I am here! What a mission to get here. Which I knew it would be. But to give everyone an idea of the journey I took to get here:


Los Angeles –> D.C. 
4 hour flight
3 hour layover


D.C. –> Addis Baba, Ethiopia 
13 hour flight
2 hour layover 


Addis Baba –> Lilongwe, Malawi 
3 hours 25 minutes


Lots of plane rides. Long plane rides. I left Monday night at 11:30pm and arrived in Malawi on Wednesday around 1:00 in the afternoon. My first flight to D.C. was fine. There was a hot second when I got to the airport where I thought I might actually miss my flight, which was stressful for a moment. United’s new process to check in is theoretically good- You use kiosk stands and check yourself in, printing your own luggage tags and placing them on, then you stand in line to actually hand your bag to a worker, then you get to leave and head to security. I am not sure that it reduces time, so much as it increases chaos. Mobs of people, trying to run kiosks, going through a 15 question menu just to print tags. Technology is not for everyone, which causes delays. If you are flying internationally, you need an employee to come over and verify your passport before you can proceed. So there I was, impatient after this couple struggled to get through their kiosk menu and print their tags, filled out my kiosk questions, hundreds of people around, waiting for some United Airlines employee to walk over to me to verify my passport. I was convinced I was going to miss it. My first leg was domestic, so I did not think I needed to get to the airport so early. Traffic into the airport was madness, it took almost a half hour just to get to my terminal and then, this. Me standing at a kiosk, waiting for an employee at 10:35pm. Still have not given them my checked bag, still have not gone through security, flight leaves at 11:30. Eventually as I am waiting to flag down a worker, another one appears from behind and verifies everything for me. It prints all 3 of my boarding passes for the remainder of my journey and I jump in line to hand over my bag. This is the part that sucks and truly does not feel any different than just the standard check in with a ticket stand. Whatever. I wait in this long line. I hand over my bag, and by 10:56 I am headed to security. Convinced this is where I am totally going to get screwed, I walk up to security to be pleasantly surprised. There was only one person in front of me needed to get their passport checked and then it was me. I walked up to the man, who said I was lucky and had just missed the rush. I walked on through. Went through security, walked across what felt like half of the airport to my gate and by 11:09 only to find them boarding my zone and walked straight onto the plane! All I could think of was how much my Dad would have loved that timing (he hates waiting) and how stressed out my Mom would have been trying to get onto that plane. Bottom line is, I made it, and I was on my way. 


My second flight, of course the long haul, was mostly fine. The guy sitting next to me was occupying SO MUCH SPACE. Sat boldly, legs wide, elbows on both armrests spilling over into the window and aisle seats. Just occupying so much space. THEN he took his shoes off and his feet smelled SO BAD. It was awful. Half of that plane ride I slept, the other I entertained myself. I actually watched Hidden Figures for the first time which is an absolutely fabulous movie that everyone should see. I got off the plane and there was a worker asking about connections. I showed him my ticket and he looked up at me in the most heartfelt concerned way and said “You have a long day ahead of you!” I laughed said yep and moved along. 


Anyways, got to Addis Bbaba in Eithiopia. Oh my gosh, what a mess. The airport was total chaos. SO crowded with people EVERYWHERE. When I left D.C. and they had verified one of my boarding passes by re-printing a new one with more information, I assumed I would have to do the same thing in Addis Baba. I walk off the plane, start trying to figure out where my connection gate is using the screens. After a lot of walking back and forth, I decide to walk downstairs to Gates 1-6 and see what is down there. Turns out, my flight was down there and leaving out of Gate 6. I get to the gate, it is blocked off, and there is no person at the ticket counter. I have about two hours, but I don’t want to get screwed by not having the right boarding pass. I decide to go back upstairs to see if I can find anybody at a ticket counter to help me. Nope. I can’t. Because there isn’t one ANYWHERE. Walked back and forth through the entire stretch, passed every ticketing gate and nothing. The only workers were the ones at security. The airport was interesting, security fed directly into the waiting area with no real separation. Also, you could not purchase anything once you went through their security. Just gates and chairs. Security just told me (and other people) to just go to our gates and talk to our ticket person. Um. Okay. 


So that was awesome. 


I decided just to wait at my gate for a ticketing agent and hoped when they got there to board the plane, they could help me. Flight was leaving at 9:40am and boarding time was 9:05. As it got closer, the gate was still blocked off, but people had begun to swarm. I am happy I chose to wait right by the front of the blockade, it allowed me to end up now in the front of this giant mob/line. Well after 9:05 a ticketing agent appeared, but we were still blocked off. One guy, came out of the woodworks from the back, wiggled his whole way forward, crossed the barricade and walked up to the ticket lady. We could not hear what she said, but she put a whole hand up and pushed it outwards (implying he needed to go back) and I am assuming told him to go back. This guy turns around, walks back to us, gets on our side of the barricade and stands there. Everyone starts looking around with that same “Is this guy serious?” Look on their face. We were not all standing there for nothing. It was not an organized line, but those who waited their time were in the front, and those who did not were in the back. Someone spoke in the native language to the group next to me and gestured with his thumb pointing to the back. Those around who understood him, started to laugh. Including me. It was clear based upon the gesture and the tone of his voice, he was making a joke about how this guy needed to go to the back of the line. I did not need to understand his words to understand what he was saying. Eventually people started to speak up, someone tried using English, and eventually the guy got it and went to the back. 


Finally, at like 9:20 the flight attendant calls people going to Blantyre and Lilongwe to come forward. I show her my boarding pass, she lets me past the barricade. I get in a short line, show that woman my boarding pass, she scans it, I was good to go. So all of that worrying for nothing. I get on a shuttle with lots of other people. Get shuttled to my plane and get on. The woman in front of me on this flight did not care about a single thing in the world. She threw her chair back (straight into my knees) before we even took off. Flight attendants walked by and asked her FOUR times to put her seat up and she just would pretend to, then lean back on it even harder into me. So that was cool. 


Landed in Lilongwe, got off the plane and started dealing with customs. It took me over an hour to get through Malawian customs. I got handed a Visa Application form, I filled it out. After you fill out the form, you have to get in a line to get the form authorized. After the form is authorized, you have to get a different line to pay for it. After you pay for it, you have to get in another line to get a sticker/stamp for it. After t that, you get in your final line to cross into the airport. Holy Cow. LINES LINES LINES. It took forever. Everything was pretty much hand written, which made it longer. I was pretty sure my friends were just going to change their minds and go home, haha!


I got through that, walked out, got my bag, walked towards the exit only to find Holly, Meg, Mitch, and Bec standing there holding a beautiful sign welcoming me! It was so exciting. So happy to see them and be off of airplanes. Holly asks me if I can rally and I immediately tell her yes. We head to our driver, Bonaface, load up the car and head to the hotel Korea in Lilongwe. We stop there, drop my bags and the groceries they just picked up, and head out to an ATM where I pulled out some Malawian Kwatcha and headed straight to the market. Before we came, Holly had told us we could buy Chitenje (Malawian fabric) and have clothing custom made for inexpensive prices. We all sort of looked up online what styles and clothing we liked and were now on the hunt through this market, looking for patterns we liked. Markets and alleyways here in Malawi were crowded and tiny. People are selling anything you can think of. Food, fruits, fabric, sunglasses, fish, wood, everything! You could find anything you needed. We went to 3 or 4 different shops selling different types of Chitenje and picked out lots of different fabrics. We never paid more than 3.5 for 2 meters of fabric. K3,500 is about less than 5USD. After running around this market, we went to a tailor whom has made Holly clothes before and ordered our clothes! We are really excited about it! We will pick them up once we are back in July.

So, let me tell you about our friend Mitchell. Mitch is tall. Really tall. 6’10” tall. He is real tall. Malawians… not so tall. Walking around through the market today EVERYONE was starring at him. Heads turning, calling out to how tall he is, calling him tall and long. It was hilarious. One guy joked about how if they got in a fight he would have to punch upwards. I kid you not, everyone turning heads. Constantly. Poor Mitch. But it was rather entertaining. Malawi’s beer is Carlsberg beer and their slogan is “Probably the best beer in the world” I kid you not. Probably. So we keep joking that Mitch is PROBABLY the tallest man in the world. An on going joke for us all. 

After all of that it was late. We went and had dinner at a local hotel. The food that everyone eats here in Malawi for lunch and dinner is nsima (see-mah). I am not even really sure how to explain it. Like, if you mushed up rice and made it into one giant ball? You’ll have to look at the photo. It is eaten often for lunch and dinner with a variety of meats and relishes. We were told we had to try it and we did. I definitely did not mind it but I did not like the relish that was part of this particular nsima. After that, we went back to the hostel and everyone crashed. Tomorrow we are leaving at 6:00am to head to Zambia.