Day 9 - Kande Beach (Malawi)

It's our second day here at Kande Beach and for the first time in a week I had a really good night's sleep. The cockroaches in the beach cabin were a bit scary at first, but I soon treated them as additional guests and left them to themselves, partying in the bathroom. The wind was really strong last night and at breakfast we found out that one of the tents had blown away last night - fortunately Alison wasn't in it at the time otherwise she may never have been seen again...

Our morning activity was a trip into the village to see how the locals live. I had my doubts yesterday that it was going to be a bit patronising but how wrong I was. I cannot believe that these people are living the way they are. I remember as a kid my mother telling us not to complain about food as there are people starving in Africa - she was right. Our guide, 'Banjo', took us around the village showing us how their staple food (Cassava) grows and it was an education in itself. He showed us the drying process which creates a really terrible smell, a bit like old cheese and explained how they use if for all different purposes including making bread and frying it to make chips. Banjo then took us all to his house where he lives with his family (6 of them in all) and it was no bigger than just one of the rooms in my house at home. It was tiny, dark, falling to pieces and his armchairs were in worse condition that I've seen people leaving out for the dustmen at home. It is shameful how wasteful we've become.

After his house visit, he took us to the local primary school and there were dozens of kids that came running to greet us. When you see Prince Harry on the news doing his bit in Africa, you tend to think that they're only mobbing him because he's a royal, but they do it to all visitors. It's a really welcoming but overwhelming experience. I was latched onto by a few people; two older boys called Gifty and Fred [Flinstone], plus two younger kids called Ayisa and... shamefully, I've forgotten the other one's name already... However, the school was great as when we went into one of the classrooms to observe a lesson all of the kids surrounded us and absolutely loved having their pictures taken. They then all started singing to us.

After the school, where the headteacher told us about donations and child sponsorship, etc., we were taken to the hospital. That was a real eye-opener. It was a ramshackle building that although clean by local standards, was still a miserable place that you wouldn't want to linger in. The doctor came to talk to us and she was one of the nicest, humblest people that I've ever met and she works there on her own! Incredible.

On the way back, Gifty and Fred taught me how to play Bao - a local board game made of a piece of wood with hollows cut out of it and using stones for counters. It's quite addictive! Gifty told me that he is going to school to learn how to program computers - I'm not sure how useful a skill that's going to be to him living where he does, but an education is probably the best thing that a person can have so I can't knock it.

When we got back to camp, the cynical side of people started to come out. Stories of the headteacher skimming off large percentages of the donations were circulating along with ideas of him sending off pictures of his own kids rather than the locals to 'prove' that the money was going to the right place. I don't know - as far as I'm concerned I'd rather some money got through to these kids so that they were at least given a small chance rather than no chance at all.

I must stop comparing these people's lives against our own standards - we're worlds apart.