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Published: October 7th 2008
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“Well officer, this is a little unusual isn’t it?”
Too many events have happened over the course of the past few weeks for one entry so I am breaking up my latest news from Malawi into a couple of chapters! My good friend and ex-colleague Todd is over visiting from San Diego for a few weeks. He is helping me a lot with work (more of that in the next entry) but we had a public holiday the other day, to celebrate the end of Ramadan, so we took a little road trip to Ntchitsi Forest Reserve. There is an interesting thing that I have discovered about several of the ‘tourist spots’ in Malawi and that is that they really are ‘hidden treasures’ i.e. they are hard to find even if you’re trying! It’s difficult to know if you’re headed along the right track when signs lead to ‘roads’ that barely resemble roads. I tried out my Chichewa to ask for directions and was confused when people who clearly did not see many white people on a regular basis didn’t seem to even understand my greetings. I later realized they quite possibly didn’t even speak Chichewa as there are several
other languages that are spoken in the Northern end of the country. We never did find the lodge we were looking for but we had a lovely drive through the mountains. The diversity of landscapes in Malawi is breathtaking. Even over the course of our short drive (we really went just a few hours from the hospital) we passed through high plateau, mountain peaks, forests (though extremely dry forest these days), grasslands and fields of maize, tobacco and beans.
All in all we were having a very enjoyable day when we turned and started heading home, planning on stopping at one of the little tearooms in the mountains on our way. Things suddenly changed when we saw a crowd of one hundred and fifty or so people on the road ahead of us, along with a policeman who stopped us in our tracks. I suddenly had a terrible, sinking feeling in my stomach. The policeman leaned into the driver’s side of our rental car to talk to Todd. He greeted us and then told us that he needed our help (all of the villagers were looking on intently). Todd very politely asked how we could help him and he
told us he needed our car. I thought this only happened in the movies?? He told us that they had found a lady who had escaped from the prison in Mponela - a town 15km or so along the road - and they needed to take her back. He then told us that she had murdered her daughter. “Murdered. Yes - that’s right - murdered. Imagine, her own daughter and she murdered her. She’s a murderer. A murderer.”
I suddenly decided I wanted to see some identification (the way the mind works in situations like this is fascinating) and so found myself glazing over looking at a Malawi police identification card that was given to me by a guy who had seemed to appear from nowhere to be standing over me on the passenger’s side. Before I could really register what was happening I was moving our big bunch of local bananas (bought from a stand at the side of the road in the mountains) off the back seat to make room for 2 policemen and the murderer. Todd started the car and set off in the direction of Mponela leaving the cheers of the villagers behind us. One
of the policemen got on his mobile phone and said ‘we’ve got her and we’re on our way back’. Todd then said “well officer, this is quite unusual isn’t it?” The other officer then proceeded to tell us that the lady was crazy, whilst swirling his hands around his head to support what he was saying. We then sat in silence for the rest of the journey to the station. I had a little case of nervous laughter and was trying to keep it hidden as I was extremely aware of the policeman on my side, and the murderer, keeping their eye on me. I was also extremely aware of the stench coming from the murderer.
We finally arrived at the station, which Todd narrowly avoided slamming into as he was distracted by the sight of the tiny white cell blocks to one side. The policemen were greeted like heroes. We pretty much left as soon as we could and, once we felt we could speak again, both said exactly the same thing in unison (un-publishable). As soon as we could we found a little shop to stop at and sat outside to have sodas. It is unbelievably hot
Shida and Todd enjoying some nsima
My good friend and ex-colleague from San Diego is out to visit for a few weeks. these days so moments like that are very much appreciated if not absolutely necessary. After discussing the events of the afternoon some more we did realise that there were a few questionable things such as why did the policemen not have their own car (though there were also no cars at the station) and how did the ‘murderer’ really escape (we were told the policemen were attending to other police duties). However, at the end of the day we were safe and sound with just another story to tell.
You would think that might be enough drama for one week wouldn’t you? Not for us. The very next day we found ourselves ‘in discussions’ with a couple of policemen in another part of the country, much closer to home this time, on our way to the airport to pick up a new hospital volunteer. Unfortunately, Todd mistook one man’s signal to pull over for a friendly Malawian wave. “I could forgive you if it were just one offence but there’s a second one - your passenger is not wearing her seatbelt”. I was kicking myself. I would never have forgotten to put my seatbelt on before living in Africa
View of Mount Kamande
The mountain that we climbed in Mozambique. I was unable to climb it last time as Mozambiqan soldiers were patroling to protect their maize. Right now there is no maize so we were fine. when more often than not there is no seatbelt to be found. The two policemen wanted to take us to the police station right then and there. I tried going with the “please sir we really need to pick up our friend - she doesn’t know anyone here - is there any alternative for us right now rather than going to the station” (the man immediately picked up on where I was going with this and yes - again - I’ve been in Africa too long). Todd was trying the alternative route of begging for mercy, saying that we all here working on HIV/AIDs projects and throwing in the hospital’s name as often as possible. Eventually, we were allowed to pass through on the condition that we stopped on our way back once we had picked up our friend. During our time at the airport waiting for the flight to come in we managed to find the phone number for Mponela police station. We were hoping that because we had helped some policemen bring back their prison escapee these other policemen might let us off. We were actually disappointed when we returned to the road block to find a different
The border between Malawi and Mozambique
Our fearless leader Lucius in Mozambique with Weston in Malawi lady who was not at all interested in talking to us never mind trying to charge us with any offences. Our ‘friends’ had knocked off for the night.
Weekends/days off here seem to always provide for much adventure! Last weekend a few of us had a very relaxing Saturday night at Dedza pottery and lodge (in a beautiful setting in the mountains) but two weekends ago myself, my colleague Weston (who was visiting for a week to service our instruments) and housemates Eileen and Martine went to Dzalanyama Forest Reserve. I was really excited to climb a mountain in Mozambique that I had sighted last time I was there. Weston and I were off on our 7 hour hike, unaware of the fact that a forest fire had started and (we found out later) was moving closer and closer to the lodge, where our friends were relaxing, Martine having felt really unwell the past few days. I’ll save the long story to tell you in person one day but all turned out fine in the end and we are all alive and well. On to my next entry and all the latest happenings with the project……
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