Sika | June 7, 2010
I had to get more pages put in my passport. After over two years of traveling all over the freaking place, my passport only had a couple blank pages left. It was sort of frustrating: I liked the symmetry of filling my passport at the end of my service*, but I knew I was, at [...]
Sika | September 11, 2009
What was that I said about having enough time and just letting the trip unfold, and not stressing? Yeah, well, even though I know that to be best, after today I’m tempted to give up the whole trip. I got off today just fine: Kory was concerned this morning that since the bwanas are in [...]
Sika | July 2, 2009
First, I must explain what took me so long (yes, before I explain what the “it” is.) You see, I never had one until Honi moved in. I’ve said before that rather than stress about power outs at dinner time, I kept food I could eat cold. But, a combination of Escom’s escalating stupidity in [...]
Sika | February 20, 2009
When I think of writing now, my thoughts seem so negative. As much as Derek may rejoice in me becoming a jaded old PCV, I am not happy with the way all the negativity makes me and Malawi sound. So, I think I’m going to do what I did for my students after their practical [...]
Sika | January 19, 2009
Because it’s taken me about 5 hours to get a screen up I can post from, I’m going to hijack my own post to give y’all a link to an article that I think makes a good case for why Bush officials need to be prosecuted for war crimes: www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/01/18/prosecutions/ . It basically says that [...]
Sika | July 22, 2008
Last saturday, sometime between 1 and 3am, our kitchen and cafeteria (called kef in Chichewa) burned up (not down, as the building is still intact). No one was hurt. ESCOM says that the reason why the kef burned up is that the kitchen staff forgot to turn off the outlets to the cooker or whatever*. [...]
Sika | June 13, 2008
Transport home the other night was running late and the sky was turning such interesting colors. Just above the plateau it was a dusky pearlescent mauve, the newly crescent moon suspended from the heavens like a boat sailing between the clouds. The moon glowed so that it seemed as if the shape had been cut [...]
Sika | February 11, 2008
Some people, when they think of Africa, think of corruption. Corruption of government, corruption of life, in ways big and small. Corruption is both bigger and smaller than you’d suppose. It can be ingrained, although some “corruption” is not viewed as such when we do it*. On a daily basis, corruption usually doesn’t come into [...]
Sika | January 14, 2008
My grandma is doing better, I’m back in Malawi and back at work. Derek and I had Christmas dinner Iranian-style at the house of an ex-PCV in Old Niecy here in Zomba and then hiked the Zomba Plateau right after Christmas. I then went north and camped on the beach for New Year’s eve with [...]
Sika | November 8, 2007
Sitting here, writing in my journal by light coming from increasingly shorter (or decreasingly tall) candles, a spider, I assume attracted by the light and warmth, came near me. These spiders are creepy. They are nearly flat and big – about the size of the palm of my hand. They are flat enough that they [...]
Sika | November 8, 2007
Is starting early this year. On Saturday, around 6:30 (pronounced “half-six”) at night the lightning started. At first there was no rain and no thunder, and then a little drizzle started, but it sounded like a real rain because the tin roof amplifies the sound. The lightning started coming more and more frequently, but the [...]
Sika | October 2, 2007
I realized that I haven’t written anything about what’s been happening here with me. When I arrived in Zomba, my house wasn’t ready, even though we had been told the day before that it was. The remodel wasn’t completely done, but more importantly, Escom had not put in the electric meter. Now that sounds like [...]
Sika | July 13, 2007
I am at Nkhoma, staying in the house of the deputy principal this week. On Friday (the day I’ll be posting this, so here I am, time traveling [neener neener]). There’s been a slight hitch, which really should not surprise me as nothing has happened without a hitch yet. The slight hitch is that the [...]
