Friday was a long day in the office struggling with the applications shortlist! It reminded me a bit of allocating places to the Hamlet centre playscheme! When I finally finished putting in all the data I printed the thing out and it covers twenty sheets of A4 paper, but I feel a bit more in control of it now. I allocated one point for having an MSCE cert., one for actually sending a photocopy to prove it, one for any evidence of further study and another for proving it with certificates or testimonials, one for a mention of any kind of experience of working with children, from 0-3 passion points, and one for a mention of Beehive or any kind of evidence of interest in or commitment to its projects. I recognize there are all sorts of built in biases here, but these are really the only things I know about these people from their letters! Anyway, to cut a long story short there were 100 applicants who scored 4,5,6 or 7 and so that is 100 places taken up. My task for Monday morning is to choose 20 of those who scored 3 to make up the numbers. I shall worry about that tomorrow!
On Friday night I was introduced to the night life of Chilomoni High Street. Seven of us piled into the bigger pick-up and visited The Liquor Garden and the Drinking Den. Very aptly named! The Liquor Garden looks small and insignificant from the street but rooms open out of one another and by the time you get to the third space it expands sideways behind what must be several shop facades at street level. A big back room is comfortably furnished with cane chairs and sofas identical to the ones in the houses at Mitsidi. The walls are painted a darkish, institution green. It,s pretty dim with only a few 40 Watt light bulbs. The tall, glass fronted fridge behind the bar is a bright beacon in the corner and the choice of drinks is clear to see: Carlsberg lager (Greens), Special Brew, Carlsberg Stout (a new one on me, but it tasted OK, thinner and sweeter than Guinness, but more to my taste than Greens), Tonic, or Fanta. Malawian Gin was available in the front bar, and possibly other things, I'm not sure. The gin comes in clear plastic sachets, like you get shampoo in, in hotels. There are glasses available in the front bar, but you have to pay a deposit on them. Several local people who work for Beehive were present in various stages of being 'greened' up! One of the foremen from the building site did an impression of Malcolm which soon had us all, including Malcolm, laughing heartily! All was very friendly and good-natured. A number of people expressed an interest in an mzungu girl-friend and we had to invent a mythical fiancé for one girl and pretend that Malcolm was her father before she was left alone! Jack gave the phone no. of one of the male volunteers to the most persistent seeker of mzungu love and told him it belonged to a beautiful mzungu from Sweden who had been tired tonight but who he should phone the next day! In the morning Marty got a confusing phone call and an amorous text, which he promptly forwarded to Jack! Happily I fall into the category of mature woman, too old to be considered as potential girlfriend – Hurrah! After a couple of drinks we moved on to the Drinking Den which involved a short cut down a back alley that I definitely wouldn't have attempted if we hadn't been by that time a group of about a dozen! This was smaller and more intimate. I bought a round of two greens, two stouts, two fantas, and two sachets of gin which cost me K850, about £3.70! Here I had an interesting conversation with a dreadlocked drummer called Emanuel about the differences between Malawi and UK, which I don't remember a great deal about and I'm sure he remembers nothing! We decided not to make a late night of it and all piled into the pick-up with several Malawians in the back and went the long way round to drop them off at home before returning to Mitsidi, and so to bed.
Saturday was a bit of a desultory day really. I got up late, at about 8.30am and drifted down to the main house for breakfast to find that only one person was up and out before me. We pottered about, wrote letters, read and chatted and eventually got it together to go into town where we split into groups to laze by the pool at the Mount Soche hotel, have coffee or shop. I was in the shopping group. WE RETURNED TO Mitsidi for a lazy afternoon in which the only constructive thing I did was to make Sam a birthday cake, chocolate/orange sponge. Then it was gin and tonic on the verandah before another trip into town to celebrate the birthday with a drink and a pizza. I gracefully retired at about 9.30 but the young and lively ones stayed to sample the night life.
This morning Malcolm and I got up relatively early to walk, or rather scramble, the Way of the Cross before the day got too hot. Well that was the plan any way, but before we got to the top at about 10.30 am it was certainly hot enough for me. I did struggle a bit to get to the top and had to go very slowly, but I made it in the end and was very glad that I did. The views were terrific and despite a haze we could see for miles. It was interesting to see Chilomoni spread out like a map below us. St James' Church made a good landmark to link together places that we recognized. There were a number of pilgrims, if that is the word, who climbed either singly or in small groups, with their bibles, pausing at each station to pray, and a couple of young men on their own, singing their way to the top. I take my hat off to them, I certainly had no spare breath for song! We saw a deer of some kind in the distance, lots of birds and butterflies and a few lizards. Where there were bigger trees there was a terrific sound, a sort of buzzing which we thought might have been crickets or something, but it was so loud there would have had to have been loads of them and we didn't see any, so the source of the sound continues to be a bit of a mystery.
Coming down again was a lot easier and we made good time. We saw a group of six girls collecting fire wood. They were very interested in us and walked with us for a little while. We branched off the Way of the Cross about half way down and found our own way back down into Chilomoni and then across town to Mitsidi arriving back at about lunchtime.
No comments:
Post a Comment