Nkhata Bay

Returning to the shores of Lake Malawi in a little town called Nkhata Bay, I found no end of lizards, fishing birds, kittens and Bao Game players. Although still far fewer tourists than in a lot of other places in the world, this was the most touristic place I'd been to since leaving Zanzibar, a very popular stop off for most people traveling through Malawi.

At first I stayed in a backpackers on the shores of the lake where there was home made cake (an incredibly important thing in a country where so many things look like they should be sweet but when you eat them are extremely disappointingly not sweet at all), and then I moved to another backpackers a little further south in order to do some volunteer work, which was organised through the owners. Here there was no cake but I did have a huge mango tree growing outside my dorm and was able to witness the first mangos of the season beginning to grow.

One of the aspects of life I love here is that people have time for each other. There is always time to great the people you pass in the street, whether you know them or not. If someone needs help with something it seems help will be given without any questions asked, even if it means stopping what you're doing at the time. Family and community are important and people work together to do what they need to do.

However, for people with mental health problems or learning disabilities life can be very different. Whilst belief in religion is strong here, often so is a believe in witchcraft. Many people believe that those with mental health problems or learning disabilities have been bewitched because of something bad they have done in the past and that this is the cause of their illness or disability. There is very little support available for those who need it and people are often kept out of sight at home with little if any opportunity to participate within the community or live a fulfilling life of their choice. Alternatively people can be completely outcast and left to live on the streets, surrounded by a lack of understanding around their illness or disability and often victims of taunts and laughter.

These attitudes are slowly beginning to change. Within Malawi there are now two mental health clinics. One is government funded in the south, and the other is privately funded by Irish missionaries in a town close to Nkhata Bay. Whilst I was in Nkhata Bay I visited this clinic and was able to find out a little about the sort of work they do.

The clinic supports people with mental health issues as well as people with learning disabilities, although fortunately the two aren't thought of as one and the same. From what I saw and was told I was really impressed with the services offered.

Along side an in patients ward was a drop in centre for patients and their families, and also an outreach service. Services were free to access and I was informed that no one would be turned away. I did later meet someone who had been turned away though, so it's hard to know exactly to what extent each individual can receive support. Those who required it had access to medication and need was regularly assessed with the aim of reducing medication when need decreased, rather than using it long term regardless of changing requirements. Outreach workers met people in the community and in their homes, giving support in gaining skills needed for more independent living, ranging from every day life and relationship skills to vocational training and advocacy. After care was also offered, along with support for drug and alcohol issues. Another focus of the clinic was to provide mental health and community education - such an important area to work through if all people are to have a part to play in society and be treated equally.

Back in Nkhata bay a group for young people with learning disabilities was held once a week at the backpackers where the newly fruiting mango tree was, so I helped out a little with this. People were physically supported to get to the group if needed and once there spent time socialising, playing games, developing and learning new skills and studying similar topics to what they might study in school. This not only gave people the chance to get out of their homes but also helped them gain confidence and independence, build new friendships, and have fun.

Four mornings a week I also helped out at a local nursery school. Here 50 children all under the age of six attended and were split into two classrooms. I did not envy the two teachers who taught them! Even with myself and another volunteer it was often impossible to keep the children's attention. Things were made harder by the fact that whenever a vehicle past along the dirt track outside the school, all the children would jump up screaming and run to the windows and doors to wave. The doorways just had little gates in place of doors which proved fun for the children to swing on, and the empty spaces in the windows (there wasn't any glass) proved equally fun for the children to climb in and out of regardless of whether it was during the lesson times or the breaks.

We found that often, especially for the younger children, the material taught seemed to be at too higher level and so not of interest to the children it was aimed at - another thing which didn't help to keep the children's attention. The time everyone was the calmest was snack time. Here all the children would sit together in one of the classrooms. Before eating everyone shouted a prayer, the same one each day, at the top of their voices asking god to bless many different people in their lives, along with their food. They would then tuck into foods such as plain rice or bread or crisps, along with fizzy drinks. There was nothing that might help their concentration levels, but for their families there wasn't really any other food they had a choice of providing. Some children didn't get given any food to bring with them and for a brief moment when everyone else started eating they'd sit quietly looking rather sad, but then the others would always happily share their food with those less fortunate.

On one of the mornings the other girl volunteering and I planned a lesson. A task which at first seemed a quite daunting but actually turned out really well. We decided to teach about what plants need to grow. We looked at the cycle of a seed through to a mature plant and what it might then produce which could be eaten. Recently some ground nuts (peanuts) had been planted in the school's garden and so a few at a time we took children out to water the new shoots. This was a huge success and I very much hope that the teachers and future volunteers might continue to help the children to water so they can see the plants grow and then harvest and eat the nuts themselves.

This watering task not only helped the children learn but also helped lighten my duties, for another area I did a bit of volunteering in was gardening and it was often my duty to water the nursery's garden! Along with watering though I also planted seeds and trees, dug holes, moved stones, spread compost and potted out new plants.

My last area of volunteer work involved helping build a kitchen at the nursery school, where it was planned the children would be made porridge from in the mornings. This was pretty hard work lugging bags of bricks and sand and buckets of water around in the boiling sun. Fortunately though I was only needed to help with this for one afternoon.

When I wasn't working I spent my time relaxing by the lake, playing Bao Game, and enjoying being around friendly people and animals. I also did a couple of dives in the lake. I'd never dived in fresh water before and one enjoyable difference was that you needed far fewer weights, so when you had all the gear on it was a lot more comfortable. The dives were really pretty with all sorts of rock formations including tunnels to swim through and big walls of rock. The fish were very colourful, many shiny stripy blue colours, and there were extremely cool Mouth Breeders - I was amazed as I saw hundreds of baby fish, which together looked like they'd fill a space far bigger than the entire size of their mum, all taken up inside their mother's mouth for protection. I did a night dive here, where although we didn't see a huge variety of fish we were followed around for the entire dive by about ten or more Dolphin Fish. These were pretty ugly looking things about a metre or so long who loved the torch light and weren't at all afraid of us. Fortunately though they also weren't at all tempted to bite us.