The rain is here!

My life has settled into a nice routine of gardening, reading, visiting with friends, and working on projects. I wake up every day at 5am and work on my garden. I'm making a gravel path around my house, swales to reroute water, terraces for soil conservation, and planting trees aplenty. I'm reading all kinds of stuff, mainly nonfiction. I am just a non-fiction kinda guy; I have been reading a lot about permaculture and books on development of impovershed nations. I guess due to my lack of enthusiasm for Malawian culture and lack of affinity for Malawians themselves I've been feeling very free about travelling around. I've been visiting my friends a lot on the weekends. I want to the southern province of Thyolo for Halloween, last week I spent playing around the lake, and this weekend I'm chilling with my homey Ben Nebo in Lilongwe. This Peace Corps gig is not all about helping others. Today we made quiche, it was bad ass! And then there are my projects . . .

Well my greatest love lies in my agricultural pursuits. Inside of my fence I am working hard to create the most awesome permaculture garden that Peace Corps has ever seen and outside of my fence I'm working on a more educational demonstration plot. Perhaps demonstration is the best way to teach these people here. At least I could lead a horse to water . . . Otherwise my oil pressing group is moving along. I am making them do yard work for me to help pay for the oil press, but I'm not able to find the hybrid peanut seeds I want. But perhaps the most interesting project I'm working on is forging a relationship between my village and a company that sells baobab fruit powder. This would entail my villagers providing labor to collect and do minor processing to the fruit. The company will provide bags, rent money for storage in the village, and a vehicle for transportation of goods. It would be a great deal if people would only get their asses in gear and work hard! We'll see . . . I'm gonna have a meeting on wednesday with people who are interested in doing the actual collection. We'll see who shows up. . . . I don't know. I've had several meetings and informal informational sessions, we'll see who is really enthusiastic. All I need to do to derail and project with these people is put them in a possition of responsibility. When someone wants to do a mud stove training, all I have to do is say, " OK, you collect the materials and I'll come do the training. Tell me when you've got them and I'll come." Most of the time that is all that is necessary. So you'd think that asking them to show up wasn't much . . . but it is really quite impressive when they are that responsible. Can you tell that I don't particularly care to work with Malawians? hate to say it, but it's true.