Yesterday was great! I left the lodge at 10:30 in order to be at the airport by 11:00. The teams flight was landing at 11:55, but I wanted to be there early so that I would be sure to see them land. I went upstairs to the balcony of the airport where I would have a good view of the plane coming in. After a coke and few minutes of conversation with a friend I happened to see there we saw the plane in the distance. There were about 200 school children at the airport on a field trip to watch the planes land. As soon as the plane was in sight the energy among the all the kids began to build. There was lots of pointing at the sky and cheers 😉 I can’t explain how excited I was knowing this group was on that plane! After the landing I waited to see the people shuttled from the runway to the building. The first shuttle emptied and no sign of them. The second shuttle came and I watched each person as they hopped off. Finally I caught sight of Lynn and began yelling “Lynn! Lynn!” Sure enough he saw me and was able to point me out to each member of the team as they got off the bus. Everyone was all smiles and Dena (of course) was catching the moment on film. I wanted to meet them in the baggage area to help with bags, and so I could hug them all sooner. Typically you are not allowed in that area unless you are a passenger or have a special permit. I wasn’t going to let that stop me though 😉 I waited outside the door and began inching closer and closer to see if could just sneak in. I ran into a man who works for the airport so I asked if I could go in. I said I had a group coming and they would need help with bags. He said it was not allowed so I must go in and ask the police officer. I went on and asked the officer….he smiled and said I must ask his boss. I found his boss and asked him. The bosses response was “wait here a minute” so I waited and then the ore officer came up and said “did you speak with him” I let him I know I was told to wait. He yelled something in Chichewa to his boss and his boss waived me through 😉 YES! I was in! I had to wait until they all cleared immigration. This took about 45 min. But at least I could see them all waiting in line and we did a lot of waiving and smiling. Once they were through one by one I told them to head for the baggage and start looking. 2 flights had landed almost side by side so there were a ton of people crowed around the one small baggage carousel. After about and hour we finally pulled the last bag (which was Hal’s). He was sorry he had held us up, but I told him it was luck of the draw and could have been anyone’s bag. No worries and we were off to the bus. The ride to the village was about a half hour. Everyone was pretty quiet just enjoying the scenery. Lots of cameras flashing and me just smiling from my seat next to the driver. I did a little explaining about certain landmarks and areas and before to long we had arrived “home” in our village. The weather was gorgeous and since it was a Sunday there were other people in the village enjoying some live music from the band and some food and drinks. We all decided to have a glass of wine or a beer and just relax for a few minutes. Friends of mine and Scott kept coming up to the table and introducing themselves and before long we had a big table full of people. The drinks were flowing and everyone was so happy just talking about how excited they were to be here. They also all commented on how incredible the village is and how amazing they knew the next 2 weeks would be. With all the wine going around Scott finally said “these must be your friends since they drink wine like you do!” My response was ” I told you my mates were coming! You should known what that meant!” A lot of laughs 😉 Everyone was tired so we had a nice dinner, chatted a bit and then all went to bed before 9. The plan this morning was to see the site where our projects will take place and then go to the permaculture center to learn about what permaculture is and how it someday will be incorporated at Adziwa. The morning started a bit slow since it was the first for all of them. I woke everyone at 6 and they began preparing for the day. With this being new to them they all scurried around trying to figure out what they would need and what they should wear. The process took a bit longer than normal, but it was ok since we were not on a tight schedule. After coffee and breakfast we finally took off for our long walk around 8. The walk took about an hour and everyone seemed to really enjoy seeing all the kids and locals in the surrounding communities. We crossed the ever popular “bridge” and of course that was exciting for everyone. Then as we approach the big hill a crowd of kids started running down it. Shei looked at me and said “why are they running? Are they running to us?” I told her yes 😉 they were running towards us. Lots of high 5’s and hellos and then we made it to Adziwa. The team was given a tour and told a bit of history about the program. We also gave a brief overview of what our goals for the next 2 weeks are. We left there around 11 and headed to the permaculture center. It took another hour to get back there and then we had a very brief tutorial from Scott about the permaculture concept. Everyone seemed to really think it was neat and made a lot of sense. After that we walked back to the village for lunch. Everyone was all a bit tired from all the walking and ready for a rest. Lunch was great and ended with an hour long language lesson from Sai. The group was excited to learn a bit of language since they had been hearing it all day 🙂 Lynn got some great video of the lesson and it ended up being really fun practicing with each other. Once that was done the official program for the day was finished and everyone was free to have some down time before dinner. I think everyone is impressed with the set up here and just so excited to get started tomorrow. If you have a friend or family member on this trip and haven’t heard from them yet please know everyone is safe, happy and accounted for! It looks like it will be a great 2 weeks and over far to quickly I’m sure 😉 hopefully more tomorrow for me to post…stay tuned and ill do my best! Erin