, me and some of our collegues together with a lot of nurses and doctors went to a procession up the highway with one truck in the front loaded with older ladies who were singing and booty shaking to the rhythms of drums. In the end of this march of maybe 200 people and their banners, another car with speakers on the roof, playing Michael Jackson´s “heal the world” over and over again. So loud you could hear the song throughout the whole town and Limbe I´m surre! The walk ended with a few speeches and prayers from cancer survivors and of course a lot of dancing again. There´s this dancing group from the hospital, I´m telling you these ladies have rhythm! Out of any topic they make a song, teaching about cancer or how to prevent it, what the symptoms are and what the methods are which can be used to cure it. This all in a song, together with dancing and drums, I think its fantastic! The best way to raise attention. We even saw an acting group and although I couldn’t understand any it was hilarious to just listen to the melody of this language with all the “eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee´s” and “iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiieeeee´s” and “aaaaaiiiiiiiiiiii´s” I love it!
But the highlight of these last few weeks was definitely yesterday!

On my way from Blantyre to Ntcheu I accidently met a german couple in the minibus who told me that they are working in a missionary orphanage not far from Ntcheu and they invited me over to have a look and get to know their work. Of course I went, on the back of a motorbike, down the dirt track a good bit up the hill to my new german friends. It is amazing what they have started in a few years, of course there are a lot of orphans around and their aim is it to give them the possibility to go to school, maybe a training afterwards and be taken care of.

They more or less live on their own expenses, they have cows for milk and pigs for meat, maize for Nsima and vegetables all around. They even have a little health clinic and just started on a project to care for babies who´s mother had died during childbirth to give them the food they need and support the father and the rest of the family. In a country where only really rich people can afford to feed their baby with formula (what they by the way love to do just to show how rich they are) it is dramatic when the mother dies during labour. This baby will starve to death because there is no other possibility for a poor family to feed it. They cant afford formula now normal cows milk nor sugar or anything. So all they could feed would be water and maybe tea or a mix from maize flour and sugar cane if they´re lucky. I think it’s fantastic these people want to start this project! The other idea they have is to provide some sort of further education to the orphans once they´ve finished their school. In one hall which was just built a few month ago was a lot of furniture building equipment, even real machinery and proper equipment to learn how to build furniture and work with wood and iron. Amazing! I really enjoyed my visit there and will definitely come back some time. Besides all these wonderful things they do it was great to meet some more Germans and I´m sure we´ll keep in contact!

So that was pretty much all about the time since my last entry. I keep you posted.

Hanna