We’ve had a nice and productive week! After multiple
building committee meetings, traveling, and errands we’re a bit tired but feel
pretty productive.
On Monday
after we got back from Blantyre we ran a ton of errands. Monday is starting to
become our grocery-shopping day, which I love. It does take most of the day,
however, because we make around six stops. Since moving here and seeing all the
stores, we’re getting used to which places have the best prices and the best
products. Now we go to Food Lovers for meat and potatoes, Shoprite for eggs and
coffee, Sana for dried beans, Chipiku for biltong, Game if we need stuff for
the house, and anywhere and everywhere for produce. All the roads, except for
the few main roads, have little shops set up where people sell (usually)
tomatoes, super tiny dried fish, some type of greens, sweet potatoes, potatoes,
and short fat cucumbers.
We had two
little neighbor boys, Mohammed who’s 7 and Sean who’s 5. When we came back in
June though Mohammed had moved and now Sean is super bored so he spends most of
his after school time at our house. Recently he’s become my cooking buddy.
We’ve made tortillas, pico de gallo, and cookies so far.
On Tuesday
we went out to eat and Brennan ended up getting food poisoning so we stayed
home on Wednesday when Lewis and Lena went down to Mangochi to check out the campsite
for summer camp.
Friday was
a nice busy day to lead into the Sabbath. Brennan went to a building committee
meeting and I worked in the office on stuff for camp. Then we ran some errand,
as usual. Part of our errands included going to the post office. I love talking
to the guys who sell stamps outside of the post office—always so nice and
helpful, but I’m not a fan of going in. We’re supposed to have a PO box but for
some reason no mail was being sent to it so now we go into the post office to
get our main. When you walk in you see a bench, three chairs, and four service
counters. The two counters farthest from the door have no signs. The third
counter has a sign that says, “Counter 14 Acceptance and Delivery of Parcels.”
The last counter has a sign that says, “Counter 13 Parcels Acceptance Customs
Declaration.” … So we just stand in the shortest line then ask for mail from
out PO box. It’s been quite interesting to figure out.
We had a
nice Sabbath! Brennan and the Kachali sister did special music again and then
after services we had lots of food and some good fellowship time.
Sunday we
went and visited people! Chimwewe, who works in the LifeNets shop lead us up to
the first home (she used to be their neighbor) then after staying there for a
while we went and visited her mom. While there we got to meet plenty of
neighbors and had lots of laughs. On our way out, their friend made us
zingaygay (total guess on the spelling) which are delicious curry battered
fried potatoes. So yummy! While visiting the first family we learned more about
the strike the teachers are on. Since we’ve been here it seems like the
teachers are on strike almost as much as they aren’t. This is because the
government isn’t paying them. It’s really frustrating for the teachers,
students, and parents; especially in secondary schools where students pay
school fees then don’t get taught.
Today,
Monday, was a long day. We arrive at the LifeNets office at around 8:30 for a
building committee meeting which was to start at 9:00. Or 11:20. But I got to
use that time to finalize the camper and staff application forms for summer
camp. The meeting went well (yay!) and the building should be finished by the
middle of July (yay again!). Then we did our normal weekly shopping with eight
stops and ended with delicious Sana Food Court food.
It’s
been a great week overall! We've been having some internet troubles so I'm not able to upload a lot of pictures. I'll try to later.
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