Morning lift
In the weeks before Kay started school, Anne used to get a lift to work from Roy in the Nursing school truck. She still gets a lift home sometimes, up the rocky track. As we are at a dead end, he comes into our yard to turn. This shows the lovely hills, over the top of which is Malawi, to the North, strangely enough.

Kay debut at school
Kay starts off on her first day at school. She is wearing the Muslim safe school uniform which we had made for her for £11.00. It is very hot, but she has grown to like it. Curiously she has two casual days a week, but still must keep her legs covered. She is the only white kid in 150 students and gets off with a lot, but has never encountered any hostility.

Flatpack hero
When we arrived the house, in addition to being bug ridden, was largely unfurnished, but with several flatpacks. I diverted myself by applying long dormant flatpacking skills, though without the benefit of proper tools. God bless the Swiss army and their knives. I have lost a few lbs from this Chirstmas corpulence. But only a few.

We celebrate the table being built
Anne and I click Mosis in celebration of the completion of the table and chairs. Though we have a lounge, the table serves many functions: meals, study desk and card table. Sharp eyed readers will have noticed our patriotic centrepiece.

Mango picking
The girls hide from the sun as they pick mangos from our own garden. The season is a short one, and they are now done. However, we have lemons (green), oranges(green), pawpaw, guava, avocado and some other varieties our watchman doesn't know the name of, to look forward to.

Spivved up to meet the VIPs
Here we are, with Emily, Anne's colleague, dressed up to go to a meeting with the junior minister for foreign develeopment. A good night in that we met a lot of UK VSO expats, but had to listen to a lot of Tory doubletalk to earn our samosas. Chipata by night looks lovely, doesn't it?

Chipata Golf Club
I was told this was one of the oldest golf clubs in Zambia, if not the whole continent. "The St. Andrews of Africa" was how the club president described it. Kay had a lesson one Sunday morning, but not sure about joining. The clubhouse is very clean and cool, but not sure if we can justify a family membership. And like most golf clubs, the main sport is drinking.

The girls unpacking
Once we got the house cleaned up and sorted, then the unpacking began. We are stillliving out of suitcases, as there are no cupboards. You will notice the tiled floor, throughout the house, the plaster walls and the girly pink mozzy nets. They could have had a room each, but decided to share, even though they are both big and strong and not scared of spiders.

At N'Chwala Festival
The girls meet with the Ngoni warriors, this offshoot of the Zulu tribe, put old greivances behind them to make us most welcome at what is called by some the best festival in Zambia. Full of brass including the President himself, but not much dancing. Didn't hang about to see the cow being slaughtered.

Nothing on the telly
There is only one free channel in Zambia, which broadcasts state and poilticial news only. However, if you had told Anne a year ago that she would be spending many happy moments watching a troupe of ants, anthandling a dead moth along the tiles floor, she would have called you barmy.

Outside Steve's Restaurant
As we work so hard, and don't usually go out in the evenings, we cut a bit loose on Sundays. We try to get a swim and a late lunch somwhere - food is served all day - and back home before the bugging hour. We had just been to our pal Steve's taverna for Nachos and Pizza and white wine with ice. It is a lovely spot too, and worth stopping at next time you are in Chipata. We will be again.

Lift to Church
When we were invited to church, we got offered a lift from the foot of the hill. Little did we know it was going to be in the back of a pickup truck! By way of compensation, we got a lift home from the minister, in his 4x4, which was the poshest and cleanest we have been in since we arrived.

Computers by candlelight
When it deluges, as it does at least once a day in the rainy season, we usually get the electricity - quite often called ZESCO after the suppliers - flickering a bit. We haven't had many full outages of late though, but Friday night was an exception. We started the DVD three times then gave up, pottered on the laptops for a while then had an early night, once the batteries ran out.

The Day of the Locust
Wisdom proudly displays his new catch - a locust in all its biblical glory. It fluttered about trying to fly, displaying amazing red underwings, but could not, at least until the day warmed up, apprently. I don't know how many constitute a plague, but we were glad this chap arrived, and left alone.

Leaf cricket (sic)
This was on the outside of the bedroom window looking in. About 3 ins long, and look at the variegations on the wings. If you are going to go down the camouflage route there is no point in half measures.