Dr Mulenga’s Experience!

Dr Teddy Mulenga

We were delighted to welcome Dr Teddy Mulenga (above) to our local radio show as the guest on a recent edition. Dr Mulenga is no stranger to radio – he features weekly on a show on Zambezi 94.1 fm – the same station which broadcasts our show – on which listeners phone in to tell him their health issues and he gives them advice on what to do. Very popular and very professional, hosted by his son Mambo, himself a previous guest on our programme. Our show, The Chanters Lodge Experience with the Milli Jam Ingredient featuring Jay Hillz, airs every Tuesday evening at 20.30 hrs CAT and is a great mix of latest international and Zambian hit records, as well as chat with our Guest.

Dr Mulenga told us that he had ‘been in Livingstone since 1974’ when he was a schoolboy at Hillcrest Technical Secondary School, just up the road from Chanters Lodge. After passing then ‘Form 5’, now Grade 12, the doctor had proceeded to do his national service, a must in Zambia at that time for all Form 5 graduates. After national service he had attended University of Zambia, where he had read psychology and philosophy.

Upon graduation Dr Mulenga had been selected for the award of a scholarship to study medicine in the then Soviet Union and had spent the next seven years or so in Kiev, now part of Ukraine, where he obtained his medical qualifications. He had also spent time in Sochi on the Black Sea. He still speaks fluent Russian. On return from USSR he had served his internship at Ndola Central Hospital after which he had gone ‘searching for greener pastures’ and had established his own successful clinic in Botswana where he had lived for some 20 years bringing up Mambo and his sister Juliet.

The doctor told us he loves Bob Marley, Lucky Dube and Dolly Parton as well as other musicians who ‘sing proper songs’! On this show we featured tracks from Little Mix ft Sean Paul, Sia, Pink and Charlie XCX. Added to the mix was work from Yemi Alade, Afunika, Avicii ft the Zac Brown Band (the doctor liked that one). Slap D was also included.

Doctor Mulenga is a keen chess player but revealed he usually loses to son Mambo who is himself an excellent player. He has written four books on various topics and is involved in publishing, criticism, as well as sometimes consultancy at Livingstone General Hospital ‘helping the young doctors’. He is ‘The Sceptic’ on Facebook and pretty controversial too! He has never bungee jumped and expressed his medical opinion that people doing that to their bodies might not be wise! He told listeners that he is a long term client of Chanters Lodge and a regular listener to our show.

Asked where he would like to be and what he would like to be doing ten years’ from now he answered with the one word ‘Parliament’! And then roared with laughter! So did we!

0

Yale University Students on The Experience!

Ben Marrow & Alicia Alvarez

Ben and Alicia (above) were our guests on the most recent edition of the Chanters Lodge Experience with the Milli Jam Ingredient featuring Jay Hillz, our weekly radio show airing every Tuesday evening at 20.30 hrs CAT for an hour live on Zambezi 94.1 fm. The show is a lively mixture of international and Zambian pop music, interspersed with chat with our guests.

Ben Marrow and Alicia Alvarez, third year students at the famous, prestigious Yale University, an American private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, USA. Ben is reading Ethics, Politics and Economics, Alicia Economics and Mathematics. High powered? You bet! The guys told us that their college had educated four former US Presidents with a fifth – Hillary Clinton – perhaps on the way to the post. This provoked a discussion about US politics in general and Donald Trump in particular – there’s a surprise! Ben hails from New Jersey while Alicia is from Madrid, Spain. This was their first trip to Southern Africa, visiting family friends in Lusaka, so the guys were determined not to miss the chance of a sight of the mighty Victoria Falls, just 10 kms from Chanters Lodge where they were staying whilst in Livingstone.

Our visitors told us that they had only arrived in Livingstone on the day of the show, having flown from Lusaka with Proflight and having been met at the airport by Richard. Chanters Lodge offers free airport transfers from/to Livingstone Airport for all their guests on arrival and departure. Were the couple ‘an item’ Milli Jam wondered? They claimed they were not but ‘just good friends’ who had met at college and liked to travel together. Alicia seemed a shy mathematician, Ben a more outgoing student. While in town they hoped to have a bike ride to the Falls as well as doing the rhino walk in the Mosi-o-Tunya National Park.

The music on the show was good, with tracks from Ariana Grande, Kelly Clarkson, Zayn, DNCE, Willz ft Red Linso, Tinashe, Alpha Romeo ft Macky 2 and Tommy Dee, as well as Yemi Alade. The guys said they had no particular favourite music or artists but listened a lot to Yale’s own radio station while they were studying. Ben did say he favoured Kanye West and Chance The Rapper.

Alicia surprised us by telling listeners that she was into the sport of fencing and was in Yale University’s fencing team. I warned Milli Jam to control himself otherwise the young lady might take out her foil and sort him out! Coming from where she does it was no surprise to learn that she supports Real Madrid though other members of her family are for Athletico. Does she miss Spain? Not really the States is apparently ‘more exciting’….

Ben comes from a family of academics – both his parents are university professors. Part of his education had been in UK during the time his father was involved with Cambridge University, he had therefore played cricket, rugby and field hockey, as well as mysteriously ending up as a Manchester United supporter. Thereby knowing much more about sport in UK than his peers in America! We moved on.

Asked where they would like to be and what they would like to be doing ten years’ from now, Alicia said she would like to have finished her studies and to be working for a big international organization, while Ben said he would like to be working, travelling and to be involved in research. We wished them all the best!

 

0