pandastan

(The following was written five days ago but the internet failed, so it is being posted late):

I returned from Lilongwe yesterday and my neighbors informed me that Kamwezi gave birth to her kittens while I was gone! There are three in the litter. My temporary names for them are "Gizmo" for the one with orange spots, because she looks like Gizmo a little, "Han" for the one that's mostly white, because he's always on his own like Han Solo, and "Rascal" for the other one, because he seems rascally. But I plan to give them away in a month or so, and I assume whoever takes them will be giving them new names.



Kamwezi decided to give birth in the neighbors' toilet room (it's not being used by them since we don't have running water - they just use a pit latrine out front. My pit latrine on the other hand is locked, because it's too close to the well to be sanitary to use. So I have to use the toilet in my house, draw buckets of water from the well and flush by pouring the bucket in the toilet tank). Their toilet room was stuffed with junk which we had to clear out to grab the animals. I set up the kittens in my own house and brought Kamwezi over to see them. At first she seemed uninterested, but as soon as she showed interest, she grabbed one in her mouth and started running around with it. I had heard stories about mother cats eating their kittens before and I started freaking out. I'm not prepared to handle that kind of trauma right now. The kitten was crying and then stopped. I was sure Kamwezi had broken its little neck and would soon be tearing it to shreds, but luckily, as it turned out, she was just trying to bring it back to the neighbors' toilet room. Somehow, she had gotten it into her head that that was where she needed to nurse them. I had to chase her over there and separate her from the kitten so I could bring it back home.
I put the frightened kitten back with its brothers and then went to go fetch Kamwezi again. This time I closed the windows and door so she couldn't escape. Again, she picked one up and tried to carry it out the window, leaping up on the table with it in her mouth. After banging her head on the closed window a few times she realized she couldn't get out. Meanwhile, she heard the other kittens crying, so she brought the one she had back and grabbed a different one. She couldn't get this one through the closed window either. Then she looked over at the other kittens again. I could almost see the gears turning in her head as she decided maybe she could just nurse them where they already were rather than move them somewhere else. She brought the kitten back and all was well.

In other news, the electrician didn't finish the job the next day as I had written before; he left for another week, saying he had forgotten a certain part. He came back at the last minute before I had to leave for Lilongwe, and it turned out that instead of just installing the missing part he also decided he needed to carve newer, even more giant holes in my walls in order to unclog the pipe that was to contain the grounding wire. Again, he made the same promise about construction workers coming to fill in the wall. As before, they haven't arrived yet. (update: in the last five days, the construction workers Did arrive, but they ran out of cement before they could finish the job. They said they'd be back in a month or so) Oh well, I just hope that now that I'm wired, the electric company won't take it's usual period of delay before hooking me up, so I can get electricity at least before I leave. Here are the pictures of the Kittens and the new holes in the wall: http://picasaweb.google.com/yenwela/Kittens#

Also, next month, my health group is putting on Camp GLOW (GLOW standing for Girls Leading Our World). It's a girl's empowerment camp that the Health sector of Peace Corps Malawi puts on every year. They have them in other Peace Corps programs too: I think the first one was started in Romania. Anyway, the coordinators are still attempting to finish raising all the money they need for the camp, so if you want to contribute, you can visit the website: campglowmalawi.com and there should be links there for you to do so. Even if there ends up being extra money left over from contributions, the run-off will go to next years' camp, so you don't need to worry about your money going to waste. For my part, I will be co-facilitating a human rights session, and I have also written a song for the girls that I plan to perform at the camp. It's a sappy "you can do it" kind of empowerment song called "This Is My Time." here's a link to it if you're interested in hearing it: http://www.ziddu.com/viewfile/10679132/RaymondThomson-2010-ThisIsMyTime.mp3.html

Until next time!