Poor Malawi!

Malawi feels like the poorest country I have ever been to in Africa – and I’ve been to quite a few of them now.  In fact, according to most statistics, Malawi is one of the 10 poorest countries in the entire world.

It shows.

From the moment we crossed the border from Tanzania into Malawi, I began to notice the signs of poverty around me.  Now that we have been here for two weeks, evidence of Malawi’s abject poverty has truly begun to pile up.

“Be careful of that cyclist on the side on the road!” I warned Bruno, as we arrived in Karonga, Malawi’s most northerly city.  It was an unnecessary warning, because soon enough we were surrounded by so many cyclists that it was all-but impossible to miss them.

Parked outside the bank, I began to count the bicycle-to-motorized-vehicle ratio.  I’d count up for each bike I saw, and start again at zero every time a car, truck or motorbike passed.  I noted each number on a pad of paper.  When Bruno finally returned, with a bag of near-worthless Malawian Kwacha, I calculated the mean average of the data in front of me.

The conclusion of my very-very scientific experiment: Seven bicycles pass, on average, for every one motorized vehicle.

I must specify that this is on the main transit highway between the North of Malawi and its capital.

Seeing heavy packages loaded onto the backs of bicycles is commonplace in Malawi, as is seeing four bikes on a car-less highway.

Loading dried tobacco onto the bicycle to bring to town

 

At over $2 a litre, Malawi claims the prize for most expensive fuel in all of Eastern and Southern Africa – 32% higher than the average world price.  For the average Malawian, owning a car has always been a pipe dream, but now even those that do own cars don’t seem to be driving them.  Almost all of the cars we see on the road belong either to international aid agencies or police officers.

Instead, most regular Malawians walk – pedestrians have staked such a claim on the highway that they hardly yield for passing vehicles – or ride bicycles.  There are even bicycle taxis with padded seats over the back wheel for the comfort of a paying passenger.  I’ve seen men riding bicycles carrying bundles of wood taller than them, or overflowing with jugs of water stacked and tied to every possible corner of the bike.  I’ve even seen bicycles with an entire family aboard.

No wonder there are also a lot of bicycle repair shops in Malawi!

Moving Time!  We saw five pieces of heavy furniture being moved on foot along this major highway. Perhaps in times gone by, the family might have been able to afford a truck hire, or at least a minibus ride.

Bicycles taxis waiting for passengers.

Women walking to market, heavy bags on head.

Occasionally, while we guiltily drove along Malawi’s smoothly tarred roads, we would spot a transport truck or a minibus speeding along, overflowing with so many people and goods that we were sure the vehicle would either break down or explode its contents all over the road.

I decided to see what it was like to ride in a minibus in Malawi.  For less than $1.50, I traveled 45km between the village of Ngara and Karonga town.  That may not seem expensive, but in a country where 65% of the people don’t earn that cash in a day, it’s a hefty price to pay for a ride.  Malawians think twice before hopping into a minibus.

But when they dohop on, they cram themselves into one of the few minibuses still plying the roads.

“Is there space?,” I asked incredulously at the driver’s cash-boy, as he slid open the minibus door for me.  He pointed to the tip of the bench nearest the door.  I shrugged, squeezed in, and wedged my butt onto the half-seat.  I peered around – with difficulty – to count how many people we were in the vehicle.

Eighteen, in a twelve-seater.  No wonder I felt squished like a canned sardine.

Over the next few kilometers, the minibus stopped frequently.  But not to let people off, as I’d naively assumed – to let more people in.  At our maximum, we had twenty three people inside the vehicle.  Heads poked over my shoulder, knees dug into my legs and back, smelly armpits hung over my nose.  NowI felt like a sardine.

A truck, packed with people, finally takes off, when minutes before it was on the side of the road doing some repairs (no doubt from the weight of the cargo!)

This truck is carrying people and about 450 litres of water.

A year ago, road transport in Malawi was probably a more comfortable and pleasant affair, back when fuel prices were “normal” (well, the new normal).  Drivers didn’t have to stuff their vehicles to the absolute limit in order to make a day’s wage.  But now, the price of fuel in this poor country has forced everyone – from minibus drivers to shop-owners and farmers to families – to rethink the way they travel.

After visiting Karonga’s local market, I cursed myself for not having brought in papayas, mangoes, and pineapples from Tanzania.  The market had a serious lack of variety.  Yet, the couple we met at our first campsite thought differently.

“Karonga market is heaven for us.”  They were traveling south-to-north, and had been in Malawi for over a month.

Once we headed further south, I began to understand their perspective.  In the Chitimba market, all I could buy were tomatoes and the spinach-like rape.  In the Livingstonia market, all I could buy were tomatoes and onions.  In the Rumphi market, all I could buy were tomatoes and cabbage.  Along the roadside produce stalls, all I could see was tomatoes (if anything).

Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes, everywhere.

The [tomato] market in Livingstonia. Ok, there were tiny dried fish too, but the stink they create doesn’t make me think these are particularly editable.

An empty road-side market with attached [closed] dried goods shop – an all-too-common feature in Malawi.

The People’s Supermarket – northern Malawi’s best-stocked – carried cookies, chips, long-life milk, cleaning supplies, beer, juice, maize-meal, and white bread.  I walked around the shop, hallucinating gourmet foods, only to find another pack of coconut biscuits upon closer inspection.

“What do locals eat?,” I speculated rhetorically during each failed market visit.  Deep down, though, I knew.  In Malawi, 80% of adults are subsistence farmers.  They grow maize and cassava in order to make nsima, their staple food.  Boiled into a ball with the texture of porridge mixed with play-dough, it sits in the stomach like a rock.  Though it has almost no nutritional value, it does fill you up.

To complement the flavorless nsima, there are always tomatoes (!).  Those with foresight (and taste buds) plant small gardens, generally with a single type of produce.  It might be pumpkins or potatoes, cabbage or avocadoes, potatoes or bananas.  These products account for almost all that is bought and sold in local markets and on roadsides.

A family selling their squash on the side of the highway – hopefully they will make enough cash so they can buy themselves some tomatoes!

 

Sometimes, a rare and desirable product shows up at the market, but it doesn’t last long.  In Rumphi, I was walking past the road-side market at the exact moment that a woman showed up with a bucket of guavas.  I was alerted to her treasure by the sheer kerfuffle the surrounding women made.  Equally ravenous, I managed to squeeze myself through the women and reach inside the bucket for as many guavas as my hands could carry.

We feasted insatiably on nothing but guavas for the rest of the day.

Madonna may have adopted a few Malawian orphans, but she certainly didn’t adopt them all.  It is estimated that 25% of Malawi’s children are orphans.  As one of the most-densely populated areas in Africa, – almost 20 million people packed into an area of only 118,484km₂  (maybe everyone here feels like a canned sardine..?) – that makes for a lot of orphans (so Madonna, you’re off the hook).

Malawi’s orphans are often taken care of by their ageing grandparents (come-of-age before the HIV epidemic).  But they are a burden on the elderly, who no longer have the physical ability to work and are without savings accounts and social services.  International aid agencies have come on board to help the countless families in this situation, but most are concentrated around the big cities of the central and southern regions.

We have stumbled upon quite a few lodges in the remote North that are generously running their own orphan care centers, funded by the profits from tourism.  One such was the extensive Matunkha Center in Rumphi, which involves itself in education, health care, and agriculture for orphans’ families in 116 surrounding villages.

Another is the smaller but no less impressive FloJa Foundation Lodge.  We spent a few nights camped along their lakeside site, and I had the opportunity to visit the foundation and speak at length with the founders.

“We started our organization six years ago, but the idea to give something to the children of this forgotten community started way before that,” says Floor, her husband Jan nursing their adopted Malawian four-month old in the background.  “We’d come as tourists to Malawi a dozen years ago, and it called to us when we returned to the Netherlands.”

The idea of FloJa is to provide early childhood education and healthcare to the orphaned, disabled, and otherwise vulnerable children of the community.  Preschool is offered for free – including two substantial meals – for 80 children between 2-6 years old in order to give them a proper kick-start at life.

The 2-3 year olds at FloJa taking their morning porridge.

FloJa’s playground, and the only see-saws I’ve seen in Malawi

The classroom for the 4-6 year olds, where I spent a morning with Mr. Simon’s class

 

“The government primary school in Ngara is wretched,” continued Floor.  “The classes are overcrowded, kids don’t even have their own notebook or pencil, and the youngest students learn outside under a tree rather than in a classroom.”

In these conditions, FloJa’s kids ordinarily wouldn’t stand a chance.  But with their 3-4 years of literacy, numeracy, and English education, they are regularly at the top of their classes.

“We also offer free afternoon tuition for primary-aged children that have passed through our foundation,” pipes in Jan.  “We want our kids to know that they are not forgotten once they leave our preschool, that we will continue to support them throughout their primary school careers.”

Floor brought me to see the two classrooms, to meet the children and teachers and to sit in on their lessons.  As a trained teacher, it was interesting to see how the teachers were faring with limited resources and technology.  The teaching style was admittedly rather traditional, with tables in a row facing the teacher, who would talk a lot and then ask a student to stand and repeat something or answer a question.  There were also a lot of wasted minutes, as when I was asked to look over the answers in a literacy book, the teacher (Simon) watched over me for a full 10 minutes, periodically silencing his awaiting students.

When Simon went for breakfast, his class sat waiting for him at their tables, as it was raining out.  Feeling uncomfortable with their gazing eyes, I broke into songs with actions, and the kids immediately followed suit.  When Simon returned some 15 minutes later, he took my cue, and began running his students through their repertoire of English songs.

Mr. Simon’s class – only half full because of the heavy rains (Can you imagine how crowded these tables are when all the students are there? Yet this is a GOOD school.)

 

Throughout the rest of the morning, Simon and I talked education.  He showed me his flashcards made of milk cartons and hand-painted wooden number and letter boards.  He had the students copy out sentences on their mini chalk boards, and read words from the flashcards.  When the class was practicing color words, I suggested a more interactive game, and he willingly played it with them. Despite our very different educational philosophies, Simon seemed eager to learn and adapt.

“I’m proud of the way I teach,” declared Simon unreservedly.  “But I think I can learn a lot from you.”

Floor and Jan are doing some heartfelt work with their foundation.  Many of these children don’t get another meal in their day, and if they weren’t in school, they would be running around their villages unsupervised – or worse, along the dangerous highway (as I’ve seen many a-time).

It costs about $4000 a month to keep the FloJa Foundation afloat – that’s about $50 per child.  Imagine how much it would cost to take care of allMalawi’s orphans.

It’s amazing to see a country stifled by soaring fuel prices and food scarcity, and with a high death rate in the valuable working-age population, still smile.  And yet, Malawians are smiling, almost everywhere we turn.  They smile while riding three to a bicycle on an uphill muddy road.  They smile while hawking identical handfuls of tomatoes.  They smile while harvesting mountains of maize in blistering midday African heat.  They smile while crushed into minibuses on bumpy long-distance journeys.

And they smile when they meet us on the beaches, in the markets, and on the road.  With perfect courteousness and genuine smiles, they greet us foreigners and welcome us with earnest to their country.Because even though Malawi might seem poor to me, a Malawian sees through these economic indicators, into all the true wealth their country has to celebrate.

Smiling kids of the side of the road.  No school for them, I guess….