Italian Knighthood (How I spent my birthday)

A newly knighted Florisa Magambi

Since my birthday falls in July I am usually in one of my two beloved spots - Ogontz Suzuki Camp or Westport, MA - with old friends or family around. Preferring not to spend my birthday alone in Malawi, I was thrilled to receive an invitation to attend the knighting of a new friend. It was the perfect way to celebrate my birthday African style. I traveled with 3 other expats out to Dzaleka Refugee Camp where Florisa Magambi was knighted by the Italian Ambassador (who came from where he serves in neighboring Zambia). John tells me about official events that he attends so it was fun to see for myself how they run in Malawi (lots of protocol!). Fortunately, the speeches weren't too long and the event was interspersed with drumming and dancing from the Burundian dance team. The guys on the team were all born in the refugee camp.

Florisa joining in the dance

Dancer greeting the Italian Ambassador

Florisa was knighted for her work with the refugees - in particular for her work with Kibébé which is a social business providing work opportunities through artisan products. More on Dzaleka after we make another trip there to the camp and to meet the artisans tomorrow. 

One of my friends in the car checked her Facebook on our way out to the camp and discovered it was my birthday. This is the same social friend who organized a group to attend our concert in April and was John's social sponsor when he arrived. She did a great job of celebrating me on my birthday - telling everyone we saw that it was my birthday and treating me to lunch after the ceremony.

For our evening celebration John took me to a new restaurant in the neighborhood (a Mexican place with good Margaritas) where I was further celebrated when one of the waitstaff noticed my gift box and card that I had brought with me to open at dinner. They brought out a complimentary dessert with candles and sang Happy Birthday! A great way to end a great birthday!

Safari in South Luangwa with family from the US!

Okay, I have to admit that our very first safari adventure in 2012 was a bit "meh". While it was amazing to see the animals in the wild we happened to go at the end of rainy season which is not prime time for animal. Our kids were at the stage of life where driving around a game park for a couple of hours at a time was not highly energizing - especially since Abigail had just gone on a school trip to the same park a few months earlier. Over the years my experiences viewing wildlife in Africa has grown on me and so I was quite excited that we had saved our trip to South Luangwa in Zambia for the dry season and our visit from Dan and Ruth - John's brother and his wife. Having the elephants traipse through our camp one afternoon was just one of the many highlights of our adventure.

My safari in Kenya was thrilling because of the opportunities to view the cats. South Luangwa was equally exciting in that regard, plus had the beauty of the Luangwa River which made driving around the park in the best light of day a pleasure in itself.

 Our first cat highlight was seeing a leopard guarding her fresh kill in a tree:

The next morning we went back to see that she had managed to bring her two cubs back to the kill area and she was finishing up munching on the antelope - we could hear her crunching the bones and got to see a hyena come scrambling when mama dropped a morsel.

Cub in a tree.

Besides the leopard event, we had a lovely time hanging out with about 9 lions one evening at sunset. 

We saw plenty of hippos, zebras, crocodiles, antelope, cape buffalo, a wide variety of birds, etc. in addition to the cats and elephants which were all fun to see. Besides the animals, the light at dawn and dusk was just amazing in the park. So thankful for the opportunity to spend a couple of days out in nature viewing all of the amazing things in God's creation. 

Satemwa Tea Estate - a bit late!

All the way back in February I posted about our trip to Zomba but never got around to posting about our side trip to Satemwa Tea Estate where we had lunch. I love visiting the green tea estates of Africa and it is also interesting to see an example of colonial Africa preserved at the estate house. Although the house reflects a bygone era, tea is still in production on a large scale in Malawi, Kenya and Zimbabwe where John and I have visited estates and always enjoy the beautiful sea of tea plants. 

The tea plants go as far as the eye can see.

A step back in time:

Lovely spot where we had lunch.

When we were leaving we thought there had to be a shorter way to get to the road than what we had used on our arrival. So we wandered for kilometers before realizing that in fact we had come in the correct way to the estate house, several kilometers off the main road through fields of tea.