Jinji Sadan

I was very happy to recover from my physical stress in the big city Blantyre in Malawi, after crossing Mozambique I was happy to be in a place that some people most of the people know English and I can communicate better with the people, I ate wll and  just tryed to rest , a thing that I am not really good at it. You can see that the people are very friendly and nice (some times too much – they can wake you up in 5 a.m. just to ask if everything is ok…). The Malawian people are proud to say that Malawi is “real” Africa. I am surprise to see men drinking milk in the middle of the day and every where but I understood that this how they drink the local beer… in cartons and it in the same color like milk…

 I was happy to know that there is food on the road and vendors are selling everything that you can put inside from everything that you can find inside the cow and the goat to small birds in deep fried… lake worms that its look like cow shit (and taste quit the same..)

They have her also breed call Obama after the U.S.A. president really good bread. They same color of Obama. I will tell you that I was in shock to see that they are selling a local delicate cosine of small rats, fresh and only boiled, they don’t skin it and they eat it with all the hear, really amazing( you can see in the photos).

I cycled on the big and beautiful Lake Malawi on the Great Rift Valley and I could make a  good distance during the long days of cycling. On the first day I noticed my new name I am: AZUNGO – white man. It was nice in the first days it was ok but every one was shouting “AZUNGO, AZUNGO”  I can understand that they don’t see many white people in this places because all the whites are going in 120km per hour speed in there white Land Rovers but In every small village once that one little kid see me he shouts my new name and all the children coming from the houses like flies and they start even running after me and demanding  money. Real Africa they said. I felt in my way the depending of Africa from the aid and help of the world, the white world, in a place that you feel like bringing children is like a hobby or national sport you can see small children not older then 4 years old walking with a young baby hanging on there back… the mother is busy making another baby… I understood very fast on the road no one know English(only in the big cities) but even the small child that look like he start to talk two days ago know the magic words : “AZUNGO! GIVE ME MY MONEY!” like I owe him something from years ago before he even got to this world. I could not rest for 2 minutes before a crowd of children will ask me for money. The big guys say “give me my money”, the smaller ones are saying” give me money” and the babies are only saying “ give me” no hello no pleas…. I was frustrated by my condition but even more from their’s. If this is a real Africa it is a sad reality. After 2 weeks on the road with not a lot of rest in the end of the days I found myself angry and it was new feeling for me , I thought maybe to kick the ass of one small child that every one will not ask for money, but I didn’t do it because its not going to teach them. Don’t get me wrong , I think that Malawi is beautiful country with amazing places to see and many people and children waving there hands and welcome you to there country like a guest but this children must be stop and the answer is education but that’s a different story… Right now I just arrived to Tanzania and try to work my way with the Swahili language because no one knows English and I am still AZUNGO but I will be good at least less children asking me for money. It’s all about the money… Have a good day and great life after it…. Roei “ AZUNGO” sadan

Tags: Africa, Malawi, Tanzania

This entry was posted on Friday, September 11th, 2009 at 15:25 and is filed under Africa. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.