Weekends

So my two new favorite people are Melody (who is the new agriculture officer for USAID) and her husband Keith. They have really cool career experience, met and fell in love and got married in Kenya, and have worked in Afghanistan and Sudan. But even better they are just extremely cool and really fun to hang out with and really nice to me. On the weekend of July 23rd they took Karolyn (the new democracy and governance officer at USAID), Molly, and I to a lodge in Senga Bay on Lake Malawi. It was a SUPER relaxing weekend. I read and laid in the sun and tried not to get eaten by baboons and kayaked and ate yummy food and hiked.

On 31st that same group went to Dedza. On the way there I ate a mouse. All along the roadside in Malawi boys hold up sticks with rows of dead mice on them. They typically burn grassy fields and then catch mice as they run out of their holes in the ground. Then they take out the intestines then they smoke the mice. They don’t take off the head or the fur or anything, and people eat them just like that. I had mentioned it to everyone that I would have to eat a mouse before I left Malawi. Keith really latched onto this promise of mine and stopped alongside the road when he saw a groups of mice-sellers. I bought a mouse and took a bite. I saw the redness of the inside and immediately sit it our because I thought it wasn’t cooked. But as I examined the non-chewed portion of the mouse I realized it was in fact cooked. In fact it was very cooked and dry. So I took a real bite and swallowed. I wrote on facebook later that I had eaten a mouse which I suppose is slightly misleading because really I just ate a piece of a mouse. I hope my internet persona hasn’t lost all credibility.

Anyway, we went to this place where they make lots of nice pottery and had a great lunch. Then, we went on search for these 2,000 year old cave paintings. The guidebook took us down a dirt road, through a couple villages, and finally to the base of a mountain where there was an old Catholic church. We got out of the car not knowing where to go from that point. Then, several small children from the village came up to us and asked if, by chance, we would like to see the paints. Why yes, in fact, we would.

They took us on a hike up the mountain. And finally we got to the crest where there was a small cave and, behold, cave paints. The paints were of various animals. We sat there for awhile looking back and forth from the paintings to the gorgeous view. I started talking to a girl named Elizabeth, who spoke awesome English. She told me about all the tourists that come to see the paintings and how she enjoys talking to them so she can get better English because she wants to be a nurse.