NAMIBIA

Howdy to all - esp families who may be wondering how we are now that we've launched into a new country and new part of our travels. We are great! Had our final farewell from Ruth and Lovemore earlier today in Otjiwarongo (for those with a map of Namibia handy), where we had our last official Africare work meeting a few days ago. We met up with Lisa in Windhoek two days ago, after having driven nearly 1500 km's from Lusaka to Otjiwarongo with the Mufutes -- long haul, but much preferable to a plane ride due to cost as well as teh fun company in the car!

Our transit day of note was 1000 km's in 13 hours, which took us through 4 countries in one day (anyone else done that, without airplanes?) Zambia, ever-so=briefly in Zimbabwe again, then through the extreme corner of Botswana, and finally about 7 hours driving through the Caprivi Strip of Namibia and down to just shy of Windhoek ==- all in one day. (for those with maps, check out the funky Caprivi Strip - it's the guitar handle looking thing up in the corner of Namibia above the Okavonga Delta.. where mandy was 2 years ago!).
So anyway, safe and sound to Namibia and 4 new passport stamps in one day.

Next day met Lisa WITH no probs in Windhoek, and we were off to the races in our rental toyota. Last two days we spent in the amazing Etosha National Park. Saw everything in the way of animals on the awesome white plains of Etosha pan -- two sets of male lions, elephants aplenty, giraffes, etc. -- and even the elusive rhinocerous. Great great game viewing, all DIY in our own car. SO cool. Namibia, compared to much of the rest of southern Africa, is buttoned up and the evidence of how lucrative the tourism industry (and diamond m,ining) is for this place and its relatively small population of inhabitants is everywhere. Good roads, good signs, and nice nice houses almost everywhere.

Today we drove through the Damaraland desert, which seemed to stretch forever, to the Skeleton Coast. This is the most desolate and bizarre landscape i've ever seen. Words cannot describe how open, vast, and strange it is to see 200 km's of sandy desert terminate at the rocky pounding and foggy coast of namibia. strangest geography i've ever seen. Stranger still is teh authentically german coastal beach town of swakopmund, with the expanse of skeleton coast stretching to the north and the imposing huge red sand dunes of sossusvlei sitting just to the south -- with ocean pounding 200 feet from our pensione windows. is this africa? germany? egypt? sahara? a blend of all of them. And it's moist, foggy, freezing (~50 degrees F), and everything is written in german. again, "africa?"

tomorrow i'm trying sandboarding (snowboarding on sand dunes), ml and lisa re planning to go kayaking in Walvis Bay and check out the seals and birds of the atlantic african ocean up close. next few days we'll be spending in style (special deal - thanks Pat!!!) in the sossusvlei dunes, then heaading out of namibia. not sure where yet, but eastern south africa and/or lesotho is potentiallty on our list, before we are heading up to dar inb tanzania and then over to zanzibar. and all with Lisa Chick - hooray, what a treat to have our great seattle friend here to explore a new continent with us (and mandy as "old hat", having explored namibia once twoi years ago with Ben!).

ok, better go - time for a german lager (?!) and some seafood (a delightful change from mealie-meal and chicken, staples of our diet for past 5 weeks) and strategizing about what will fill a few of our days between namibia adventures and zanzibar beach/spice exploring. love to all, we'll give an update when next having access to internet somewhere...

xo to all - CLay, Mandy and Lisa
p.m. tuesday 23/9
- posted by Mandy and @ 10:18 AM

 
FAMILY BIRTHDAYS AND ANNIVERSARIES

We are celebrating our parents and grandparents from afar!

Mattoon shout out:
Happy 82nd birthdays Mimi & PopPop!!! (9/14, 8/25)


North Carolina shout out:
HAPPY 60TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY TO NANA & POMPAW! (9/18 today!)

Chicago shout out:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MOM/PAT! xoxo (9/18 today!)


(East coast Hurricane shout out: We’re thinking about all friends and family along the East Coast, particularly our friends and family in Florida and DC- stay dry and safe!)

- posted by Mandy and @ 7:16 AM

 
LATE NIGHT SOUNDS = Not exactly Lion Roars (although we did hear that at night one week ago in South Luangwa National Park…)

You never know what you are going to hear in the African night. Three nights ago in suburban Lusaka it sounded like a rock and roll concert was happening until 2:00 a.m. Then two nights ago, there was a faint hint of a church service or some kind of chorus singing… Which brings us to last night, which started off with the melodious strains of a church service chorus and switched abruptly sometime between midnight and 1:00 a.m. to a rock concert. We were uncertain upon waking up whether this concert was live or just being amplified by loudspeakers into the Lusaka night by one of our neighbors. Whatever the case, even earplugs didn’t work – and this is inside a concrete house. Always a man of action, Lovemore managed to summon the Zambian police in the middle of the night and eventually isolate the offenders and quiet them after a few hours. This is nothing short of a miracle in a city where getting the police to the scene of a fender-bender can take the better part of a day…. Every day, and night, brings something new!

- posted by Mandy and @ 1:26 AM

 
LUSAKA – ZIMBABWE WEEKEND TRIP – LUSAKA – LAST WEEK AT AFRICARE…

Typed this all up once and it got erased by the testy Zambian internet connection.. so this one will be shorter….

Went to Zimbabwe on a whim last weekend with ruth and lovemore. It was great, just as warm and beautiful as we remember it. Harare is so much more developed and full than Lusaka. Comparisons bring insight – even with mugabe’s disaster, the economy is still so much more robust, the city so much more clean and nice than Lusaka. Zim will one day be a fantastic economy and place, but it will be some time.

We spent another weekend in ruth and lovemore’s cottage next to their house, where we were 2 years ago. Returned to dinner at wombles, the best (and cheapest) steak in the world. Had a ½ kg – that’s 1.1 pounds – steak with Wombles sauce. Ben, eat your heart out – I have pics to prove it. Long drive back and forth to Harare from Lusaka, but worth it for a fun weekend back where our southern African experiences began. Keep the zim people in your thoughts as we are for a new govt sometime soon.

One more week of work with Africare, then we meet up with Lisa and begin the next phase of our honeymoon. Lots and lots of work to do to complete our Africare volunteer commitment, but we’ll get it done…. Off to Namibia on Saturday – we’ll meet lisa in Windhoek. Then to etosha pan, sossusvlei, pacific coast… then who knows. Eventually to dar and Tanzania, then over to Zanzibar. Can’t wait!

OK gotta go =- Zimbabwe is still wonderful, despite all the dreadful mismanagement of govt, finances, etc. Southern Zambia is covered with hills, many slowly burning in the omnipresent brushfires that you can smell everywhere. The zim-zam border is hilarious – baboons everywhere, waiting for open car windows to dash in and steal food. Some border guards care and look in your car, some don’t. Passports almost full of stamps, it confused the guy on the Zambian side this time. I was sick as a dog, had fleeting fears of malaria but then realized it was just a flu/cold mix and was over it as soon as I ingested some wombles steak.

Fish eagle is official bird of Zambia, but it might as well be the chicken – it’s at every meal! How would you like to be a small business person in Zimbabwe, like Lovemore is, with 400% inflation per year – you need to raise salaries every 3 months by doubling in order to keep up!. No one has cash in zimbabwe, much less gasoline (all the gas stations are dry dry dry), so the banks are issuing these funny just-invented “travelers cheques” instead of cash (because they don’t have cash, because the reserve bank doesn’t have cash, because they’re out of money). We haven’t found the dual CD with Zambian music legend J.K. in duets with Zim music legend Oliver Mtukudzi, it’s sold out everywhere… but we will.

Our dear friends, we just found out, had their first child a healthy daughter this weekend… we are delighted!!! Love to them, to their new daughter,
Thanks to all of you with the uypdates to our shared yahoo email, we love them! All is well, we’re excited to wrap and drive Africare volunteer work to a close and begin the next phase of our honeymoon and travels, and excited to see Lisa our friend from seattle, now down south and on the other side of the world… see the deserts and etosha pan of Namibia, and see what’s ahead…. Love and thoughts to all, to the seattle friends we miss so much in the midst of a beautiful late summer September, to families in nashville, Illinois, California, north Carolina, florida, -- to friends and all we miss!
==p.m. September 15
Xoxo love ml and cm


- posted by Mandy and @ 12:02 PM

 
FAVORITE THINGS SO FAR...
Mandy and I just remembered, and had to post while we had the chance, a few of our favorite things about Zambia so far -- to balance the serious thoughts and things we've learned that occupy most of the prior blog posting...

Favorite expressions of Zambians:
-"Yes, please", "Thank you, please", "You are most welcome, please." (people say Please after everything, it squeezes its way into the funniest oddest places in zambian responses here!)
-"What would you love, madam?" (any waiter or waitress)

Favorite smells:
-the everpresent wafting smoke of brushfires, which are burning throughout both the cities in empty lots and roadsides as well as in the rural areas everywhere...

-nshima (stirred mealie-meal corn, the staple food of southern aFrican diet -- on every, not most, every plate at lunch and dinner here) cooking over open fire

Favorite sights:
-men holding hands while walking (friendship indicator here, rather than intimacy...)
-the striking bright purple jacaranda trees, which are now starting to flower and bloom (even in garbage lots in downtown lusaka)
orange-ball fast-drop sunsets (followed by pitch-black nights)
-Mars at its closest ever to earth, big and bright and orangish and clearly not an ordinary star

Favorite ideas:
-notion that soybeans, organic crops, and others are potential ways to supplement the basic corn-and-greens diet here.

-"Juju" - the primitive witchcraft practice that is common in rural, and sometimes urban, areas throughout southern Africa (there are too many different juju's to count, but our favorites involve what husbands and wives can do to put a spell on each other surreptitiously, so that their partner will get permanently engorged private parts if they are unfaithful -- sounds crazy, but crazier still is how many people we meet believe in juju.)

-Ruth and Lovemore's decision to complement the traditional Shona names of their sons with English middles names based on singers (Tinashe Steve Mufute, steve for Stevie Wonder, and Farai Eric Mufute, eric for Eric Clapton...)

Favorite sounds:
-birds and bugs and night.
-"pecky" the crazy pseudo-pet bird who incessantly runs into the dining room window of the mufute's house each morning (purpose? unknown...)
-Bicycle bells ringing up and down the streets of Chipata.
-Oliver Mtukudzi on the radio in a remote rural village.

Favorite tastes:
Authentic indian food at Dil, the bizarre restaurant down the street
Fresh nshima from hand-ground, hand-grown, hand-harvested corn at Chiwe village.
the difference between a Village Chicken (scrawny, loud, rambunctious) and a hybrid chicken (white, fat, boring).
Imported south african chocolate candy (a daily guilty pleasure) and the licorice "all sorts" candies that mandy cannot stay away from...
Mosi beer - people complain, but thin sweet beer is really tasty when it's consistently 90 degrees fahrenheit+

Favorite Senses:
- sleeping on a reed mat
- mandy having to kiss my beardy prickly face with irregular whiskers growth(sorry!)
- feeling my hair get buzzed off at the local barber shop (pronounced "saloon" by ruth)
- shaky-dancing with traditional Zambian dancers (you know it when you see it - lots of hip moving, not much else moving) all over

OK, bye!



- posted by Mandy and @ 3:46 AM

 
ROAD TRIP/FIELD WORK: LUSAKA-CHIPATA-LUNDAZI-CHAMA-LUNDAZI-CHIPATA-MFUWE-CHIPATA-LUSAKA

(Warning to those with low tolerance for stream-of-consciousness rambling – this blog entry is a biggie for us!…)

We’ve been out of touch for the past few weeks…We were on the road and we traveled far! If you look at a map of Zambia- we traveled to Chipata, Lundazi, Chama, and Mfuwe--- to the South Luangwa Game Park… and back again. We traveled about 1900 kilometers over about 10 days – mostly doing field work reviewing and consulting on small business projects -- and we’re pretty beat. The roads here are the WORST I have ever experienced- potholes, dirt patches, crumbling sides, and out-and-out ditches stretching all the way across the road surface abound, and you have to travel really slowly – we traveled about 70 miles in 3.5 hours the other day- and we were all bumping up and down the whole time. Apparently whenever the president of Zambia needs to go the areas we were in, he flies. We have learned through this experience that investments in infrastructure are not a priority for the Zambian government… we’re not sure whether they can’t afford it, don’t view it as important, or just don’t care – but whatever the case, the roads all over the country (except for a few merciful patches in and around Lusaka) are dreadful and apparently have been like this for over 2 decades. It’s clear to us now that basic infrastructure – consistently covered roads and reliable electricity – is a core requirement for any other national development to occur. Given that these requirements are not being met in Zambia – at least not in the sections up in the direction of Malawi and Tanzania – nor have they been many decades, we better understand why Zambia is in such dire economic straits.

The overall situation in Zambia is so strange and somewhat depressing and utterly frustrating. While the country is exceedingly poor (much less economically solid or promising than even Zimbabwe was 2 years ago, and we all know the degree to which Mugabe’s policies have decimated that place in the last 20 years…), the prices for food and lodging and other basic necessities remain incomprehensibly high. We keep getting so surprised at how much things cost- it has not been cheap being here at all! We are still learning but in general are feeling somewhat discouraged about prospects for rapid progress here- from what we’ve seen, and as we’re learning more about southern Africa in general, we appreciate more and more that it will take a long, long, long time at the pace things are moving here for any of the countries in this region to achieve something resembling economic self-sufficiency or sustainability. It is almost as if the government doesn’t want to see improvements for the economy or the quality of life for its citizens – there’s very little discussion of what’s to be done, or where the core problems lie with the federal oversight and management… instead, officials appear in the papers every other day insulting each other personally and/or deflecting blame. I’m not sure if we’re less sensitive to it or if it seems somewhat under controls, but HIV/AIDS seems to be getting a fair amount of attention- there are no major political issues (besides a tacit acknowledgment by the citizenship of a continuation of major incompetency, zero representation of voter interests, tax revenue mismanagement and lack of accountability, and outright corruption- sadly, so often the norm among Zambia’s and nearby governments for the past several decades…). There are over 3000 NGO’s registered to do work here. There is quite an influx of people and $$ focusing on AIDS. HIV/AIDS is undoubtedly one of the largest challenges and societal, economic, and political problems of the southern African region… but it has also lead to major international investments and focus on this area, while hunger and political abuse and stagnating economies have not attracted nearly as much focus. The World Bank just decided to dedicate $42 million to Zambian HIV/AIDS programs. We have talked about how ironic it is that while HIV/AIDS is killing a large part of the continent, it also employing a lot of people- it is a large part of the economies/employment base for many countries in Africa- a silver lining to a horrible cloud? It’s apparent how much international NGO’s and aid is driving some of these economies as you move around throughout the country. There are undoubtedly some entrepreneurs and business people operating here in Zambia and elsewhere, but we can tell you that when you drive around Lusaka, or the rural areas, when you see well maintained 4x4’s and well-dressed people, more often than not they are working on behalf of an international NGO. And many – not all, but many – of these NGO’s are trying to target and work on the “triumvirate” of development problems here in southern Africa: HIV/AIDS, hunger & food security, and poverty reduction. So the international aid organizations, in an odd twist, are increasingly the “models” of successful enterprise in countries like Zambia where so few other examples for business – retail or otherwise – exist.

[OK, ok, enough of the soapboxing… but one funny story I’ll relate which will help provide an example of what I’m talking about here. Phil, dad, Rob, and others from Kellogg, you’ll particularly enjoy and appreciate this… Yesterday I opened the paper here in Lusaka (the independent, non-government controlled paper, that is), and learned from an article that the prior day had seen the exciting activity of ONE trade on the entire Zambian stock exchange. Apparently, this is not so unusual. As I glanced down the page at the small box showing the sum total of all companies listed on the Zambian stock exchange, I noticed that it totaled 12. Last week, only 5 of these companies experienced any equity trades at all. Checking the address of the Lusaka-based Zambian stock exchange, I noted that it is located in a small room on the 3rd floor of a downtown building (additional note – I’ve not seen any buildings in downtown Lusaka over 3 stories but 2, and one is abandoned). Ah, capitalism at it most youthful. In other, less promising/amusing developments, last week the federal reserve bank of Zimbabwe literally ran out of all of its cash. Yes, that’s right, the national bank is out of money. Nor can they print any, because the country is so broke that they cannot afford the ink and paper required to run the presses. As you may imagine, this makes administering a fiscal policy – any fiscal policy, even the disastrously bad ones maintained for 10 years in Zimbabwe – impossible. As usual, Mugabe deflected any responsibility or blame from himself or his inept administration or cronies – instead charging that the problem was caused by (who else?) the citizens of his country inappropriately “hoarding” cash. Hmmm, wonder why people would want to hang on to their cash when inflation is running at 300%+ per year and money seems to disappear from banks – especially the federal reserve bank – with alarming regularity. OK, OK, enough economics – just a few illustrations of the challenges faced by the small number of honest, hard-working people who are participating in the formal sector here and in neighboring countries. Sorry, one last point I learned – what would you guess the tax rate would be for a country like Zambia which delivers very close to zero in return to its working citizens (no utilities such as water or garbage or sewage, no reliable electricity, no road network or maintenance of public buildings or resources, no pension or retirement income, and increasingly rare compensation for its public officials, etc. etc.)??? Well, friends and family, the tax rate (for those lucky few who can secure steady employment in the “formal” sector of the Zambian economy – only about 10% of the citizens here) is 30% of gross pay. Yes, that’s right – 30% right off every paycheck to the federal govt, in return for which people have grown accustomed to expecting very close to nil. And Zimbabwe is currently at about 50% effective tax rate. Appalling to someone like me that studied economics at an earlier, more naïve point in my life… OK, I’m done – just thought the business folks and others who are following our travels and who haven’t been to this part of the world would benefit from a few dollars-and-cents examples of the shape that the economies are in here --- and how little of it is the fault of the average, working person.]

Our volunteer work with Africare has been interesting end enlightening as well, not only from a humanitarian aid but also just a basic economics perspective as well --- During our time here, we’re particularly focused on the YES project – this stands for Youth Empowerment & Support. It is the second part of an adolescent reproductive health education initiative funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation— and is currently running in Malawi, Zambia and South Africa. There is a component of the program (beyond all of the great HIV/AIDS prevention/education, etc that really is the core of what the program is seeking to accomplish with young people in particularly destitute communities here…) that is called the IGA piece--- for “income generating activity”. The youth groups created business proposals and asked for little grants from Africare. Africare Zambia chose 10 groups to receive little grants and start little businesses which they, hopefully, would be able to start up and eventually run on their own. The net benefits are, at a minimum, to keep youths busy and active and learning some basic business skills and, at a maximum (or most optimistically), to get a group of youths to actually be running a sustainable community business in the long run. The idea is for the profits to then fund local needs, ongoing HIV/AIDS education activities, and growing the business so that more youths from the community can get involved. At least that’s the idea – but getting from theory to reality is quite a challenge, as you could imagine!.

Ruth asked Clay and I to visit all of the groups, assess their progress and advise them specifically on the businesses they had started, and recommend ways to assure that the businesses (which support the HIV/AIDS activities in the youth groups) are sustainable beyond May 2004 when the grant runs out. We were all over the map- if you look at a map of Zambia and look north of Lusaka, we were in Chipata, Lundazi, Chama –again all on the worst possible roads in the middle of nowhere! The kids were generally highly motivated, articulate and interesting- their businesses ranged from a piggery (raising pigs and selling them), a video rental shop, a chicken run, a tie dye dress making shop (teen mothers youth group started this and are doing well!), etc. Ruth asked us to identify the “gaps” in the program and quickly we saw that the kids needed more attention, support and training. The kids had enthusiasm but little business “know how”- so we spent most of our time out on our site-visits training them, answering specific questions about their businesses, and introducing them to the Community Business Manual -- which is an updated, similar one to the Manual that Clay, Ben and I wrote in Zimbabwe in 2001 for similar income-generating projects there. Africare is struggling a bit with having a lot of highly trained health and agriculture workers but few folks who are trained in business, so we also conducted a training with all of the staff in the Chipata offices and we’re doing another one at the all staff meeting next week here in Lusaka. This is about 100 people, so we hope to make some progress in tuning in Africare employees with business principles so that they can advise their grant/loan recipients on how to be successful with their small businesses! It has been eye opening and funny at times and at times so hard b/c we are such short-termers here and we can only help so much in this short visit. But we are trying our best to communicate what we see as the biggest opportunities for improvement in the projects, and to transfer as much knowledge as we can to the youths directly as well as to the Program Coordinators, while we are here…

Overall, in terms of HIV/AIDS issues, though prevalance is extremely high- official infection rates are among the highest in the world, there are billboards on the streets about anti-retro-viral medications and condoms, there are youth drama groups performing plays about abstinence and feeling empowered to “say no” (we saw a few performances in the villages) – HIV/AIDS is really on people’s minds and in their words here. It’s probably that we are 2 years further on into the pandemic here in southern Africa, but overall we think that there is more openness and discussion going on – both in private and in public – about HIV/AIDS than when we were in Zimbabwe. Some of that might be cultural here in Zambia, but I think that with every passing year the discussion is growing. It’s good that Africare is trying to be a part of the dialogue, and get everyone talking openly and directly about not only the threat, the danger, the tragedy…but most importantly, what needs to be done to reverse the infection rate trends. That’s the hardest part here – unifying a strategy, by country or, even better, by region – and getting it communicated and understood and adopted. This hasn’t happened yet… but there is positive movement in the direction of at least discussing frankly the situation – and that’s an improvement over even 2 years ago, it seems. There is still hope, undoubtedly, and the faster the clear, honest, action-oriented talk occurs, the better chance for survival this region ultimately has (in my/our opinion, of course!). Anyway, again, enough soap-boxing – there is a lot to say when the topic is so near, and so difficult…..

OK, on to new, unique, and special personal experiences that have complemented all this learning we are doing.

CHIWE VILLAGE
We had a really special experience about which we wanted to share just a bit.. . Last week while in the field, we spent the night in a traditional rural village -- , Chiwe Village- they were not part of the YES program, but instead Africare’s RCF program- which stands for the “rural credit facility”, where Africare gives loans to groups of villagers for agricultural projects. These women, the women of Chiwe, are a great success story for Africare. The women banded together and have created a co-op working society full of incredible products which they have grown, harvested, and processed together with their own hands --- maize to use in the village and sell, sweet potatos, pigeon peas, beans, etc. They have received 4 separate loans and paid all of them back but one, which they are in the process of paying back this year. They have transformed their village into a little factory and apparently when Africare started working with them 5 years ago there was a lot of malnutrition and now everyone looks well-fed, confident, and (modestly) secure in what their future holds! It was quite impressive and they made a really nice meal for us, we stayed up late into the night having a discussion about HIV/AIDS with the women (their husbands were noticeably nowhere to be found), and they had some really interesting comments about the delivery of the message about HIV to their children- that NGOs sometimes just come into their village and scream out messages about condom use, etc without consulting the elders and this often makes their job as parents very difficult. It was great for Ruth to hear and so interesting for us- they had questions about AIDS in the USA and how we all deal with it. The women had an unusual situation- they had all gone to get tested and also had convinced their husbands to go and get tested. This initiative was lead by an older woman in the village who is also a teacher in the schools- she was translating for us a lot as her English was very good- she was great! That night, Clay and I slept on the floor of one of the huts in the village ( we admittedly were pretty sore in the morning, but what a wonderful night to connect with the experience that our hosts have experienced every night of their entire lives!) and when we awoke we all helped make some breakfast over the fire. Afterwards, there was a whole ceremony where the women sent Ruth, Lovemore, Clay, and I off with gifts of a guinea fowl, a chicken, beans, maize, etc. and they toured us to all of the production sites. The village chief, or “headman” (a man), surfaced to give us a warm send off- Clay and I were laughing a bit b/c he was wearing a billowing shirt – probably the nicest he owned, hence his donning it that day for his meeting with “the visitors from USA” -- that had the design pattern of Saddam Hussein’s face all over it. Just to be sure there was no confusion, the shirt designers had made sure to write his name in flowing script below each portrait. The irony and cross-cultural wackiness of this situation was too much -- we made sure to take a photo with him, we’re quite certain he has no clue what his shirt is shouting to the world! It also shows how many different middle –men are in between the production of clothing and what ends up being worn way down the line by rural villages throughout Africa, after being bought, worn, given away, transferred, and resold numerous times over. (If I had a photo of every young boy I’ve seen in tattered t-shirts with US collegiate names, small-town American sports league logos, or wacky 80’s wear from our grade-school years miraculously come back to life on kind villagers 500 km’s from Lusaka, I’d have a full camera already…) Before we left, Ruth and I asked the chairperson of the women’s group, how much it would be to become members of the Chiwe women’s group and for 20,000 kwacha ( - the local currency, equivalent to about $5) we became members, I’m proud to say that I am an official member of the Chiwe Women’s Group (I had to sign their registration book!). We have some great photos of this incredible group of ladies that we hope to be able to post soon!

Incongruously, this amazing experience was followed immediately by the surprise of the…

Weekend in the SOUTH LUANGWA GAME PARK
In our 10 days on the road we also made a stop at South Luangwa Park- supposedly the best (of the 19) game park in Zambia. Again, the road to get there (the ONLY road) was a mess – 130 km’s of un-attended ribby, washboard-like gigantic bumps, all dirt, occasionally pocked with surprise potholes that could flip your car if you hit them at more than but once we arrived, it was quite an experience. We stayed in a very crazily fancy lodge that Ruth stayed in once in the “off-season” and was “sure that it wouldn’t be costly.” In the meantime, with every fancy feature offered Clay and I kept mumbling to each other, “we are dead meat”…we could tell we didn’t quite fit in when we found out that all guests charter flights into the park and we were the only ones who had driven…not to mention the rooms, the food, the views, etc… it was a big fat change from where we had been the night before. And in fact, we were all a bit shocked at the price in the end but b/c we were with Africare it softened the blow a bit b/c we got the “national rate”- oh well, we did have a great time there! The park is amazing and chock full of all kinds of great animals- our first 20 minutes into a game drive on Saturday we spotted two male lions and spent a good 30 minutes observing them, there were elephant, giraffe, impala, hippos, zebra, the whole lot. The landscape was very pretty and it was good to be off the road for a few days! On our way out of the park, we spotted just off the roadside (the park directions are clear about not leaving your vehicles when driving around in the park – this is why..) a male and female lion lazying about next to each other in the shade. They were actually kind of flirting for a while, and we thought we might get to see a national geographic moment of giant cat mating, but sadly they plunked back down next to each rather than having a Barry White moment in front of us. Oh well – an amazing last memory from an unexpectedly luxurious and special weekend of once-in-a-lifetime game viewing of great big predator mammals and a whole lot of beautiful carmine bee-eater birds (unique to this part of Africa).

So now we’re back in Lusaka, working to get our project review and recommendations summarized before planning to head down to Zimbabwe for a quick weekend jaunt back to where our love affair with Africa and its people all began two years ago… (Ruth and Lovemore want to go home for the weekend- so we’ll get a chance to see Harare with two more years of Mugabe’s mismanagement and reign of oppression under its belt). We can’t wait to see familiar faces, spend some time with Ruth and Lovemore enjoying th country and city where they really will always feel is their home. Then next week we finish up at Africare with our volunteer services and head to Namibia to meet Ms. Lisa Chick and start some personal travel on our own through the rest of our southern African destinations!! She is spending a week in South Africa and then meeting us and we are excited to see her! We will be in Namibia, Malawi and Zanzibar before we all leave Africa on Oct 7! Yee haw.

This will – far and away – be our biggest blog, we’re sure, until we arrive at some other destination with reliable internet access. In the meantime, we’re safe and sound, happy and learning lots, enjoying seeing new faces, new countryside, and experiencing the many challenges and joys of southern Africa. We miss you all, in special personal ways, and talk often of the weddings, birthdays, dinner parties, and conversations with you all that we’re missing. If our stories and blogging runneth over, as they say, it’s mainly from yearning to share with you what is filling our senses here. (so apologies if its on –and-on-and-on!). Love to all, we’ll pop on when we can for updates, new experiences, and occasional “where in the world are we” notations so that anyone reading this regularly knows where we are. The next week or so should include Lusaka, Harare, Lusaka, and hopefully Windhoek if we can get our acts together and make it down there to meet Lisa next weekend without breaking the bank… Keep sending us your own news to our shared email on yahoo, and know that we’re sending our love to you from across the world…
XOXOXO

- posted by Mandy and @ 3:31 AM

 
Return to Lusaka from 1 week+ in the Eastern Province.

Quick blog - mandy and I are rushing to get out emails and do some planning for our next few weeks before Lovemore and Ruth come back to collect us from the internet cafe.
We've just arrived back in lusaka from a week in eastern province doing field work with the income-generating activities projects that Africare is funding with youth groups there. for those with maps, we were in chipata for several days, then lundazi, followed by chama... back to lundazi, back to chipata... then on to mfuwe and the South Luangwa national park and game reserve for two days of complete relaxation and luxury, (more stories on this weekend experience later..), followed by return to chipata for a couple days and now finally back here. so much to tell... don't know if we';ll have time tonight (we're rushing to get mails dealt with, travel plans done, etc. on a short visit to internet cafe before lovemore and ruth return to pick us up...)
\If we do, then we'll post another blog. briefly, a few impressions from the time in field:
eastern province of zambia has the WORST roads mandy or i have ever seen anywhere in the world. if you are reading this and live in teh U.S., I can guarantee that you can't even imagine the road conditions we've experienced travelling over 1600 km's on in the past 9 days. more on this later...
Zambia has some serious infrastructure and development challenges ahead of it... but amazing people.
we stayed overnight in a real village outside lundazi. it was amazing. more on sleeping on floor of a thatch-roof hut later...
We have had more starch than we could believe -- craving some veges and fruits!
We saw male and female lions from 30-feet away... and many many more amazing animals.
So much to tell about the amzing projects we visited and children and adults we met while in the field... more (much more) on this later!
xo and love to all for now.
Clay and ML
- posted by Mandy and @ 9:54 AM