the VanWoerdens in Malawi

Christmas dinner: A story from our Christmas here in Malawi. Just before Christmas, Isaac (our gardener) had made a comment that just because it’s Christmas he could not just splurge and buy rice and meat, his family would just an ordinary meal just like any other day – nsima and ndiwo. We had already talked about inviting our workers and their families over for a Christmas dinner so this made it an easy decision. We had nine guests over for dinner; Anastanzia was not there because she had left a week early to visit her family up north. Alex made rice with chicken and meatballs, beans, carrots, coleslaw, etc. – nothing real fancy, but a feast by their standards. Oh, and juice, chocolate cake, and tea as well. We asked Isaac to pray in Chichewa and we thought everyone would just dig in after. But Bambo Musa decided to pile food on all the plates, dividing up all the rice, meat, and vegetables – all piled together in a large heap.

Village culture: We had forgotten about village customs. In the village, a family makes just enough food for everyone so nothing goes to waste. Usually they eat from the same plate till it’s all gone. Well, there was too much food to divide up so when all the plates were piled high, Musa gave up and started passing plates around. After taking ¾ of the food off our kids’ plates and adding some meat balls to our plates, we could dig in. There wasn’t much for conversation, not in English or even amongst themselves. There were lots of leftovers, both on the table and the plates. Leftovers, but no waste. As the table was being cleared, all the leftovers started disappearing into plastic bags. Everything – plate scrapings, half eaten meatballs, everything mixed together in bags. The chocolate cake almost made into the same bags but Alex stopped them in just in time to give them another bag. At least they had food for the next day too.

Azungu price: Earlier that day Andre went to the market to buy a bag of maize for each of our workers. It’s hunger season, maize is becoming scarce, and prices are going up fast. So we thought maize would make a great gift at this time of year. Andre asked Isaac if he knew where to get maize for a decent price so they went together. Andre sent Isaac into the market with enough money to buy 3 bags of maize at K3700 (up from the government rate of K2600). Turns out the price had already gone up to K4200 but Isaac heard of someone still selling for K3700. After confirming the price, Andre went with him to pick up the maize, but when the seller saw the ‘azungu,’ the price suddenly changed to K4200 – exactly why Andre sent Isaac into the market alone. As they started walking away, the price quickly came back down and they got their maize.

King of the village: “Your house is close by, let’s go drop of a bag of maize to your house,” Andre told Isaac. His jaw dropped, he couldn’t believe his ears. He thought that his rich ‘bwana’ was buying 3 bags of maize for himself when he couldn’t even afford to buy 1 bag for his own family (nearly half his paycheque). Isaac told Andre, “Someone who has maize in his home [this time of year] is king of his village.” So with a bag of maize, Isaac was crowned king. I’d say that was a pretty good Christmas gift. They others got their maize that evening at the dinner. Musa’s bag will last his family of 4 children maybe a month. In April everyone should be harvesting maize. Hopefully we’ll have a plentiful harvest in our garden to share with our workers. Our fruit trees have also been producing enough avocadoes and mangoes to share around. This property really has been a blessing to us. We hope to be a blessing to our Malawian friends we share life with here in “Azungu/VanWoerden Village.”