life in the north.....: snakes and dancing.....

What a weekend I have had so far. On Friday morning the teachers came to clean the school as it is the end of school holidays and we open on Monday. Frank and Annex are busy making some new swings for the toddler class. Its looking good so far.

Meanwhile I was busy cleaning in the classroom when Frank called me to look out the window – to see this wonderful big shiny silver snakelike thing – with what looked like a head at each end. How horrible…..I didn’t venture out to take a photo of it and Frank disposed of it! I had never seen such a creature before – people tell me that they live in anthills and can live deep under the ground - they also say they don't bite but I wasn't taking any chances!! I was just glad that it appeared when we had no children at school, because children tend to run after things that move……….

On Friday afternoon I headed off to Karonga (a 3 hour journey north of Mzuzu) with two of the trainers for Early childhood development. We were going to have a workshop on Saturday at Ngana, one of our CCAP congregations on the Tanzanian border. It was my first time to go so far north. We were told to go to the border and then the border post officials would show us the way! We reached the border only to be told we needed passports to cross……I was furious because no one had told us this before we left. However, I decided to call one of the colleagues in Mzuzu who informed me that the road to Ngana was just 50 metres before the border. Very relieved we turned around and found the road. When we asked how far it was to Ngana, we were told not far. It was quite a rough dirt road, so we drove on and on and asked again….its not far, we were told again. Then we met a motorbike – it was the minister coming to look for us! I must admit I was relieved to have found the place. It is in a beautiful place – mountainous and peaceful. We were training the committee and caregivers for two new nursery schools which are just opening. It turned out to be a great day –the training was a huge success and the highlight of the day was that there was a traditional malipenga dancing festival going on in the village alongside our training. We left around 4pm with a large bag of rice in the back of the car, and arrived back home around 8.30pm.