In other news, Joy and I made the journey to Lusaka – the magical land of pizza, movies, and flush toilets – with our entire intake of 48 PCVs for in-service training (IST). So far the communication has been poor (standard for PC Zambia) and the training sessions have been good, but not clearly directed – feedback that I offer to PC administration whenever I get a burst of audacity. However, seeing our colleagues has been unbelievably refreshing. There is a different feel to the group, both collectively and individually, after we have spent the last 100+ days flying solo in the African bush. It’s hard to explain, but we all seem to share the same understanding of difficulties faced and battles lost, losing, winning and won. The Friday afternoon undergraduate level elective class atmosphere that existed during our pre-service training is subtly transforming to a group of adults looking to make the most of their time here.
We have some good things coming our way in the next few weeks. We will celebrate our second Anniversa-week starting Monday!!! We will finish training and then head back to our village for about a week of business before returning to Lusaka and taking what will undoubtedly be an amazing vacation with Lincoln (Joy’s brother). We are so excited to see Lincoln and to share our experiences here with him.
Now, a few photo updates!
Happy Birthday Joy!! As a gift, Joey cleared an area behind our house creating a perfect hammock spot!
The last week of the school term, the zonal school hosted the zonal sports' week. Here, Joey is watching the Grade 8 girls play netball.
This was taken just outside Mukushi, the closest "city" to us. This is a hike we take often if we need to reach our favorite lodge 7k from the center of Mkushi.
Joey is helping one of the several pupuils that came to help move all our mud bricks to our house so we can eventually have a second structure. The bricks were very heavy, and some of the girls could carry 4-5 bricks on their head. Very impressive.
Our new school library! Joey and I worked really hard to prepare a library for the school, and now during morning breaks pupils will come read, look at magazines, or play chess.
We had a puff adder (a very poisonous snake) pay us a visit a few weeks ago. Our neighbor (just above) killed the snake with a rock. It was his idea that we photograph the snake and show our families.
