Final Dispatch from Malawi
Back. Our return passed without incident (almost - we were conned of a business ticket in a traditional fiddle - Grant was the martyr who ended up at the rear of the fuselage).
The Janeemo festival was a great success, although it started slowly. I set off at 4am as a taxiing service, then waited for an hour and a half at the roadhead to bring punters back to the gig. It was the overcast weather. Very few in the villages have a wristwatch, and the sundial instinct is usual for timekeeping. I eventually returned at 930 with my singing passengers to find others in panic mode. The schedule was blown out of the water - by two hours. The Play Soccer team was still eating breakfast, not showing off their stepovers. Slowly, at tennish, people drifted to the festival ground.
The minister, Grain Malunga, turned up at 11 in a cavalcade of ten cars (the biggest convoy ever on the Masanjere track?), and took a good hour and a half to look round the Janeemo market and chat to farmers hosting the demonstrations - oil pressing, soap making, moringa grinding, lamp making. He was engaged and charming. A retinue of minders were in continual attendence, chasing away children. Meanwhile, the Janeemo singers, rappers and dancers jumped up on the trailers, and their voices crackled through the sound system.
100 or so of us then piled onto the stage. It had been built by five of us, hard labour over the past couple of days. Wheelbarrow loads of soil, contained by blue gum logs, held in place by wooden stakes. A couple of thousand handplaced bricks made the floor. Over the stage a number of poles and split cane held a flapping green tarpaulin, peppered with holes.
Once we were sitting comfortably, the formalities began. The tarp billowed outwards ominously at the slightest gust. I had an awful vision of poles cascading on heads, logs shooting outwards and the stage collapsing. I needed a more African attitude. In the event, all was fine.
Much protocol around the lengthly speech making. Clifford, the master of ceremonies, introduced five in all. A Traditional Leader (chief of the village chiefs), The District Commissioner, The Chairman of Rab food processors, a leading forestry civil servant, then the star act, the minister himself. Formal addresses to all 'dignitaries' present by name, including the Scottish contingent. In many cases, translation from English (the main language for some reason) into Chichewa.
Speeches were very positive, old fashioned and polite. “Permit me to make a few remarks” etc. starting a 15 minute monologue. The crowd was twitching a bit by the end, but even the kids kept schtum.
Our Janeemo T-shirts almost caused a riot – over a 1000 were readily donned on the spot. We saw them the 60km length of the escarpment the next day).
Chiwkawa Civil Servants beat Blantyre women by 2-0.
The media follow up was good. Janeemo is even being considered for a radio soap now! Thousands of seeds were sold.
For our last day, Sabine, Julian and I went to Liwonde national park. Our first sight was an orange mist around the baobabs, lit by the rising sun. A great character greeted us at the park gate. My journal takes up the story: “A charming guard, with a Lee Enfield, and Pidgin English from the same era, welcomed us and completed the formalities. Forms, receipts, stamps. Meticulous. He very splendidly saluted and clicked his heels as we drove past.”
This part of the Shire valley is very flat, creating a wide floodplain, making it perfect habitat for hippos and birds. And we saw plenty. All manner of kingfishers, cranes, heron. Three types of eagle in half an hour. Crocs. The mvuus (hippos) in abundance, groaning and belching their way through the reeds. An adult grows to four and a half tonnes, and is a vicious warrior if provoked.
Hippo is tasty, mind. I know, because we ate hippo stew back at the village. Much crowding around a very pleased (enriched) guard, with the beast being chopped up with a large axe. Bits of lung and thigh were taken away in plastic bags, by old ladies. The head and hooves proudly on display. At the next market, four days later, he brought and smoked the festering remains, and sold them all.
We spent the safari day on game drives and a boat trip, and ate lunch at a rustic lodge. That evening, we sat in the treehouse and admired a perfect sunset.
So what next for Janeemo? Sabine and Julian will go back for much of September, to shoot their documentary. They will make an ‘info film’, which shows the crops, processes and products of Janeemo, organised into chapters. Secondly, they will produce a character–led documentary about Janeemo, seen through the eyes of (up to) four individuals. They will be Janeemo farmers, or young students, with a common theme or thread throughout. It will be ready in November.
Zikomo kwambiri for your attention.
Charlie