It's been a while...

So, its been over a month since I posted – time to get up to date.  The last month or so has been pretty flat out; including (in no particular order) driving 9 people and a baby for 5 hours in the dark to an engagement party, attending a meeting of the board of trustees, spotting an Elephant in the local National Park, being ill with a fever for 4 days, producing management accounts and a payroll for 150 staff, recruiting a new Finance Manager and being propositioned by a prostitute.

In a nutshell that is why I haven’t posted for a while!

Attached should be a couple of photos of the Head Office team, including Immy who was also volunteering out here for a month.  As you can see we are a professional and driven bunch.

Just under 3 weeks til I’m back in the UK, really looking forward to coming home but sad my Malawian experience is coming to a close.

Nkhotakhota n' Nkhotakhtoa

Apologies, its been a wee while since I posted anything - mainly due to t'internet connection issues in the office, but also down to laziness on my part.

Last weekend I visited Lake Malawi for the first time and stayed in a beachside lodge near Nkhotakhota.  It was a beautiful spot - more like a tropical beach than a lake.  Unfortunately my photos cannot be extracted from my Mac so you'll have to trust me - it was amazing.

As luck would have it my first visit to one of our branch office that following week was to.. you guessed it Nkhotakhota.  We were introduced to a group of women who have been utlising MLF loans and treated to a traditional Malawian welcome, and then were forced to stay in the same stunning beachside location again - shame!

This weekend myself and Paolo (see pictures) conquered the local 'mountain' and were treated to some stunning views.

Chicken and chips

By my reckoning in the 8 days I have been in Malawi, I have now had Chicken and Chips for lunch 6 times, with a Beef stew and a packet of biscuits making up the other two.  The time has come for a bit of experimentation with my diet!

The locals eat a maize concoction called Nsima which has the consistency of cotton woll and the colour of milk - I think I will continue to swerve that, however, in the relatively swanky restaurants that are our lunchtime haunts the menu does stretch to rice or beans with your Chicken/Beef/Fish so plenty of opportunity to mix it up.

Dinner time is a more varied affair, with Maggie and Able at the guesthouse whipping up a storm each night - albeit a storm with rice as the side.

That said, I have just had a samosa brought to my desk - so there is hope!

Hmmm, blogging..

Right, this is most definitely a first; having not kept so much as a diary before, here goes nothing with a blog from Malawi!

I've been here a week now and the welcome i've had from the local and UK staff over here has been fanastic, making settling in to both the office and my guesthouse (see below for my view from my bedroom) pretty easy.

Internet access seems (so far) pretty consistent in the office so emails etc should be no problem.  But for now the light is fading (its dark at 6 here) so I'm going to make the 30 walk back to my guesthouse.  A nice change from the Victoria and Bakerloo lines!