Nkhata Bay (Malawi) : time-out on the great lake
S11°36.294' E034°17.942' (altitude: 489m)
Around Nkhata Bay the land is hilly and the shore-line rocky. Besides being a port of call for the lake’s ferry service (wbich takes a week to do the north-south round trip) and having a few lodges there is not much going down in Nkhata Bay. Two weeks flew by as we soaked up the atmosphere at a Malawian pace: daily visits of the local market for the next meals, watching the locals effortlessly manouever their wooden canoes on the lake, visiting the village (three houses, a one-and-a-half hour walk from town) of Jonathan (one of the night watchmen at our lodge), playing round after round of Bao (that great African board game with sixteen holes and seeds or stones) which can last for hours, chilling out with new friends and wondering if we will ever be able to leave. More so than the slow pace, it is the values and virtues of Malawians which make the place so peaceful and pure. To us this was personified in Johnathan to whom everything seemed “nice” (or "very nice") and who values the little that he has, although he is quite aware that he is at a disadvantage in this world. He, with his family, belongs to the two billion people in the world who have to make do with less than two dollars a day, and that in a money economy where one kilogram of locally produced sugar costs $ 0.70. The amount of people in this kind predicament has been on the increase over the past decade - even as a percentage of population.
Makes you think?! Anyway, a German cyclist who has been peadling around the world for the last seven years and was on his last leg from Cape Town back to Europe said, "Africa is the continent which makes you think".
Around Nkhata Bay the land is hilly and the shore-line rocky. Besides being a port of call for the lake’s ferry service (wbich takes a week to do the north-south round trip) and having a few lodges there is not much going down in Nkhata Bay. Two weeks flew by as we soaked up the atmosphere at a Malawian pace: daily visits of the local market for the next meals, watching the locals effortlessly manouever their wooden canoes on the lake, visiting the village (three houses, a one-and-a-half hour walk from town) of Jonathan (one of the night watchmen at our lodge), playing round after round of Bao (that great African board game with sixteen holes and seeds or stones) which can last for hours, chilling out with new friends and wondering if we will ever be able to leave. More so than the slow pace, it is the values and virtues of Malawians which make the place so peaceful and pure. To us this was personified in Johnathan to whom everything seemed “nice” (or "very nice") and who values the little that he has, although he is quite aware that he is at a disadvantage in this world. He, with his family, belongs to the two billion people in the world who have to make do with less than two dollars a day, and that in a money economy where one kilogram of locally produced sugar costs $ 0.70. The amount of people in this kind predicament has been on the increase over the past decade - even as a percentage of population.
Makes you think?! Anyway, a German cyclist who has been peadling around the world for the last seven years and was on his last leg from Cape Town back to Europe said, "Africa is the continent which makes you think".
posted by Retobados at 7:02 AM
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