Life is a highway....sort of

RUFA has joined in coalition with 4 other organizations to form a new initiative in Northern Malawi – FAIR – Farmers Agricultural Innovation in Rural Malawi. The Program is funded by Find your Feet/Harvest Help, a UK based NGO and The Development Fund of Norway. The implementers of the project will be RUFA, MACRO – a Malawian NGO offering counseling and support services to HIV/Aids patients, and the Ministry of Agriculture. What’s unique about the program is the approach we’re using; before offering any kind of aid or support, we’ve been facilitating discussions with the community’s governing bodies to discover issues preventing true ownership of development activities and to empower the community to tackle these issues themselves. This process is being lead by a man named CAPS (he actually has 5 names, but this is the acronym they form, so people use it as a short form, lol). He’s one of the most talented facilitators I’ve ever seen in action, and I’m learning an incredible amount from him. It’s a complicated process and definitely something I’d like to share more about when I get back, but for now lets just say it makes for interesting work.

For the last 10 days, a group of 8 of us, representing the 4 main organizations involved have been traveling to a remote district near the Zambian border. There was no suitable accommodation for us there, so we’ve been commuting the two hour drive there and back every day to the nearest town with a motel. It so happens that this isn’t actually that far from where I’m living, so Geoffrey and I have been commuting an extra half an hour home to conserve costs. This can mean up to 6 hours a day of traveling packed into a single pick up truck/on the back of a motorbike. And no ladies and gentlemen, we’re not talking about paved roads here; we’re talking about winding, climbing, narrow, rocky, potholed dirt roads that make for one hell of a journey. The landscape is stunning though and totally makes it worthwhile; the tops of the mountains are swallowed by drifting clouds, making the sky feel closer than ever, the rock formations are something out of the lion king, and the trees couldn’t be more African.

Its been a bit of a tease because these communities are all bordering the Nyika national park, and every day we drive up to the turnoff for the park… and go the other way. I can’t complain though, RUFA’s organized a trip to Nyika this Thursday when we’re done this batch of community discussions for some of their lead farmers to reinforce the value of natural resource programs, and guess who gets to come? My first opportunity to see some African animals! Zebras, and antelope, and hyenas oh my… all on one of the most beautiful plateaus on the top of one of the mountains covered with ancient forests. Excited much? Pictures and stories to follow….