Meeting the Ambassador

We scheduled part of our visit to Lilongwe to include a time to meet The Honorable  Jeanine Jackson,  American Ambassador to Malawi .  Last spring while vacationing in NC, her husband Mark’s home place, the Ambassador read an article about our work in Malawi in a local paper. She was intrigued enough to write and ask us to visit her at her office on our next visit to Lilongwe.  She wanted to know more about our work with women in the Zomba District.

Many nationalities’ embassies are clustered in a several s sq km area of Lilongwe, and almost without exception, they are very impressive buildings.   The security of most starts with tall walls and well armed security guards.   The US embassy seemed to be the exception. We simply drove into the grounds of the US embassy. At a checkpoint about 200 meters in there was a barrier gate manned by Malawian nationals whose job was to check our IDs against a list of expected guests and to check our vehicle for explosives.

Mirrors on long poles examined beneath the engine and in the wheel wells. They examined under the hood as well as in our trunk and inside our gas cap. Once they determined that we were not terrorists, the gate was lifted and we were waved through.  Then we noticed that the security on one side of the building was not tall walls but a series of short metal poles, maybe a meter tall, and lengths of thick chain joining them.  With their backs to the embassy, a few uniformed nationals sat by the chain barrier facing a broad grassy field and beyond that traffic along a busy city street.    

We arrived early enough to go to the US Counsel’s office to officially register our long term presence in Malawi.  This registration assures us that the US embassy would contact us in the event of a national emergency or security risk. We gave them contact information for our loved ones back in the US, then we were  escorted to another checkpoint where our bags were checked and all electronic devices were registered and left at the desk. 

Once we cleared that security checkpoint, a receptionist escorted us to the Ambassador’s office. She greeted us very warmly then pulled up a chair and sat nearby. She asked about our adjustments to living in Malawi. We told her we are settling well in our house and preparing it for friends who will come and help us with our work. She asked how our work is progressing , and we were happy to tell her that we are working in two villages and in our own community in the areas of health and hygiene. We informed her that we had already met the Zomba District Commissioner and the Minister of Health and that those visits were very encouraging.  In fact, after seeing our curriculum, the Minister of Health  encouraged us to visit the Makwapala Clinic and work toward opportunities to do some training of the staff there.

We were invited to tell her about our initiatives to curb the rapid degradation of the environment, including the Changu, Changu Moto cookstoves. We informed her that once  we left Lilongwe we would travel to Nkhata Bay where we would get hands on experience building these stoves. Then she told us that the US government at this time is keenly interested in environmental issues, including alternatives to the typical method of cooking, three rocks and a pot. 

The Ambassador told us the US government is presently doing a comparative study to evaluate the fuel efficiency of several models of cookstoves. She encouraged us to get to know some of the many Peace Corps volunteers who live and work in the Zomba District who are also working on these initiatives.   It was a great first meeting, and at the conclusion, she invited us to come to the Nansasala Clinic in the Zomba District where she would be the honored guest at the dedication of the clinic on February 28. We put it on our  calendar and told her we would plan to attend. What a great honor it was to meet her and her words of encouragement were especially gratifying to us.