Last Monday, Madonna arrived in Malawi a VIP. Last Saturday, she left the country with her VIP status revoked.

Bees reportedly chased Hillary Clinton out of Malawi yesterday. The State Department described the bees as "normal."

Sure, Madonna created a whole (possibly shady) charity to raise money for schools in Malawi, but do you know how she raises money for daughter Lourdes Leon's schooling? By selling her old Chanel boots.

All Madonna wanted was her own private school for impoverished African girls, just like Oprah has (minus the molesty stuff). What she got is a PR nightmare. Her mismanaged charitable foundation, Raising Malawi, is on the verge of collapse, and $3.8 million designated for the school have all but vanished into thin air.

A proposed law in Malawi would ban, among other things, the public passing of gas. If farting is criminalized, only criminals will fart. And criminals have really stinky farts because of poor dietary habits. [via]

One half of the Malawian couple who were convicted, and then pardoned, for being gay now has a girlfriend. Shortly after being pardoned, Steven Monjeza left his old partner for a woman because he "had enough" of being harassed.

Under pressure from the international community, Malawi's president Bingu wa Mutharika ordered a gay couple, jailed for 14 years for "unnatural acts and gross indecency" to be pardoned and released. But kind of grudgingly.

The two men, convicted of "unnatural acts and gross indecency," have been given the maximum sentence permitted by law: 14 years of hard labor in prison. The judge said of his ruling, "Let posterity judge this judgment." It will. [NYT]

In order to "protect" the public, a judge in Malawi has sentenced a gay couple to 14 years in prison with hard labor for "gross indecency" and committing "unnatural acts." Somewhere, Rev. Rick Warren is smiling. [BBC, pic]

More than 200 villagers have to move from land Madonna bought from the government for a $15m girls' school just outside the capital, Lilongwe. Don't worry though, they got 16m Kwacha in compensation. That's a lot of Kwacha. [AP]

Simpson-Wentz loses her role on Melrose. Madonna is building a school in Malawi. Lindsay Lohan coaxes a club into lifting its ban on her presence. Come, enjoy the fruits of Friday's gossip.

Not that charity is ever bad in any form, but Madonna could probably do better than sending old clothes and her own damn children's book to the Malawi orphanage where she found her son, David.

Yohana Banda, the biological father of Madonna's Malawi-born adopted son David, is worried about the tot's future now that David's crazy pop icon mother seems to relish fighting an ugly divorce battle in public. "I am still a poor farmer with nothing to offer, but maybe he would be better off back with us," Mr. Banda said. David's biological mother died in childbirth, and Banda, 34, has remarried and lives with his wife Flora, her daughter Tiyamike, 3, and their seven-month-old son Dingiswayo in a thatched hut. Shown a picture of David with Madonna and her manager, Banda said, "He doesn't look happy in this picture. He looks bewildered. If there is no love in the family, is there any love for him? This is a new and terrible thing to happen to him. I am too upset to think clearly. He is only three years old and he has been through so much."

Heroic woman of dance Madonna has been working for almost a year on a documentary about the obscure African nation of Malawi, her pet cause ever since she adopted a son from the country in 2006. The Material Girl tells Interview magazine (in editor Ingrid Sischy's farewell issue) that, at the time, she "didn't know where Malawi was." That's what makes adoption logistics so difficult [NYP]! To further help the imperiled nation, Madonna teamed up with the good people at Gucci for an ostentatious luxury fundraiser that coincidentally also helped to promote the opening of Gucci's flagship store in NYC. And now it's clear that Gucci's commitment has not flagged—they're selling some items that will be very useful for Malawi-bound "jungle doctors":

Gucci's new flagship store on 5th Avenue [Photo via Racked] opened today&mdash the one that was in no way related to the blockbuster luxury bash at the UN Wednesday night, which was done only with the children of Malawi in mind. And coverage of that fabulous night keeps on coming, today in the form of an ET video (after the jump) that features shots of actual African children amongst the celebrity throngs, and this quote from Drew Barrymore: "I think that it's great to have fashion and philanthropy sort of intertwined, because people care about fashion. So when you combine the two, it makes it fun."

Well, you'll be happy to hear that the purely altruistic GUCCI/ Unicef fundraiser for Malawi went off smashingly last night at the UN; no thanks to you, cheapskate, who didn't even buy a single $2000 ticket. Luckily for Africa, people like Madonna, Ashton Kutcher, Tom Cruise, and J-Lo are willing to put the welfare of refugees before their own needs. Some of them even showed up in new Gucci outfits, in order to help the company, which is a force for good in this world. Madonna took on the accusations "made mainly by bloggers" that the event is a sickening, decadent fashion orgy, a sham passed off as a benefit for a charity that is run by the co-director of the Kabbalah Center . The Material Girl doesn't pay attention to that talk, because it's that same old "controversy surrounding anything that involves change." You go! And Gucci CEO Mark Lee clarified that it is just "a coincidence" that Gucci is opening a new flagship store in NYC this Friday. To emphasize the point, they even scrubbed the original press release!

It's great that Tea Leoni, Madonna, Timbaland, and Alicia Keys can take time out of their shiny lives tonight to attend a fundraiser for UNICEF. Because they all support UNICEF, and are each determined to raise money for the suffering people of Malawi, you see. Purely coincidental is Gucci's co-sponsorship of the event. The high fashion brand is also extremely concerned with Malawi, and whatnot. And did they mention that this event will celebrate the opening of their NEW 5th Avenue flagship store? That is only a secondary concern, of course. Gucci is actually very popular in Malawi. And why wouldn't they be, with products like these:

Us mag kindly supplies this photo of Madonna arriving at "the airport" in New York today with her recent Malawian acquisition. Note the Kabbalah-fied red string on little David Banda's wrist, said to ward off the evil eye, bad luck, unfortunate publicity, etc. Three cheers for prescience! Talk about too little, too late though.

Despite initial denials from Madonna's publicist, various Malawian relatives of the alleged newest addition to the Ciccone-Ritchie household claim that the adoption of one-year-old David Banda is proceeding apace. Madonna's publicist, Liz Rosenberg, earlier tried to finesse the adoption thing as Madonna's metaphorical adoption of Malawi in general. But Banda's father says his son will be "very well looked after in America," though he will make "regular" trips back to Malawi so as to "know his roots." (Apparently the little tyke won't be welcome in Madonna and Guy Ritchie's London home.) In response to the Bandas' joy, Rosenberg robotically intoned, "I am unable to make any official statement at this time," before self-destructing in a shower of sparks. Expect wee David and family to manifest a well-financed public silence very, very shortly.