WAWAWAWA!

I'm back in Lilongwe for a 2-week training.

So...

let's see...

You know how I usually love kids? I hate them here... or at least just the primary students (the ones 6-14). Why? Because they're punks. I don't know how to explain it... but they frustrate me here. Just try to imagine 50 kids swarming around you every single freaking day, staring at you, calling you "azungu" (which is more of my first name than my second name now), laughing at you... every single freaking day. And their parents don't teach them how to do right, because they don't listen to their parents, so they especially won't listen to anything I say... like "stop asking for money" or "stop calling me 'azungu'", which is pretty much equivalent to calling a black person "nigger" or a Chinese "chink" or a Latino "sic". I know it's vulgar, but that's exactly the kind of feeling it provokes in me every single day. I could start a whole essay on that alone but I won't.

I've concluded that I only like babies. Just babies. The wee ones that don't speak. Because they never ask anything from me. The adults always ask me for money. The kids always ask me for sweets. The babies just smile (or cry haha)! :D

O.K., I know I gotta do a better job at describing my African life here. Umm... I don't even know how to begin... I just sat here for a minute not knowing what to type...

I greet about 50 people a day with "Mwadzuka/Mwaswera bwanji?" (I hate greeting. I'm so anti-social. haha)

Uhh... o.k., I'll start with my health center. It's this tiny little place - not really a hospital - with a maternity ward, a female sick ward, a male sick ward, and a consultation room. It's actually kinda nice because it's like being an outdoor center, so I'm not in some enclosed building. Then, there's the Under-5 Clinic room (about 10 feet x 10 feet) where all the government health workers work (which is where I'm supposed to be too). Every morning, the mothers would come to the clinic, line up to weigh their babies, and get the immunization shots (DPT, Polio, BCG, measles, TTV). As for the babies, they just wrap them with a chitenje (a piece of cloth) and hang them off a weighing scale... meaning you can drop them if they're not tied appropriately. (I haven't dropped one yet... knock on wood.) Then, they go into this tiny little room to get their shots (I'm not allowed to give the shots for liability reasons). And they'd just record the data in a book (record-keeping is really poor here and incredibly inaccurate). I've also been going into the villages for the first 2 months to evaluate and assess their problems and needs, as well as developing an action plan before submitting them to OxFam. Just this past week, I went to the villages for a home-based care training (groups of people who take care of the sick in their villages) on soya beans. (I was drooling sooo much when they made soya mince and fresh soy milk from the soya beans but I was too weak to ask to try it!!!)

(I miss fruits sooo much. :( But I heard there are watermelons in April! And I'm starting to see peaches!!)

Yeah, sounds fascinating, right? That's why I don't really bother trying to type up what I do. haha

Well, here's an interesting fact I learned awhile ago regarding natural medicine. Sesame is known to help treat sterility. SO... every time you consume sesame (seeds, oil, etc.), just think, you become more fertile! HAHAHAHA And I found out that turmeric treats flatulence, so you know exactly what you need when you get a case of gas! (You know who you are! :P)

Umm... let's see... I still don't really know what I wanna do yet. I've been focusing a lot on this newly developed youth club that involves 18 villages in my area, so that has been pretty awesome. The most difficult part is not being able to speak the language, but I'm trying everything I can to learn their language so I don't have to rely on the few youths that speak English or even just on my co-worker to translate. But they're worth it, because they're the ones that are always overlooked. The adults are always trained in caring for the sick; the children get all the free immunization, free education, and free food; the youths in school are getting an education. But the out-of-school youths are stuck with unemployment, prostitution, and pressure from their parents to engage in early marriages or cultural practices that lead to unwanted pregnancies and HIV transmission. I've been working mainly with the committee on leadership. I'll talk more about that later.

I still feel like a celebrity.

And it sucks.

I hate being a celebrity. I hate the fact that my status of beauty and my status of wealth is determined by one factor: the color of my skin. I hate the 50 pairs of eyes staring at me everywhere I go... to the market, to work, to my home. But even then I don't even want to go home because there are a couple pairs of eyes spying on me through my grass fence (those darn kids). I don't get any privacy here. I hate it when people ask me for money or food or sweets or just anything I have or even just to take them back to America. Even though some of them are living better off than me. I hate being in this weird position where the people I work with think I'm some kid so they don't treat me seriously, yet people of high positions treat me like I'm some goddess (even better than they would a chief). I hate how the men treat women here.

But I don't hate being in Malawi. I know I have much to learn and much to gain. I've met few people here who amaze me and bless me. There's an 80-year-old lil white lady living near me who's originally from South Africa, had 11 kids, and lost 9 of them to malaria here. Oh yeah, and she killed 2 chickens for me. haha She's sweet. :) Then, there's my Chichewa tutor aka my best friend here aka my only Malawian friend. He is nothing short of amazing yet I know few people recognize how truly amazing he is. He's one of the people that I know will succeed in every way in this life despite all the obstacles he had to go through in this life (and there's a lot, believe me). Then, there are a few people I work with who are truly hard-working and gentle people. They've helped me out so much and been so patient with me for learning everything so slowly. Then, there's the baby. His name's Hope. He's my substitute for Joshua Lee (but definitely not his replacement!). :P He's sooooooooo cute. Everytime I see him, he makes my day better no matter how crappy the day was.

And... that's about it.

ZABOBO!

Dude. I am so fluent in Chichewa.

*cough*

Yeah right.

But I'm getting there! Everyone thinks I'm learning Chichewa because I wanna get married here.

"So, do you have any promises?"
"*cough* Are you serious?!"

OK gotta jet. Tiwonana!

A Malawian Romance

One more shot at this thing called technology.

I’m gonna try to write this update offline again and hope that it’ll work at the internet café.

So, before I start off on another anecdote, I wanted to shout out to the awesome people who sent me packages! J My mom knew exactly what to send to satiate my sweets and salts cravings. Daphne and Pedro (and LW) – dude yall just doubled my closet and desserts! haha Jennifer and Mark – thanks for the goodies! haha It was truly a nice surprise that made a better present than the pink shirt that Mark got me! haha (I ate a big of chip and ramen for breakfast yesterday! :D)

A Malawian Romance.

Once upon a time, I (or me) am walking down a dirt road in the sweltering heat. While the sun is scorching my skin to a dark clay red, I’m desperately trying to find Chimpesa village. All the while I’m thinking, why didn’t I just rebel against the Peace Corps rule for once and just hop on that motorbike?

Then, a guy bikes up next to me and greets me. He’s wobbling on his bike because he’s trying to keep up with my slow pace up the hill. Eventually, he gets off his bike and starts walking next to me. I’m doing my best to hurry up and find this village. In the meantime, he asks for my name, where I’m from, what I’m doing in Malawi, etc. And I don’t think he even told me his name.

Then, he cuts to the chase, “Have you married?” Uh oh.

“No.” Why didn’t I say “yes”?!

“Why not?”

“Sindikufuna kukwatiwa.” Because I don’t want to. Well, it’s not a fib… kinda. Then, this guy gives me a 10-minute lecture in his broken English about why I can’t just say “I don’t want to” when someone asks me if I’m married. Something about it’s everyone’s purpose in life to marry. Or something like that.

“Right.” Where is this village?!

Finally, he asks me where I live.

My response is, “Oh, in America.”

Then, he desperately tries all the different ways of finding my location of residency: “Where do you put up for the night?” “Where do you sleep?” “Where do you wake up?”

So, I play dumb and innocently respond, “I don’t understand.”

Despite my annoyance, he continues asking where I live.

“Oh, I sleep in my bed.” Can you tell I’m trying to stall?!

Finally, he cuts to the chase and after a moment of suspense, he says, “Should chance you fall in love with me?” *cough* What a way to kill the romance buddy. What was your name again?

So, I say again, “Sindikufuna kukwatiwa.”

“I mean, can we be friends?” Poor kid, he’s gonna get his juvenile little heart crushed.

“Sure. Everyone’s my friend. That guy can be my friend too,” I respond and point at a 5-year-old kid. Hey, I’m trying to be nice!

Then the guy tries to find out where I live again when I hear my name, “Ellen!” I turn to find a guy I worked with. Relieved, I darted without looking back. Sorry kid, but it just ain’t meant to be!

Lesson learned: I need a picture of Ryan Phillippe pronto! Wouldn’t it be awesome to flash his picture and ask, “Isn’t he the most beautiful man in the world?” and blind them with a huge rock on my finger. Or maybe I could tell them that they’d have to go to America and Asia to ask my parents for my hand in marriage. Or better yet, I could tell them that my bride price is 1,000 cows, 1,000 chickens, and a land the size of Texas.

O.K., I’m not that ruthless. I could just stick with saying that I’m married and walk away. But hey, maybe one day Ryan Phillippe will come to Malawi, and someone will point out that he has a short Asian wife. And he’ll realize that I was the love of his life that he was looking for all along.

O.K., snapping back to reality. But on a serious note, even though it’s amusing to receive all these random marriage proposals and awkward compliments, I’m becoming more and more annoyed. Unfortunately, I’ve become more obnoxious too. A student asked me if I were married, I responded “No, and I don’t wanna marry in Malawi.” I realized how obnoxious that sounded without really trying to, so I didn’t bother trying to argue when a teacher responded, “You never know what God has in store for you.” Instead, I told them that I had received marriage proposals, and the teacher asked, “Oh? What did you say?” Uhh… what else can I say?! Yes?! And marry every man that asks me?! “Oh, I just say ‘no’.”

The fact of the matter is that when these guys see me (or any other light-skinned person), they see dollar signs flashing. But what really agitates me is how quickly they judge me because of the color of my skin. I was reminded of the way that women – Asian women in particular – were portrayed historically. They were the “exotic” ones – the sexual objects of every man’s affection. Who were to be the geishas, the comfort women of WWII, the prostitutes in Thailand/India/Cambodia/etc., and hey, who played the illiterate but sexy women in Western movies? Foreign women in Malawi are portrayed in much the same way. I’m sorry, but I’m not about to be objectified.

And to be honest, it really frustrates me at how Westernized Malawians’ standards have become. The lighter your skin, the more beautiful you are. The more you dress like Beyonce, the more attractive you are. I can’t say that I’m exempt from such mentality (I once thought that to be blonde-and-blue is to be beautiful), but the more that I see how ridiculous it is, the more I wish that I could un-brainwash them and show these girls how beautiful they really are. And that they don’t have to be subject to such ignorant expectations. And that they don’t have to sleep with a boy everytime he says “I love you” or when a sugar daddy entices them into their home for a little “something-something”.

I know that’s “just how things are”, but man, my heart goes out to them. But I just gotta take one step at a time, right?

Wow, that sounded like a bitter entry. haha That wasn’t my intention at all! I’ll update with more light-hearted entries tomorrow… if this entry successfully makes it into my blog. After that, it’ll be another month or so before I’ll update again.

Until then… tiwonana!

A funny lil anecdote

So I'm sitting in this HIV support group... absolutely bored to death while they're figuring out logistics and collecting money...

I'm entertaining myself watching these two toddlers play around... One girl keeps covering herself with a chitenje and falling flat on her face and laughing at herself... The other kid's crying for some reason and pees on the ground. So, the girl goes over to him and bends down scoping it out. She sniffs it, then starts lapping!

His mother doesn't do anything.

THEN, she smears it around and continues to drink from it!

And still, no one does anything!

By then, my site mate and I looked at each other in disbelief (he said it was one of the grossest things he's seen in Malawi - probably after killing a chicken). And I couldn't stop laughing just cuz that was the funniest sight ever.

That's how bored I get here I guess.

But on the other hand, it's not that gross to me... because I weigh babies at the clinic... and let's just say most of them don't have diapers.

Anyway, my favorite thing about Malawi: the Gerber babies! :) I don't think I've seen so many cute babies in my life before!

And the sunrises and sunsets... never seen a sun so orange before (except in switzerland once).

My least favorite thing about Malawi: battling the rats and bugs. I've made enemies with the rats. I must avenge Mr. Empty Plastic Bottle and his offsprings Plastic Bags that the rat(s) have so ruthlessly slaughtered! Just kidding. O.k., but seriously though, it annoys the crap out of me. My coworker said it must be so hungry if it's eating empty bottles. Hey, here's a better idea, rat, why don't you just go somewhere else? (It's so hard to not get that image of the Master from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles! If only I could admire them so!)

And the bugs. The grossest thing I've seen is probably the cockroaches in my chimbudzi ("toilet" = hole in the ground). AGHHHHH!!!!

Only in Malawi

Only in Malawi do strangers sit in my lap (a few volunteers have had the privilege of my cushiony bootie)

Only in Malawi are chickens passengers sitting next to me

Only in Malawi are goats the back-seat drivers

Only in Malawi would the window sill of the minibus (a toyota van) become a passenger seat

Only in Malawi do doors come on and off the minibuses while in motion

Only in Malawi would high school boys try to hit on me ("hello madam, are you married?")... o.k., granted that most of them are my age or older!

Only in Malawi would I help kill a chicken (will post the video if I can)

Only in Malawi would I hitchhike

Only in Malawi would I wear clothes I'd never wear

Only in Malawi would someone say "You look fat" and mean it as a good thing

Only in Malawi would I feel so used and useless haha

I'm a Peace "Corpse" Volunteer

no silent p's. I'm a corpse.

This sucks. I had spent like an hour yesterday (re)typing up a really good blog update for yall (with stories and theses about feminism and environmentalism and hygienism and pictures too!) offline, but for some reason I can't pull it up (even though I can with other files) at the internet cafe! I can't upload pictures either.

Internet here sucks. I give up.

My mom called me and was freaking out about marriage proposals. No worries people. It's a common phenomenon here for foreign women. Just imagine that I'm Angelina Jolie... except short and Asian and doesn't and act and is in Malawi! haha I hate being a celebrity.

A long overdue update...

that will continue to be overdue... I had an update (a really good one too) all typed up and ready to go... but then somehow a virus got into my flashdrive and I can't view it at the internet cafe. So... I'm sending my apologies from halfway around the world at an internet cafe with the inverse speed of light.

I've finally moved home (in Malawi)! For those who are committed to the lost art of snail mail, you can now mail me at:
Elaine Lo
PO Box 74
Chilembwe, Malawi
Central Africa [although I think it might be technically considered South Africa]

(And look for my number from the previous post.)

I'll probably check my email once or twice a month... so feel free to email me at elaineheartsyou@gmail.com and let me know how you're doing! :) If you want me to mail you, you can either mail me first... or email me your address and an update so I have something to respond to you.

A lot has happened in the last 3 months from marriage proposals to hitchhiking... but I cannot adequately describe anything at this internet cafe (I've already been here for over an hour). I'll just give brief updates.

I live in the southern part of Malawi at PIM (Providence Industrial Mission), home of the revolutionary who fought for Malawi's independence. Chilembwe was the George Washington of Malawi and I live only 5 minutes away from the church he built, the rock where he meditated... and probably the hole he defecated in.

I have electricity (with blackouts every other day) but no plumbing or running water.

I think I have bats in my house (there's loud banging on my roof).

I built fire for a week. And nearly died doing so.

I carried water on my head. And nearly broke my neck doing so (and embarrassed myself in front of a group of American tourists here).

I miss my host family. :(

I'm in love! ....with the babies! :D

I've had 2 babies named after me - all within a day or two they were born! :) (I'll try to post a picture whenever my drives are free of viruses.)

OK, that's all I can give for now... Sorry. :( I'm going to visit some street kids in about an hour.

Tiwonana!