stephaniecole

Just completed a 10 hour bus ride across Tanzania, now I'm in Dar Es Salaam and I'm not too keen on being here. It's dirty and so many people/ cars, but it is a gorgeous mixture of people and culture... very strong Muslim influence on the east african culture as well. Its very tropical too, well it is on the coast. Anyways, the airport's waiting area is outside.. AWESOME! I'll explain later why I'm here and what the hap is on this side of the world, just all know that I am safe and sound now.. hakuna matata (no worries!)... read more

So sorry for the delay in updates... some things have happened and are resulting in a bit of a situation. I will update you soon, I promise.... read more

6/17 @ 3pm - friday - oh, elizabeth This week seemed to fly by. I can't believe it's already Friday, that means tomorrow is good food day in Arusha, horray! Today was fun but definitely interesting! I woke up to rain (and as I've said before, the roads are dirt, so mud in rain!) and its a 20 minute walk to the school so that was...fun? Got there and the kids were everywhere, the rain is always exciting to kids. There was a group of about 5 boys that all had these gorgeous little beanies on, I want one!!! So Friday's are play day, but the highest class has exams every friday through june, so I gave the exams to half the class. It was on spelling and grammar, and the test goes like this - ... read more

Wednesday 6/15 @ 730 Well the week seems to go by quite quickly which is nice. Monday was fine at the orphanage, just a normal day.. but we ended up stopping to by beer from the shop to bring home and put in the fridge (which rarely works becuase of the same old story.. never electricity.) Well, turns out there was acutally electricity so we fridged the beer and go to enjoy a nice cold Kilimanjaro beer in the evening. Oh boy I crave beer here all the time but its not the easiest thing in the world, finding beer (or cold) here. So theres about 4 types or beer here.. its the same few that are in bars and restaurants and shops... you can't buy 6 or 12 packs or anything like that... its just ... read more

The start of the educational piece of the malaria initiative took place on Saturday morning - I did a speech/presentation to roughly 75 kids at Lukendane, discussing what malaria is, how it's contracted, the importance of preventative methods, and the seriousness of the disease... I had a translator and talked for about 30 minutes, than we did a "community clean up" for an hour after the talk. My logic behind this was that if we can reduce the number of resevoirs that are host to many bugs, including mosquitoes, than we can overall reduce the density of mosquitoes present which in turn will lower the prevalence of malaria. There is SO much trash here and by teaching the young generation of the importance of not littering and keeping the community clean, it may help to change ... read more

Friday, June 3rd @ 4.30pm Play Day Today was great- Friday's at the orphanage is play day, so there are no lesssons and the kids just play games all day. It is seriously the cutest thing. There were about 55 today and when we arrive, the kids are playing all over the place - soccer with punctured balls and no skin left; jump ropes that are retied and retied (except for the 2 new ones i brought) and kids with sticks and nails and trash playing with whatever the can find. There is no 'school yard'; its just an area that there are no buildings. The ground is dirt everywhere but Ana and Sabrina, the orphanage keepers use the homemade mand broom to sweep the dirt floors each day. Hm. They have a song for EVERYTHING, ... read more