Busy with lots of stuff!

Hey everyone!

So, I have realized that I haven't written for a long time and its time for an update on what I've been doing since my bike accident...after some physical therapy in Lilongwe, I went to Zomba to help teach summer school with the education volunteers. It was fun and I led a goat dissection and taught genetics. It brought back my sense of longing for anatomy! I feel like the students had a better understanding of biology after their two weeks at summer school. I went back to site to find the guardian shelter not having a lot done and the students gone for break. I was only there a small amount of time and then headed up north to the Lake for Christmas.

Christmas at the lake was pretty good. I got some swimming in and eating some good food. I was more anxious about visiting the US at the end of December...

I flew out of Blantyre (the major city in the southern region). My flight was 2 hours late, so I freaked out about getting to the US. The flight staff helped to get everything taken care of. When I got to Johannesburg, I went to the South African Airways desk and they had everything taken care of for me. I was re-routed to JFK and put on a Delta flight to Portland. It was a long haul, but definately worth it. I didn't get in until 11pm instead of 9, but oh well. Bridget suprised me with getting Paul a security pass and he was waiting for me at the gate! It was so cold when I got in! I know that it was because I am used to 85 degree plus weather year-round. Everyone thought it was really funny.

Visiting the US was really good and that deciding to go home was definately a good thing for me. It was really good to see all of my friends and family, and especially Paul. I found out that Paul is leaving for Moldova (eastern Europe) at the end of this month, so we spent a lot of time getting stuff for him to leave. It was kind of weird. I feel like I don't fit in as much with american culture and that being back for good is going to be a hard transition. Everything seems so different even though it probably hasn't changed that much, but that I have changed a lot. I spent a lot of my time going to thai food restaurants, shopping for Paul (a little for myself), spending lots of time with Paul, cooking Malawian food for my parents, and going to the mountain with my girlfriends. It was sort of hard to leave, but at the same time I was missing being in Malawi and wanted to get back to wrap up projects and say my goodbyes.

When I got back to Malawi, I spent a few days dealing with jet lag. I got back to site and was busy from the get go. I had some meetings with the head chief and set up a meeting with the local chiefs to discuss the progression of the guardian shelter. Twenty-five chiefs, technical college instructors, a rep from the district health office, and myself had a pretty good meeting. I spent the next week running around Zomba town getting lots of supplies for the guardian shelter. It took almost all week to get most of it done. However, when I returned, I found out that nothing had really been done since I left. The villagers hadn't come to start working and the technical college can't provide most of the work like they had promised. So, I have to figure out how to get the villagers to come and do the building. We'll see what happens. Before I left site, I taught the community based organization (CBO) that I am working with how to make peanut butter.

I just finished at weeklong training on Home-Based and Pallative Care. It was pretty helpful. I took two people from the CBO since they are interested in doing HBC in my area. They found it very helpful and are really excited to start doing this stuff at Nasawa! We will (hopefully) train people in our area that are interested and keep working on the peanut butter making and selling!

Well, I guess that's a semi-short wrap up of what I've been up to lately...I will try to write more often since I am outta Malawi soon-ish! I hope that everyone is doing well and healthy!

Love ya,
Nikki