Heading North

We left the comfort of the AOG house in Lilongwe at 5 am on Saturday to travel north to Mzuzu.  About sunrise, it got foggy, but the truck carrying our stuff couldn’t go fast anyway, so it didn’t really matter.  After a couple of stops to remove the tarp that was trying to blow off and tie everything down tightly after shifting, we drove with only on potty break to Mzuzu.  We got to town about 11:30 with no particular difficulties except a couple of semi-trucks that were across the road in the mountain area. 

 

After unloading and getting stuff into the house, the reality of being here set in.  We have rented the house for almost 2 months already in order to provide the landlord with some money to get things in order.  Unfortunately, in Malawi if you aren’t there to watch something get done, it probably won’t.  So, all the toilets leak in some fashion except one that doesn’t seem to know what flushing is supposed to do, no sink has hot water except the kitchen, the lights in two of the bedrooms and hall don’t work.  Besides that and the general mess made by painters and carpenters doing work, things were in good shape.  The Lord definitely wants to get our eyes off of the worldly needs.

 

By the middle of the week, we had found our way around town, paid for our phone hookup, got a new security service for night (one that will actually show up), and gotten most of what we needed to make things more homey.  We are all freezing, as the weather changed in concert with our move north.  Each day starts with rain showers or clouds at about 50 degrees, then transitions into sun/cloud mixture by mid afternoon and warms up to about 65.  The house stays a constant 64-68 degrees since it is all brick, including all the interior walls.  Good thing we brought some warm clothes.

 

Our purpose has already been made known to some and we have had one offer to take a child by a woman who was supposedly sick.  I’m sure there will be no shortage of occupants for the infant rooms when we get approved and are “open for business”.