Their scales gleam blue, green, yellow, black or silver and they are striped or spotted. Mbuna coloured perch have such imaginative names as "Yellow Skin", "Mumbo Blue" or "Gold Eastern". Malawi displays the variety and beauty of its local fish in large aquariums. For example, over 200 varieties of Mbuna are unique to Lake Malawi.

The three multi-angular aquarium pillars are arranged at different heights, so that children and people in wheelchairs may also view the fish easily. An illuminated pillar, in which bubbles rise up through the water, can be seen from some distance.

A panoramic photo in the background gives the onlooker an impression of the beauty of Lake Malawi. It was the mists rising up from the lake and dispersing in the sunlight, which gave the country its name. In Chewa, the national language, " Malawi ", roughly translated, means "bright haze".