Mis-information dissemination

Lilongwe has a new parliament building. Last week I asked someone what she thought of the new parliament building. And then someone else told me something else. And then, it became a thing to ask. I never expected what followed. The parliament building was built by chinese prisoners? It was a gift from the Chinese in exchange for uranium? Malawi had the building built to attract business and foreigners and is now indebted to the Chinese three times over. And the list goes on....

Everyone seems to have a different idea. Some say they used some Malawian workers, but some say they didn't. It's surprising to think that in a poor city in a poor country the Malawian government would introduce a new population strictly to build an elaborate new government building. Is there a lack of skilled workers in Malawi? Are the Chinese more in need of work? Are they more trusted to complete the job than local workers? It could be anything. I just don't understand.

A brief google search revealed the following: In support of the UN One China policy in 2007, Malawi changed its alliance from Taiwan to China (apparently there used to be a large Taiwanese population in Malawi that was suddenly replaced with a large Chinese population). Building the parliament building cost 40 million USD. The People's Republic of China funded the endeavor along with a road, future five star hotel, future national stadium and future science and technology institute. The parliament building was completed in 13 months--five months ahead of schedule. The cited motivation behind the parliament building seems a little dubious--it was explained as a gesture by China to support Malawi for their allegiance.

With such conflicting information circulating about one of the biggest, most imposing, well-known structures in Lilongwe, it becomes more clear why information dissemination is so difficult for more nuanced topics.

Fresh Start

Today was a good day. Went to my first Malawian market and made it out with my ass being grabbed only once! I'll write that off as a success. I love the markets here. It's easy to be overwhelmed by the activity and swarms of people, but there's so much color, smell and life!

I was able to get some of my work started, although much less efficiently than usual (which isn't saying much!). One of the others here is leaving in five days, so she cooked a grand feast for some of her friends and co-workers that she's met here. The food was fabulous! It was also nice for me since I was able to meet a few locals and get to know the other people who have been living here a bit more.

Inaugural visit to the UK

Inaugural visit to the UK--15 hours. Thanks to Ian and Carole, I now have a fiercely favorable impression of the UK! It all began when I told Alan that I'll have a ~15 hour layover at LHR; he informed me that his brother and wife (who didn't know me) would be happy to retrieve me from the airport and show me around. And they did.

We started with toast and coffee. I went for a nice run through Sunbury park and around the neighborhood then back along the Thames. After a refreshing shower in a closet cleverly designed by Ian, we headed to Kingston (where Ian and Alan grew up) for coffee...along the Thames an a boat! Although the day started out a bit overcast, windy and cool, the sun came out around noon and it warmed up to ~70F.

From Kingston, we backtracked to Hampton Court.

There we saw the beautiful gardens; wandered around the castle; got reprimanded by a security guard, who seemed happy to have a reason to interact with people; and admired the world's largest vine (which had already begun to fruit!) that was apparently growing when the infamous Henry VIII occupied the place.

Jeannie (their boat) provided a lovely setting for Ian and Carole's tour de la Thames...past narrow canal boats, extravagant house boats, tiny island cottages and beautiful gardens!

Common Threads: After our boat ride, Carole had me in stitches as she gave me the long and short of how random community members were united to create an embroidery display to represent their town for the year 2000. As she filled me in, it became clear that this project provided a great introduction to their tight knit community. All sorts of people, who would never normally find themselves embroidering, were engaged in this project...including a former General Secretary of the Trade Union Congress (also a member of embroidery gang); he entertained us with a story as we had tea at the Walled Garden.

Seeing Carole's embroidery project and her subsequent encounters with sundry Sudburians got me thinking about community. People in the community with very different skills collaborated on this project and once it was completed, continued give back and make their community a better place to live! How great is that? While they've chosen embroidery to sew the seeds of community, it really could be done in any medium. Anywhere.

It begged the question: why do I want to go all the way to Malawi to "do good things" when a simple, well-integrated, community based initiative could achieve the same desired effect--helping people to make a difference in their own community.

This is probably something I'll struggle with regularly during my time in Malawi, or at least I hope I will; it might look something like this (though surely not as graceful as this horse statue at the Walled Garden).

What are the benefits and limitations of public health efforts at different levels--global, community, policy, lab and individual? How do you identify the "right" level for intervention for desired outcomes? Well, maybe there isn't a "right" level. Or a "right" anything. I'd settle for figuring out which levels require intervening for each issue and which interventions are effective. For personal gratification, I clearly don't have to go further than my own community. Now...if only I could convince everyone else, in every other community to do the same!

I should have packed less

I should have packed less.

That's right. I'm going away for the summer and I have too much stuff. And of course, as my travel plans go awry all I can think about is how much crap I have to lug around and what have (temporarily) lost.

Ridiculous extras include:

1. Food: I'm bringing along a lot more food than I ought to. It sounded like a great idea once upon a time. I'll let you know if it was worth it. So far, it's saved my acidic, dehydrated stomach from getting too angry with me after sleeping through two meals on the plane.

3. Books. I'm taking a lot of books as I expect to have time to read at night when I'm too tired to work. I haven't been a good reader for awhile so one of my goals is to make this weight worth carrying.

4. An extra computer. I'm sure this is ridiculous to most of you, but in order to be productive, I'll probably need to have something to entice me into working...like watching shows while managing data. That's the theory at least. I hope it pays off!

5. A little bit of crazy--this is really weighting me down (see #2...).

Assumptions

Do you know what happens when you assume? I do. But, I'll do it anyway. Assumptions are an integral part of an epidemiologist's tool kit. As I won't strictly write about epidemiology, I'll start this blog thinking about the major assumption I made when I decided to create it...that someone will read it.

I decided to start writing because: 1) I love to write and I'm getting bad at it; 2) for my first international work experience, I'm going to Malawi and people wanted updates; 3) I'd like to be more in touch with my favorite people; and 4) I have a lot of opinions and need an outlet.

Writing for an invisible online audience requires making quite a big assumption. It feels a little indulgent too...might I actually have something to say? Will people want to read it? Will they care? I'll spare you the anticipation. Ultimately, no. There will be nothing of consequence written here...well, not on purpose! But...as all bloggers do, I'll make the assumption and proceed.