Malaria Scare/ マラリアになったかと思った。

Monday morning this week, I woke up with pain in my stomach. I had some stomach problems, aching body and a bit of fever. I went to work, and someone told me to go see a doctor, since these symptoms can be malaria. In the afternoon, I managed to get to a doctor. The technician punctured my finger and squeezed blood out of it. It was painful, but I was too sick and tired to react to it. Good news was that the test came back as negative. I have been bitten by mossies only a few times since I came, so I would have had to be pretty lucky to get malaria. The rainy season will start in about a month or so, but I am not so looking forward to coming back to get more holes on my fingers…. (Needless to say getting malaria itself) What I had was probably some kind of flu. Thank Goodness! ああ良かった！

My work

I haven’t written much about work. It was because I was too depressed about it. I have been in Malawi close to two months by now. However, I haven’t been able to accomplish as much as I have wished because of many challenges.

As Gender and Education Specialist, I was supposed to work with Gender Coordinator person in the ministry. Soon after I arrived, she passed away unfortunately. There was obviously no hand over notes. On top of that, I did not have an access to her office nor to her work files, as the room was locked until this week. There was also a confusion as to which department I should belong to. Combined with struggling to find a house, furniture and sorting out everything about life in a totally new country, lack of support and supervision made me feel quite lost at times. I know to a certain extent some difficulties are part of the reality of working in a developing country, but it was much worse than expected to be honest. I was ready to come home a couple of times. (though the option is always there..)

Having said that, I am still hoping to do a good job. Past two months, I have been attending many meetings. I was able to familiarize with the general education system in Malawi. I have learned major issues in the gender and education sector. Has been a real learning process.

This weekend, I was at a meeting of Gender and Equity Technical Working group to revise Malawi’s education sector plan from the gender point of view. It was a very vigorous process indeed since we go over a thick document page by page. But, how often do I have a chance to get involved in making a plan for the whole country’s education plan??

Abbreviation Test

Starting a new job requires lots of learning obviously. And it usually comes with a whole set of frustrating abbreviations and acronyms to memorize. My position in MOE (this is easy, isn’t it?) is no exception. As I am reading relevant documents and attending meetings, I have to keep going back to the list of all the abbreviations…..

Here are some of new ones that I came across with. You can guess what these abbreviations are. Scroll down to find out what they mean!

BCC
EMIS
IEC
MTEF
VCT
TOT
TTC

Some more that I am familiar with and use frequently:

TOR
WID
GAD
M&E
PLWA

BCC Behavioral Change Communication
EMIS Education Management Information System
IEC Information Education Communication
MTEF Medium Term Expenditure Framework
VCT Voluntary Counseling and Testing
TOT Training of Trainers
TTC Teacher Training College

TOR Terms of Reference
WID Women in Development
GAD Gender and Development
M&E Monitoring and Evaluation
PLWA People Living With AIDS

If you know all of them, you can work in the Ministry of Education!!

International Literacy Day ・世界識字の日

On International Literacy Day, September the 8th, 2006 I had the opportunity to attend an adult literacy graduation ceremony in the Ntchisi region. The Ministry of Women and Child Development’s Community Development Department is responsible for this program. It was noted that this particular region has a high illiteracy rate. While Malawi’s overall literacy rate is 60%, only 40% of the people are literate in this region. Approximately 2,000 people have graduated recently from this program.

The Adult Literacy graduation ceremony took place in one of the primary schools in the area. The ceremony consisted of several speeches in the local language Chechewa (which I did not understand unfortunately… ) and other entertainment. It was nice to see some traditional dance, songs and music.

After the ceremony, Helen and I got to interview some graduates. This research was aimed at gaining insight into why students drop out of school in order to understand the complexity of problems that people face. I spoke to about nine people with an assistance of Malawian to interpret. I had a set of questions to find out why they dropped out, what they did afterwards, difficulty of being illiterate, their plan now that they know how to read and write among other things.

It was clear that all the interviewees were very excited as well as felt empowered to improve their lives. They were also pleased to speak to us about their experience. I certainly saw a great success in this program, which provided a valuable opportunity to people to not only to be literate but also to help build their confidence and take control of their life. To read and write, we take it for granted, but it made me think how powerful it can be in some people’s life when they were deprived of this opportunity. I also saw one of the keys to improve the education in the country is to educate the adults, so that they would encourage their children to pursue their education.

I love doing research. I hope I will have an opportunity to conduct some policy related research with my job at Ministry of Education.

The photo is with all the graduates that Helen and I interviewed that day. We had much more people than we asked for. They were fighting to get into the line to be interviewed.

Birth Day& The New House

I have turned 30 on September 1st!!

For those who sent me happy birthday wishes, thank you very much! You are the best thing that I have in my life. For others who forgot my birthday, please don’t feel bad ;) I know that you still care about me!! (right??)

As me and my two roommates were moving into the house on my birthday weekend, we postponed the celebration to the following weekend. My roommates and a couple of other people took me out to a nice restaurant near our house. I had nice pasta and crème brûlée as a dessert (was yummy~.) They put three candles on a cake and I made a wish. The restaurant offered all our dessert to be on house, and it felt nice and special.

How do I feel now that I am 30?? I feel exactly the same as before. Unfortunately, it does not mean that I suddenly become mature and wise. I thought I would have everything figured out by this age, but I am in fact as confused and lost as I was five or ten years ago. Life is not easy sometimes, but it’s all good and I am grateful for what I have.

Our new house is located in the Area 12 in Lilongwe, which is a sort of an upper middle class Malawian neighborhood. The house is a nice cozy size with three bedrooms, a kitchen, living and dining rooms with two bathrooms-- a perfect one for three of us to live comfortably. The unusual thing is the size of the house lot itself. It must be close to an acre. Just huge! Cannot believe how big it is. For Japanese person who is used to living in a rabbit hutch house, it is just incredible. From the front gate to the actual house, it is more than 40 meters! It feels like I am living in a small park. The yard got some nice trees, flowers, fruit trees and plants and is quite nice.

We now have nice furnishing and appliances, and we are all quite happy. It involved so much work and spending $$ to get here, and we are completely shopping-ed out. We bought beds, mattresses, a fridge, a stove, a television, couches, a dining table with chairs and some side tables along with other household items like pots& pans, dishes, a toaster etc etc. The list got longer and longer. We have hired three staffs to work around the house. One housekeeper who lives on the premise with his family, one full time night guard and another guard to work on Sundays as well as to work as a part-time gardener. We also hired two additional “security guards”. Two doggies! Two 10 months puppies. The security is an issue here, so to have someone around clock is a good thing. I do feel guilty to have someone else who does cleaning, dishes and laundry& ironing. BUT I have to admit that after long stressful work day, it is so nice to come home to a nicely made bed and ironed shirts.

I will post more photos to make you jealous.

I am still alive

Sorry that I haven’t been able to update this blog. I am still alive, just to let you know. I will start posting soon about my birthday, new house and work etc. I have been busy, stressed and a bit sick. Going away again for three days to attend a planning meeting in a city called Mongochi on Lake Malawi. michiyo

最近なかなかブログを書く余裕がありません。忙しいのと仕事のことでまいっていたのと体調を崩していたので。今日から３日間、マラウイ湖畔のモンゴチという街で行われる会議に出席してきます。私の誕生日のことや家、仕事のことについてまた書いていきます。