Body in Motion

This is what I remember:

Riding up the escarpment from Nkhata Bay in the back of a pickup with 13 other people, a few sacks of maize and a stack of jerry cans; eating corn bread and chili for Christmas dinner; reciting the prologue to Shakespeare’s Henry V while waiting for a hitch; seeking shelter from a rainstorm in the Chikangawa Forest fire tower hut only to find a very surprised Malawian staring down four white girls.

It was the middle of my first full year in Africa and I’d gone to spend the holidays (and the rainy season) with a friend just beginning her Peace Corps stint in northern Malawi. Next week, I will land in Lilongwe, 1400 miles from my last residence in Kinshasa, DR Congo, to stay for awhile.

A country of nearly 13 million, Malawi is about 5% the size of my previous home though about as poor with an annual per capita income of US$160. In fact, the IMF lists Malawi as the second poorest country globally. Malawi is however a lot more stable than poor old Congo and has roads enough to make the places outside the capital more accessible than the Congolese equatorial forests. I hope to be spending much of my free time at Lake Malawi, which spans the majority of the eastern border of this landlocked country in southeastern Africa.

Stay tuned for more tales from the Warm Heart of Africa.