I have arrived!!!

I am here in Malawi!  It was a long 3 days of travel, but Kelsey and I made it!  The flights went smoothly, despite the ticket man in Johannesburg who tried to steal our money.  He tried to tell us that we had to pay extra money so that all our bags would make it to Blantyre, but that was not the case.  God definitely protected us and gave us a discerning spirit for the situation.

Some of the team members who picked us up from the airport.

(Paul, me, Kelsey, Simon, Abigail, Yomikomi, Davi)

So, here I am in Malawi trying to adjust to the time difference, climate and culture.  We are 10 hours ahead of California and with the lack of sleep we got during our days of travel we are trying hard to catch up.  It is still summer here and gets really warm but there is always a nice gentle breeze that comes through to cool us off.  The culture here is quite different as well.  Most people walk or take the minibus (a medium sized, rundown van that works like a taxi) to where they need to go and so do we.  It is odd to them that we walk the streets because the white people here are considerably rich and drive cars.  We are going to break that stereotype!  Everyone here is REALLY friendly, they often wave or smile and greet us as they walk by.

Yesterday, because we are still trying to catch up on our sleep, we took it easy and had a lazy morning.  We took a walk in the morning and explored the land our house is on.  At this time all the vegetation everywhere is such a luscious green it is like living in a tropical paradise!  God blessed us by providing such a beautiful place for us to stay.  The house is in an elite, rich neighborhood in the township of Yambadwe.  Because so many rich people live here, the security level is high.  We have a guard, which is completely normal in this culture, everyone has a guard, and even Malawians have guards. It is normal.  His name is Arnold and he, his wife, and five kids live in a little house at the back of the property.  We met his family when we went exploring in the backyard and they were nice.  They giggled pretty much the whole time because we only know a few words in Chichewa and they now little English, it was funny.

The front of our house (no, its not a hut!) :


The back of the house:

The view from our backyard: 

In the afternoon we visited the Montessori School.  Kelsey and I were invited to sit in a circle with the kids as they listened to their Bible story.  I don’t think the kids heard one word from their teacher because all 28 pairs of dark brown eyes were on us the whole time.  If we caught the eyes of a child and smiled, we were usually luck enough to receive a bright white smile from them.  Once the Bible story was over, the kids were dismissed to get their snack of the day, which was an assortment of fruit.  The sweet thing was, three or four of the kids came to where we were sitting and gave us some of their fruit.  It meant a lot to Kelsey and me because it showed us that they accepted us and were not scared.  The kids are not used to seeing white people, so it was a new experience for them.  It was fun visiting the school and seeing the children, we will most likely be helping out there when we are not at the hospital.