I know it's been a long time. New Postal Address - Katie Silver, P.O. Box 6965, Moshi, Tanzania

So yeah according to my blog its been over a month since an update. So i apologise for this. I hope that since the last time I did this people have been keeping well.

I HAVE MY OWN POSTAL ADDRESS YAY> It is now - Katie Silver, P.O. Box 6965, Moshi Tanzania.

I cant believe its nearing the end of my volunteering stint and soon I will begin my teaching job in Moshi. This starts on May 5th. I am however returning to England for a while to see family and friends. So if you want to hook up then please let me know. Recently Iwas told that hook up means more than just meet up, ie. i am looking for romantic prospects, but since this blog is going out to no people in that category then i think its fine to say hook up. Sorry Andy Tulley (Nice Andy for all those at uni (Lucy in Partic) who dont know his surname).

Recently there have been lot of hospital interaction by myself. not really going to go in to it on this blog, rather do it individually when i see some of you. Some of you know the situation and I ll fill other people in once i get back.I have enclosed some photos so you can see the conditions at various hospitals.

But on to more positive stuff. My volunteering is still going well in that next week I will be working with a doctor to try and meet epilepsy patients in the surrounding villages and try to reduce the stigma around the condition. It is such a good yet sad experience to meet people who have the condition and are trerated so badly. It will be attached to the HIV awareness campaign that i do already. It should be really good. The weird thing here is automatically people think you know stuff simply because you are from a western country. There is no way back home i would even be able to meet patients of the doctors and so on. To be honest i constantly feel out of my depth but i guess if its just reassurance that other people also have the condition who are from the perceived developed world, but still its a very crazy life out here in that sense. I am probably rambling so sorry for this.

I have recently been to some waterfalls which were beautful and you could swim in the whirl pool and everything. Was lovely, nice hot day, picnic etc. lovely.

The volunteer house has a pub next door called the Falcon Crest. Obviously we live there in teh evenings unless we go to glacier a sports bar and la liga a night club. THe volunteers sometimes have bottled beers and drinks in the house which is fine. tho sometimes they forget to return them. anyway after repeated warnings and requests tp bring the bottles back some volunteers were still not doin g it so they put up the following sign. Now lots of people were going mad saying that the sign was racist and how we wouldnt be allowed to put it up in our country etc.,..... But i know it may seem ridiculous that such a sign can be put up but it should be taken in the way it was meant. In that their english is not great so their vocabulary is limited. since here all westerners are called mzungu or white people (even though that is not true by any stretch of the imaginiation) then they just specified the volunteers by calling us european or wazungu (white people). I can see how it can be seen as racist but it was just meant ot tell us as a group of people that we would not get served because we dont return the bottles. Now whilst i only have water so no glass bottles i could understand both sides of the argument. Anyway in the end we returned the bottles and there were no problems. What was funny is our canadian friend who is very brown now went over and said can i be served because i am neither european or a mzungu anymore. He was not served tho. Anyway it was a storm in a tea cup and we now are back to normal with the falcon. I wouldnt want you to take away negative impressions of tanzania it is such a peace loving country and normally we are treated with hige respect and kindness.

Another funny story was i got in to a taxi with firends to go back to the house. And on the windscreen was a sign saying that the car was protected by the blood of Jesus Christ. It was a bit odd to be honest. I would rather the car be protected by his good driving,. He was a bit of a nutter and his driving was about as good as everybody elses whihc is not saying much. though nowhere near as crazy as when i went to cairo in decmeber last year. but still a bit scary to see.

Other than that not much news. Have sorted out accomodation and i will go and finialise it tonight and add pictures of it on here soon. and The job is sorted too and I will start in May.

Hope you are all well and I will see many of you soon.

Lots of love always


Katie
xxxx

oooh I get to watch premiership football live at glacier so i saw the arsenal villa match ooh arsenal you lucky gits against us!!!!!! also going to see the grand prix at the weekend it is like being at home!

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