Almost as soon as we left Livingston we seemed to enter what we have called the real Africa. Western shopping centre are being replaced with markets made of pallets, nails and string with music blasting from as many speakers as the locals could get. We crossed to Malawi quickly where I was surprised that all the locals speak perfect English being a British colony and all. Other then being under a cloud of constipation caused by an overdose of Imodium for five days I really enjoyed the chance to stay within a living, working traditional Malawian village. Its amazing to see just how extravagant our lives can be with the chief of the village barely able to clothe and feed his village of 139 with 24 orphans (almost solely due to aids). This was only enhanced by a reliance on government fertilizer schemes as the nations soils have degraded after only four generations of non-nomadic farming life. Without natural resources the nation relies on 20% of the population being able to pay taxes and international aid to balance the nations budget. A very moving experience, though not all bad news, Jac is now Malawi’s third highest income generator after only an hour at the local wood market.

The last few days have been on the sores of Lake Malawi, as mass inland lake with a beautiful beach front camping ground. The camp site is popular and one of the other tour guides is slow cooking a whole pig for us tonight, its been on for nearly 6 hours and smells like heaven. I am nursing a very sore rear after I have overcome the consitpation and had a two hour horse back ride through the local villages. The highlight of the day has been a fantastic opportunity to ride bear back in the water - one of my favorite experiences thus far and not only because of the ridiculously attractive British instructor. Unfortunately today Jac’s IPOD was stolen from the campsite and we spend half the morning at the police station prior to moving to another campsite on the northern end of Lake Malawi, here we have some very dodgy internet but I am hoping to post this and survive the mosquito’s

Next stop Tanzania and hopefully post some more photos for all (sorry in advance for the pale skinned shirtless bear back horse riding photos)