Today started off kind of rough I woke up with a bad cold. I had been sneezing and coughing all night since it was freezing. Malawi has a very interesting winter; the days can get very hot, but the nights are completely cold. Dr. Barber gave me medicine, but it was the cough medicine strip things that dissolve on your tongue. I never even knew these things existed and I was even more surprised when it made my tongue numb for a little while. But on a happier note, I had a nice breakfast with an omelet, toast, and these huge pieces of bacon with some pineapple juice.
We were leaving Annie’s Lodge in Lilongwe to travel to the first Annie’s Lodge located in Zomba. I learned that Annie is very successful woman. She started off with a coffee shop and restaurant and worked her way to owning four different lodges in Malawi.
Well, anyways, we had to squeeze all 18 of us plus our luggage (which I still didn’t have) all in this small van/bus thing we drove in. It was very, very tight but we made the 7-8 hour drive to Zomba just fine.
On the way there we stopped at this beautiful pottery shop where they sell handcrafted figurines, pots, vases, blankets, shoulder bags, and a bunch of other things. We also got to have a nice lunch there; I ordered the chicken lasagna which was pretty good. One funny thing that happened while I was eating was that the power went out and all the workers looked at us and our lost faces and started laughing. The power going out is a very common thing in Malawi; it happens all the time but for only short periods.
Driving to Zomba was very pretty from what I did see since I kept falling asleep to avoid feeling my legs cramping up. At one point we were at the border line of Malawi and Mozambique which was only separated by one road. Well what I learned about this country was that they had a civil war throughout the 80’s and early 90’s that’s why their buildings looked so bad and some were destroyed and I guess some citizens would run away to Malawi to remain safe.
We got out the car and walked over to Mozambique’s side and walked by the people who had stands of food everywhere. In a way I kind of felt bad because I think we led them to believe we were all going to buy something since we got out the van, but instead we walked by them and kept looking around. Some started yelling and pointing at us and others were starring and talking about us. I didn’t feel very welcomed, but I could understand why they felt that way. Something that did surprise me was that the men kept saying hi and one man came up to me and asked me to be his wife. I didn’t know what to say so I just said no thank you. As we were all getting back on the van one young man tried to get on the bus with us. He wouldn’t take no for an answer until our bus driver came to talk to him. Some think he was drunk since he smelt like alcohol but who knows.
Well, we continued our journey and we saw huge mountains and lots of village life. We stopped at the top of a hill to take pictures of a village below and all these children came running to us. Some were nice and let us take their picture while some threaten to throw rocks at us and started picking some up. That was when we realized we needed to leave.
Finally, we got to Annie’s Lodge which was beautiful! It was like our own little village. Everybody had their separated buildings and you had to travel up little hills and stairs outside to get to others and buildings like the restaurant, the bar, and little gazebos. At first they had me and Danielle in this room off at the bottom of the campus by ourselves, but luckily they moved us up to the upper level with the other girls. And good news came when I reached the lodge. Noah, who is like a manager, informed me that they the airport found my bag and contacted our last lodge so Annie’s son Peter was going to drive it down to me soon. It was the greatest news I had all day. 
This little hut was the bar! Yes it sold more than beer it had water and soda too but only Coca-Cola products.
Dinner time was great we all had some pretty good meals. I ordered the cheese burger and chips which is basically little potatoes. My burger was very, very well done so it was kind of crunchy but good. I also had an exotic Fanta which is now my favorite soda; I have no idea what flavor it is but I’m glad I tried it. And Annie made us a tasty chocolate cake to welcome us to her lodge which was very nice. I was so glad to meet her; I just think she is such a phenomenal woman. She was really nice to me; she heard I was sick so she said she would send extra blankets to my room which I appreciated very much.
The last few hours of my day were spent with some students from Radford University. They’re pretty cool, I’m glad they came.
Our room was pretty nice except for the large spider I had to kill when I first got in. I loved how we had a real shower with really hot water. That was the best shower I had in a while. I did like how our floor had carpet unlike the last lodge and that we had mosquito net hanging above our beds. But one thing I was disappointed to find out was that we now had to start buying internet cards, which means that my future blogs will be posting less frequently.
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