Research Update

Greetings from Balaka! It has now been two weeks since I left California, and while I very much miss my bay area family, it has been really nice to reconnect with all of my friends here in Balaka.

Sorry for not updating this for such a long time, but things are very busy at work these days. I have been training my team of four interviewers, and making changes to the interview guide. While I’m here, I’m working mainly on a set of in-depth interviews, which is different from a survey in that we ask open-ended questions and the respondent does most of the talking. While surveys are great for many questions, in-depth interviewers allow respondents to tell stories and speak openly about their opinions. A really great interview is a joy to read, and a batch of several interviews can tell a researcher a lot about how people think and feel about an issue, in a deeper way than even the most well-designed survey.

The open-ended nature of in-depth interviews, however, also means that it is a challenge to train interviewers. The questionnaire that we have spent the past few weeks developing is by nature just a guide, and interviewers must feel comfortable straying from the questions printed on the page in order to follow up on stories that the respondent tells. Often respondents will answer questions before they are asked, and some questions will be inappropriate for certain respondents. It is a subtle art, and very much an expression of individual personalities and styles, so a trick that works for one person will come across as forced or fake for another. Add to that the fact that both the respondents and the interviewers have a totally different cultural background than me, and the fact that I have virtually no experience managing more than one person at a time, and you can imagine how much I have learned through this process of training the interviewers.

Luckily, I inherited an amazing team; one that already had some experience with this kind of work. They have already been working as in-depth interviewers for about 5 months. So while I had to teach them about the kinds of questions I’m interested in studying, they already knew something about how to conduct interviews. So I was reinforcing what they already knew rather than starting from scratch.

We spent several days “interviewing” each other as a way to practice and tinker with the questionnaire, which turned out to be a really great way to get to know each other, since the interviews are for the most part autobiographical. Ellie came in one day and they interviewed her, since she would be an “eligible” respondent if she were Malawian. She is within the age range I am targeting and is still in school. This interview led to a very interesting conversation about how the American education system works and how it is different in Malawi.

In particular, one of the things that I have been very struck by on this trip is the fact that the high school leaving exam is the exclusive pathway into college. This exam, called the MSCE, is being held this week. In the office where I work, a total of 6 people are taking the MSCE (the secondary school leaving exam) this week. All of them have been out of secondary school for at least 5 years, all are employed as interviewers or data assistants, have worked for TLT for at least a year, and thus have more knowledge about research than many college graduates. Yet they are spending their evenings studying high school text books, subjects that they passed successfully many years ago, in order to have a chance to go to university. This seems like a terrible waste of human capital to me, and the fact that nothing else makes any difference in determining whether a person is accepted into the university (job experience, other post-secondary degrees and diplomas, perormance in class).

If you don’t do well on the exam (even one subject can disqualify you from all university programs), or if you are just not within the lucky 10% of students with high scores who are selected to go to one of the public universities, your two options for going to college are to pay a lot more money and attend one of the private universities (which are typically of lower quality) or return to secondary school and try again. Even in the middle of one’s career, if you want to get a degree, it is necessary to go back to the last year of secondary school.

the trip to Balaka

Ellie and I arrived in Lilongwe on Sunday, after a very long but uneventful flight. Ellie is working for an organization called IKI, and they had offered to come and pick us up from the airport. Unfortunately, I think both of us thought the other person had written down contact numbers for the folks at IKI. We emerged from the baggage claim through a sea of Malawians (mostly men) holding signs like WELCOME WORLD VISION TEAM! and FAITH IN FRIENDS WE ARE HEAR FOR YOU and EDITH. We looked for one that said "Ellie" or "Maggie" or "IKI," but nobody seemed to be there. Of course it would have been easy to take a cab into Lilongwe, but we weren't sure if somebody was coming and didn't want to leave somebody waiting at the airport for us. So we made our own sign, which said "IKI Ellie and Maggie" and held it up, sitting dejectedly with our pile of bags. After a few minutes, we noticed a white man starting and pointing at us. He came over and it turned out he knew IKI and put us in touch with Augustine, who is a friend of mine from 2008 when we worked together. Augustine called his friend to come and get us, and he drove us to a hotel. We stayed the night there, instead of trying to take a bus to Balaka (a 3 hour trip) since it was now getting late.

The next morning, while we were eating breakfast, Augustine showed up at our hotel. He had found a car for us, but they were searching for fuel. While fuel is always short in Malawi, recently it has been worse, and there are long lines of cars and trucks waiting for fuel. There was no diesel at any of the gas stations in Lilongwe, and he would have to find it on the black market if we were to go to Balaka. We gave him a little money (since black market fuel is much more expensive) and waited to hear back from him. About 3 hours later, he came back with the car and driver, and we piled our bags in the back and set off for Balaka.

Our driver was very nice and we chatted almost the whole time, mostly about all of the political turmoil in Malawi in recent months. People are really worried about this, everyone keeps saying that Malawi is returning to a dictatorship and it is as bad as it was in Banda’s time. The issue that he mostly talked about was what happened a few months ago when Bingu (the president) kicked out the British ambassador, who had criticized his presidency in a memo that was leaked. The British ambassador had said that Bingu was becoming increasingly autocratic, and Bingu responded by asking him to leave the country. In response, Britain kicked out the Malawian ambassador and threatened to pull all state-funded aid from the country. As Malawi’s largest donor, this was a grave threat. Already, many private donors have pulled out hteir funds, citing concerns over the ruling party. As the driver said, “even the people in the villages were shouting at Bingu for kicking out the ambassador.” He said that “Malawi has a long history of friendship with England, and it is very important for our future.”

After about an hour, we were pulled over by police, who accused us of speeding and charged the driver with a 5,000 Kwacha speading ticket (about $30). The driver was very upset, and I asked if he thought it would help if I got out of the car and talked to the cops (there were four of them). He said yes, so I got out of the car and went over to them and greeted them with my best Chichewa and my widest smile. After talking a bit about where I am from and what I am doing here in Malawi, I asked the cop who had been talking to the driver to explain what the problem was. I told him that my friend was a very good driver and I didn’t think we had been speeding, only that he had caught us as we were going down a hill. The cop replied that it is a driver’s responsibility to control the car as it goes down the hill, and I said, ok, maybe, but can we just get away with a warning, since this is the first time that he has had any problem with speeding? He replied that maybe he could just lower the fine, and he made it 3,000 kwacha (about $17).

After we went on our way again, about 20 km down the road, we encountered a speed bump that had just been installed (or so the driver said). He hadn’t noticed the signs warning us about the bump, and we were driving at least 80 km per hour, so it was quite a bump. It seemed like the car was driving ok, but a half hour later it started making a strange sound, and we pulled over. When he looked in the hood, he saw that the belt had come off due to the impact of the speed bump. He rigged a temporary fix and we set off again. Unfortunately he hadn’t closed the hood properly because about 10 minutes later the hood suddenly flew open and completely blinded the windshield. We all screamed, and the driver pulled over and thank god there was nobody on the side of the road (this is rare in Malawi, where a constant stream of people walk and ride bikes along the highways).

We made it home without further incidents, and were very happy to get out of the car, despite the great conversations we had had with the driver.

quack convention!!

So my research is going pretty well, but in the meantime there is something much more exciting to update you on. We have two total quacks, who came here independently, staying at our hotel and testing their “therapies” on Malawians.

Jim Humble came about 2 weeks ago. He is an old creepy pale man, sort of a hunchback, white hair and a scratchy voice that comes out in bursts, maybe early Parkinson's? He is in Balaka because he is promoting what he calls MMS, miracle mineral solution. It is chlorine dioxide and lemon juice and water. If you take a few drops twice a day, you will be cured. He calls himself an “inventor” and has a “clinic” in Mexico (no medical training). His cure will take care of AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, tooth abcesses. He has been testing the drug in prisons in Lilongwe, and has now moved down to Balaka to sell it at an herbal clinic.

Once one of the professors overheard him on the phone in his room saying “If the wrong people got their hands on this information we could be in trouble. Just go and take photos of all the people and we will be in the clear. Everybody still alive?” Instructions: “Take 2 drops twice a day, it will dissolve heavy metals in the body, kill the parasites. Basically flooding the body with oxygen, and oxygen oxidizes. That is what omega 3s are all about. Basically I think it is like the Japanese have booths with pure oxygen.”

So not only do we have Jim Humble, who is staying at our hotel indefinitely, but there is also a totally unrelated quack who came to the hotel tonight. Brian Kocourek- he came here to do mission work. He's an evangelical pastor, American, living in Cincinatti. He has given 140 “zappers”, to people all over the country. It is this little thing with two copper rods attached to a 9 volt battery. He showed it to us, and you put one hand on each rod. According to him, there are different “frequencies” and 365 is the frequency for AIDS ("easy to remember because that's how many days are in a year." It also cures malaria, yellow fever, jaundice. All have different frequencies. He wants to democratize the “Electronic cure” 26 patients, all were cured. Cheap technology, it works, but FDA will never buy it because it is not a drug, and FDA are attached to drugs.

His sales pitch: In Bolivia, a little girl had an infection around her mouth. Whole mouth top and bottom gums were totally cancer sores. Seen 12 doctors, all kinds of drugs. He happened to be there preaching at the church. Said why don't you take my zapper, hold it on each side of your mouth, see if the current runs through, what happens when I get back. Went into the Amazon to do some mission work, came back and she was completely cured. Left her that and some neosporin. There was a nurse, he asked her administer it to her. He is not a doctor but this thing works. Instructions: cover handles with one layer of white paper towel. Wet the towel with water. 7 min on 20 minutes off. 7 minutes on, 20 minutes off. "We do what we can. The little children are what I care about.” Cures AIDS, parasites, malaria, yellow fever, jaundice. "

what it is made of: 9 volt battery, resisters, oscillator. Copper rods. One side has an LED. Kills the viruses through frequencies. Apparently one time he burned himself by falling asleep with it on his cheek, so since then he recommends the wet paper towel.

Both were doing testing in Mexico, because they weren't allowed to do trials in the US.
He has also mentioned a cure that involves cholorine dioxide and citric acid, can make it with lemon juice. We said, there is someone here who does that. He said, who? We said, “Jim Humble.” He said “Jim Humble is here? What!???” We told him what room he is staying in and he lept out of his seat and ran to check it out. Apparently at the same time as he has been marketing his zapper, he has also been distributing the MMS of Jim Humble! Jim Humble is a hero of his, they both have their “clinics” in Mexico! A quack convention! Hallelujah!

daily routine and thoughts about stigma

Things are going well here. I have been busy doing my interviews and the internet has been really spotty, so I haven't been able to post anything, but here's a brief update.

I am really enjoying my daily routine. I walk to the research center every morning, about a 40 minute walk through town, stopping at the market on my way to get fruits and veggies and at the Superette, where a very nice man saves newspapers for me (they are hard to come by in this town). Then I work here for a few hours, mostly so far that has been perfecting my questionnaires, getting them translated into Chichewa and checking the translation, and reading some articles and things that people have thrown my way. Then I sometimes walk home or take a bike taxi home for lunch, and sometimes stay here and get a samosa or some chips and bananas as a snack. Then in the evening I have mostly been reading.

A funny thing happened last week- we went to the cobbler to have sandals made, and a friend of mine wanted to have some flip flops made with thin straps. So another friend had some thin flipflops that had a straw bottom that we brought in as an example of the type of straps we wanted. The cobbler asked us to leave them, so we did, and went to pick up the new pair of sandals, along with the older one, to find that he had painstakingly leathered over the straw flip flops! They actually look sort of cool, but definitely not what any of us expected.

Ann Swidler and Susan Watkins came yesterday, along with three new grad students and an anthropologist, Adam Ashforth. So we have doubled in size, which I'm sure will change how things feel at Catholic Women's. I'm really glad to have Ann and Susan around again- they have so many good ideas and are always willing to talk through ideas with grad students.

One interesting conversation I had recently was about stigma- the need for the concept of stigma to be reexamined. I think stigma does exist here, but not in the way that ngos speak of it. I think that in Malawi, stigma and compassion are deeply intertwined. Jenny told of a time she was riding a minibus, where everyone was chatting loudly and the bus was speeding around the potholes, and then a woman put a sick man (visibly dying of AIDS) on the bus. According to Jenny, the bus immediately became quiet and the driver drove much more slowly, as if he was carrying precious china. This is pretty similar to how I have heard people speak of AIDS, and how I have seen AIDS patients be treated. From my experience, stigma does exist, but it is not the type of heartless prejudice that would make people banish an AIDS patient. This stigma is more of a discomfort, a quiet fear, similar to what happens in America around terminally ill cancer patients. According to Erving Goffman, stigma is when people are unable to behave normally around you, roles must be shifted, behaviors no longer fit with established codes of conduct. AIDS is an ugly disease- it always kills and the misery it creates is visible on people's skin. So maybe “stigma” = “stigmata”, visible, repulsive mark. Anyway, an interesting thing to think about- whether stigma and compassion can be present at the same time.

Sunday in Liwonde

Four days in, my life in Balaka is slowly becoming routine. We work six days a week, and take off Sundays. Yesterday I traveled with one of the other grad students, Amy, to Liwonde, a town about an hour away, to have lunch at an Indian restaurant. The food was great, and the restaurant is right on the Shire River, so there are hippos slowly floating by, and tons of bougainvillea, very relaxing. It makes me uncomfortable though, because the place smacks of colonialism- fountains and a veranda and the wait staff kneels to ask you what you want, and talks very softly. It is run by Indians and owned by Chinese, like many of the businesses here.

Sundays are really nice because everybody goes to church, so as we were walking down the road to catch the minibus, we heard singing all along the way. The singing is beautiful- lots of harmonies and very different style than our church singing. I think Malawians tend to have better pitch than Americans.

I chose an excellent week to come- last week we got both hot water at the hotel and wireless internet at the office. So life here is much more comfortable than it was a week ago. It's so nice to have hot showers, it feels really decadent. The only thing is that the water sort of sprays in a very wide circle, so you can only catch a little bit of the stream, and the rest of it sprays out around you. So while the pressure is pretty good, it takes a while to wash because not much water pours out on you at once.

Food situation is quite good. We cooked yesterday and made pasta with tomato sauce and string beans, sauteed eggplant, and hummus. And today I am going to learn how to make yogurt. And we have bread delivered twice a week from a bakery, which is great on the first day and pretty good after that, except that it needs to be toasted, because no matter how many bags we tie it in it always gets tiny little red ants in it.

In terms of research, I am still waiting on finding interviewers for my adolescent girls project. I have a meeting this afternoon, and will hopefully get some names of people who applied for Jenny's project but did not quite make the cut. They had 300 people apply for 20 spots, so there were many who were high scoring but couldn't be hired. For my teacher interviews, I am meeting with people from the schools this week, hopefully. I'm itching to get started but still have quite a bit of time, so if things start off slowly its ok.

first day

I arrived in Malawi yesterday, after a relatively uneventful journey (the only excitement was that my debit card was frozen twice during my 10 hour layover in London, despite the fact that I called ahead and let them know I would be traveling out of the country, which led to two unpleasant pay phone calls with mastercard from Heathrow).

My plane landed at about 2:30, and I had planned on finding a hotel and getting a minibus the next morning to travel to Balaka, but to my surprise there was a man named Andalo holding a hilariously decorated sign that said “Hie Maggi from Balaka.” By hilariously decorated I mean with flowers and stars and squiggles. Andalo had booked me a ticket on a fancy bus that left at 5, so he took me to his house, where I met his wife and two daughters. Andalo was a funny character- he is a movie buff, and had a huge shelf of tapes and dvds, and seems to have built up his vocab from movies, which made it hard to understand him at times. He kept saying things were “just juicy lucy” (the fuel prices going down since last year) and “sugar in spice” (weather in Balaka) He also said that the living in Balaka was “a roller coaster” I'm not sure what that means- either that it is unpredictable or really exhileratingly fun...

The place we are staying is really nice- it even has roses in the front garden! And the food is pretty good- standard rice and chicken and bitter greens, but well cooked. I went to the market this morning and found both avocados and okra, so that made me happy. There are 3 other grad students here so far, and all seem nice and really have their shit together, which will be motivating for me to get mine together. One of them just arrived on Sunday and has already completed 6 interviews, and she had stomach flu for 2 days- tough to live up to.

While I don't think I'll be able to match Amy's pace, I think research wise things should be moving pretty quickly for me as well. I had a great meeting this morning with Jenny about my teacher interviews. We decided that I should focus on 2 or 3 schools, and interview teachers multiple times, to try to get them to tell me more personal or potentially sensitive details. She wants me to ask a lot of questions about the “no chibwenzi” policy, which makes it against the rules to have any sexual relationships. I find that policy really fascinating, since many of the students in secondary school are in their 20s- its hard to imagine even a middle school setting a no dating policy, but for it to extend so far into adolescence is totally unimaginable in the states. A detail that only other demographers or sociologists would find exciting- I discovered that Jenny (the woman who runs the larger survey) has compiled a household listing of the entire town of Balaka, so my interviews will be a random sample. My methods teacher from the fall would be very happy to hear that :)

In other news, things are a bit tense at the hostel, because one of the other grad students who arrived last week lost about $50, and went to the woman who is in charge of the place. She immediately fired all of the cleaners, many of whom have been good friends with the project staff for many months. Accusations go a very long way here, and people are guilty until proven innocent. It is hard to take them back or prevent them from leading to outcomes you don't intend. Jenny is trying to convince Emma, the woman who runs the hostel, to hire them back, but it does not look likely. Hopefully it will blow over soon.

Back to Malawi! Leaving day...

After weeks of running errands almost constantly, I am at the SFO airport, waiting for my first of three planes totaling more than 36 hours, and expect to arrive on site in Balaka some time on Friday afternoon (today is Tuesday). I'm hoping to have more access to internet, so please check in every once in a while for updates on research, travel, and unexpected adventures that I encounter over the next few months! I may even be able to upload some photos this summer, although that may be wishful thinking...

Quick description of what I'll be doing: I'm working for a sociologist at ASU, Jenny Trinitapoli, who is conducitng a longitudinal study of young women's transitions to adulthood. She's based in Balaka, which is in the south, not too far from the lake. I'll be helping her to conduct interviews with teachers and administrators at the schools attended by the adolescents in th study. I will also be continuing my own research from last summer, interviewing young women about their aspirations for the future, including marriage, employment, and education. This summer I'm planning to talk to both studenst and otut of school youth, to see how they differ in terms of how much control they see themselves having over their lives. I'm looking forward to being able to conduct the teacher interviews myself, as they will be comfortable in English (for the schoolgirl interviews, I had to hire Chichewa speaking interviewers, so I would wait until they were transcribed and translated before finding out what people had said, making it harder to ask follow-up questions. I'm also trying to learn some Chichewa, pangono pangono (slowly slowly). Ndi kufuna phunzira. (I want to learn).

Differences between this summer and last summer: There will be fewer Americans there this summer than last summer, but there will still be quite a smattering of professors, grad students, husbands, babies, and one high school student, Sophie, who will apparently be my assistant for the last few weeks I'm there. I'll have to figure out what to do with her... The two professors who I worked closely with last year, Susan Watkins and Ann Swidler, will be there for 4 weeks as well. They give off an electric intellectual energy, and type all day long, so I'm looking forward to getting a lot done while they are there. Balaka is a larger town than Mchinji, where I was based last year. There is internet, and even a supermarket apparently! I'm looking forward to meeting up with friends from last year while I am there, and looking forward to making several new friends! Jenny, the woman I'm working for, has young girls (a 4 year old and a 1 year old), and she has been living in Balaka for 4 months. According to the emails she sent me, she has an herb garden, and has figured out how to make yogurt, ricotta cheese, and granola. I'm looking forward to helping with the cooking and eating something other than goat and nsima this summer!


That's all for now, but I'll hopefully write more in a few days, after the long and solitary journey...