On Friday June 27th I headed to Lilongwe with Binnu to meet up with the rest of EWB’s Malawi volunteers. We hopped on a true Malawian coach bus; three people per row, people standing, and lots of chickens, and drove for 6 hours to Lilongwe. On most long trips the driver will stop at the markets along the side of the road and people will come running to the vehicle with fruit, potatoes, vegetables, drinks, biscuits, etc. for the people in the bus to buy. This probably adds about an hour to the drive, but is pretty awesome: food right to your window!
We were meeting at the same resort type place that we went to when we first got to Malawi, and Binnu and I had a few troubles getting there. Including: getting on the wrong minibus, Binnu falling out of the minibus and getting the wind knocked out of her, me figuring out how I was going to make sure she didn’t pass out as we got into a minibus heading the right direction, and finally getting in a cab and paying way too much to get to the resort. We got there right on time and were greeted by most of the Junior Fellows and Long Term Volunteers. It was awesome to see everyone back together again, and people’s energy was booming. We got on a minibus for a 2 hour drive to Senga Bay, an area right on Lake Malawi. The weekend consisted of the usual EWB stuff: lots of discussions, sessions, and conversations that hurt your brain, but are completely awesome. It was neat to see how far everyone has come in the last one and a half months, and to share some of our experiences and learn a whole lot from one another.
We left Senga Bay on the Tuesday (Canada Day!) and headed back to Lilongwe. Duncan, one of the Junior Fellows, had met a couple people who are working with the UN and had invited us to come with them to the refugee camp in Malawi. I decided not to go because I didn’t want to change my headspace that much, and I don’t really know a whole lot about refugee camps. Apparently it was nothing like anyone was expecting. It was basically a village with people from all over Africa. The stories that some of the EWBers heard were pretty rough, and there was a lot of talk about waiting for someone to come and help. While they were at the refugee camp, Janelle (another Junior Fellow) and I headed to the Lilongwe market in search of chitenjes and a good market experience. We headed to a market that isn’t really known by tourists. It is set up in a fenced in area, and the entire market is kind of divided into different sections. Produce and food, household brooms and cooking utensils, fish, cooked food, and chitenjes all have their own areas. Once we found the chitenje area (after asking about 4 people), it was like a gold mine! I have never seen so many chitenjes in one area. There were tables lined with fabric and you just walk along and choose the ones you want to see and buy. The even more awesome thing is that they were all at a fixed price, so we didn’t have to go through the hassle of bargaining. I bought a lot of chitenjes! We had lunch at a table set up in the centre of the market area. Rice, beans, and vegetables for only 100 kwacha; probably the best 100 kwacha I have spent.
We slept at the resort in tents and Binnu and I headed to the bus station in the morning to head back to Lilongwe. It turns out we picked the wrong coach bus, because about 30 minutes outside of Blantyre it ran out of fuel. We were stranded, and the driver had to run to the gas station about 5 km away to bring back gas. We waited for about 30 minutes then decided to catch a minibus that was heading to Blantyre. We got in, went out for pizza (a final Western hit), and caught a cab to Binnu’s house just outside of Blantyre.
I moved back into my home in the village on Friday afternoon and already the preparations for the Monday wedding were starting. The bride and groom, Grace and George arrived on Saturday morning from Blantyre where they both live and work. Grace is the daughter of my host mother and father, and George’s mother and father live in a village about an hour outside of Lilongwe. George speaks English very well, and Grace speaks enough for me to communicate with her, so it was nice to be able to ask them questions about how a Malawian wedding works. My host mother is Roman Catholic and my host father is part of the CCAP church, and Grace is Roman Catholic. Both of George’s parents are part of the CCAP church, as is George. In Malawi, it is very common for the wife to convert to her husband’s religion before marriage. Apparently it’s in the bible, but I’m not entirely sure about that…
On Sunday is when the real festivities began. When I awoke the women of the village had a huge container (it looked like toxic waste containers-but I’m sure it wasn’t) sitting on top of three flat rocks with a fire underneath. In between each of the rocks they had put long dry grass to keep the fire going. Once the grass begins to burn, you push it underneath the container into the fire. Inside the container was water which you bring to a boil and add maize flour. Once that has come to a boil you take it off the fire and let it cool. The next day you put it back on the fire and bring it to a boil again. This makes a kind of starchy drink that is very filling. I’m not too fond of it, and even with heaps of sugar I find it hard to gulp down.
All throughout the day we had guests arriving. Most of the guests that arrive the day before the wedding are the close family of the bride and groom, but that does not mean that there aren’t a lot of them! As women and men came they went right to work helping with different tasks. The women were mostly responsible for collecting firewood and water, cooking the food, and greeting everyone. They also did a lot of singing, clapping, and dancing. It was mainly the older women who would stand in a semi-circle around the fire, with younger women and some children standing behind them, and the older women would lead the song and dance. The men were working on a pergola type shelter which was made of logs with a thatched roof. They also had the job of killing the 4 goats and chickens that were purchased for the wedding. The groom had the responsibility of doing the initial kill of each of the goats. I had initially thought it might be neat to watch this, but I’m kind of glad I didn’t…
The food on Sunday was almost overwhelming. I think I ate more that day than I usually do over the course of a week. For breakfast I ate with the bride and groom, the grand daughter who is living with us, and my grandmother. We had sweet potatoes, African bread (banana bread made with maize flour), and tea. For lunch we ate nsima and beans, and at around 4:30pm we were given chips (sliced potatoes in oil). Dinner had quite an interesting set up; we had three mats set up in the main room of the house. On one were the men (my father, the groom’s father, and the groom’s uncle), on another were the grandmothers, the granddaughter, and me, and on the other were the sisters and a couple of the granddaughters. We all had our own dishes of nsima and chicken, and ate in our separate circles.
Then the party started. Speakers were brought out onto the front porch of my house and blasted with Malawian music and everyone in the village and all the guests were outside in front of my house dancing all night long. I was exhausted by this time and my mother was quite concerned with someone coming into the house and stealing my belongings, so I didn’t stay outside for too long. Also, as a white person I stand out quite a bit, and me dancing is always good laugh and sideshow. So I put my earplugs in and attempted to have a fairly good sleep in spite of all the noise.
There were people sleeping everywhere on Sunday night, we had mats and blankets set up in the main room, and all around the back of the house.
On Monday morning all the women woke up at around 4am to fetch water, and start the preparations for lunch. I was brought into the main room for my breakfast, and I think that moment was probably the most uncomfortable of the entire weekend. I was put right beside the bucket of raw goat meat and handed my plate of rice pudding. I’m not entirely sure how I got through the plate, but the point in time when my mother reached her hand into the bucket and started scooping out the meat into separate buckets was probably the worst.
The groom had asked me to come to the church service on Monday morning, so I went along with my father, and the groom’s father and uncles. I initially made the assumption that everyone would be attending the church service, but I was very wrong. Almost all the women and younger men stay at the house for the morning preparing for lunch and the afternoon. Even my mother didn’t come to the church because she was busy preparing for lunch. I’m not sure if she didn’t come because she is Roman Catholic and it was at the CCAP church, or if she needed to be at the house. In her place, her sister went and sat beside my father. My father and I walked to the house where the bride and groom were getting ready. They had about 15 girls as brides maids, 4 boys, a best man, and a little boy and girl in their wedding party. The girls were dressed in shiny purple dresses with white shoes, and the boys in black suits with blue shirts. The bride was wearing a very traditional white wedding dress and the groom was wearing a beige suit. The bride and groom drove to the church in a car and the rest of us squeezed into a minibus. The minibus ride was quite the experience. All the girls and the women were singing the whole way. The actual wedding service lasted only an hour and consisted of the bride’s maids coming in 2 at a time in a choreographed dance and the bride and groom being escorted by their best man and best woman up to the front, while dancing. The priest preached for quite awhile in Chichewa, there were a lot of amen’s, and he married Grace and George. There was no kiss though, but public displays of affection are not seen as appropriate in Malawi, so I’m going to assume that that was the reason.
We drove back to the house and were greeted by everyone who had stayed behind. The food has been prepared and we ate right away. There was rice, nsima, goat, and chicken, and tons of people!
After lunch we gathered under the pergola on plastic chairs and the children all stood around the outside. It really brought out the realization of how many children there are in comparison to the number of adults. There were a few adults under the pergola (mostly guests), then there were adults from the village and surrounding area along one side, and children all along the other three sides. The bride and groom sat on a couch at the front. Then began the “true Malawian tradition;” the throwing of money. The bride and the groom each stand up with a large woven plate and music is put on they start to dance. Guests come up and dance and throw money, usually 20-100 kwacha bills. This goes on for about 3 hours, with the bride and groom coming up on their own, the mother and father of each side coming up, the group village headman, and the bride and groom coming up together. I went up once to throw money to the bride and groom, and got quite a few giggles. The white person dancing and throwing money is always quite a sight!
At about 5pm the ceremony finished and everyone began to clear out. The only people left were the close family who had been there since Sunday and the people in the village. We ate leftovers from lunch and went to sleep. The bride and groom slept in the house behind ours, the grandmothers slept in our main room, and all the other family slept on mats outside.
On Tuesday, the groom took his new wife, her parents, and his parents to his house for lunch so that the bride’s parents could agree to let their daughter live there.
And that is a Malawian wedding, or at least one version of one. And don’t worry, for those of you that are visual learners, I was able to take quite a few photographs that I would love to share when I return!
We were meeting at the same resort type place that we went to when we first got to Malawi, and Binnu and I had a few troubles getting there. Including: getting on the wrong minibus, Binnu falling out of the minibus and getting the wind knocked out of her, me figuring out how I was going to make sure she didn’t pass out as we got into a minibus heading the right direction, and finally getting in a cab and paying way too much to get to the resort. We got there right on time and were greeted by most of the Junior Fellows and Long Term Volunteers. It was awesome to see everyone back together again, and people’s energy was booming. We got on a minibus for a 2 hour drive to Senga Bay, an area right on Lake Malawi. The weekend consisted of the usual EWB stuff: lots of discussions, sessions, and conversations that hurt your brain, but are completely awesome. It was neat to see how far everyone has come in the last one and a half months, and to share some of our experiences and learn a whole lot from one another.
We left Senga Bay on the Tuesday (Canada Day!) and headed back to Lilongwe. Duncan, one of the Junior Fellows, had met a couple people who are working with the UN and had invited us to come with them to the refugee camp in Malawi. I decided not to go because I didn’t want to change my headspace that much, and I don’t really know a whole lot about refugee camps. Apparently it was nothing like anyone was expecting. It was basically a village with people from all over Africa. The stories that some of the EWBers heard were pretty rough, and there was a lot of talk about waiting for someone to come and help. While they were at the refugee camp, Janelle (another Junior Fellow) and I headed to the Lilongwe market in search of chitenjes and a good market experience. We headed to a market that isn’t really known by tourists. It is set up in a fenced in area, and the entire market is kind of divided into different sections. Produce and food, household brooms and cooking utensils, fish, cooked food, and chitenjes all have their own areas. Once we found the chitenje area (after asking about 4 people), it was like a gold mine! I have never seen so many chitenjes in one area. There were tables lined with fabric and you just walk along and choose the ones you want to see and buy. The even more awesome thing is that they were all at a fixed price, so we didn’t have to go through the hassle of bargaining. I bought a lot of chitenjes! We had lunch at a table set up in the centre of the market area. Rice, beans, and vegetables for only 100 kwacha; probably the best 100 kwacha I have spent.
We slept at the resort in tents and Binnu and I headed to the bus station in the morning to head back to Lilongwe. It turns out we picked the wrong coach bus, because about 30 minutes outside of Blantyre it ran out of fuel. We were stranded, and the driver had to run to the gas station about 5 km away to bring back gas. We waited for about 30 minutes then decided to catch a minibus that was heading to Blantyre. We got in, went out for pizza (a final Western hit), and caught a cab to Binnu’s house just outside of Blantyre.
I moved back into my home in the village on Friday afternoon and already the preparations for the Monday wedding were starting. The bride and groom, Grace and George arrived on Saturday morning from Blantyre where they both live and work. Grace is the daughter of my host mother and father, and George’s mother and father live in a village about an hour outside of Lilongwe. George speaks English very well, and Grace speaks enough for me to communicate with her, so it was nice to be able to ask them questions about how a Malawian wedding works. My host mother is Roman Catholic and my host father is part of the CCAP church, and Grace is Roman Catholic. Both of George’s parents are part of the CCAP church, as is George. In Malawi, it is very common for the wife to convert to her husband’s religion before marriage. Apparently it’s in the bible, but I’m not entirely sure about that…
On Sunday is when the real festivities began. When I awoke the women of the village had a huge container (it looked like toxic waste containers-but I’m sure it wasn’t) sitting on top of three flat rocks with a fire underneath. In between each of the rocks they had put long dry grass to keep the fire going. Once the grass begins to burn, you push it underneath the container into the fire. Inside the container was water which you bring to a boil and add maize flour. Once that has come to a boil you take it off the fire and let it cool. The next day you put it back on the fire and bring it to a boil again. This makes a kind of starchy drink that is very filling. I’m not too fond of it, and even with heaps of sugar I find it hard to gulp down.
All throughout the day we had guests arriving. Most of the guests that arrive the day before the wedding are the close family of the bride and groom, but that does not mean that there aren’t a lot of them! As women and men came they went right to work helping with different tasks. The women were mostly responsible for collecting firewood and water, cooking the food, and greeting everyone. They also did a lot of singing, clapping, and dancing. It was mainly the older women who would stand in a semi-circle around the fire, with younger women and some children standing behind them, and the older women would lead the song and dance. The men were working on a pergola type shelter which was made of logs with a thatched roof. They also had the job of killing the 4 goats and chickens that were purchased for the wedding. The groom had the responsibility of doing the initial kill of each of the goats. I had initially thought it might be neat to watch this, but I’m kind of glad I didn’t…
The food on Sunday was almost overwhelming. I think I ate more that day than I usually do over the course of a week. For breakfast I ate with the bride and groom, the grand daughter who is living with us, and my grandmother. We had sweet potatoes, African bread (banana bread made with maize flour), and tea. For lunch we ate nsima and beans, and at around 4:30pm we were given chips (sliced potatoes in oil). Dinner had quite an interesting set up; we had three mats set up in the main room of the house. On one were the men (my father, the groom’s father, and the groom’s uncle), on another were the grandmothers, the granddaughter, and me, and on the other were the sisters and a couple of the granddaughters. We all had our own dishes of nsima and chicken, and ate in our separate circles.
Then the party started. Speakers were brought out onto the front porch of my house and blasted with Malawian music and everyone in the village and all the guests were outside in front of my house dancing all night long. I was exhausted by this time and my mother was quite concerned with someone coming into the house and stealing my belongings, so I didn’t stay outside for too long. Also, as a white person I stand out quite a bit, and me dancing is always good laugh and sideshow. So I put my earplugs in and attempted to have a fairly good sleep in spite of all the noise.
There were people sleeping everywhere on Sunday night, we had mats and blankets set up in the main room, and all around the back of the house.
On Monday morning all the women woke up at around 4am to fetch water, and start the preparations for lunch. I was brought into the main room for my breakfast, and I think that moment was probably the most uncomfortable of the entire weekend. I was put right beside the bucket of raw goat meat and handed my plate of rice pudding. I’m not entirely sure how I got through the plate, but the point in time when my mother reached her hand into the bucket and started scooping out the meat into separate buckets was probably the worst.
The groom had asked me to come to the church service on Monday morning, so I went along with my father, and the groom’s father and uncles. I initially made the assumption that everyone would be attending the church service, but I was very wrong. Almost all the women and younger men stay at the house for the morning preparing for lunch and the afternoon. Even my mother didn’t come to the church because she was busy preparing for lunch. I’m not sure if she didn’t come because she is Roman Catholic and it was at the CCAP church, or if she needed to be at the house. In her place, her sister went and sat beside my father. My father and I walked to the house where the bride and groom were getting ready. They had about 15 girls as brides maids, 4 boys, a best man, and a little boy and girl in their wedding party. The girls were dressed in shiny purple dresses with white shoes, and the boys in black suits with blue shirts. The bride was wearing a very traditional white wedding dress and the groom was wearing a beige suit. The bride and groom drove to the church in a car and the rest of us squeezed into a minibus. The minibus ride was quite the experience. All the girls and the women were singing the whole way. The actual wedding service lasted only an hour and consisted of the bride’s maids coming in 2 at a time in a choreographed dance and the bride and groom being escorted by their best man and best woman up to the front, while dancing. The priest preached for quite awhile in Chichewa, there were a lot of amen’s, and he married Grace and George. There was no kiss though, but public displays of affection are not seen as appropriate in Malawi, so I’m going to assume that that was the reason.
We drove back to the house and were greeted by everyone who had stayed behind. The food has been prepared and we ate right away. There was rice, nsima, goat, and chicken, and tons of people!
After lunch we gathered under the pergola on plastic chairs and the children all stood around the outside. It really brought out the realization of how many children there are in comparison to the number of adults. There were a few adults under the pergola (mostly guests), then there were adults from the village and surrounding area along one side, and children all along the other three sides. The bride and groom sat on a couch at the front. Then began the “true Malawian tradition;” the throwing of money. The bride and the groom each stand up with a large woven plate and music is put on they start to dance. Guests come up and dance and throw money, usually 20-100 kwacha bills. This goes on for about 3 hours, with the bride and groom coming up on their own, the mother and father of each side coming up, the group village headman, and the bride and groom coming up together. I went up once to throw money to the bride and groom, and got quite a few giggles. The white person dancing and throwing money is always quite a sight!
At about 5pm the ceremony finished and everyone began to clear out. The only people left were the close family who had been there since Sunday and the people in the village. We ate leftovers from lunch and went to sleep. The bride and groom slept in the house behind ours, the grandmothers slept in our main room, and all the other family slept on mats outside.
On Tuesday, the groom took his new wife, her parents, and his parents to his house for lunch so that the bride’s parents could agree to let their daughter live there.
And that is a Malawian wedding, or at least one version of one. And don’t worry, for those of you that are visual learners, I was able to take quite a few photographs that I would love to share when I return!
1 comment:
The short film we produced in Malawi may be of interest to you and can be seen via the following
http://www.rumblelimited.tv/malawi
You may have to copy the link into your browser.
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