It's after six pm and the sun has gone down a while ago. I'm still here in the log store, chipping away at the pile of paperwork that I have to do. I'm waiting on either the call of the expats over in the office or the call of my empty stomach to tear me away from my work. Then we all pile in the car and head up to the house for dinner.
That sounds good right about now.
The road leading up to our house is under construction. It's a hard pack dirt track with some rocks as reinforcement in some places, and some concrete tracks for the hairpin turns. The road is quite bumpy, and many of the concrete strips are in very bad repair. Instead of making the road better, they become obstacles to be carefully avoided.
The district is doing construction to repair a couple of the sections with the concrete tracks. I expected barriers, road closures, signs and at least some heavy equipment (a cement mixer at least?), but none of that was forthcoming.
Instead, we got a few men and a wheelbarrow. The closed the sections of the road by discretely putting football-sized rocks in front of whichever track they were repairing. They cleared away the rubble with shovels and hands, laid the rocky base by hand, and formed the cement with some timber to frame it and flatten it. Each strip took about a week. The rocks have been moved aside as of today, and the road is open.
As part of our arrangement of feeding ourselves, we (the group of expats living in the group house) go shopping on Saturday. That means whoever is in charge of the 'food box' that month goes shopping with a self-generated list and a lot of cash in their pocket.
That person is, of course, me.
Shopping happens at Shop Rite, a large Western-style supermarket on the outskirts of Blantyre, the largest city in the region, and Sana, a Halal bulk store just nearby. There's also a stop at the market in Limbe, if we need fruits and veggies.
I hike to work everyday. It's hike or take the car, and they both take approximately the same amount of time. It's a 800-vertical foot descent to the office, over about a mile. The road wends its way through tight switchbacks over uneven terrain and the trail cuts through hillside, crop fields and even people's front doorsteps.
It's a brisk 15 minute hike to the office, and a very nice way to start the day.
Every Thursday we fill our fleet of cars with diesel fuel. We have two underground tanks in our compound, connected to two old fashioned fuel pumps. At 7:15 on Thursday morning, I arrive at the office and get everything ready to fuel the fleet.
What follows is 45 minutes of chaos, full of rushing, prepping, recording and validating that makes me feel completely at home. One thing that theater teaches you is deadline-driven performance.
I'm a base log. That means I'm the logistician in charge of the center of operations, not some metaphorical support structure.
Today I found myself tackling the large and tedious job of doing inventory on our stationary supply. It's something that happens every month, and for several reasons it was put off this month. So today we had to do it, since we are distributing our stock tomorrow for the monthly supply of August.
It's not so bad once you get in the mode, but I spent over an hour counting each plastic page protector, each marker, each folder with the storekeeper.
Big sigh of relief that's done.
Tomorrow is hardware. I wonder how many nails we have?
This was the view up the mountain this morning behind our house. It towers over the town at its base and juts solidly into the cloud cover. Mount Chiradzulu.
I'm standing in the laboratory for the district hospital of Chiradzulu. I'm here teaching the biomed technician how to update the antivirus software on all the computers and back them up. It's slightly ironic because we are in an HIV lab, with signs posted around us saying "Danger: Risk Of Infection" and "Authorized Personnel Only." And we're checking for viruses too.
The labcoat-clad technicians move about the space, tending to the equipment checking viral load and CD4 counts. I stop in to the UNITAID lab to check on the equipment there. It is a project installing and training local staff to use state-of-the-art testing equipment for HIV diagnostics and treatment. All is going well, and we're preparing the next health center for its new equipment installation next month.
The refrigerator repair crew just got here, and the next computer is ready to be backed up. Just another day on base in Malawi.
I spent my morning in an echoing hall listening to representatives of many different ministries of government and industry conduct the businesses of the district government.
In Chichewa, the local language.
Four hours later, I'm finally done. I escaped after the closing prayer, although I'm not certain that was the end.
I did get to do a presentation on water needs and access, but that was in English by necessity.
Another language to learn...
It's 6:45 and all is quiet and buttoned up for the night. It's a little more than two hours after 'knock off,' so the staff are long gone.
I've been getting many things done without constant demands on my time. Even though all of the expats continue to work, the official workday ends at 4:30. There's an unwritten rule that no requests are made and no problems are dealt with between departments in this peaceful time. No one will ask about their antivirus software being up to date, no one will ask for a box to be stored in the warehouse, no one will request an extension cord. And I won't ask for computers to be backed up or for pharmacy drugs to be updated in first aid kits. We're all on our own. And it is lovely. I get forms filled out, requests submitted, orders processed and schedules clarified. All of the little details of the day are caught in this time. It's a sieve that prevents the loss of all those tiny particles of information that seem to drain out of the day once the team goes home.
But it's dinner time now. Tomorrow is Thursday, which means I'm up early to fuel the fleet.
The morning sun rises over our fleet of land cruisers parked at the logistics store compound. It's just before 7:30 am and the work day is about to start. It is quirt before the drivers arrive to take out the cars, the mechanic begins servicing, the carpenter comes to finish the shelves, the storekeeper comes to do inventory and the laborers start on their trench.
The work day will end at 4:30 pm today and the sun will set shortly after 5 pm.
We are lending four tents to the District Commissioner for a special event this Sunday. They're loaded in the back if a pickup and lashed down with some cording that we found. Quick and easy.
Mount Chiradzulu looms in the background, with clouds that hang on even as the dry season is starting.
The event was a success, with singing, dancing, speeches and celebrating lasting all day. Although they only used 3 tents...
