Settling In

Its been about three weeks since ive been here in Mbale at my permanent site. So far things are going really well and I have been unexpectedly busy. Going through training and reading about Peace Corps, they really prepare you for the worse. I guess its good to go into things having low expectation because then you are pleasantly surprised when they are better! When I thought of Peace Corps, I’m not sure exactly what I was thinking, but it definitely wasn’t this.

Currently, I am working a lot with Richard (my counterpart and the coordinator of the community health department). We have been working in his office, which I now have a desk in, organizing it and complying malaria data for one of our donors. Last week we had about 17 people visit from the UK who have donated money to FDNC, they came to see where their money was going. So we were busy preparing for their visit, which was actually quite stressful to get all the information done in time, but the visit went well and they were pleased to see the work that FDNC is doing.

Ive also been going out almost every afternoon into the field with Richard and Sandra, my supervisor. We have 28 different communities with a community health volunteer in each community who is responsible for organizing the events. So we go out to the communities to do different health related projects including, fuel saving stoves, the importance of mosquito nets, HIV/AIDS, girl child empowerment, and we are currently in the process of creating a curriculum for 2008 to implement in January. I am sort of in charge of putting that all together.

During our visits to the communities, the community members are always really excited to have us there and especially happy to see me (the muzungu from America!). They usually provide us with some sort of soda, or crackers, or even they prepare a meal. Which can be awkward at times because they expect me to eat a plate of food twice my size, but anyways, we were out the other day and the community prepared a feast! Beef, chicken, rice, potatoes, beans, eggs, matooke, millet bread, seriously, tons of food! Well, I am sitting there eating, trying not to think about the food preparations/cleanliness of the utensils I am using (my germ phobie kicking in), when my supervisor pulls out a round ball shaped mass from her plate. I thought it was a potato and didn’t really think much of it until she looks at me and asks if I wanted an egg. Yes, an egg, from the inside of her chicken that she was eating. When I realized it was an egg that was cooked from within the chicken (it took me a minute to process that) we all had a good laugh and conversation about culture. How pulling out an unhatched egg from a cooked chicken would never happen in America, or at least I haven't witnessed it. One of many hilarious conversations since ive been here…

Some other projects that I will be working on in the next couple of months, that im sure you will be hearing much more of, is a sports league within the communities, a library project for the vocational school, much needed organization, and developing the special needs school. I did my first health science lesson last Monday at the vocational school to the students here. It was a little intimidating never having taught before and then doing it here, but it went well, the topic…diarrhea, awesome. Haha.

We are planning on having thanksgiving with some people in my training group the weekend after thanksgiving. Deep-fried turkey? It will definitely be an exciting adventure…ill let you know how slaughtering, plucking, and whatever else has to be done before you eat a turkey goes! =)