Wednesday, November 18th - Mchinji, Malawi

I was up early this morning, I think because of too much thinking about money.  I showered and got dressed and at 6 a.m. I walked over to the office and took some laundry as they apparently have very cheap laundry rates.  When I asked her about the laundry rates she hesitated and said she didn't know the rates.  And it was a strange hesitation, like "I don't know what to charge you now that room rates have been increased for you."  I then said I'd like to pay for my room and pulled out the 35,500 kwacha for the posted rates.  She looked at me and said she had instructions from Aaron that he would pay for all three rooms and she was not to take money from us.  I said I was just budgeting my money and wanted to know how much I would owe him.  I pointed at the chart and did the calculation for the 35,500 kwacha.  She then gave the same line as the manager last night, "the rates have changed and we just haven't reprinted the sheet with the new rates."  After some discussion about the rate increase and my displeasure with it, I picked up my four pieces of laundry and left saying that I would do my own.  Then I went back to my room, did my laundry, and fumed for a while before going down to breakfast.  

After breakfast we started off to Bua Community Secondary School just a few minutes away.  The head teacher was a lovely lady who was on time and welcomed us and had her staff - just about all of them! - join us for the presentation.  Before we started we had a quick tour around the campus and stopped in each of the four grades.   The students are packed into their classrooms with no space between them - desks 9 rows deep and 4 rows wide with 3-4 students at each one and no room to spare.  Again they stood up immediately when we entered the room and greeted with "good afternoon, sir" or madam depending on who addressed them first.  In two of the four rooms the teacher had already gone to the hall for our presentation and yet the students stayed there quietly working on their assigned work.  They are definitely a well disciplined group.  A couple of students were standing at the entry gate when we drove in.  Apparently if you arrive late you do not get to come to school at all that day so they were just hanging around looking very forlorn.  Although this seemed strange to us, they had tried other forms of punishment but this one seemed to have the most lasting affect on the students.

Our presentation went well.  As usual it was very quiet at first but eventually they started talking a bit more.  Because the head teacher had decided that they all should attend, not all of them were really pleased to be there.  They probably had classes and marking they would rather be doing but for the most part they paid attention to what we were saying and they had some good comments.  They all agree that Malawians don't make enough money to save anything so starting a business with money they have saved is almost impossible.  And they all agree that borrowing from a bank is impossible because of the high interest rates.  So our main job was just trying to get them to think about all the aspect of a potential business before starting it, and then starting small and growing gradually into what they really want to do.  There wasn't much else we could say.

The school has 17 teachers and 386 students in the full-tim program.  There are also 324 students who study in the afternoon - mainly adults and drpouts.  They do not teach Business Studies and they do not have an entrepreneurship course.  However, the head teacher agrees that entrepreneurship is what is needed in the area.  Mchinji is a border town with Zambia and there is a lot of trade going both ways.  There is also a lot of traffic and a great opportunity for small businesses in the area.   Only two of the teachers have/had a small business - one in used clothing and one in baked goods.   A couple of teachers were away and people had to come and go from time to time so we presented to a group of about 12 people with the numbers fluctuating from 10 to 14 as the presentation went on.

After the school we drove to the border crossing just to see what was happening.  We didn't get too close but we could still see some of the transactions.  Two trucks on the side of the road with one facing in each direction and men on each flatbed throwing bags from one truck to another.  It was a shipment of maize that was from Malawi and driven to the border.  Once transferred to the other truck it would go to Zambia.  And there were several such business transactions going on.  There were even bicycles going back and forth loaded with big bags of maize or many cans of gasoline.  It was interesting to watch for a while but with the sun beating down on the car it was also hot so we took our leave.  Also there were a lot of young ladies walking around and not dressed the traditional Malawian way, if you get my drift.  I guess with all the truckers and traders around, it was a profitable place to be re the sex trade.  We hear that the truckers have a bad reputation everywhere in the country for being drunkards and spreading HIV.  Here at the border I guess the ladies come to them.  

We headed back to our hotel maybe 10-12 kilometres away in Mchinji.  Aaron had to stop at the bank to do something so while we waited Lynn and I decided this was probably the best time to talk about money with him.  We pay him 25,000 kwacha (about $45 US each night for a hotel so for the four nights here we had given him 100,000 kwacha.  HIs room only cost 8,500 per night so 34,000 in total.  So we told him he could pay for our rooms for all four nights instead of paying it back.  In total it was a bit more than 100,000 in total - maybe 110,000 - but there had been a lot of other nights where the cost of his room wasn't as high as we had given him.  He was not impressed but finally agreed to do so.  He's still arguing for more gas money but we're not likely to give that to him.  We each give him $25 US per day and we've been on the same tank of gas now for five days.  And because five days ago was our "long" drive, we had to pay directly for the gas that day.  So we paid for the gas for those five days plus gave him $50 US per day for transportation and he still wants more.  It's an interesting conversation each time and the tension in the air is quite nerve racking at times.  Luckily we only have one more day to get through and, since we are all professionals, no one attending the presentations would ever sense anything was wrong.

During the heat of the afternoon we rested in our rooms - even had air conditioning for a while but it went out about 4 p.m.  Lynn and I went for a walk shortly thereafter.  Our original intention was to go to the internet cafe so we could actually get on line.  However, with the power out that was not going to happen so we just kept walking.  What we normally see of a town is just what is right along the highway - the small businesses and the people selling things on the side of the road and all the people going in every direction.  Where we went was back behind the highway businesses and we found more businesses but slightly different.  One street we named bicycle alley because when you turned the corner what you saw were bicycle tires hanging at the front of every shop.  Down that street we also found different businesses and Lynn bought some cloth from one of them.  It was white with a black design of giraffes on it and very nice.  

We continued walking past some sports fields, one clearly for girls and one for boys although we didn't see a school attached to each of them so it might have just been the schedule for the day.  We passed several homes and some of them were very neat with plants around them so someone has a flare for plants.  There were lots of people out walking.  Some would look at us with a look of, "who are you and what are you doing here?" but most were happy to say, "hello, how are you?" and carry on a brief conversation.  Some asked where we were from and of course some of them, the children, wanted money which we didn't give them.  Everyone seems friendly and you feel very safe wandering the streets.  Now I'm calling them streets but in fact they are just dirt paths and very, very dusty.  Mainly they are for pedestrians but occasionally a bike, motorcycle or car goes past.  Sometimes even some goats go by but we didn't see any cows on our walk.  Oh, we did see one big bull though and he was not tired up or fenced in so I guess he was a friendly bull.

After about an hour we were back at the hotel but there was a beautiful sunset so we had to stay outside a bit longer to enjoy the view.  After a quick shower we went down to dinner and chicken and rice and pumpkin leaves yet again.  You think we'd get tired of it but when it's the only decent choice it tastes pretty good.  Oh yea, I should mention that we decided not to have the usual lunch at the restaurant today.  We went next door to the shop at the gas station and bought some yogurt and some whole wheat bread and went back to the hotel to have peanut butter sandwiches as we already had peanut butter on hand just in case.  As boring as it may sound it was actually delicious.

I didn't last long after dinner and was probably in bed and sound asleep by 9 p.m.  This waking up between 5 and 6 every day is taking its toll on me.  I definitely need a few long sleeps with no interruptions.  Hopefully our two nights in Lilongwe will allow me to do this before we start our tour.  We are sharing a room on the tour and I never sleep as well in those situations.  I'm not sure why but it seems more difficult.   However, this particular night, I was sleeping shortly after 9 and it was wonderful.