It's been a while since I last wrote an entry. Sorry things have been busy. My parents arrived Mon. May 1st. =) It's soooo good to see them. Before they arrived I was busy with interviews and getting research done. I was also busy planning some of the things we would do. It was a busy week and I was very anxious to finally have them here. Mon. morning I woke up early and went to the airport with Mkuu, my host-mom. It was a great first day with my parents and was wonderful to see them again. We came back to Mkuu's place and had a wonderful Swahili breakfast. Yummy yummy food and lots of it. My plan for the first day was just to walk them around Mombasa a bit. They arrived at 7 ... read more

What an amazingly fun, interesting and busy weekend it's been. The wedding on Fri. night was good. This ceremony was for the female family and friends of the groom. The dresses women wore were a lot more elaborate than the 1st wedding I went to. They were so sparkly. The women all sat around the dance floot, some in chairs most on the mats on the floor. They played a lot of Swahili music and women got up and danced. Yep, and I joined em. Dancing at a wedding is easy and pretty boring. The women kind of shuffle around in a circle and move their hips. That's it, but they have a great time singing along with the music. A cousin of the groom who had recently been married was there and they sat her ... read more

Just got back from Bewjuu (a town on Zanzibar island) this afternoon. We left Stone Town yestereday morning and drove to Jezani Forest. We first had a little info session on the forest and the conservation of it. Then we walked a little bit to an area that usually has Zanzibar Red Backed Colobus Monkeys. There were quite a few of them and they were sooooooo cute! =). There were babies jumping from branch to branch pretty much at eye level. Some monkeys even used Gabi's head as a go between. After that we went for a walk through the forest. It was soooo beautiful! Some of the trail got pretty muddy and it was intertaining to see how everyone's shoes looked like at the end=). The trees were so amazing. Took lots of pictures, so ... read more

A little after noon we left the park and headed into Voi. We ater our packed lunches at a gas station/ rest stop. Anne, Ruben (our teachers), our food and other supplies joined us there. We then clombed back into the vans and began our way inot the Taita hills for our week village stay. We got rained on on our way up. It was so peaceful I ended up falling asleep. When I awoke it appeared our vans had been teleported to Costa Rica. The hills/mountains we were climbinb were so green and trees were everywhere. The only ones I recognized were the banana trees. The hillsides were covered in terraced farms that reminded me of Nepal and scattered houses. It didn't take us long to arriave at the site of the clinic we were ... read more

We finished our lectures yesterday! =) That was nice. Tomorrow we're leaving for Tsavo national park. I'm soooo excited to see all the animals. Unfortunately though I'm sick. YUCK!!! having a fever (even a slight one) in a place where it's super hot anyway really bites. I'm hoping that I'll be all better by tomorrow, but we'll see. We'll be camping for a night in Tsavo national park and then continue on to Taita. Apparently the roads there are pretty bad. One section of the road should only take 15 min. to pass, but usually takes around 2 hrs. WOW!! I'll tell you if it's true when I get back. This is the last you'll hear from me until I get back to Mombasa at the end of the month. There's no electricity in the villages ... read more