Thoughts about leaving

Well, this is my first post of hopefully many! I am very excited to be leaving in now less than 3 months! I am sad to leave Paul, my friends and family, but know that they will all be excited for me to return with awesome war stories.
On Thursday of last week, I met with a woman who served in the Peace Corps in Malawi from 1992-94. She told me some amazing things about Malawi. For example, I am most likely going to have a "worker," also known to us Americans as a housekeeper. It seems like if you don't have one, you are seen as an outsider. This will be very weird to me, as I've always done my own laundry, cooking, and cleaning. I'm hoping this interaction will allow me to practice the official language of Chichewa (Chi-cha-wa).
Another interesting thing I've learned from Shannon was that Malawians are really conservative, so much that I am not allowed to befriend any men so that they do not mistake my friendship as me wanting to have an intimate relationship with them. This will be difficult for me as an American since I befriend all of my male coworkers as a way of comradery. Oh well, something I will have to get used to. I will just have to keep business as business and make a lot of female friends.
I recently purchased the first of my few dresses that I will take with me since I have to either wear a skirt or dress all the time in my village unless I am in my own hut. I can only wear super conservative clothing that shows no figure and has to go passed my knees since showing of thighs turns on Malawian men. I can, however, wear shorts and pants in the large cities since it recently became legal for women to do this in cities. I will get most of my clothes in Malawi since they have tailors that make clothing for really cheap and have many used American clothes at the markets! These clothes are supposedly called "dead white people's clothes" since they wear their clothes until you can't anymore and don't understand why we would give up perfectly good clothing and buy new ones.
So, all of the things that I've been told about Malawi has made me very excited and I can't wait to see how much of this applies to me! I am hoping to learn a lot about a fantastic culture and a different way of living! I will write more when I have some more random cool things about Malawi and new things that have come my way!