OPSEU in South Africa and Malawi: March 20, 2008

On March 20 we left South Africa and flew from the vibrant city of Johannesburg, South Africa (with a population of 8 million in the greater Johannesburg area) to the very hot and much smaller city of Lilongwe (less than a million people), the capital of Malawi.

At the airport we were met by Doug Miller, Montreal based Coordinator of the Makupo Development Project. From there we drove north for two hours to a small village called Makupo – near Kasungu, Malawi.

Upon our arrival at dusk we were greeted by the
villagers who were singing and dancing to celebrate our visit.

The Makupo village women greeting OPSEU

We quickly learned to adapt to village life – at a much slower pace and with no modern amenities at our fingertips. We stayed in the village in modest accommodation with no running water, no electricity and only outside toilets. Nevertheless because of a recently constructed well – built partly from OPSEU funds – there was plenty of water available to us for bathing and washing.

Makupo women now have 24 hour access to water with
the newly installed pump at the well.

We stayed in the village for two days and two nights and ate the traditional food - “nsima” - with our hands usually for both lunch and dinner. Nsima is a maize (corn) dough – stirred into boiling water until it reaches a dumpling-like consistency. We were taught to scoop up a piece of nsima and then dip it into the various sauces made of spinach, tomatoes, pumpkin leaves, etc. with our hands. We were usually treated to chicken stew – made from freshly caught free range chickens – as well.

Women plucking chickens for our evening meal

The Makupo women sorting through pumpkin leaves before cooking our meal.

OPSEU Social Justice Funds have been used to construct a new outdoor kitchen for cooking communal meals. Almost every house or village uses wood in an open fire for cooking and heating water for baths, etc.

The newly constructed outdoor kitchen with double roofing for
better air flow from the open fire.

Our accommodation in the village

Village kids hamming it up around the well

Village women wearing their OPSEU donated Canadian flag head scarves

Montreal based Makupo Development Project Coordinator,
Doug Miller (whose wife, Nellie was born and grew up in Makupo village)
with some of Nellie’s relatives