from the ground UP!

Life is very seasonal in Malawi. There is a time to plant, a time to harvest, a time to make bricks, and a time to build. In the dry season the activity of the village has shifted from the women's work with mats of maize kernels drying in the sun, to men busily shunting sloppy mud bricks from the swallow pool to the flat drying ground so they can bake in the sun's rays. As I gawked at this process of building a home from the ground up, I slid off my sandal, and touched the dirt beneath my feet, imagining what the mud hole would feel like as I watched Manyozo stamp in the pile, the black slush oozing between his toes. Maybe it would be like pressing on grapes? Maybe, if the whole village didn't come out to see why the white lady was so interested in this yearly ritual, I might have bared my feet and gotten dirty.

(Manyozo at work in his village)

According to Manyozo, it will take him 30,000 bricks to build the home he wants. Samson tells me that an average home takes 8,000 mud bricks. Manyozo says he can make 1,000 bricks a day, and I was inclined to believe him as I watched him race from the mud pool to the drying ground like a man on a mission.

Bricks are made by creating a mud pool, slapping a mold full of the slush , and turning it out to dry in the sun. They are then rotated and stacked to dry more, before being piled high and hardened by fire beneath the stack. Often bricks are made years before they are used, as the only cost involved is the mold, which is easily borrowed from a neighbor. Maxwell, our gardener had made a pile a bricks years ago, waiting for a chance to build his first home. We gave him an advance on this wages this year, so he could realize that dream.

(Even though iron sheets are expensive for roofing, and don't last a long time, they are still the preferred roof material)

(Maxwell's builder assembles his own scaffolding before working on the trusses)

(I think they are going to screw these nails down, but it was unclear, maybe they will stay like this)

(Windows awaiting bars)

The idea of property and home acquisition in a Malawian village differs largely from my reference points in Australia and the USA. When a man marries, he will build a home in his wife's village, very near to his Mother in Law's house. Most men will make their own bricks, and then pay a local builder to erect a structure that the owner has designed himself. Raw materials are bought from the local market and once all the windows, doors, bars, nails, iron sheets, wood and labor are tallied, a home in a village in Malawi will cost around 65,000 MK. (around $400USD) This is a big deal when unemployment is high and most people have a difficult time saving month to month, as a present need outweighs a future goal.

(Maxwell and Mwayi outside their first home)

(A 'beam' holds the wall up)

(I am hoping this is Maxwell's storage room, because it is tiny!)

(notice that mud is used to glue the bricks together, kind of haphazardly too. Maxwell says that when the builder is done, he will walk through the house and crumble off the excess)

(Maxwell's mother in law's house. complete with solar panel to run small appliances. Sweet!)

(one small solar panel can run all these appliances and a light at night)

(Maxwell's mother in law's home is outfitted nicely with a dining room table, chairs and concrete floors)

(The drying room)

(This building outside the main house contains the kitchen, bathroom, chicken coop and store house)

(This is the bathroom)

(The kitchen)

(place for storing firewood)

(Chicken coop)

While the men of the village are sweating over homemade bricks, there are men in the city who are driving home to their upper class dwellings in Malawi. Many homes in Blantyre come with granite counters, swimming pools, and large living spaces. Renting a large home in Blantyre will cost anywhere between 2,000 to 6,000USD per month. Even as I look around my own home, our new formica counters (that have already begun to chip) shine like granite when you think of having no counter at all, my cracking cement floors – like marble when compared to dirt, and my bathroom with a molded tub, missing tiles, and handle-less door – like a luxury in Morocco when compared to river rock leading to a hole in the brick work for the local “Baffa” (bathroom).

(The house of Maxwell's in laws)

Malawi is a country where poverty and wealth intermingle every day. Without strengthening the “outstretched hand” concept in Africa, and the limited opportunities for industry and work, helping to close the gap might just be a Westerner's idea to make me feel better about my life of luxury. When I ask Samson every morning, “And how is Ruth (his wife)” he replies, “She is not complaining”. And neither are the men working hard to construct a house from the earth. In fact, they are rather proud of the work they have done with their own hands, and the ability they have shown to provide for their family. And I'm proud of them too. Shoot, I wouldn't have known the first thing about building my own home. And this sure might take the edge off someday when I go to buy a house, and the kitchen counters are only formica.