Happy Thanksgiving

We have much to be thankful for. God has provided such an amazing community of people to help us adjust to life in Lilongwe. Not to mention the treat of having a regular Thanksgiving feast--turkey and all! Turkeys are not easy to come by here. We celebrated with the Partners in Hope ex-patriate staff. Our contribution was a fruit salad--with mangos from our tree, watermelon, pineapple and strawberries--not quite traditional, but definitely available, and yummy on a 95 degree day. Although we missed spending the day with our families, we were thankful to be celebrating with new friends!
Today we visited the Lilongwe Nature Sanctuary. It is a large area in the middle of Lilongwe with walking paths. It must have some secluded areas--as referenced in the sign. It also has a few caged animals--including crocodiles, monkeys, hyenas and pythons. It also has a few uncaged baboons that roam around and tried to give us all hugs. It freaked the kids (and us) out a little, so our visit was short.

Mike and I have completed our first week of language lessons. The lessons are challenging, but even now we are recognizing some of the basic grammar on signs and billboards that we didn't understand at all before. That is encouraging.

Sydney's school celebrated an international day on Thursday. Everyone came dressed in a costume from their home country and brought a traditional dish to share. Sydney wore a red, white and blue dress. It was so much fun to see all of the other costumes from around the world--other African countries, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, New Zealand, South Korea just to name a few. I wish I would have had my camera that day.

fun in malawi

We made a trip to the lake--Lake Malawi. About 1-1/2 hour drive from Lilongwe. The beach is beautiful and we had a great time.




On the way we passed many villages with native mud huts. And we saw a huge baobab tree.




Mike satisfied his hunter-gatherer passion by climbing our mango tree and harvesting 5 mangoes. Yummy!











The rains arrived last week. We didn't realize what a big deal this was until someone told us there had not been even a drop of rain since last march. We had quite a downpour for about an hour and we were told that everything begins to green-up. A welcome change from the hot, dry and dusty landscape we are used to. However other things come up after the rain as well--these termites are one example. The 2 evenings following the first rain at dusk, thousands of flying termites filled the sky. Heather was lucky enough to be out on a run when this happened the second night. It was like being in a snowstorm, there were so many. They eventually lose their wings and crawl around the ground. Then the local Malawians catch them, boil and fry them up for a tasty treat. We haven't had the courage to try it yet, but our friends say they take like bacon.

Today we had our first official Chichewa lesson. Our heads were spinning after just an hour, but we are excited to be moving forward in language learning. We look forward to the day when we can converse with native speakers--right now that seems very far away. But as they would say in Malawi---pong'ono pong'ono--little by little.

3rd Week: Celebrations and "Challenges"

It's almost Wednesday--
I (Heather) am up yet again in the middle of the night, so I thought I would at least take advantage of the lack of sleep to update our blog. Much has happened in the last week and we have a lot to be thankful for. Our biggest praise is Sydney turned 5 on Monday! I can hardly believe she is already 5 years old. She has amazed me with her ability to adapt here in Malawi--making new friends, attending a new school, sleeping in a new bed. God has answered our prayers in regards to a smooth transition for our kids. We celebrated her birthday with the Jansens--pizza and ice cream (a Tacheny tradition).



Birthday shots


Another point of praise was the safe arrival of the 2 boxes we had shipped. We weren't sure what would happen on this end, and as they sat in customs here for a few days, we started to wonder if we would ever see our stuff. Thankfully we had the help of Partners in Hope's customs clearing agent, Smiles (yes, that's his name), and we were able to get our boxes without paying exorbitant fees and taxes. So Mike's guitar made it here (among other things) and we were able to have our Saturday morning family praise time with the aid of Mike's guitar. Perry Jansen plays guitar as well, so Mike is looking forward to some jam sessions with him.We have had some "challenges" as well this last week. I put this word in quotes because just as we were getting overwhelmed with these challenges, God has provided. We were having trouble finding a car--we had hoped to buy a used car as we were told there are always cars available from people coming and going from Lilongwe. But we weren't finding much. The Jansens had been so generous in letting us borrow their car when they didn't need it, but trying to set up our house and find the things we need without our own car, and being dependent on others to pick up our kids from school, etc, was getting a bit old. I'm sure God was teaching us something on depending on Him and the generosity of others, but we still desired a car. And God provided--in fact he provided 2 great options in one morning and we had to choose. So we are now the proud owners of a car--it is 10 years old so please pray that it continues to run smoothly.We were also having trouble finding a language teacher and both of us were getting anxious to get started with our language learning. Our "schedule" up until now has been somewhat open-ended---getting settled and finding our bearings. For Mike and I who are quite task-oriented we were feeling like we weren't "accomplishing" anything. God has provided again--we start our language classes next Monday morning. This is the first step towards the future goal of working at the clinic and being able to speak to our patients in their language--Chichewa.Please pray for good sleep, continued good health, safety on the roads in our "new" car and perseverance in our language learning (and maybe some supernatural intervention in our ability to learn Chichewa)


Sydney and Joshua (our second and final dog). He's a nine year old German Shepherd who needed a home and has been great company for rowdy puupy Anna.

Week 2: New Experiences

Well, we are well into week #2 here in Malawi. We have recovered from jet lag and have mostly set up our house so we can move into the language learning phase of our time here.

I'm sure our entire term will be one of new experiences but we've had a few memorable ones this week. The first is an addition to our family--a dog. Many families here have dogs--they function as pets and watchdogs. We heard of a family that had 3 dogs but didn't have room for all of them in their new house, so we were given a 4-month old puppy that the kids have enjoyed. They have named her "Anna" and we have started to try and train her. To be honest, she's not the smartest dog on the block, but she's still a puppy.

Our 2nd new experience is driving on the left side of the road. Mike has taken to it quickly, but my 2 practice driving session were a little scary. First of all, driving a manual transmission takes a lot of concentration. Add to this, the stick is on the left side, you are driving on the left side of a narrow road, and the road is crowded with bicycles and pedestrians--it will definitely be awhile before I am comfortable driving here.

Driving led to our 3rd new Malawi experience. The Jansen's have let us use their car to get around. We were on the way to pick up Sydney at school yesterday, when we passed a routine traffic stop. To our dismay, the insurance on the Jansens car had lapsed as of October 31st and the officer informed us we had to go to court. Needless to say, we were a bit nervous. The officer was very polite and after explaining our situation he let us go get our kids and then we met back at the police station with the Jansens and the officer. The officer kept Mike's drivers license until we met with him. So today we went to "court", but not surprisingly the "court" time didn't happen and we get to try again tomorrow. Apparently in the past, one just paid a fine if your insurance lapsed. So the Jansens and us are a bit puzzled at this turn of events, but it's Malawi and nothing should surprise us. Thankfully, today Mike got his license back and we are still able to drive the car.
Welcome to Malawi!
God has been so good to us. Thanks for your prayers.

Settling In

Hanging bed nets/ Sydney in front of our house


Greetings from Malawi! We made it! And thanks to all of your prayers the travel went extremely well. The kids actually enjoyed the 16 hour plane trip as they were fed 3 meals, took a couple naps, and had their personal on-demand television available. This was a god-send for Mike and I. We overnighted in Johannesburg, South Africa. It was quite a sight trying to maneuver our 8 suitcases, 4 carryons and 2 kids through a crowded airport. Fortunately, there were porters available just when we needed them to assist us. And Sydney got very good at driving a luggage cart.
We arrived in Malawi on Friday, October 27th at noon and again thanks to prayers, had no problem with customs or immigration. They looked in one suitcase and flagged us through. We were greeted by Perry and Brenda Jansen--the couple who founded the Partners in Hope Medical Centre and immediately we were made part of their family. Since then, they have been our tour guides in Lilongwe--driving us everywhere, taking us to church, feeding us, taking us grocery shopping and helping watch our kids. They have 3 children (Nathan-13, Erin-9, and Olivia-4) Our kids have become fast friends which is wonderful as we live just behind them and our back yards are adjoined by a gate.
One of the first things we did this week is get the kids enrolled in school. Sydney is in pre-K or Reception (it's a British System) at ABC Christian Academy and Sam is in preschool at Rainbow preschool. They both have loved going to school, meeting kids from around the world. And the mornings they are in school have allowed Mike and I to settle in--grocery shop, furniture shop, practice driving (we drive on the left), unpack, etc. Sydney's 1st day of school


Sam, Olivia, Sydney, Erin

Thanks for your support and prayers as we transition to life in Malawi. We look forward to sharing about more of our experiences soon.