Latest News............that was almost a month ago...........network's been down, down, down!!!!

 4th May: I have been struggling with a very poor signal so access to the internet has been practically non existent.  I have a Wifi dongle and it is slower than the 14kbps dial up!  Try to open a website...........go make some tea, maybe when I come back it will have loaded..........no , not yet, OK..........check what the garden boy is doing.............loaded now?  Oh no 'cannot display the web page' and that has been the situation for almost two weeks.  How am I managing to get on today, well just bought a Wifi card from a different ISP and bingo...........I'm online.  My first task was to get to my online banking to transfer my monthly funds for my living expenses out here and all was going well until I hit the 'submit' button.......,.slow down, melt down then a message from the bank ' sorry we are experiencing some problems, please try again later'...............does somebody up there not like me or what...................aaaarghhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Anyway that's all part of life out here so down to business which again has been slow and problematic but we are overcoming the difficulties..........an old 60's song comes to mind (for those of you old enough to remember - 'we shall overcome')  yes a sense of humour is essential.  See below:

17th March: How time flys when you're busy, or having fun - I've just realised the last post was on 20th February so what have I been doing with my time?  Well........we had deadlines to meet for project proposals and we were working flat out but sadly we were not successful with either the Scottish Government call for proposals or with Fondation Ensemble but we remain optimistic and we keep plodding on.

Progress at the site has been slow, marred by the rain and, would you believe, strikes by the labourers!  Yes, it happens here in Malawi too.  Thankfully the problem is NOT with Chesney Trust it is a problem for the contractor and his employees but nonetheless it has a knock on effect and as a result the construction has slowed down.  Our consultant has called for a site meeting with the contractor to resolve the difficulties and this will take place next week.  Hopefully the outcome will be satisfactory and work will begin again.

The photos taken on site yesterday show the progress to date although we had expected the classroom blocks to be completed by now.

4th May: The consultant who is looking after the project  called a site meeting and the contractor has been told in no uncertain terms to 'get his act together' and  the classrooms have to be completed by the end of June  and the staff house by the end of July.  So hopefully............

Now the battle to upload the photos begins.............

Well, that wasn't so bad...................we are getting there with construction.  What I can say is that a very high profile lady's ground breaking ceremony was a week after ours and the following photo was taken last week..............so some comfort knowing that despite having mega bucks, this is still Malawi and it will be done in Malawi time!!