Football, spaghetti, and internet.

Hi!

So the past few days have been great, getting over jet lag and reconnecting with the girls. Wednesday I shadowed a girl to named Jamimah, who is a Form 2 (sophmore). Here is a rundown of the day:
6 am : wake up/prepare for the day
6:45-7:30 : study hall
7:30 : breakfast
Then we had two hours of physics and an hour of business. The business teacher was not there but the girls did their work even without a sub. Business was followed by Swahili, two hours of English, lunch, two hours of math, music, WISH, office hours.
This brings us to dinner at 6 pm.
7:00 - 9:30 : Study hall. By this time I was barely awake, not only do these girls have 15 hour days, but they do it with a freakin smile!

Today (Thursday) the football (soccer) team had a tournament to see who moved on to regionals. The girls played two games and lost, but it was a good time. I got sunburned (obviously) and got hit on by a Kenyan High School boy.

Tomorrow I'm starting my thesis project with a pre test on Knowledge, Attitudes, and Behaviors regarding HIV/STD Prevention and Teen Pregnancy. 35 girls will be taking a KAB survey, and then completing a five week course. Wish me luck, I don't think I'm ready to give the awkward sex talk!

Habari!

WOW! I'm here. So let us start from the beginning...

Friday: Got to the airport, checking in and they tell me they can't find my name... Hmmm, so I show them my confirmation email and he says "this was yesterday". Yeah, missed my flight on Thursday and had to pay $400 to change it to Friday (thanks mom!!)
Get on the plane and fly 12 hours to Dubai - didn't sleep AT ALL, so that was fun. My layover in Dubai was only two hours, so I ate some burger king for breakfast and then hopped my plane to Nairobi. Took about 5 hours, and still didn't sleep. I arrived at the airport without a phone or any phone numbers, so that made it difficult when I had to find out where my ride was. I asked a random women if I could borrow her phone (200 shillings) and called home to my dad. My ride showed up and I slept the 4 hours to Daraja.

Arriving at Daraja was AMAZING. The girls literally wouldn't let my van get in the gate, they surrounded the car and made me get out to hug them. Funny thing is I only knew 26 of them but they didn't seem to care. Every girl there welcomed me back like she knew me forever. That is a pretty amazing thing. I was dead on my feet so I headed up to Jason's and slept for a solid 14 hours. I woke up to Tusker sleeping on my bed, this time sans goat leg (THANKS TUSKER!). He is old and huge but still takes up less room in my bed then miss Josie.

Sunday I went and hung with the girls at their photography class and journaling class. I meant to stick around for the day but when I went home to shower I fell asleep for four hours (oops, jetlag). I ended up going back down for dinner and study hall.

Today is Monday, I had to finish a final for my medical anthro class so I came into town to get some internet. We went food shopping and I pretty much got only cookies and peanut butter. I'm going to buy a phone now and then we are back to campus. Hopefully I will get to do the pretest for my thesis work this week, but I'm still pretty jetlagged and the girls have lots of volunteers at the moment. We will see!

Updates and Freak Outs!

So there are some new and exciting things coming to the blog this time around...

First of all, the boys over at Broadcastr are working to set me up with a widget of sorts so that I can record some stories to my account and have them here for you on the Kenya Dig It blog. This way all of you who miss the sound of my voice will get to hear it!

Second, the Global Health Center at MSSM has asked a few of us going abroad to record video blogs of our experiences. Obviously I signed up :) Don't know how easy it will be to upload videos with the connection out there, but I will do my best!

I had my first pre-trip freak out last night! It's funny that I have been waiting for this since I came home last time, and yet I felt a little panic at the thought of being there for ten weeks. It's obviously not being their, I love it their and know I will have a great time. It is just not being HERE, with friends and family and Phil and Josie. I said it last time around and I will say it again- I wish Kenya and New York weren't so far away from each other! It is impossible to split my heart in two, and that is what happens when I'm away from either place. Someday I will have a job where I can fly back and forth for shorter periods of time, then I won't have to beg you guys for money and I wont have to miss anyone!

Less than two weeks to go! I fly out friday the 24th at 11 am and head to Dubai! Then it's Dubai to Nairobi and Nairobi to Daraja. I actually remembered to pack a flashlight this time around, so that should help (no electricity and no flashlight = scared Maggie walking through the bush).