Almost a month gone!!

Still trying to upload pics to the blog without success.. the internet connection is too slow and it just doesn't go! I shouldn't complain, some of my colleagues work in the countryside and they don't even have a cyber-cafe nearby. I am slowing down the rate of blogs, I start to be quite busy preparing lectures and networking (lobbying as they say in Brussels :-) ) I am going to meet this afternoon some people at the welcome trust lab here at the hospital, they have a great group working in malaria and I would love to do some work with them..

I am so lucky, last week-end I was invited in the last minute to a meeting at the lake. The objective was to rearrange the program of the BMS course (Basic medical science) and reduce it from 2 to 1 year. Why do I think I was lucky?? well, we stayed at the nkopola lodge, a really posh place, with nice food and great rooms. My back door leaded to the lake, it was just like a dream. You can see some pictures of the lake in my flickr page, see the link on the right.

It is amazing how the time flies, I have been here for almost a month and it seems that I arrived yesterday. My expectations change everyday. I quite like a bit of uncertainty in life, but sometimes this is a bit too much!

College of medicine (COM)

The famous (in Malawi) college of medicine (COM) is placed in Blantyre. Walking inside is like going into another dimension, nice buildings, well-dessed students, wireless internet conection (in the library)... All this to try to build an institution that will form health proffesionals for Malawi.

The facilities are quite good, but the lack of staff is enormous. I have talked about this before, not many people is happy to come and work in the warm heart of Africa...

For example, in the premed course we have 70 students in the class (only one swift), there is not an appropiated chemistry lab, and we have lots of glassware, but we haven't got a technician and nobody has found the time to do an inventory, I will try to do it myself.

For an ordinary European, getting used to the Malawian way of working can be a bit of a nighmare, we have the impression that nothing can be planned in advance. Many times we seem to be fighting against the system, or against the MMT (Malawy May be Time) but people is truely great and after a while you can forget it all.

Who is this one??

I am hosting several volunteers in my house these days. Ali, Clare and Kim, they are all going to work as nurse trainers in different parts of the country, but first they have to do some training themselves in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital here in Blantyre, 5 min from the COM. I won't speak here about their experiences in the hospital, they are also writing about it somewhere..

It is so much fun having them in the house, specially in the evenings without electricity... we pass the time with candles, beer and corn flakes, (we cannot cook) talking about our placements.

We profit of the transport service of the College of Medicine to get to work in the morning and we just laugh imagining what the neighbours may think of me living with 3 women in the house.. The other day, the housemaid of the neighbour asked pointing to Kim: Who is this one?? she's my friend! I said. Not very sure what she understood.. I already said that I'm a catholic (I can't be bother explaining that I'm not a religious person) so I cannot use the excuse of being muslim...

some stories about work...

still trying to upload pictures in the blog without sucess. you can visit my flickr page, where you can see a few pics.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acodina
It's dead calm here at the college of medicine. Only two weeks left of this term and I am not going to start teaching until the next semester. I am supposed to teach chemistry in the premed(a crash course before 1st year of medicine) so I'm looking at the program and starting to prepare some of the lectures. The teaching lab is so bad organised, they have lots of glassware but it's just stuck in boxes in a room. There is a huge need of chemicals, in part because it takes ages to receive them, in part for lack of funding...

I may also help my Mike Berry (my neighbour) with some of the biochemistry or chemistry courses. He is the head of pharmacology and he's having problems to employ staff for his courses. The system is too strict and he can only employ malawians or people that has an Msc. Very few persons can fullfil the conditions and even less persons would come to work here since salaries are too low.. If he cannot employ any lecturers before the end of the year the course is going to colapse. So sad but the lack of staff is huge at the university or the hospitals of Malawi. I don't want to be too negative, its great to be here, but sometimes the situation is so overwhelming..

Home, city, life...

I must say that my house is nice. Its a 3 bedroom house in a well secured area of the city. The university is paying for it, and it must cost a fortune. I'm still not sure if they will pay this place for me the 2 years of my placement, but I hope I'll still be here by my birthday and I can do a nice party!

The house is a bit far from the college, its only a 5 min drive, but it will take me almost an hour to get there by foot. There is a public transport system, its formed by minivans that stop at certain places and where people squeezes at high pressure. You may think that the van is full, but in the next stop more people will certainly jump in.. I am very lucky, my neighbour Mike is a professor also at the college of medicine and he gives me a lift in the morning.

Walking around the city is quite amusing, but it can also be exhausting. People stops to talk to you, shake hands, and want to know about you. A conversation here starts with: Muli Bwanji? Ndili bwino, kaya inu? which is something like, hello, how are you? I'm well and you? I am well thank you, thank you.

In general, people is so kind and polite, hey! it is not a lie when they say this is the warm hearth of Africa! The disadvantage is that if you want to ask something to someone you'll have to pass all this process before you can actually go to the point.

Another experience is buying something. You can bargain even at the shops. sometimes, they will try to charge you a bit more because since you are a white guy you are suppose to be rich!

I am supposed to be so rich that people stops me in the street and ask me for a job. You can hire someone to clean the house, do the washing / ironing or guard it during the night for about 5000 kawcha, more or less 28 Euros (a month!). This is pretty amazing, our allowance as volunteers is almost 10 times that and I don't really see how can I live on that.

Pangono pangono...

Hello everyone! this is the first entry of my blog! I type this things at home and then I upload them when I get conected, so you will get my news a bit late.

I have been in Malawi for almost 2 weeks now and I have not really settled down. We arrived the 3^rd of June. I say ‘we’ because we were 14 volunteers in total. We spent the first week in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi in what they call the ‘in country training’ or ICT.

The ICT includes formation about culture, language, work, security etc. We had quite a lot of fun, specially in the evenings when we used to have a gin&tonic in the hotel next door :-) . In the first days we were always shepherd everywhere by the VSO staff or by other volunteers. They don’t recommend to walk alone in some parts of the city, even during the day!

The end of the ICT was a workshop with our employers. They were supposed to come and participate, but mine did not come... umm this doesn’t start well.. Finally a driver came on Friday afternoon and he took me to my house in Blantyre. Pangono pangono, you hear that a lot. it means, of course, slowly