One convention, one report, and two retreats

So, I've been absent for a little while... but I do have a really good excuse - I've been busy!

A convention...
At the end of May we had over a hundred and fifty agrodealers in town for a two day conference. They came from all over Malawi (ok Malawi really isn't that big, but still) and attended all sort of workshops. We had speakers from business, banks, universities, a government secretary, and other big wigs. We had a reception (with some dancing - my first dancing in Malawi - yay!), we had an award ceremony, and we had lots of food. I think everyone had a good time, both agrodealers and CNFA staff. I was one of two people heading up planning of the convention, so by the end of things I was pretty exhausted (but happy).

A retreat...
Right after the end of the convention I headed to Senga Bay for an EWB convention. It was fun and work combined in almost equal proportion. The work was pretty easy though, the people were fabulous (20 of us from all over Malawi and Zambia), the sessions were outside in the sunshine (a good number of them were on the beach), and monkeys came to observe how we were getting along. The food was pretty spectacular. We hosted a bake off that featured pizza, carrot cake, and a mexican dinner with fresh guacamole. Mmmm....

A report...
It's semi-annual reporting time at CNFA. This means that we in the monitoring and evaluation team have been putting all of our energies into a long report that will make its way to our donor AGRA (Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa), which receives most of its funding from Mr. Bill Gates. Reporting is a fact of life in development - that doesn't mean that it's fun though. (I'm just about to leave work now and it's just after 8:30pm).

Another retreat...
Last weekend the CNFA staff headed off to Senga Bay (yup, I was there two weekends in a row). We spent the weekend reviewing the activities of the past year and planning for the upcoming year. I think it was a pretty productive couple of days... and I managed to sneak in a few swims and walks along the beach. I was suprised how much I missed being by the water, but hopefully I've managed to stock up on lakeside time for a little bit now.

Hope you enjoy the pictures of the lake.