Malawi Dictation: Hike on Mt Bunda

I woke early, and nervously picked up and dropped every piece of clothing trying to determine what's best for a hike in Malawi. My entrance into the kitchen was the catalyst for the group to load into two land rovers and set off. Ann and I rode with two English men in their 30s. After some banter-talk between them they turned on some melodic indy-pop and talked about The Shins briefly, before letting the soft pleasant cotton candy sounds of the male vocals usurp all as the common soundtrack. I stared out the window exclusively, watching Malawians walk down the thin orange dust streets right next to us. I saw they wore beautiful bolts of fabric or old thin jeans. I saw them sitting in front of flat billboarded storefronts, and tried to guess what was sold inside. I saw them leading bicycles through the dust, with large towers of firewood built on the platform above the back wheel like towering sandcastles that are born to crumble. I stare out the window as this footage rolls by, and the glass separates me from this place as effectively as the glass of a TV screen. The whole way to Mt. Bunda I watch this movie, and think again and again how the indy-pop soundtrack really belongs to another film.

We pull into a small group of houses, and park in someones yard. Children pour out from all directions. I look at the palm roofs and dirt bricks that are the same color as the dust we've been driving over; metal cans bursting with pretty succulent plants hang from the eaves. We stand next to the land rovers in our outdoor gear or button-up shirts, coating ourselves with sunscreen, adjusting gleaming sunglasses, loading snacks into backpacks. Twenty children in dust covered dresses, oversized shirts, and one-strapped overalls surround us, staring honestly.

One in our group draws her camera from its holster and the kids immediately grin and prepare their best karate moves for 5, 10, 15 pictures, all jostling together for prime positions. They wobble, they topple from trying to hold these precarious poses--but they do it laughing.

Chickens scatter out of our way as we head for the foot of the mountain. We walk through tufts of dry grass struggling to put down roots over granite rubble, until we reach smooth slides of vertical granite that lead us skyward. Black, aged white and pink are the colors that ribbon through the stone. The sun picks out new threads of glitter as the movement of my steps works my body higher.

Halfway up there is a group wearing while sheets that fill in the breeze. They're making a music video of religious songs. A woman in light green satiny skirts and beads across her forehead sits against the granite mountain, waving a feathery wand and singing beautifully through a wide grin, closing her eyes in bliss, gesturing with her feathery baton to the blue sky, the mountain, the flat wide land below us. Her high sweet voice sings "We worship you...We love you lord..." to the background music. Soon her "angels" in white sheets join her for another number. It is so quiet, there is only the sound of the air and the music. They want a picture with us, and I am in awe of the feeling of the crisp white sheet warm with sun that I feel on my sweaty skin as one of the angels hugs me for the picture, turning into my face saying, "My friend! You are my friend!" as if nothing is funnier or happier than that.