Living Conditions
Grace and her family live in a burnt brick home with a tin roof and concrete floor which is a step up from many of the mud huts with thatched roofs. The entire one-room house was approximately 10' x 16'. The whole family sleeps in there. They had divided up the room into three sections. One side had a mattress for Grace and her girls. The middle section was where they had me eat my meals. And the last section had a bed in it for me. They'd used sheets and chitenges to make curtains for privacy in each of those areas of the house. At night when it rained, we could hear the raindrops on the tin roof. Often as we were getting ready for bed, the girls and their mom would sing (in beautiful harmony) or tell jokes and stories. It was a lot of fun just to listen to them.
They did all of their cooking outside on wood and charcoal burning fires. I was amazed at what Grace and her daughters could cook on those fires! Absolutely delicious foods. The primary staple is nshima which is a very thick corn meal paste and is very filling. In addition to that Grace made a relish with every meal. It is what we could consider the main meal. She made a great variety of relishes while I was there including pumpkin leaves with powdered peanuts, beef with tomatoes and onions, as well as other local greens. They were always finely chopped and cooked with a lovely blend of spices. We would take the nshima in our hands and use it to scoop up some of the relish. Yummy! In honor of my visit, they killed and cooked one of their chickens on my first night. This is something they would do for every long term visitor.