A tall palm tree we can see every morning when we take a walk.

It looks beautiful.   It's almost too beautiful and too perfect.

I believed it's a well grown palm tree but it wasn't.

It is a cell phone tower made of a fake palm tree.   Well done Malawi!

Morning Dew

This is the dew which gave me the idea of my blog title.  

"ASATSUYU" in Japanese.

   

EDAMAME

Do you know “EDAMAME”? Did you know that Edamame is young Soybean? In other words Edamame is immature soy bean. To my surprise, not many countries eat soy bean as Edamame. If you live in America, you probably tried it at Sushi restaurant. They serve Edamame as one of the appetisers. Some people just buy Edamame to go at sushi bar or you can buy frozen one at store.
Edamame is a very popular food in Japan. We, Japanese love to eat Edamame with beer. That is the best combination for hot summer. I remember that my mom bought back a Edamame branch from a store and I helped to pick the pods when I was a small girl. She just boiled them quickly and put some salt on them. The picture of Edamame in a colander with steam makes me feel nostalgic.
Now I am in Malawi, my scientist husband who loves Edamame has a passionate idea to introduce Edamame to Malawi. Good new is Malawi grow soy bean already and we can buy dried soy beans at stores.
Have you ever concerned how much energy you need to cook your dinner tonight? To cook Thanksgiving turkey, probably need 5 hours oven energy. NO! NO! NO! In this country people use wood or charcoal for cooking and cooking time is very serious. I can see women carrying a enormous tree root which is just digged out from the ground put it on the head and bring it home. If I do that, I would not cook a turkey but a ear of corn.
Edamame could be a good food for Malawi people especially kids because lots of nutrition, quick cooking, everybody loves. Elementary school kids bring farming tools to school because the school has a garden and students grow veggies. Preschools (Child Centers) have gardens too. They grow corn, tomatoes, peanuts but time to time they are short of food. Jim’s idea is Edamame could be a supplementary food for schools and families.
I went to a sewing class yesterday and my teach (Japanese) asked us, “Anybody want to buy Edamame?” It made me surprised. She has already tried to grow them at her garden. Wow! They grow well! She says that they can pick them in 4 months and could be 4 times crops a year. That is a good news. She already proved it. She taught her house keeper how to grow Edamame and helps him to make extra money. It is a wonderful idea!
Some people are skeptical about Jim’s idea. But when corn was introduced into this country from America, who expected that this vegetable would be a main food for Malawian in the decades later.
Someone needs to try a new thing!

Peanuts Seller

We saw a guy selling peanuts on the street. It was around 7 am. I was pretty sure his spot was a good place for his business because near a mini bus station ( a station but there was nothing). Many people were getting in and out of the buses. This was a typical African rush hour. Jim and I were taking a morning walk at Blantyre that morning and pushed our way through the crowd.

I was staring at his table made of a stone unconsciously because of the simplicity. There were 6 bags neatly piled up 3 bags each. I could guess probably there were 20~30 peanuts in each bag.
When we returned, we decided to buy his peanuts. It was 10 kwacha per bag. That equals to $0.07/ bag. There were 6 bags on his table. I was thinking how many bags he could sell. Maybe he hid 100 more bags somewhere we could not see or he just had 6 bags only (I hope not). This is life in Malawi.

Chameleons!

I don’t like reptiles. But! I pet Chameleons.
We can find them easily in this country. I can say that I almost like Chameleon now!
Look! He is on my hand!

Child Care Centers

I am back! We kept using internet at home and we used up all credit. It just likes phone cards.

We visited a local NGO named “Save Orphans Ministries" last week. Their office is located in a suburbs of Ncheu 2.5 hours drive form our place. We left home at 7 am. This NGO is taking care of local child care centers. The staff took us to 3 local feeding centers that day. We visited several centers before but most of the time the kids went home. The early bird was fully rewarded to see the children this time.
The centers are taking care of pre-school age children include orphans and kids HIV positive. My husband askes this question every visit, “How many orphans come in this center?” It made me surprised that the leader repeated that question directly to the kids in a local language. I didn’t know how he asked the kids but one boy stood up among the 60 kids. I understood he is the orphan. It was too pitiful for me to see. The leader told us there were more orphans in the group but I think they hesitated to tell us or they did not understand the question or they call their foster parent a (biological) parent. A good thing is orphans are taking care of locally. It means if the both parent past away, normally someone in the relative takes care of the child. The children come to the child center every day and eat, play, and learn. Even the family can not feed the kids enough, at least they can eat food at the center.
It was a feeding time! We observed how they eat food. The volunteer people prepared porridge on plates which has 2 spoons. The plates were served on the floor directly. Which is pretty normal and the kids came into the room and sat down. Now I understood why one plate had 2 spoons because 2 kids share one plate. I asked if the porridge contains some sugar. Yes, it does. The child slowly moved spoon to the mouth.
This day’s visits reminded me of my brother’s school. My brother and his wife run a preschool in Japan. The kids are exactly same ages. Here Malawi, the volunteer teachers, one center we visited just have 2 teachers take care of 80 kids and they showed me the teaching materials. I know both countries kids doing same things; learning numbers and alphabets. Nothing wrong with both places but they are the exact opposite. I saw a puzzle made of old card board cut in 3 peaces. All other materials were made of recycled staffs such as plastic bottles, potato sacks, rocks. etc. Wow! all staffs they use normally I throw away.........

“Life is not fair,” of course! But this was not my conclusion of that day.
Seeing children in a opposite situation aroused mixed feelings in me.

We can use internet at home but of course it is not free.   We need to buy credit just like a telephone cards.    If we use it too much, our credit is over.

We were supposed use this credit for  a couple of months but we used up already.  

Now we are in a hotel lobby near our place.   We logged in

Bare foot kids I met

Jim and I visited a community based child care center with a guy works for Women and Child development ministry.   It locates only 20 k from Lilongwe downtown but we drove on the bumpy condition roads.   The both sides of the road were maize (corn) field which almost have harvest time.

We saw an article that Lilongwe city forbids sales of green maize (corn).   This rule is to prevent people stealing maize.

As recently as yesterday, people could pick young corns from the field easily and sold them on the road but we don't see them any more.   I mean we can see them but no more maize sales. 

The center is operated by mostly volunteer people and take care of small village children.  They had a special meeting that day which local centers' leaders got together.  They welcomed us nicely and took us a tour.    They have chickens for eggs, cows for milk and they have new shower rooms which just finishing construction.  The one of the leaders said, " These toilets are probably the best toilets in this area.  People don't have a toilet but they use a pit toilet or go to bush."   These flush toilets are innovative things for them.   

We had a meeting with the leaders and the kids all together.   First we asked the leaders about the current problems they are facing at their each center.   They told us a bunch of problems.   They don't have transportation when someone need to urgent medical care, they don't have enough food and blanketsfor children, people who taking care of orphans are too poor to feed them, there are discrimination against HIV positive kids, etc.

Next we asked the kids about their own problems.   They are about 1~10 years old and little shy but one by one raised their hands and hesitated a little but I felt that they wanted to tell us something.   One boy said, "Sometimes we don't have food."  The other boy said, "We don't have shoes, that's why bare foot."    Scarcely they finished their words, the others bursted into a laugh.   You know, their laugh saved my heart.  The admirable children siting bare foot in front of me, they were telling us their critical problems with big laugh.   

We told them that we could not promise to make changes by tomorrow but we would work on and come back here.  We donated some vita-meals for them.   The leader told us that it was a perfect timing because they just run out the food.  

I can't forget these bare foot kids with big smiles.   The kids, they probably could not help laughing because of their circumstances.   

What can I  do for them?  

That is a big question for me.   

I wanted to write down my feeling today..........

We bought a Jackfruit -the largest tree born fruit in the world

From Wikipedia:

The jackfruit (Artocarpus heterophyllus) is a species of tree of the mulberry family (Moracease) native to parts of South and Southeast Asia.  It is well suited to tropical lowlands.  Its fruit is the largest tree borne fruit in the world,  seldom less than about 25 cm (10 in) in diameter.  Even a relatively thin tree, around 10 cm (4 in) diameter, can bear large fruit.  The fruit can reach 36 kg (80 lbs) in weigh and up to 90 cm (36 in) long and 50 cm (20 in) in diameter.

The jackfruit is something of an acquired taste, but it is very popular in many parts of the world.  The sweet yellow sheaths around the seeds are about 3-5 mm thick and have a taste similar to that of pineapple, but milder and less juicy.

Jim and I went to Blantyre this week and we found this fruit on the road.  We paid 300 MK (about$2) for one.   It tastes very sweet.  The texture is different.   Feel like eating custard but smells different.   It is very gooey and like latex which does not come off even we wash. 

A Hamburger Monster

Wow!   Tomo made a monster hamburger!   

And it created a monster.

I will accept your comments.........here.

tomo

Hi, Grandma......(A desperate house wife)

Normally I don't wear an apron when I cook, but I feel like enjoying a house wife today, I decided put it on.

Jim came home and looked at me "Hi, Grandma," he said.

Obviously my apron figure does not attract him.

"You look pretty, Babe!" when I wore the exact same apron in Chad, he said that.

I concluded that it is a same thing I thought Mangos were the best food in the world when I lived in Chad but I don't buy it or don't even pay attention to it in Malawi.

I think Jim was stressed to the max and there was no amusement in Chad.    Even my apron figure looked pretty for him that time.

Well, to win his attention in this country I need to wear a mini skirt and a pair of fishnet stockings in the kitchen..........?

New life for old vehicles

Have you ever imagined second life of your previous vehicles you owned?    Maybe your cars were sold to the next person or dealers and had another life for several years and.........ended up  your cars,  your pickup trucks were scrapped?

NOPE!

I could say Africa is a retirement place for the old vehicles you gave up but this is not a  good expression.   I should say Africa is the second stage for the old vehicles before their real retirement.   

I am surprised so many Japanese buses, trucks, even ambulances are running desperately in this country.   Every time I see them, I can imagine their previous life in Japan. 

This ambulance had been running with sirens through the heavy traffic in order to save lives.    This small bus had been carrying preschool children before it came here.   That bus had been taking care of retired seniors.............etc.

  

It looks funny because they don't erase the Japanese letters on the vehicles because the erasing activity

costs too much.

People just drive them with the previous commercial signs.

I saw a kindergarten pickup bus is carrying local people (adults). They are sitting properly and the out side of the bus says 

'preschool children only.'

Who cares? But this is the moment I can giggle by myself.

Someday I may see my brother's school's buses running in this town.

　

 

UDON Noodle in Malawi

I found Japanese UDON noodle at a store which South African people own.   They have nice imported food.   I was looking for sesami oil in this town and finally found it in this store.   They have Miso and Soy Source (Kikkoman), too.   The noodle on their shelf looks little sad.  It is not dried noodle but vacuumed pack.   I was thinking how many people buy this staff.  The package looks weird because instruction written by Chinese but some others were English.   Wait!   This noodle made in Japan.   Wow, it came form Chiba prefecture.   It came such a long way.  I assume it was　exported to China first then Chinese company exported to Africa.  

Now it is in front of me who came form California.   

OK!  I should give a try because both of us (Udon noodle and me) are originally from Japan and now run into each other in Lilongwe.  

I had bad Udon noodle experience which I bought it in CA but could not eat it because it broke into small pieces.   That noodle came form Japan.   I do not expect high quality noodle in Africa.   That's OK.  I don't blame it.   

 I cooked ground beef with ginger, soy source, sugar, and I made " AN KAKE UDON."  The noodle was excellent!   I am proud of it!   I will keep buying this noodle!!!   I love it!

Jim said, "This is the best Udon Noolde in town!"  Thank you!   I take it.

 

Japanese N

Looooook! I am OK!

I made it!  He is on my hand!

"GECKO!   I won't bite you.   Promise! "

Here is a giant Moss.    This is Jim's hand.  I am still afraid of touching them.  

Where is Japan?

FeDex called me!

"You got a package!"    Wow!  It was fast.   My sister in law sent me a document package on 2/12 then arrived in Lilongwe on 15 th.    Good Job FeDex!

The next morning I walked down to the FeDex office where located 15 minutes walking distance from my place.  I got it and I could open it immediately at the FeDex office but I decided 'I dare not open it.'  I was holding it and went back to my place quickly.   I prayed!  Please do not make me disappointed.  It was a pamphlet I designed at Japan for my family's school.   

When my husband and I were in CA last October, my husband got a short term contract in Ethiopia.  I decided not to go along with him instead I visited my family in Japan.   My sister in law excited to have me because they were just thinking to order a new pamphlet for 2009 for the pre-school they run.  I was there for 3 weeks and she asked me to design it.   

"My laptop was too small and I did not design last 8 years........ "  I was looking for some excuses but my sister quickly bought a brand new big screen desktop for this project.  Wow!  No more excuse.  Just do it!

 I needed some time to catch up 8 years blank.    Well, at last I'd got going.  I worked day and night desperately! 

 In compensation for tons of papers and color toners, I finally finished 8 pages design.  I did my best.   Can't be better!  This is it!   Next day I had to leave Japan for CA.

I left my work with my sister in law.   She needed to work with a printing company for the final proof reading and picture edit etc.  

When I arrived in Malawi, She e-mailed me that it came out beautifully. 

But still I could not believe it until I looked at one by myself.  

WOW!   This is it!  I was so happy about the final professional print.   I was not disappointed at all.

I remember that 7:00 pm at the night before leaving Japan, I was till struggling with the small details on the pages in their office.  I had to save the files.

Finally I finished!   I screamed and showed the final printout to the staff working in the office.       

One lady said, "Tomoko-san, there is no Japan island of this world map."  

"WHAT!!!!!!!!!!"   NO WAY!!!!!!!   I used a world map which I downloaded from a web on the first page of the pamphlet.    She was right.  Japan was missing!   Who made this stupid map?  Damn it!  (Who chose this map? Me....)

I was shocked but I did not have time to fix it.  My family was waiting for me at the restaurant.   I gave up.....

My sister in law who is the principal of this pre-school said, "That is OK!   If someone found there is no Japan on this map, I would say 'Good Job! give you one point.' " 

The entrance exam of this school is already started. 

So, my beautiful pamphlet has a world map has no Japan islands.  

Graphic Design

I got an phone cal

日本の夏を思う・・・・

なんで タイトルが　African Morning Dew　なのかここらで説明しましょう！　

アフリカの朝は早いです！　チャディアンは朝４時には起きてた。　朝５時には子ども達が外で遊ぶ声が聞こえる・・・。　

ここマラウイでは朝６時には通勤ラッシュ。　朝によわ〜〜い私をつつくようにして散歩に連れ出す主人。６時半、ヒンヤリとした朝の空気が気持ちいい。　遠くの山々には霞がかかってる。　

私たちが歩くコースはフラットの周り。　舗装されてない道。　道の周りにはトウモロコシ畑が続く。　朝露に濡れてるんだよ、草が。　朝日をあびて雫が光ってる！　芝は露に濡れて白く見える。　

チャドではありえなかったね〜。　砂漠だからね・・・。　

道ばたに咲く小さな花に思わず足を止める私。　青いのは露草、赤いのは白粉花。　ホウセンカも咲いてるよ。　どれもみな、子どもの頃の思い出が一杯つまった草花だ。　子どもの頃の自分がフラッシュバックとなって頭をよぎる。　オシロイバナの花弁の蜜の味、ホウセンカがはじける時の指の感触・・・。　主人には説明できないな、この気持ち。　

勝手に自分でこの花達は日本を代表する日本だけの草花。　そう思い込んでたよ。　違うんだね。　アフリカに露草、アフリカに白粉花、アフリカにホウセンカ。　咲いてるんだよ。　

夕暮れ時には童謡　”赤とんぼ”　を口ずさみながら、この詩はね、１５歳でお姉ちゃんが嫁にいっちゃうんだよ・・・・なんだか哀しい詩なんだ・・・主人に説明しながら歩く私・・・・・。　（ここマラウイでもマラウイアンの着メロに”赤とんぼ”　があるんです、不思議だ！）

ゆうやーけこやけ〜〜のあかとんぼ〜

おわれ〜て見たの〜は、いつの〜〜日〜〜か〜〜

この”おわれ〜〜て”　ってところはね、”追っかけられて”　じゃなくて、お姉さんの背中に”背負われて”っていみなんだよ〜。　ね〜〜聞いてるジムさん？

　　

Geckos in my house

I grew up at Tokyo. I did not see any Geckos in my house. I found several lizards in my yard when I was small girl. I was really afraid of them. I could not go out if they were on the wall.

You know, people can practice, study and finally step up. I did it in Chad. Chad was the best place to get used to lizards. Indoor lizards, outdoor lizards, fat ones, colorful ones which were doing push up under the sun.

NOW, I AM TOTALLY OK WITH LIZARDS! I can share my room with them!

I found 3 of them last night. They are 1~3 inches. I hope they eat a lots of bugs in my house.

Go, Go, Geckos!

Destroyed their favorite snack.....

In contrast with my hope they (I mean flying termites) were still on our balcony next morning. I knew it because they got wet and could not fly.........Damn!

Lucky me! It was a first day we got a housekeeper working for us! Here she came!

I showed her the balcony. She said she's never seen these many termites in her

life. Me neither!

I asked her some laundry but she needed to clean up the balcony first because that was the only place we can hung our laundry. I gave her tools and let her go to the balcony and closed the door. Thank you, Edith!

But she called me, "TOMO! LOOK!" (I did not want to see them actually.....) Oh, My God! There are huge piles of termites beside the window wall. I grabbed my camera.

She sprayed on them and started sweeping up the bugs. She dumped them into a bucket quickly.

She took the bucket outside to dump. Curious neighbors' housekeepers

came to see our new housekeeper. What's going on? They looked into our bucket which was full with the bugs. One lady who works for next building scooped the bugs with her hand and said, "WOW! there are so many! These are very good to eat! " But next moment, they were so disappointed to hear that my housekeeper sprayed on them. "I am so sorry we did it." I apologized. "Oh No, we could eat them." "I am sorry we won't do it again, I will call you next time before we spray."

Feel guilty because looks like I buggered up their favorite snack. I know I would upset if somebody pesticide onto my favorite rice crackers. NO! Don't do that!

By the way, what is the best way to eat them?