Monday, February 21, 2011

Busy life

2-21-10
So I have been busy busy trying to make a full schedule for the next month or two and I have found that it will be a busy next few months! My villagers want to learn English and has been asking since the day that I got here so that is starting March 1st and the middle school health club mixed with a pseudo-Big Brothers Big Sisters is set to start March 3rd. The plan is to have the English class once a week on Tuesday (after my English and health classes that I teach at the bible college), then every Wednesday have a health club meeting. The local secondary school (where my sitemate lives) and I will meet once a month (on the 3rd Saturday) with our health clubs to try out Big Brothers Big Sisters. Our plan is to have topics for discussion, ie goal setting, then just give time for the kids to form relationships and have fun. Lewis University Athletics has also written letters to the kids with some good advice for goal setting (BIG THANK YOU). So that puts me and teaching preschool M-F, teaching health and English to the Bible college T&TR, teaching English to the villagers T and running the health club on Wednesdays. BUSY BUSY!!
This past weekend has been one of the most relaxing, fun and just down right American weekends that I have had in awhile! A group of us from the Njombe area got into cars of some expats in the area and drove down to a lake house for a birthday party. The expats here are a group of close knit people who have really embraced us as friends which is awesome because you can always have more friends! So at the lake house we were able to go out on the jet ski and kneeboard and ski behind it all awhile eating AMAZING food! They bbq’d a goat and 5 marinated chickens on top of many side dishes! The party went late into the night and just was a good ole time. The next morning at the expats house there was coffee and an amazing flat screen tv with a great satellite. I know, it cant get any better right? It can! We then had the opportunity for a hot shower and an amazing breakfast, which included fried eggs, bacon, sausage and toast! I know I know AMAZING!! After our great breakfast it was back out on the water for it was a beautiful day full of sunlight and more great food!…. Times like these are such a blessing for me and I am so happy I was able to go! Getting back to the village today and getting down to work! LOVE AND MISS YALL!

Sunday, February 6, 2011

random thoughs

1-26-2011
I am currently laying in my bed at 7:17pm, which is my normal crawl into bed time. You may think wow why go to bed so early? The answer is simple, there is no electricity. Why sit up all night in the dark? Its not that I go to bed at 7, I just go into my bed and read or maybe even write a letter. I have been in Milo trying to get work done for 5-6 months and it is slowly getting easier. In Milo I find that the people are motivated and some are truly educated (hospital staff), so if I ask my health related questions they know the answers but they just don’t do them. This poses a really tough situation because I need to figure out how to motivate behavior change. I am open to any suggestions. Changing subjects, today at preschool I asked Alex(2yrs) where his grandma was and his response “kule” makes me laugh because it sounds like “kuuuulllllleeee” depending on how far she was, the longer the “ule” the further (same with pale).This becomes a problem when trying to ask for directions because they just point and say pale or kule which just means in that direction, needless to say I get lost a lot.
* Ive found that ducks are way better parents than chickens. They protect their ducklings and stand up to threats, they also sport an awesome mo-hawk when they are really mad. Chickens are super stupid and just run in zig zags when they are scared leaving their chicks running after them.
*I LOVE my puppy so much and I am already sad that I need to find him a new home for when I leave. I see people beating dogs all of the time and I really don’t want my Amadeus ending up with a mean family. I have been thinking if it has been a good idea that I took him in the first place because I love him so much.
*My vil has a large forest area and from the hospital road you can see an open pasture on the next hill and the sun hits it just right so it looks like the Twilight baseball field.
*How to make ugali: take corn off the cob and let it dry, take it to the machine and grind it up to a flour, dry the flour, boil water and place a few spoon fulls of the flour in it, after that boils stir super fast and get all of the clumps out, take a bowl and put a little bit of water in it, put the ugali in that bowl and flip it around so it’s a big ball, EAT…… Yep pretty much paste.
*The preschool is going good but I have realized that I am SO not cut out for it! I can not stand the kids lol,,, Yes they are cute but they don’t listen to me and run around and leave the classroom to go play and I just want to pull my hair out! They listen to anyone Tanzanian but me? NOPE
* I have a young mother helping me with chores around the house, her name is Jen and she was kicked out of high school for being pregnant. It may seem lame that I cant do it all by myself but it really is a lot of work when there is legit no machines or anything to help lol .. I have work and then I am trying to visit people and start more work only to come home and go get water, was dishes, cook on an open flame, wash clothes by hand, sweep and mop (don’t want bugs), and do the same outside because ciafu has made its sole mission to attack my house! It is just a lot of work and I suck at washing clothes so having her is going to make life A LOT easier.