Had my first taste of real local cuisine today, the Silver Spoon right in the market. Chicken, beans, chinese (like bitter spinach), and rice, heaped on to a mammoth plate for a mere 200 MK. I must concede that the chicken was below my current threshold, luke-warm and tough as a combat boot. I stuck close to the rice and beans. However, I still lack an experience with nsima, so I am still unqualified as a Malawian gourmand. Afterwards we met up with Idah and her nine year old companion, Prosperina, the daughter of Ben's Chichewa teacher from Peace Corps. The four of us went to the US Embassy to pick up Idah's passport and visa. I finally got my first mini-bus experience. A bit anti-climactic, but everything I had been expecting shy of a breakdown. Prosperina and I sat in the waiting area of the Embassy, and, well, waited. To pass time, I convinced her to sing me some of her favorite songs. I cracked myself up asking a very familiar face at THE US EMBASSY if he had been our driver from the airport! Getting back from the Embassy got a little tense. Trying to catch a mini-bus to send a 15 year old and a 9 year old home before the sun went down, and then getting Katie and myself home under the same benchmark. It is winter here, so the days are short, the sun sets at 5:30, and just plunges straight out of the sky, abruptly cleaving the head of day from the body of night. Everything worked out, but I was in no mood to embrace the total anarchy of transportation here with two kids at risk. But all is well. Tomorrow Katie, Idah, and I head South to Mulanje.
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