Blog 1

The start of our year in Zambia

Lusaka; 14/10/08

We arrived safely in Zambia on 11/10/08. We had a go at email in our hotel in Lusaka, just to see what had been sent since we left and it is very slow. We are here for a week's induction with the other VSO volunteers who flew out with us. However we have heard that there is a hotel in Monze which has a very speedy system so we will keep our fingers crossed (see below).

So much has happened it is difficult to know where to start.
There is a lot of paper work to do and we are going to do a lot of worrying until we get the technology right, mobile phones/computers etc.
Mosquitoes have already bitten us and there is much discussion on what is the best prophylaxis for malaria.
Zambia is as much as we expected with a lot of sun, not great food and no alcohol apart from Zambian beer. We had a nice meal, just the two of us without the younger ones, last night in an Indian restaurant in the hotel!
We have been given lots of money for domestic equipment and our wages for the next 3 months, cash and one cheque for December! Keeping track of the money we have brought with us and keeping it all safe is a bit of a nightmare. It will be better when we get to Monze.
We met Kate, the wife of Dr. Tom Lavender who Maji is replacing and she has given us a lot of very good information. They have had a great time (mostly!) and Kate has given us some good contacts and places to visit at weekends. We will probably try one with James and Vicki in February.
There is a golf course in Monze and Michael Breen (the gynae surgeon who has been in Monze for 7 years) plays so we may get into that. Michael also has access to a swimming pool at an ex-pat campsite 11K from Monze, which does good BBQs and is on a farm settled by an Englishman 2 generations ago.

Monze 22/10/08

It is difficult to understand why but life has gone at such a pace with so many new experiences and stories to tell that we have had no time to sit at the computer and write a missive.
First we are very safe and happy. I hope you aren’t worrying about us! It is such a mixture of emotions that it isn’t correct to say that it is all pleasure. Far from it the food is still not great, still no good wine (I have had one glass of not very good white, one bottle of reasonable red wine shared with Tom Lavender and I have just started a bottle of very bad red wine) Maji has had no wine but likes the Zambian beer. The sun is very hot and life is very sticky. The red sandy dust gets everywhere, It collects in and out of cars, slides off when you open the boot of a car and it is too much to do anything about, you just have to live with it, wash the floors regularly and wash ourselves morning and evenings. Water is good when you get it, the electricity is intermittent and the hot water depends on the electricity so both have to be on to have a hot bath (no showers as yet but this can be changed!

(It never was and showers were a luxury when we travelled and stayed in hotels).

There are four types of water! Straight out of the tap, filtered, boiled or filtered and boiled. You can safely wash in the first; wash your vegetables in the first or second but they must then be dried and you should only drink and clean you teeth in boiled and filtered water.

The chrome water cylinders with the tap at the bottom enclosing ceramic filters in the kitchen. It is always filled with boiled water from the electric kettle after decanting into metal saucepans to cool.

A major part of life is managing water with storage in large plastic dust-bins for when the taps dry up.

We have 2 large green and one white small plastic water containers filled straight from the tap in the kitchen and bathroom and have had to use them on several occasions.

We have to boil the water when the electricity is on, if possible in the mornings so the heat from the electrically powered hot plate doesn’t heat the house and also leaves plenty of time to cool and then filter. We eventually stopped heating the house at the same time as boiling water using an electric kettle!

We have not had any illness, such as diarrhoea or malaria in spite of the change in diet, the difficulty with water and several mosquitoes bites. It is amazing how quickly all the avoidance measures become just a routine part of life.

So why are we enjoying it!

It is simply that it is all so different to “normal life”; there is a new experience everyday and we are constantly meeting new people from all walks of life and different countries; Spain, America, Nepal, Ukraine, Uganda, Nigeria, Kenya, Philippines, Ireland, India and of course Zambians. Many are our fellow VSO volunteers.

The VSO volunteers at our introductory week in Lusaka: can you see Judy on the second row on the left?

In our induction week in Lusaka we had lectures/talks from very memorable people including two HIV/AIDS Zambians who very openly “shared” their story and were able to field any question often about their personal lives; a lecturer on Zambian political history and its 27 or so languages including Tonga (which we are trying to learn), and the official national language English.

Mike standing between the "amazing Zambian woman" (see below) and one of the HIV positive people who talked about their experiences.

An amazing Zambian woman talked about Zambian culture and how the families are structured so that all a child's fathers’ brothers are their father and mother's sisters their mother so all your cousins are your brothers and sisters. It means that families consist of large groups of people which increases their economic security and in theory provides a very secure environment for children and the burden of raising children is shared by many relatives. It is also normal practice for brothers to share their wives particularly if they are attractive! Although Zambians are reluctant to admit it I think their relaxed attitude to sexual relationships, which may have never caused problems in the past when they lived in isolated tight communities with little interaction with other groups may now be one of the main reasons for the high prevalence of HIV/Aids in Sub-Saharan Africa. In some ways their old family structures may have been a good and secure way to raise children until the introduction of migrant labour, the population expanded and people moved to urban areas with development of large towns and cities .

We had a great tour of Lusaka and visited where Kenneth Kaunda lived while campaigning for independence from the British.

He was the first President from 1964-1992

and then lost a multiparty democratic election. He is still alive and revered in Zambia although heavily criticised for his economic policies which were based on socialist principles. Most of his 9 children have been very successful although only one is in politics and one died of AIDS.

KK with his family of 9 children.

We had a reception at the British High commission to celebrate VSO's 50th birthday.

Sharing skills and changing lives the VSO mantra is more difficult than we thought!

The high commissioners, Tom Carter and Carolyn were job sharing and were at the reception with their two sons and Tom's mother.

There were traditional African dancers to entertain us.

The introductory week was very relaxed at the Barn Hotel with a swimming pool, the lectures and interactive sessions were fun and highly informative.

The director of VSO Zambia, Frida, was very professional and concerned for our welfare as was Maurice Shakawamba who had set up our placement with the Monze Mission Hospital.

Frida VSO Chief Executive in Zambia with Gabby, and Maurice Shakawamba our facilitator!

Mrs Yamba in one of her wigs.

And so to Monze a rather hot and uncomfortable 4 hour drive from Lusaka with Mrs. Yamba the senior hospital administrator, Jasper the driver and Dhun and Natasha (2 other VSO volunteers in fund raising and monitoring and evaluation two common jobs for VSO volunteers).

Even though the road we travelled on is the main road in Zambia from the copper belt in the north through Lusaka to Livingstone and Victoria falls it does have above average potholes which makes the journey tedious, bumpy and sticky! It continues on to Zimbabwe. I had to help Jasper tie down a very great amount of our luggage safely the top of the Land Cruiser and even then we were packed in around our baggages of food and domestic equipment we had bought in Lusaka.

"
We were welcomed by Anthony and Sarita Brand, (seen here at "Tooters")

Dr. Tom Lavender, all VSO volunteers already in Monze, Norman Lewis and Xavier (Catholic Diocese) within 30 minutes of arrival and after freshening up and not much unpacking of our gear in our home for the next year were taken out for dinner at the best restaurant in town, “Tooters” emporium of entertainment, by Tony and Sarita to dine on fried chicken and chips, tomato sauce and a Mosi, Zambian beer.

"Tooters Emporiam".

We think our accomodation is great. This is our house next to Natasha and Dhun's,

Our houses front and back, note our front is weeded and Natasha's and Dhun's isn't and looks like a lawn. The back with the guava tree was more attractive and Judy did some sunbathing here and we dried all our clothes.

with living/dining room,

bedroom,

and bedroom where Hilary, Vicki and James stayed

and bathroom with shaving kit

and safe fronting as a wardrobe!

We went to bed with at least half of our luggage still to be unpacked and slept well in spite of the heat which has since not greatly upset us. We have already developed the pattern of going to bed early (it gets dark early and there is not much else to do) and we rise early usually between 7-8am. This morning we got up at 6.30 with water and electricity both functioning, did the washing together and then shared a hot bath in series! We breakfasted on hot porridge, milk and Huletts, golden syrup (fortunately indistinguishable from Lyles) which will probably, together with variably soft/hard boiled eggs will be the way we start the day for the next year.

This was a field just in front of our house after the start of the wet season. A constant delight was to see modern day life contrasted with practices centuries old!

Well it is now 2245 hrs Maji’s been asleep for half an hour and I am getting tired at the key board. If we can get this off tomorrow the story of Anthony and Sarita and her incredible garden, Patricia Malumbo and the strange story of the missing bananas, bottle of water, tins of tuna and tomato paste and the candle, the swimming pool and the ex-pat white Zambian husband who was shot in his own home by a robber just before we arrived, all the amazing people at the hospital the patients/wards/theatres, the Sisters and Father Rogers and catholic values such as the sanctity of life and what that means to the practice of medicine at the Monze Mission Hospital will all be in the next email.

Mwabonwa, muli buti and karbotu to you all and goodnight.


PS no mentions of Richard Dawkins so far but his theories are very helpful in understanding many of the cultural traditions we see?!

(We had good access to the internet throughout are stay in Monze first at a hotel 2 mile walk from our home and for the last 6 months or so at an internet cafe 5 minutes from home run by young Zambians who very helpful and became very friendly)

We spent many hours here with emails, this blog and booking our holidays especially our month's trip home. The young people running the internet service were really friendly, very helpful and sorry to see us go. Their charges were very reasonable and well within our budget. This was a great resource although it cut down on our exercise as it was much closer than the hotel.