Arrived in Malawi

Andrea:  Twenty-nine hours in planes and airports is an awfully long time.  But then again, Malawi is awfully far away from Greenville, Illinois.  It's slowly starting to sink in that we are actually in Africa.  The chaos of moving house (complete with leaky sinks and mouse invasions) in the weeks before our departure has kept us from having much time to think about all of this, beyond trying to pack suitcases in a house where nobody could find anything.

We're taking a much-appreciated break from unpacking and packing, in a lovely bed & breakfast in Lilongwe.  The kids are playing a game (is chess really supposed to be that giggly?) and I'm drinking a cup of rooibos tea to ward off the evening chill.  This morning it was coffee, with binoculars and an astonishing array of birds on the grounds of the b&b.  Tomorrow we're done being lazy and back to another settling-in job, this time in a faculty apartment on the grounds of the Bunda College of Agriculture.  Another professor has promised to take us on the shopping spree we'll need to get bedding, dishes, pots, and pans.  Then we'll get to unpack our suitcases and start realizing what all we forgot in that last frantic rush of packing.

Playing with the wall art at Cluny Lodge

Joel:  We've spent more time in cars and planes than is healthy in the last two months.  Dad even got priority boarding for the way back, so we can board earlier and spend more time on a plane.   Yay!  (Andrea: This is because of all the frequent flier miles Eric has accumulated, not just a scheme to make Joel sit on planes longer.)  We've all been suffering from jetlag, some worse than others I think.  (Never play chess against someone less jetlagged than you!)  

The bed and breakfast has a crocodile skull outside the door of our wing and a hippo skull outside another wing's entrance.  Way cool!  (Fun fact: crocodile skulls have air pockets/dimples on the outside so the skin traps air in them.  It helps them float.)  

They put walls around almost all of the buildings here.  Some have barbed wire or glass on them, some don't, but they're all brick and tall enough to keep out robbers.  They also drive on the left side of the road and the driver sits on the right side of the car.  Toodles!