Emotional day

Like they all aren't emotional. I would start by saying most of our itinerary was set up by Robert, our host at the Luwinga Lodge (our home in Mzuzu). We started out at the Nursery School at one of the local UMC's. As usual the children sang for us. And as usual it was wonderful. We left lots of gifts for the pastor, staff and children and even had time to play jump rope and frisbee. On the way to an orphanage we stopped to visit (and some of us cross) a suspension bridge made entirely of bamboo stalks woven into a footbridge( not sure about the wood). Did I mention it was built in 1908? It was amazing and great fun. Our next point of interest was passing by a large coal mine. It supplies most of the coal for Malawi. Go figure, another tie to WV. The drive as we pushed on looked exactly like WV. Some times Seneca Rock and sometimes Rosemont and sometimes Greenbrier County. Very Cool. Just to note, there is another Mountaineer on this trip (besides Robin), Josh Matics who now lives in Iowa. Our next adventure wasn't really a stop but hilarious none the less. Robert had been telling us we would be able to feed bananas to baboons but we really didn't believe him. Never doubt Robert. We took bananas just in case and sure enough as were driving through the mountains we came upon Baboons scampering around and across the road. We just tossed parts of bananas out the window and they were scooped up immediately. There we dozens of them and it was great fun to watch. Our next top was the point of our afternoon travels - An orphanage that Robert asked us to visit. Orphanages in Malawi aren't as we think of them. The orphans live in the villages, generally with a grandparent or distant relative and come to the orphanage during the day for food, clothes and education. That is if the orphanage leaders have any of those things to share. We had a great visit, left gifts for the chief, administrators and orphanage staff but it was tough I will tell you. There were probably over 60 children there and it was obvious they were suffering. We know we can't fix everything but that doesn't make it any easier. We left some US dollars to help as best we can. We had a good discussion with Robert and Copeland this evening about helping them in the future so those kids will be on our hearts and minds for some time. In what can only be described as a roller coaster day our next stop was shopping at a curio market (wood carvings, etc.). This was the first experience for the first timers at negotiating the price of things so it was great fun. We finished our shop till you drop experience and then made a brief stop at Lake Malawi. The lake is beautiful and a nice way to end the day before heading back to Mzuzu. We finished the day with a great meal at the Lodge, sharing about the experiences of the day, a few tears and a wrap up meeting with Copeland. Although our time here is not done. The end of our visit is the beginning of the Malawi UMC Annual Conference. Since Copeland needs to get to Blantyre as soon as possible and it is a 12 hour journey by bus, we decided to have our wrap up meeting tonight so he could leave for the conference. Tomorrow is a long travel day from Mzuzu to Liwonde (probably about 8 hours driving plus rest stops. We will be back tomorrow. Peace and Blessing to all. (S&H - school starts soon :) ) Dennis