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IST!

It’s been awhile since my last update!

I am currently in Lilongwe for our 2 week IST (In Service Training) where we are reuniting with our March 2014 group of health and environment volunteers and learning about the next step for when we go back to site. In case you don't know (I’ve noticed that a lot of people don’t understand the set up of Peace Corps), here’s how it goes for Peace Corps Malawi. We arrive in country and spend 9 weeks in Pre-Service Training living with home stay families. Then we move to each of our sites all across the country and spend the next 3-4 months conducting needs assessments and working on integrating into our rural villages. After those first few months, we come to IST for two weeks to learn more specifics about program design and management, grant-writing, behavior change, emotional resiliency, etc. The first week is just PCVs, but all of our primary counterparts arrived at our venue today, and they’ll be going through the next week of training with us! We’ll see how that goes! It’ll definitely be a different atmosphere around here. It’s always strange to be surrounded by a mix of malawian natives and fellow americans because we almost have dual personalities as PCVs. With our Malawian counterparts, we have to take extra care to be professional; we don't reveal too many personal details; and we have to speak slowly and simply and enunciate every word. When around other PCVs, we act and speak extremely casually; talk specifically about our feelings and struggles; and fly through conversations at high speed.

Our first week of training comprised of those aspects that I listed earlier and also a lot of “therapy” time spent discussing struggles and coping mechanisms at site and trying to learn to locate resources and potential partners. It’s been overwhelming with the amount of information we’ve received, but also so helpful. It’s nice to have discussions with people who are going through the same things such as being unsure of how to solve a specific issue that has a lot of root causes, trying to integrate but also needing personal time and space, and missing foods like brownies, spinach, and tortilla chips.

Another wonderful thing about the location we are staying at (Malawi Natural Resources College) is that all around us are a plethora of trails through woods and fields as well as surrounding dirt roads that are not crowded with cars or people. I made sure to bring my running shoes along for the journey and have really enjoyed getting to run in these places this week, be it by myself or with our jovial, talkative group who goes at 5:30 AM or PM—depending on how late everyone stayed up catching up with others. On my first run here, I even came across an adorable hedgehog in the middle of the trail. 

It’s also nice to have meals being cooked for us. Most of us cook over fires, so a free, prepared meal is always always appreciated. The funny part about Malawian diets is that in the village, most people rarely eat meat. It is too expensive and sparse. Our venue has some form of meat though, at every single meal. Most of us think this is too much on our bodies, so the kitchen started making vegetables, eggs, and other vegetarian options that the majority of us eat now! They also probably think we’re obsessed with coffee because every time they make real coffee (not instant) at breakfast or at our “tea breaks” during the day, we swarm the table and drink them dry. I’ve also been ordering nsima more since we’ve been here because —shockingly—i’ve missed it at my site! Everyone in my village eats nsima (the stable food) twice a day, every day, but I never do. It’s not that I don't like it either; it’s just that it’s too labor intensive to make it. Even though I learned to make it during home stay, I can never quite get it right. My one nsima attempt on my own ended up as a mountain of white, mushy, grossness. I may have to enlist the help of a neighbor when I return to site!

That’s all for now—


xo
extra extra : interesting articles in the local newspaper that I saw on my 4.5 hour bus trip from blantyre to lilongwe (during which I had to stand the entire time since the bus was technically sold out.....oh malawi....)

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