Lilongwe

The land around the Lilongwe River is Chewa country. The Chewa, the largest ethnic group in Malawi, have farmed the central plateau for centuries, and the town began as a market and meeting place on the river, at the crossing of paths that linked the lake shore, the Zambezi valley and the highlands. Until the 20th century it was small, with a few thousand people, and the administrative and commercial centres of British-ruled Nyasaland were further south, in Zomba and Blantyre.

Britain declared a protectorate over the area in 1891, and it became the Nyasaland Protectorate in 1907. A railway and roads reached the south first; Lilongwe was a district post. Nyasaland gained independence on 6 July 1964 and was renamed Malawi, with Hastings Kamuzu Banda, a doctor who had spent decades abroad, as its first prime minister and, from 1966, its president. He later took the title president for life.

Banda chose to move the capital to Lilongwe, in the geographic middle of the country and close to the Chewa heartland, partly to spread development away from the south. Planning began in the mid-1960s, and in the 1970s work started on a new government district, Capital Hill, funded by foreign loans, including from South Africa. The government officially moved from Zomba in 1975, and Lilongwe grew rapidly as civil servants, traders and migrants arrived.

Banda's one-party rule ended in 1994, when Malawians voted in the first multiparty elections after a referendum, and the country adopted a new constitution. Since then Lilongwe has grown into a city of roughly a million people, with new malls, hotels, lodges and government buildings, while still bearing the marks of its planned origins: wide roads, low buildings, long distances, and a centre that is more a set of districts than a single downtown.

Reading the city today, the layers are easy to spot: a market and a river crossing at the old core, a planned government district built in the 1970s, and newer malls and lodges spreading out along the main roads. Each layer explains a different part of a visit, from where you eat to where you must not point a camera.

Lilongwe is organised by numbered Areas, dozens of them, and locals give addresses by Area and road rather than street number. For a visitor the useful divisions are fewer: Old Town, Capital Hill, the Central Market, and the wildlife centre on Kenyatta Road. Old Town is the older commercial district, with Old Town Mall, banks, cafés and the restaurants along Paul Kagame Road, and it is the easiest base for a short stay.

Capital Hill, also known as the City Centre, lies to the north-west and is the government district. It was planned as a garden city of wide avenues, ministries, parliament buildings and hotels, and it feels very different from Old Town: quiet, spacious and almost empty of street life, with long distances between buildings. It is best seen on a short drive in the morning, with the camera away from anything official.

The Central Market, south-east of Old Town, is the beating heart of ordinary Lilongwe: a large market of produce, cloth, household goods and second-hand clothes, loud and crowded and open from early morning. Around it are bus stations and minibus stops, and the area is busy from dawn. Visitors go early with a driver who waits, keep phones and bags out of sight, and leave before noon.

Between and beyond these lie residential Areas: Area 3 with its cafés and clinics, Area 47 with newer houses, and the outer suburbs that stretch along the main roads. Most are not set up for visitors. The practical way to see Lilongwe is to take a lodge car between clusters, walk only inside a cluster and only by day, and be inside your lodge before dark.

When you plan a day, group stops by cluster and keep each outing to a morning or an afternoon. Distances of two to five kilometres between clusters can take half an hour in traffic or rain, and taxis get scarce after dark, so book the return ride before you set off.

Lilongwe is one of the few African capitals designed from scratch in the late 20th century, and the plan is still readable on the ground. Capital Hill was laid out in the 1970s with a spine of wide roads, a ceremonial centre and blocks of ministries, set apart from the older commercial town. Old Town, by contrast, grew along the earlier road and river and has a denser, more ordinary street pattern of shops, offices and workshops.

The planners' idea was a garden city, with low buildings and plenty of space, and it has left the city with a low skyline and large open areas, but also with long distances and few pavements. Because the Areas are far apart, public transport is minibuses and shared taxis that most visitors avoid, and the practical way around is by car. That is why a lodge driver, or a taxi you know, is the first thing to arrange.

The government district is the clearest example of the plan. The parliament buildings, ministries and the presidential offices stand along wide avenues, and the Kamuzu Mausoleum, a memorial to Malawi's first president, is one of the landmarks. Photography is restricted around anything official, so use the drive for looking, not for taking pictures, and ask before photographing any memorial.

More recent building has added shopping malls, new hotels and lodges, and the growth of the city towards the north and west. Power cuts and fuel shortages remind a visitor that infrastructure has not always kept up with growth; lodges run generators or solar, and drivers keep a full tank. For the practical traveller, the planned layout means a slow, quiet, low-key capital where the useful day is short and the drive is long.

For a first visit, this means keeping expectations realistic. Lilongwe is not a city of sights to tick off but a calm, useful base: cash, coffee, a good lunch, an animal rescue centre and a market, and then the road to the lake.

Chewa culture runs through central Malawi. The best-known tradition is Gule Wamkulu, the great dance of the Nyau societies, in which masked dancers appear at funerals, initiation ceremonies and other gatherings, representing animals, spirits and ancestors. UNESCO listed it in 2005 as a masterpiece of the intangible heritage of humanity. It is a private and sacred practice as much as a spectacle, so a visitor should go only by invitation or through a respected guide, and ask before photographing.

Craft is easier to meet. Wood carvers make masks, chairs, bowls and figures, and the carving of the Chewa area and the lake is well known; basket makers use reeds and grasses; and potters make bowls and jars, with the Dedza pottery a short drive south of the city. Chitenje, the printed cloth worn as a wrap skirt or used as a cover, is sold in every market, and tailors will make it up in a day. Ask where a piece was made, bargain politely, and do not buy items made from ivory, animal parts or protected woods.

Music in Lilongwe ranges from gospel, which fills the churches on Sundays, to Malawian pop and reggae in the bars, and the traditional songs and drums of the villages. Football is the shared passion, and the national team, the Flames, draws crowds. English and Chichewa are the working languages, and Chichewa greetings are received with real pleasure: muli bwanji, how are you, and zikomo, thank you.

Manners are gentle and formal. Greet before you ask for anything, use the right hand to give and receive, dress modestly away from your lodge and cover your shoulders and knees, and be patient: in a country that calls itself the warm heart of Africa, an unhurried greeting is part of every transaction.

A useful habit is to buy directly from makers where you can, agree the price before anything is wrapped, and ask your lodge which sellers they trust. That keeps money in the community and gives you a story to take home with the object.

Lilongwe is unusual for a capital in having a serious wildlife project in its middle. The Lilongwe Wildlife Centre, on Kenyatta Road, is run by the Lilongwe Wildlife Trust as a rescue, rehabilitation and education site for animals confiscated from traffickers, orphaned or injured, and it sits inside the Lilongwe Nature Sanctuary, a stretch of river woodland. The centre cares for primates and other animals, runs education programmes for schools, and releases animals back to the wild where it can.

For a visitor, the centre and the sanctuary trail are the easiest half-day in the city. The morning is best, when the animals are active and the woods are cool and full of birdsong. Ask about guided walks, follow the rules about distance and never feed anything, and remember that the fees pay for the rescue work. It is also the easiest outing to do with children.

Beyond the city lie larger areas. Dzalanyama Forest Reserve, to the south-west, has miombo woodland and birds; Kasungu National Park, to the north-west, has elephants and savanna and lodges; and Lake Malawi, to the east, is one of the great freshwater lakes of Africa, with beaches at Senga Bay and Cape Maclear and a national park under the water for the colourful cichlid fish. Each needs a car or a transfer, planning and, for some, a night.

A note on health and safety: malaria is present all year, so take prophylaxis and use repellent; bilharzia can be present in lake shallows and slow rivers, so ask locally before wading; and fuel shortages can make long trips uncertain, so keep a buffer day. The dry season from May to September is the best time for wildlife and for travel.

If you have only one morning in the city, spend it here: the walk is shaded, the animals are close, and the guides are usually happy to answer questions about the animals, the plants and the conservation work behind them.

Malawian food is built on maize. The everyday meal is nsima, a stiff porridge made from maize flour, rolled into a ball by hand and dipped into ndiwo, the relish that goes with it: beans, greens such as rape or pumpkin leaves, tomatoes and onions, fish or meat. It is eaten at home, at local eateries and in lodges, and it is worth trying at least once, with the right hand and a hand-wash at the basin.

From the lake come chambo, a much-loved tilapia grilled or fried whole, and usipa, tiny dried or fried fish cooked with tomato. Along the road you will see stalls selling roasted maize, groundnuts, fried dough called mandasi and fruit in season, and sweet, lightly fermented maize drinks such as thobwa. The Old Town has cafés serving eggs and toast with Malawi coffee, and Indian-style restaurants reflect a long-established Indian community in the country's towns, so curries and biryani are among the most common restaurant meals.

Drinks include the local lagers, Carlsberg Green and Kuche Kuche, brewed in Malawi, and Malawi Gin, a local gin often served with tonic. Traditional beers such as chibuku, sold in cartons, are a different experience and vary in quality. Malawi grows tea and coffee in the highlands, and both make good gifts.

A practical way to eat well is to mix three formats: a café breakfast in Old Town, a nsima and chambo lunch at a local eatery with your driver waiting, and a sit-down dinner at a lodge or restaurant with the car booked home. Drink bottled or filtered water, eat where the food is cooked hot in front of you, and keep small notes for stalls.

Prices are low by international standards, but fuel, power and currency swings have pushed costs up in recent years, so check the menu and ask the price of fish before it is cooked.