Malawi is the type of place you don’t often see in ‘Top Ten Destinations’ or ‘Best Kept Secret’ lists. That’s because travellers riddled with Malawi fever, like this week’s tongue-in-cheek guest blogger Anton Crone, have been defacing the magazines and hacking the websites that publish them.
‘We want it for ourselves, this paradise, this portal to Nirvana – I mean this malaria stricken sliver of land beside a lake bubbling with bilharzias,’ he writes.
‘That thing about Malawians being the friendliest people on earth? Marketing ploy. Chances are the first person you meet will be a nutter with a bazooka and 15 grenades strapped to his chest, training his crazed eyes on your watch.
‘Malawi had its time. The nickname, Lake of Stars, was coined by David Livingstone when he saw the lamps of fishermen on the water at night. Now it’s a bunch of rastas lighting up their doobs as they paddle erroneously between Malawi and Mozambique ferrying mountains of Marijuana and armed militia. And let’s not ignore that it was here that Livingstone probably contracted malaria from which he died after a deliriant battle. Did I mention it was aggravated by the onset of bilharzia after dipping his toe in the water?'
‘That thing about Malawians being the friendliest people on earth? Marketing ploy. Chances are the first person you meet will be a nutter with a bazooka and 15 grenades strapped to his chest, training his crazed eyes on your watch.
‘Malawi had its time. The nickname, Lake of Stars, was coined by David Livingstone when he saw the lamps of fishermen on the water at night. Now it’s a bunch of rastas lighting up their doobs as they paddle erroneously between Malawi and Mozambique ferrying mountains of Marijuana and armed militia. And let’s not ignore that it was here that Livingstone probably contracted malaria from which he died after a deliriant battle. Did I mention it was aggravated by the onset of bilharzia after dipping his toe in the water?'
