Fire

crackle, crackle, pop, pop!
I know that sounds more like my cereal, its acutally fire.
Fires are happening EVERYWHERE!
I swear the air is constantly filled with smoke. Its hard some nights for me to keep my windows open to let in cool air because the smoke hurts my throat and eyes.

For those of you that don't know, there aren't necessarily seasons here. We have mainly dry and wet seasons. Well, we are in the middle of our dry season, so everything is brown and dry.

We have lots of forests here in Mzuzu...lots of indigenous trees...and we have these horrible fires in the middle of the forest...the smoke is so thick you can't see in front of you. It hasn't been that bad here in the middle of the city, but I've driven through it on my way in. Its awful. On the way out of town, you can see where miles have just be devastated by fire...

But the scary part is when you can hear the "crackle, pop," because then you know its close. Twice now, I've been sitting at dinner at the Laffoons, and we have seen fire right around the house, neighbors burning trees, or just random fires.

Almost every night you can look up and see a mountain with some huge fire on it. They burn their fields to ready it for the next planting season, they burn brush to chase the mice out so they can catch them and eat them, they burn trash, they burn leaves, they burn trees/bushes they think have snakes in them...burn, burn, burn!

I'm ready for rainy season!!