Visiting my new home and other random tidbits

I only have 1 hour left on my computer battery so I'll jot down some tidbits about my site visit this week. I'm posted in the far north region and the trip takes 3 days. (email me if you want to know the town I'm in). So we were supposed to leave Tuesday then they told us wednesday. Tuesday morning we show up and theyre like surprise, you're leaving today at noon, go home and you have 20 minutes to pack. That was the beginning of this long voyage: 2 hour bus ride, 16 hour train ride (overnight) and then an 8 hour bus ride and another 1.5 hour bus ride. So the first night I finally got to my town, i was with a few other volunteers from the area. They took me to their friend Patti's bar, which was really just a lady's front yard. All of a sudden a storm rolled in so we went inside the house. She then preceded to pull out mattresses for us to sleep on because obviously we were not going to go home that night. So I laid down of course. We ended up going home later. Except for the big cities the taxis are motocycles here. So we took motos home on wet unpaved roads. We only fell off once.

I also forgot to mention that on one of the bus rides we ran over a goat. I saw it coming and the bus driver did not slow down. Then I looked back and the baby goat was on the ground disappearing behind us....

Animals such as chickens, goats and sheep run free here. My friend even has a turkey at her house. Somehow they belong to people tho (more on that later).

So I went up north with 4 other girls. We were all sick by the trip back because we had no notice and we did all this traveling to spend 1 day in our town. then we had to turn back and do it again. everyone was on the bus feeling sick, people were puking on the bus or in bushes at the side of the road. These french people came up to me during one of the stops and were like are you guys ok? I was like its been a long week.

So when you are traveling by bus there is no bathroom. you have to go by the side of the road when the bus stops. but the bus always stops at a town, so it gets weird. people usually end up seeing you do your thing.

on the 4th of july we stopped at someone's house for a party. they grilled burgers and made mac and cheese potato and fruit salad. then people obnoxiously read the declaration of independence and various other american documents. it was pretty funny.

At a bar the other night I ordered fish and of course how do you eat it? with your hands. thats why hand sani is really useful here....

So today we had the opening ceremony for the summer school we're having here (for us to train) and we had to sing the star spangled banner. I took the high note at the end there...it was great. i knew ms hansons teaching would come in handy in africa.

Thats all I can think of for now. we have internet at the site now so I will be able to update more. let me know if you have any questions.

xoxoxo Liz