To say that yesterday, I bought an "All-Purpose* Mosquito Killing Bat." That, um, looks like a tennis racket. With electricity. Unfortunately, all the mosquitoes in my house apparently heard about this and decided to bail, thus thwarting me in my attempt to kill about a million of them last night. But they'll come back, and I'll be ready!

*Does ( Read more... )

Working on another bulk, massive update (yay!), but I'm thinking about leaving livejournal. Seriously enough that I only paid them for 2 more months ( Read more... )

( Read more... )

I had a mellow weekend: a nice Saturday where I took 3 naps before noon*, and then rinsed out and hung my laundry which had been soaking overnight because I’ve become too lazy for proper scrubbing and sunlight washing powder takes less color out of clothes than omo did. Very little of it was overrun by the ubiquitous ants that are crawling over ( Read more... )

I got there late because my tires needed pumping. I knew I had loaned my pumps to Sarah and David, respectively; I knew I had to get to NOC last Wednesday; I knew I always need to inflate the tires a bit when I haven’t ridden my bike in a while. I still forgot to actually collect either of the pumps from Sarah or David any of the numerous times I ( Read more... )

Yulie and I were walking from the stage to my house and two guys said "how arle you?" I was trying to decide if they were the harasser types when one of them said ( Read more... )

Kris stopped by on her way to town to drop the lavender plant (thanks, Eric!) and water bottle I had left when Yulie and I spent the night Saturday night*. Musi, her driver, called out “Mwachena! Red and black!” (I am wearing a black skirt and an orangey-rusty-reddish colored top. Kris pointed out that my shirt is orange, and Musi said, “Oh, no, ( Read more... )

The weekend before last, Cory arranged a football and netball tournament and HIV/AIDS thingamajig. A few health volunteers deigned to show up* even though Cor is a lowly education volunteer. It was interesting, although most of the educational bits came in Chichewa and so we spent a great deal of time trying to figure out if they were saying ( Read more... )

Tamandani’s name is a command to praise god*. She is my 4-year-old neighbour and is absolutely fascinated by me. The first time I met her she wouldn’t say a word to me but her father told me that she had been talking nonstop about how she was going to make friends with the mzungu who lives in that house over there. It took her a little while to ( Read more... )

Was just talking to my mama on the phone (irritatingly shortened by the whole disconnect and then have to pay connection fees again thing that happens just about always), and I was describing to her how eating chicken seems like a perfectly justified act here. I bite into a drumstick, feel the flesh satisfyingly part beneath my teeth, and hope that ( Read more... )