My Placement - Nkhata Bay

Today I have received my placement details from my country manager, Matt. I have been eagerly awaiting this email as it tells me where I am going, which school I am going to teach at and who I will be partnered with. So after refreshing my Hotmail about 1,000 times today the email eventually arrived.

First of all I am going to teach at the Nkhata Bay Boys Boarding School which surprisingly is in Nkhata Bay. I am over the moon with this placement as Nkhata Bay was on my shortlist of places to visit. It is located on Lake Malawi (obviously, as it has the word Bay in it)... and the pictures are stunning! Interestingly I have spent all this time trying to get away from the Isle of Wight and I have been placed right on the water again - maybe this is a sign for the future? Anyway...

According to Matt (my country manager) it has some of the brightest students in the country and as it is a boarding school I will be involved in extra curricular activities. I will live in the teachers quarters with running water and electricity. This reassures me a bit as the thought of not being able to charge up my camera really worried me! I have Wikipediaed the area and it says that they have at least one internet cafe - this means that I can update the blog and talk to my friends on Facebook now and again during my time out there.

My "partner" for the placement is a guy called Anthony who is Irish. Without saying too much about him (as he can read this as well) he seems awesome, did a degree in history and politics so I will have to gen up on my Irish politics before I go! I will now apologise to him in advance for all the annoying things that I will do in the next 6 months.

So basically I am REALLY happy with the placement, I have got a beautiful location and I have been placed with a guy with common interests. As I come to the end of this post the enormity of what I am doing has just hit me... I am going to travel 4,900 miles and attempt to teach. It's going to certainly be an experience... Thankyou Matt for the placement and of course thanks to Lattitude.

 33 days to go...

Pre Departure Meeting

So today was my pre-departure meeting in Reading. I was really looking forward to today as I was meeting my fellow volunteers for the first time. I had added a couple of them of Facebook and talked to them and they seemed great but the first meeting is always important and slightly scary as first impressions are everything. So I shaved off my terrible "beard" that I grew for No-Shave-ember and away we went to Reading.

I thought there were 6 of us going to Malawi with Lattitude however once I arrived I found out there were 25 in totally and still rising. These included 8 Brits, 11 Aussies, 2 Kiwis, 1 French, 1 Danish, 1 Irish and 1 Estonian... so a broad mix. I only met 7 other volunteers today but from what I found, they were all completely lovely and I can't wait to spend the next 6 months with them.

The pre-departure was about meeting other volunteers but also understanding more about Malawi and what the placement involved. I learned some valuable information about Malawi from returned volunteers (RV's) and also the country manager, things like... "don't trust the computers as they are full of virus's and will destroy your photos if you put your SD Card in there". The things I have been taught today are fantastic, things a guide-book won't tell you but RV's know perfectly.

I will be given my placement by the 30th November, this will mean that I will know where I will be in the country, which school and which person I will be paired with. This is obviously key as I will know my partner inside-out by the end of the 6 months and it is key that I get along with them, I am sure that I will as they were all completely lovely!!

That's about it for today, other than the fact that I thought Lattitude were incredible... they have the right balance between being professionally and being friendly. Today was brilliant (other than the traffic coming out of Reading which was a nightmare and made us miss our ferry!). There are now 43 days until I leave and I am counting down each one like a child counts-down until Christmas.

I could ramble on for hours on this post but I must keep it brief so for now I will say goodbye and I must get some sleep as it is now 2 AM!!

Over and out...