I've been a bit cut off from the outside world recently hence the lack
of communications. I've been working at a lodge in northern malawi. It
is near livingstonia, the original mission in malawi, on the side of a
big hill overlooking the valley below and the lake, 600m below. It is
quite small, it can take up to 30 guests and has no services, itss
powered by two solar panels and water is from a spring, tyhe toilet is
a compost one and water and cooking is done by firewood collected from
the mountainside. But im helping the owner out, he is having a problem
wit the staff and locals stealing things and so cant ever leave. It is
quite tiring, i get up at 5.30 for when the staff get here at 6, do a
stock take, feed and let out the ducks and chickens and set up the
restaurant and bar. Then during the day I make sure the staff all do
their jobs properly, which is rarely, chase away baboons, serve at the
bar and restaurant, take people to their rooms, prepare peoples bills
and take payment, feed the chickens and collect eggs and then in the
evening help the cook with meals as she couldnt cook more than rice
and beef stew before she came here and isnt very good, make sure the
staff have done the evning jobs, lock up everywhere, while guests are
eating patrol about as thats when the locals steal things and then go
to bed when all the guests have gone to bed. I normally try and nap
during the day as I get very tired but its quite hard, everytime
someone orders food i have to get it from the store room or cupboards
as they arent allowed access because theyll steal it, and everytime
they finish a job i have to tell them what to do next, even though ive
said that days jobs and most jobs are the same each day. And it has
two pigs, a goat, 33 chickens and three ducks. I like the chickens,
they are extremely stupid and funny, wheneveri walk about i get
surrounded by 33 chickens thinking im ngoing to feed them, and one
flew onto my shoulder the other day, but then turned itself so its
arse was in my face and i was scared it was going to s*** (they have
duck like poos) and so i made it get down. Ive named three so far
(hibbleton, cherise and shell). I dont like the ducks, they have
chicks and are very protective, they somehow got into the storeroom
the other day and i walked in and the mum chased me inside thinking i
was attacking them, i slammed the door behind me and the padlock went
flying so i spent about half an hour searching for it but then
yesterday she went for me and i chased her shaking the keys, and now
theyve excepted my dominance. So its very tiring but fun and i get
free food (which is nice because i can just go Elfreda (the cook) make
me {insert meal here}' and i get a nice meal which is a change from
beef and rice which I eat all the time, free drinks and accomodation.
Its also good because im not spending any money which has become a
problem. Because of the falling pound im living on $10 a day less,
which is a lot- $3650 over a year) and i only have a thousand pounds
left for africa, and i was thinking that living on 10pound a day is
not going to be fun as 20pound a day was a struggle and southern
africa is more xpensive than east africa so was thinking that I would
just have to be a thousand pound more in debt than i had previously
envisaged so that i can live on 20pound a day, but as im staying here
i wont be in so much debt. Im not sure how long im going to stay, i
have been here about a week and am thinking maybe another 2. the only
problem is its quite cut off, the nearest small town is 10km away but
its down a mountain with constant hairpin bends on a dirt track with
big drops and their is not public transport only hitching, which isnt
comfotable as its in the back of pickups.

im going to have to cut my email short as it is coming into the wet
season and the mother of all tropical storms has just unleashed and
power is going to go very very soon. we had a huge storm last night
which felled a couple of small trees and we thought the toilet was
going to blow away, once it sets in there will be 4 to 6 inches of
rain a night and the dry river bed near the entrance will have a
couple of metres of river each night and then just a trickle druing
the day.