Everyday things that are so very different

Culture of service: in Malawi there are people to take care of everything. To open doors, to sweep the floors, to drive other folks around, to clean the house, to care for the children, to cook, to clean. You name it, they have someone to do it. It’s a level of personal service that I equate with great wealth. But here, it seems that everyone has someone else to take care of them in some capacity. When I talk to my colleagues here they can’t believe that I clean my own house, that I cook every night, that there isn’t someone sweep the front stoop. These are not wealthy people, it is simply that there is an entire structure of folks who are paid a wage of $1/day to complete these tasks for you. 

This man sweeps the grounds of the hotel all day long. Leaves fall like rain but the ground is always clear. The bonus of this: no leaf blowers!

Women don’t drink alcohol. At every restaurant we have visited, no drink menu is brought. (Not sure what happens if it’s a table of all men). None of my women colleagues partake. And the only women I have seen imbibing have not been Malawian.

They sure do make DELICIOUS drinks though. This is fresh watermelon juice

This is called a Rock Shandy (Sprite, Ginger ale, bitters)

This is a Chapman (sprite, soba, bitters)

Everyone says hello to every person in your party. When a waiter walks up, he first looks at me and says hello, then I say hello. Then he looks at the person to my left, makes eye contact and says hello and that person says hello. Then he looks at the next person and says hello. And so it goes. It’s very nice, but it feels like a long time, actually!

This woman works on the construction site, bringing supplies back and forth in a bucket perched on her head

There are no power tools here. I suppose this makes sense given that only 17% of the entire populations has electricity. It’s a little jarring to see a guy with a handsaw cutting the wood to build tables for his vendor stall on the side of the road. Today we drove by a construction site where a tall building is going up. The scaffolding is made of large tree branches lashed together. The whole thing was akimbo and looked as if it would tumble down at any moment.

This is a construction site by the place we are staying. They are adding more rooms (currently the whole place is 4 rooms). Everything at this site is done manually

Funerals are a whole-village affair. After someone dies, only one to two days will pass before the funeral. The village walks as a whole to the cemetery down the street. To let cars know, they lay a tree branch filled with leaves on the road. This signal tells drivers to stop and wait until the people have fully vacated the street and then the branch is removed and traffic can resume.

This is a photo behind a village full of people at a funeral walking to the cemetery. 

Mosquito nets are used for everything. People rely on them to help with fishing, with washing, with building anything, really. There is kind of a joke that they are used for everything except protecting themselves from mosquitos. 

Tipping is not a thing in Malawi. Unless you are a westerner. Then they expect you to tip.

There is no daylight savings time change in Malawi and it gets dark, DARK here at 5:30. There are no streetlights so by 8:00 it feels like midnight and I have been going to bed early!

The unobstructed view is spectacular. Without high rises, lights and all the big things in the US, the land just goes on and on forever.

This green leafed crop is tea

The sunset glow is magnificent