Language Lessons and Culture Shock

It seems possible for someone to get by only speaking English in Malawi, as a matter of fact their official language is English, a relic from their colonial British history I imagine. The most common language in the country isn’t actually English though, it’s a local language called Chichewa.

At this point I only know the very basics of Chichewa, words like sorry (Pepani), how are you (Muli bwanji) and thank you (Zikomo). Francis, the gentleman who takes care of the university guesthouse, where Thomas and I are living, has taken it upon himself to teach us more than just the basics of Chichewa. Every morning Francis greets us with a Chichewa phrase and then picks a topic for us to learn, for example, today was animals. He writes a list of words from the daily topic in English and translates them into Chichewa. His patience with us is truly virtuous. I can get a simple phrase wrong over and over again… a hundred times wrong, Francis will smile and kindly correct me each and every time. He makes living in the guesthouse very comfortable and it’s always fantastic when he buys us a bowl of ripe mangoes or tomatoes with some money we leave with him. Too bad it’s the end of mango season now, but apparently it’s cucumber season coming up next. That’s something I’ll be looking forward to in the near future. 

My morning walk to work takes about ten minutes. I think it’s one of my favourite parts of the day because temperatures are still cool enough that I don’t break into a drenching sweat after a couple strides. This is something that occurs at most other times of the day, especially in the afternoon. I think I’m getting acclimated to the heat but it could also be a cooler week due to the heavy rains we keep having, it is the rainy season after all.

Humidity is often a good indicator of when it's going to rain. 

Right before it rains it gets really humid and I break into a sweat, 

but once the rain starts it cools down to something more comfortable. 

The road that I walk along passes beside a schoolyard where young children gather for class. As soon as Thomas and I come into their sights one kid sounds the alarm with a shrill scream of some unknown Chichewa word. All of a sudden the other kids join together and start a synchronized chant. It goes something like  “Mzungu how are YOU! How are YOU! Mzungu how are YOU!”  The kids put a lot of emphasis on the “you”, in “how are you”, you see? This continues until we’re out of sight. Sometimes Thomas will acknowledge them with a loud "HELLO, I AM GOOD". This only seems to excite the kids more as we notice their chant get even louder. I normally just give them a wave or thumbs up.

Most kids that we come across find us fascinating, either we’ll get stared at, followed, nervously waved at or a combination of the like. It’s always fun to see a kid’s reaction when I give them an acknowledging hello or a simple thumbs up. Sometimes it feels like I’ve made the highlight of a kid’s week, judging by their jubilant reaction.

It took some time before I actually felt comfortable with the differences between Malawian and Canadian lifestyles. I believe “culture shock” is the correct term for this feeling. I was welcomed to Malawi by friendly and accommodative people but it wasn’t until I gained some experience with the culture that I could actually relax and start enjoying the experience. Figuring out public transportation was the one event that really boosted my confidence and gave me a better feeling of independence. Before figuring out the public transportation system I relied on asking co-workers for rides into Lilongwe. They were always happy to arrange rides but for the most part I felt trapped at home until I tried taking the minibus transportation system.

We're all in this together. This is how most people complete their

 daily commute. There's always venders trying to sell different

 things to people waiting for their minibus to depart. 

If you don't say anything they quickly move on.

 It seems impolite but that's how the locals handle it.

  

A minibus is essentially a minivan used to transport anywhere between 18 to 24 people back and forth between two destinations. Keep in mind that these vehicles are really meant to sit eight to ten people comfortably. The minibus drivers honk their horn as they drive down the highway, signaling to people walking on the side of the road that they still have vacant seats. If you want to get on the bus you simply wave it down.

This was a small taxi that brings you around Lilongwe. 

I would say it has a little more power than a golf cart. Look how happy 

Thomas and I are with all the extra room compared to the minibus. 

Fuel costs are actually expensive compared to most other things in Malawi. It makes sense to cram as many people that's physically possible into a single vehicle, a good strategy for keeping transportation costs affordable to the general public. It costs 600 kwacha to travel from Bunda campus to Lilongwe and it’s a journey that takes about one hour to complete using the minibus system. At this time, fuel costs are around 600 kwacha per litre and 600 kwacha is equivalent to just over one Canadian dollar.

These are some Canadian coins that have similar value to the kwacha bills.
The largest bill available in Malawi is for 1000 kwacha,
that's equivalent to about two Canadian dollars.  

Tangent: I've been told that the Malawian kwacha was once worth about half the value of a British pound but has undergone some serious inflation since 1971. It can be inconvenient to withdraw larger amounts of cash or pay for anything expensive here. To be honest this probably isn't an issue that many people deal with due to the large disparity between socio-economic classes, but sometimes the ATMs will run out of bills and close for the day. Malawi also has minted coins but they're virtually worthless, I thought they looked similar to some of my Canadian coins. As I suspected, Malawi coins are produced at the Royal Canadian Mint in Winnipeg, hometown connection! 

Speaking of shocking, we ran out of electricity yesterday. I thought we had a blackout caused by heavy rain showers but I became suspicious that this wasn’t the case when our neighbours’ lights were on at night. Turns out you have to buy electricity in prepaid units, who knew? Unknowingly Thomas and I reached our limit and needed to buy additional units. The units are activated using a code to verify your purchase and the code needs to be inputted into an electrical box outside of the house. I was a little nervous inputting the code because wasps have made a nice home out of the electrical box. I consider myself lucky for opening the box at night when the wasps aren’t active. We’re back up and running now.

Thomas and I relax outside, waiting for the electricity to come back on.

 Little did we know it would never come back on by itself! 

Gecko with an impressive sticking ability.

The blackout at least gave us the opportunity to enjoy sitting outside as the day transformed into night. Crickets start chirping, bats start echolocating and geckos come out of hiding spots to do whatever geckos do. Not that it’s a bad thing but I swear our attic is a fully functioning roost for a healthy colony of bats. It’s probably actually a good thing for me; perhaps they’re eating all the mosquitos, keeping me bite free and therefore malaria free! 

The Tropics have lots of beautiful colourful animals, 

including this mesmerizing moths. 

That's all for now. Next time I will write about the interesting wildlife that I've spotted , but also the wildlife that seems to be missing from the African landscape. Just like in Canada, most natural habitats that can be used for farming and raising animals have been modified to achieve these goals. Loss of biodiversity seems to be a serious consequence of increasing human development everywhere in the world. 

Canada to Malawi

 

Canada to Malawi

It must be common for university students to experience what seems to be a perpetual oscillation between the feelings of excitement and anxiety as they enter the final weeks of their undergraduate degree. These feelings were amplified for me as I approached my final exams, inching closer and closer to completing my Marine Biology degree at Dalhousie University. The feelings of excitement were brought on by the thought of traveling and the possibility of beginning an exciting career in Marine Biology. The anxiety came from the looming uncertainty of post graduation life. Now that I think of it, the future is always uncertain but it must be in my nature as a science student to increase certainty or predict future events. There were so many questions to be answered and even more concerns. Where was I going to live? What kinds of jobs are available for recent graduates? What if it’s impossible to find a job like so many people claim? Etcetera, Etcetera.

 Thankfully, I have wonderful friends and family who sent me job listings, almost on a weekly basis.  There was one posting that really caught my interest because it would satisfy both my urges to travel internationally and work on a project related to aquaculture and fisheries. It was called the International Youth Internship Program (IYIP). The IYIP was looking for candidates to fill internship opportunities related to fisheries and aquaculture in developing countries. I applied for a position and was contacted for an interview within a week. My heart nearly skipped a beat when I opened an acceptance email from IYIP informing me that I was selected for an internship in the African country of Malawi. (I already have, but I really must thank those who acted as a reference, it really helped!)

I’ve now been in Malawi for about a week. Travelling to Malawi took all of 35 hours starting from St Johns, Newfoundland. There were stops in Toronto, London and Nairobi. The travel was uneventful, which I suppose when traveling is a good thing. I got to see a really cool crane-like bird on the Kenya airport runway! We also had to wait outside the plane in Kenya for about 15 minutes. The early morning sun was almost too much for me to handle so I tried hiding in Thomas’ (My new roommate and fellow intern) shadow. Once we boarded the plane the pilot apologized over the intercom for making the passengers wait outside in the cold morning. It was 24 degrees Celsius… Thomas and I couldn’t help but laugh as we sat there sweating from the heat.

More on Malawi next time, I want to write about the weeklong pre-departure training session in St Johns first. It must speak to the ability of the IYIP selection committee but I’ve never been part of a group that got along so well together as the 16 young Canadians selected to participate in the different internship positions around the world. Many of the selected Canadians already had prior international experience, allowing us to have informative discussions on the challenges and rewards of living and working in foreign countries.

The IYIP booked apartment style hotel rooms for the interns that were not residents of Newfoundland. We had a lot of fun exploring the scenic city of St Johns or otherwise hanging out in one of the apartment rooms. I always thought people exaggerated the thickness of a Newfoundland accents, I quickly realized it truly does exist and it really is that thick. I loved walking into the Tim Horton’s, early in the morning, to the blasting tunes of the Great Big Sea, the iconic Canadian East coast band. Newfoundland was basically everything I expected it to be and that was fantastic. During my brief visit I even got to try the famous iceberg beer from Quidi Vidi, as per my friend Josh’s recommendation. It was crisp and light, as you might expect from a beer produced from the purest waters, acquired from icebergs, frozen for thousands of years. If you don’t believe iceberg water makes a beer taste any better well at least you still get to drink it from a really cool dark blue bottle, the color of an iceberg.

A big group of us went out to George street for our final night in Newfoundland, I couldn’t believe that beers were only 1.75$ each.  This is unheard of in parts of Canada that I’ve lived in or visited! I don’t know how but that price was actually cheaper than buying the beer at a liquor store. Altogether, with the beautiful rugged wilderness, friendly people, cheap drinks and a strong aquaculture industry I think Newfoundland will be in the back of my mind as a potential place to live and work in the future. I also appreciated my visit with aunt Michelle and cousin Nathaniel who recently took up residence outside of St Johns. Now I understand why they were attracted to Newfoundland. I’m guessing that the price of beer was not a deciding factor in their move. I’ve never taken Michelle or Nathaniel as big beer drinkers. Nathaniel is far too classy for simple beers. He prefers to drink his beverages from wineglasses, as he demonstrated to me by pouring his ice-tea from a regular glass into something more to his taste. We danced patiently while waiting for our food to arrive at the very lovely restaurant. Thank you again Michelle, the food was fantastic and Nathaniel was entertaining as a dinner guest. 

I’ve already mentioned my roommate Thomas, but there were 16 other internships available for young Canadians to travel to countries including Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines and Barbados. I believe more positions will be posted on the Marine institutes website sometime in March or April. I would highly recommend anyone that recently graduated to apply for an internship with the IYIP. The IYIP will cover most of the costs related to the internship including vaccinations, medications, travel expenses and lodging expenses. You will even receive a modest monthly stipend to cover your cost of living during the period of your internship.  

That's all for now.

-Shaun

p.s. Sorry about having so few pictures it's difficult to upload anything with my internet connectivity.