19th August 2025
Having fish for dinner last night was a wonderful idea! The only problem is, the flies think so too. After finally getting myself out of bed (after realizing that I needed to charge my phone) I went in the kitchen for something small to eat to accompany my second dose of a daily malaria prophylactic. I’ve been taking the same prophylactic for the past few years whenever I visit Malawi. It’s supposed to be started one or two days before entering into a malaria endemic area. Doctors always recommend prophylaxis when traveling to Malawi but only sometimes when traveling to Zimbabwe (depending on the region and time of year). I ate an apple, took my pill, and then proceeded to make a cup of coffee. Somehow in the middle of the coffee process — scooping the instant crystals, scooping the sugar (I typically use sugar in my coffee in Africa because it’s usually delicious local sugar that I can’t quite find elsewhere), pouring the water from the kettle, and stirring — two flies managed to get into my mug. I was watching it the whole time and still don’t know when they got in there. They weren’t in the coffee or the sugar. I checked. Chisomo, who I was chatting with in the kitchen, checked the kettle with me just to see if there were somehow flies dying in the boiling water. No flies there either. I guess this morning is definitely a two cup kind of morning even though I had to dump out the first one.
I had a difficult time getting back to sleep after I woke up in the middle of the night. Chisomo insisted that I must still be tired from the journey to Chemba or perhaps I haven’t yet acclimated to the time zone fully. I think it’s food fatigue from all the hospitality. There are certain people in certain places that will make sure to feed their guests even they themselves might go hungry. Thankfully our guests always seem to make enough food for everyone present while we’ve been visiting. I know that growing enough food to feed one’s family in the rural drought ridden areas is tough so I’m always especially humbled to be honored with a delicious plate of food in rural villages even though a cup of coffee would do just fine.
Today’s main event was a short drive to visit Douglas and his family. The last time Mabasa and I came for a visit was during the rainy season, although it was relatively dry that day. I remember enjoying Douglas’s small family garden, seeing the borehole well pumping along, and enjoying some delightful tea with fresh milk in it. This time around the borehole well has been deepened and there is abundant water coming from it which benefits Douglas’s family as well as many of their neighbors. The family has also built things up a little more, expanding the gardening operations and building up their home.
We had a nice visit, sitting in the cool shade as the weather was getting hotter throughout the day. We chatted with some of the family about world history, the political and prophetic situations in the world, and also about life and languages. We shared a meal of chicken and steak. Douglas grows a few chillies which he dried and ground into a powder specially for Mabasa who we all know enjoys some spice in his food. The chillies made for an extra delightful meal.
After lunch we toured the garden in the back and the front. So many different fruit trees and bushes, and vegetables of all kinds. I always enjoy seeing some of the native African fruit trees that grow. Occasionally we get to taste them when they are in season. All through the garden we could smell the fresh onions growing as well as a beautiful flowery fragrance that I finally figured out was coming from the orange blossoms.
As we were walking around Douglas’s mother noticed we didn’t have hats. Derek had forgotten his at the house when we left. She gave us some homemade hats and mentioned that she does take orders and is willing to send some homemade hats with me for any buyers who are interested. They are nice hats. It’s just a shame she didn’t have our sizes ahead of time because the hats are a bit small. Before saying our goodbyes we took a few photos together.
In the late afternoon Derek and I took some time to prepare for the journey in the morning. We also wrote some blogs, contacted a few people, and spent some time with the Chichaya family. One last dinner in Kadoma and a nice photo of the Chichayas. It was so hard to get Mabasa to smile or look at the camera or stop chewing, but we did manage one good shot. We ended the evening with ice cream and stories.
Of course as soon as we leave we’ll be thinking about our next trip to this unique part of the world. Stay tuned for a special blog entry from Derek Strauss coming soon. Next stop, the Warm Heart of Africa, and place that was home for Lena and me for a year, and is still like coming home to visit family.
-Lewis VanAusdle
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