Christmas for Brian Smyser meant a long bicycle ride in the rain to celebrate the holiday with two friends over a meal of rice, mangos and tomatoes — and maybe a duck, if they could find a spare one in the village.

That's a pretty good day for the 23-year-old Rohrerstown resident and Peace Corps volunteer, who is dedicating time and energy in the Republic of Malawi, a landlocked nation in Africa.

"My plans are to spend the holiday with my two nearest Peace Corps neighbors (both about an hour's bike ride away)," Smyser said Dec. 22, communicating from Malawi via e-mail.

"Right now is the brink of rainy season, so the weather fluctuates from quite hot in the direct sun to fairly cool when it is overcast," he said.

"The Christmas weather should be quite bearable, though most definitely not white."

The 2005 Hempfield graduate is, according to his mother, Kathy Smyser, working in the tiny village of Bembe and living in nearby Luviri, both in Malawi's Rumphi district, about 45 minutes' travel from "the thriving metropolis" of Mzuzu.

He left for Malawi on April 24 and won't see home again until summer 2012.

"This will be his first Christmas away from home," Kathy Smyser said. "We're going to miss him."

Living for two years without electricity or running water, Brian Smyser is leading efforts to build a sorely needed, sustainable and environmentally friendly school.

To obtain a secondary education, students in Bembe must walk 18 miles each way, barefoot, "along a dust road through harsh weather conditions," Brian Smyser said. Many students don't make the effort.

"This situation has motivated the community to make huge sacrifices for this project, even as they must bear the entire financial burden of the project as government funds are unavailable," he said.

He lauded "the overwhelming commitment of the people of Bembe, with large turnouts on work days and continued persistence," for making it happen.

Malawi, formerly known as Nyasaland, is bordered by Zambia to the northwest, Tanzania to the northeast and Mozambique on the east, south and west.

Malawi is among the world's least-developed countries. It is nearly identical in size to Pennsylvania, at 46,000 square miles, and has a slightly larger population — 13.9 million vs. 12.6 million.

When not working, Brian Smyser travels primarily by mountain bike, gardens, trades books with other Peace Corps volunteers and cares for his adopted dog, Bwana. He follows the Baltimore Orioles during weekly visits to Mzuzu, where he has Internet access, and he calls home once or twice a week.

A graduate student at the University of Michigan, Brian Smyser is pursuing a double major in urban planning and sustainable systems.

He earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry and environmental sciences at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

"At some point in his freshman or sophomore year, he started talking about joining the Peace Corps. He decided it was what he wanted to do," his mother said.

He previously volunteered with a Catholic mission group on campus, and participated in its Habitat for Humanity house-building project in rural Louisiana.

"But he was very interested in Africa and in environmental issues in Third World countries," she said.

"When he came across a community that was struggling to put up a school, he got all excited about it and started sketching designs."

Building a school wasn't his original task.

"I came to Malawi with an interest in working on projects that help to address our global climate challenges through alternative technologies that can provide benefits to both natural and human habitat environments," he wrote.

The Peace Corps asked Brian Smyser to promote rocket stoves, which conserve energy, burn more cleanly and cost less than other cooking options available, he explained.

However, "it became obvious that the secondary school project in Bembe was the most needed project in the area," he said.

He immediately set to work on the "innovative environmental and educational project."

He successfully lobbied the Ministry of Education for approval. Brian Smyser hopes the school will begin classes in September.

"This will be a huge step forward … for Bembe's dreams for a complete education for their children, but certainly not the end of educational needs in the community as the school will remain very much incomplete," he said.

"Even when the school opens, the infrastructure for a fully functional school still will not be in place and the village's finances will have been pushed to the brink."

Brian Smyser must raise about $33,000 to support the project. Donations can be made online at peacecorps.gov.

He hopes to raise enough money to build a wind turbine or install solar panels to power the school.

"Right now, nothing in the area has electricity," Kathy Smyser explained.

tknapp@lnpnews.com