Malawi

It’s been too long.

I normally go back twice a year, but this year my commitments haven’t allowed a mid-year trip. It’s been 10 months, and I’m feeling it.

The sky - it’s so much bigger there. And the lake – swimming in it, sitting by it, looking at it, counting the fishing boat lights at night, which make a horizon. It’s the rain, real hard rain, relieving the heat and leaving freshness and flying ants. It’s the dust and the red sunsets.

It’s the people and their openness and warmth. Life can be so hard, and yet I’ve never seen so much smiling. Always time to talk and laugh. Really beautiful people.

It’s putting down my suitcases, taking off my shoes and walking out into the garden. It’s tea-time with the cats and dogs. Banana bread.

It’s the baobab named Julia, which we pass on the way to the lake. She’s the first one you notice – after her, you realise that you are surrounded by them, having descended 500m since Lilongwe. Then you stop to buy some mangos. And the tomatoes are so full of flavour – as are the avocados.

Why do I feel so free there?

All the parts of London that I normally love seem to have dulled. I don’t care about the anonymity of London, which I usually indulge in. As I cycle over Vauxhall Bridge in the morning, I don’t get excited by the view of Battersea power station, or St Paul’s when I cross Waterloo Bridge. I don’t want to discover another amazing little theatre doing Shakespeare. I don’t feel like socialising and meeting all the interesting people that you do in London. I know I will appreciate these again, but for now they seem so meaningless to me.

And maybe it’s other things that are making me blue. The lengthening hours of darkness as winter approaches. The pressures of a work-and-study lifestyle and the worries about my dissertation. Or being just too far from my family.

But I long for Malawi and I’m counting the days.

get blogging...

the blog gang is slacking again....

i have a few posts in their early stages and promise to complete at least one by the end of the weekend.

and i expect others to do the same!

Which is better? Being president of the USA or winning the Nobel Peace Prize AND an oscar???

So, Al Gore and the IPCC have won the Nobel Peace Prize. As you can imagine there is much excitement in my office.

Very interesting methinks:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7041082.stm

totally random

a few thoughts (mainly because i am going on holiday and i really don't want the post at the top of my blog to be about a haircut the whole time i'm away...)

regarding the MA i am doing: i think i am going to ask for my money back. i am becomming more and more confused the further i go along. seriously, the opinions i had before the course may have been naive - but at least i had opinions.

regarding squash: i love love love love it! we have a squash court in the basement at work and now all those hours spent at lilongwe golf club playing squash in my youth are paying off. and i get to give the boys at work a run for their money! representing the girls - woohoo!

Has Delilah been misunderstood?

Having just had a haircut, I wonder to myself whether there has been a little inaccuracy in the documentation of history. Delilah is supposed to have betrayed Samson and caused his downfall. She is supposed to have done this for the Philistines, in exchange for money, by cutting his hair (or at least ordering a servant to cut his hair).

But I suspect something different happened. Suppose Delilah herself had just had a haircut; and feeling the power and exhilaration that this experience had bestowed upon her, thought she should pass this feeling on to Samson.

Because it seriously does have this effect – the shorter the better. I feel like a new person. I feel like I could take over the world. I even wonder whether I have turned into a super-hero.

How to start the day

The best-laid plan

06:00 – wake up and embrace the day.
06:30 – spring out of bed, shower, get ready, wear pretty new top, feel fantastic.
07:30 – leave for work.
08:00 – get to work and have an extremely productive morning.


What actually happened (no mice and men involved)

06:00 – wake up with headache (realise it may have something to do with friend’s birthday dinner the previous night and the red wine that accompanied it).
06:30 – get up, shower etc etc.
07:00 – phone aforementioned friend to wish her a happy holiday. Listen to sad story that friend has lost bank card, is at heathrow and is about to go on 3 week holiday with no money. Recollect (in horror) that bank card was taken away from friend when friend tried to pay for birthday dinner. Look in back pocket of jeans worn last night to find bank card.
07:15 – leave the house, run to Brixton station.
07:20 – wait for train.
07:25 – keep waiting for train.
07:30 – get told that there is a signal failure at Victoria and there will be no trains running. Try to leave the station with 1 million others who have been waiting for the tube.
07:37 – run to minicab place down the road.
07:40 – get told that they have no cars. Wait while they check all the other minicab places in the area.
07:42 – start running to Stockwell tube. Sprint the last 200m to try and get in front of the bus carrying all the people who couldn’t get on at Brixton.
07:55 – get on tube. Feel the sweat pouring down my back and getting soaked up by pretty new top.
08:15 – finally get on Piccadilly line.
08:55 – get to heathrow - swap bank card for cup of tea and chocolate muffin. Laugh a lot with friend. Watch friend running off into the distance to catch flight by the skin of her teeth.
09:00 – get back onto Piccadilly line.
09:15 – finally start moving. Do make-up on train.
10:00 – change at Green Park.
10:15 – get to Westminster. Get stopped at ticket barrier and threatened to be fined as not enough money on oyster card. Get let off fine.
10:30 – arrive at work.

Sucked in

So term has started at uni.

And once again I find myself sitting in front of my computer on a Sunday, attempting to be a good student – this time trying to write a year long work plan for my dissertation.

Now of course, before I could REALLY get down to some good work, I needed to get some stationary (mainly because I found myself without paper). So a trip into Brixton’s Woolworths was in order.

And I just wanted to share with a couple of people how I embrace our consumer society.

As my budget at the moment denies me a silver convertible or a flat screen TV, today, I bought Woolworth’s special offer, half price (was £4.99, now £2.49) 20 colour gel pens, consisting of 3 classic gel pens, 6 neon gel pens, 5 scented glitter fruits gel pens, 4 pastel swirl gel pens and 2 metallic gel pens.

Of course these pens (along with the 40 fibre tip pens, the letter pack with smiling bees and the three pack of reporters notebooks) are essential to anyone writing a dissertation highlighting the social effects and power structures resulting from capitalism and the imposition of the free market on the rest of the world.

Hmmmmmmm……