Work Updates & New REDES Group

Work:
So what happened last year after the holiday break happened again this year! My supervisor left for another job so the first half of the month was veryyyy slow at work. I pretty much just show up and sit around until it's time to leave like everyone else. The facilitators were all in Chiure for motorcycle training for 2ish weeks as well so there weren't really anything for me to help out with anyways. I watched a lot of tv shows and played a lot of sumoku! hahaha I also did get to focus on my tasks for the Malaria Task Force team and got work done.

Second half of February, I got a new supervisor and things started to get busy real quick! I'm currently working with him to implement a water project in Ancuabe. We finished drafting up a presentation and going to finalize it and set up a date to present to the governor and key partners soon. Once that's done, the real work begins with setting up training about the project to the facilitators and health committee and building the water pumps throughout the community. I'm also facilitating another malaria training of trainers next week so I've been busy preparing for that.

Hora das Crianças:

2/3/15 Letter 'P' and coloring pages

2/14/15 Coloring hearts

REDES:
2/24/15 The new school year started for the kids here. I wasn't planning to do REDES this year but some of my old girls came over and asked when we are meeting again so I decided to start my REDES group again. I told my old girls to bring any of their friends that would want to join. I had 7 girls that came to the first meeting, yay! We just talked about what REDES is and what we will do. I had them draw a collage about themselves to use it to introduce themselves to the rest of the group. We will be meeting every Tuesdays to learn and Sundays to dance. I have 4 more girls coming to the next meeting so I'm excited to have a big group again! I still have yet to find a counterpart for my REDES group but it's been a challenge =/ I'm planning to ask the school director again for help with this.

Other updates:

-2/2/15 I dyed my hair red again! I was waiting to have excess amount of rain water to do it.

-2/9/15 After 28 days of power outage, POWER FINALLY CAME BACK!!

-2/18/15 Celebrated lunar new year with friends in Pemba with lots of yummy food :)

-2/19/15 I found a supermarket in the city that sells my favorite instant fried noodles!!

-2/20/15 Zambie finally gave birth! 5 kittens again! They're so cute!!! My iphone is filled with cats again.. I can't stop taking pictures of them!

Holiday Break & Life Without Electricity

It's my personal goal to blog at least once a month. Since it's already Jan 31 today and my laptop still have some charge left, here's a quick update since the last post before my laptop runs out of battery! 

Holiday break:

I was on holiday break from 12/20/14 to 1/20/15!! I came back to site after 2 weeks only to find out I have another 2 weeks off the weekend before I thought I'm supposed to be back at work hahah. For the holidays, I traveled to Zambezia province to spend Christmas in Namarroi and then back to Pemba for New Year. I got to visit PCVs and see their sites in Mocuba, Namarroi, Alto Molocue, and Macomia. Zambezia is beautiful with lots of mountains and really cheap fruits!! 33 cents for pineapple?! I'm so jealous! I also went hiking in the tea field in Gurue, which was also beautiful. Here's a map to show how much ground I've covered during my break! Purple dot is my site, red dots are where I traveled to.

Power outage:

My longest power outage record since I've been here was 3 days.. I have a new record now and it's 20 days AND COUNTING! ahh! So the power went out on the evening of 1/12/15 and I didn't think anything of it since power outage is a normal thing here. 3 days later, I finally heard about the heavy rainfall that caused a lot of damage and deaths in Zambezia. Read here for more info on the floods and storms: http://allafrica.com/stories/201501210330.html

I have to give props to PCVs who are living without electricity at their sites! Life is hard here already but it is even harder without electricity! All of my electronics were dead so I was unreachable for days. Phone service was also out for awhile. I slept at 7pm because there's nothing else to do in the dark and end up waking between 10-midnight and try to go back to sleep until the morning. Cooking everyday with charcoal really sucks... good thing I have amazing neighbors who give me food often :) I've also been eating a lot of snacks like mandaze (fried donut-like ), bread with peanut butter, and baija (fried bread-like bean). It's also tempo de fome (starving time) here so the market literally have nothing but onions.  My friend gave me a solar panel that charges to a lamp which can also be used to charge some stuff. It's been a life saver! The cost of candles was getting expensive! It was rainy and gloomy most of the first 2 weeks of the power outage so I was only able to charge about 10% on my phone each day.. 20% on a slightly sunnier day. This past week, it was really sunny and hot. I was hoping it would rain again soon and it finally did yesterday! I desperately needed water since I was almost out of the rain water I saved from the last time it rained. No electricity = no water since it has to be pumped from the ground. By the way, I've been taking cold bucket bath.. rain water is REALLY really cold :( After 2 weeks of finding ways (solar panel, car, other org have a generator, etc) to charge my phone whenever I can, I finally have a constant place to charge all my electronics! My org got our generator from Chiure back so I can charge during the weekdays. As long as I have a place to charge my electronics, life without electricity isn't so bad now! I think I'm finally getting used to this lifestyle hahah Okay I have 20% left on my laptop so my power outage ranting will stop here. Here's some pictures:

candlelit bucket bath

cooking with charcoal

collecting rain water

Generator at work

Hora das Criancas:

1/8/15 coloring pages

1/27/15 coloring pages

Other updates:

-The termites has been destroying the roof in my closet! Because of the power outage, it's always dark in my closet so they were having a feast eating away the cardboard roof. My landlord helped me fix the piece that was falling off but then they started attacking another piece and it's starting to fall off too. I decided to just replace the whole roof with tin since this problem keeps on happening. 

new roof!

-It took a little over 2 months but I finally got my care package from Bryan!! <3 I've been anxiously waiting for hot cheetos!! hahah

-I booked my flight to Cape Town for April!!! I'm so excited for April! Bryan's coming here to visit for 2 weeks and then we're spending a week in Cape Town :)

World AIDS Day, REDES trip, Malaria TOT & White Elephant

World AIDS Day:
12/1/14 We had a march around town, entertainment with local singers and then a health fair in Salaue where the community members can get their blood pressure measured, tested for HIV and/or malaria, get condoms, and talk about family planning.

REDES:
12/2/14 & 12/9/14 The girls practiced dancing to the song Balada Boa and Ai Se Eu Te Pego to perform for New Year day but we decided afterward that they won't be performing anymore since some of the girls might be going out of town for the holiday.

12/12/14 Sleepover party! Since we have to catch the 4am chapa to go to the city, I told the girls they can sleepover at my house since some of them lives further away. We bought food to cook dinner but since the girls came late, it was too late to cook so we decided to cook on Sunday evening instead. We ate dinner with the food Belinda cooked earlier and then hung out for a bit before sleeping early.

12/13/14 Pemba trip with 4 of my girls! 2 of them couldn't make it so I gave them 200mts from our fund afterward to make up for missing out since they all worked hard to earn the money for the trip.

On the mini bus at 4am heading to the city!

Eating breakfast while waiting for stores to open up

Resting after a long morning of walking around

Chinese food for lunch!

Ended the day hanging out at the beach

12/14/14 An evening of cooking dinner and hanging out

Malaria TOT:
12/15/14 - 12/16/14

All ready for the TOT

Facilitating the training

The participants demonstrating how to properly hang a mosquito net

An activity to demonstrate the importance of sleeping under a net

Wrapping things up

Each participants received a Tatu book

They also receive oil, sugar, and soap as incentives for coming to the training

Everyone got certificates!

Hora Das Criancas:

12/11/14 Letter N and Christmas tree

12/18/14 Letter O and Santa Claus

White Elephant:
12/19/14 I made gifts for my coworkers, neighbors and REDES girls :) I also prepared gifts from things that I have but don't use to play White Elephant with my coworkers. I explained to them the rules but no one wanted to steal! Hahah they all wanted to open new gifts to see what it is. 

Other updates:
-I learned how to knit!! Bucket list item :) 

-GUESS WHO'S GETTING ANOTHER BABY NAMED AFTER THEM?! :) My coworker told me she's pregnant and wants to name her baby after me!! She's due sometime in May/June so a few months before I leave Mozambique. I'm so excited and honored to have another namesaked child!!