Stress, Isoke, Juba, Ed

Be aware, this is a very long post. I had days to catch up since the last time I posted.

Thursday, June 26, 2008
We did not do anything special today…just continued to do work. We researched some more for the RFP, looked at budgets, and I found some attachments to the proposal. Sister Florence dropped by and Ed set up a team meeting with her to talk more about our plans. I was getting nervous by the end of the night because I realized that I still had so much to do before Ed leaves on Tuesday. I wanted to get the most out of him while he was still here, but I was really annoyed that I had to help out on a UNDP Expression of Interest for HIV/AIDS and TB this weekend as well…which is totally out of our team’s work on malaria. I really did not plan on working on this, but the deadline for the Expression was this Monday and Ed and I were really worried Emmanuel was going to push it until the night before it was due. This Expression of Interest would enable the Diocese to qualify for the UNDP RFP, so it was important for us to complete it if we wanted support our programs in TB and HIV. Even though I knew so little about HIV or TB in Eastern Equatoria, I really wanted us to qualify to just get the RFP, so I decided to help out Sister Florence and the Diocese. But Emmanuel did not come today when he said he would, which really annoyed me because I needed to work with him on this immediately. So we decided on a whim that we will go to Isoke Hospital tomorrow and hunt for Emmanuel. Well, I wanted to hunt for Emmanuel. Ed and the others wanted to observe the operations of the Diocese hospital. Isoke hospital is one of the best and most trusted hospitals in Eastern Equatoria. In fact, the villagers of Imilai drive all the way to Torit, bypass the Torit hospital, turn roads, and drive even further to get quality service at our hospital in Isoke. After all the drunkenness we have seen, we could understandably see why they would do this.

So I got a training budget out of the way today, but that was about it. I could not wait to find Emmanuel tomorrow and start working on this Expression of Interest.

Friday, June 27, 2008
So we started out early on our trip to Isoke. It was, as usual, very beautiful. The difference between the road from Juba to Torit and this road was that on this road, there are a lot more rocky mountains in the background. There were ranges of them and they were just incredible…majestic. Ed let me even got to drive the Pajero for a good half hour on the road! It took me a while to get used to driving on the right side of the car, swerving around the ditches, and braking before the potholes. I really need to learn how to speed up a bit. Thankfully there are not a lot of cars on these roads. There were some hut villages on the mountains positioned there for security reasons, but they looked really cool. Isoke is definitely the prettiest town we have been in so far. We drove in at the junction and onto a little road with shops. It was really cute because it looked like a western saloon. We then drove into this wonderful road along the hospital which had a line of tall trees planted along both sides of it. We turned, saw a huge brick church set against the mountains, and entered the mission. It was truly impressive. The mountains added everything to the beauty of this town. You could definitely see why the Italians chose to build a mission here.

We got to our rooms at the sister’s and settled in the dining area. OH MY GOSH…the food was heaven. There was hot chapatti (it tasted a lot like puri), bread, fresh local made honey, and local made mango jam. I really wish I brought back some of that honey and mango jam; I knew my parents would have loved it.

We then walked over to the hospital, down a little dirt path out of the mission. The hospital was actually very nice…nicer than Torit hospital for sure. The main buildings were positioned in a U-shape, with a grass lawn in the middle for the patients to sit under the trees. We first entered the out-patient room for children, and there were so many babies and mothers inside the room, about 3-4 sitting upright on each bed. There was definitely a stench when we entered the room, but I could not tell what it was from. The first baby we saw had rashes on its arm and the mother was breastfeeding him. Ed started questioning the doctor and got riled up after he found out that they do not take temperature readings, but this was before he found that this was the same doctor who saved a woman who suffered 6 bullet shots through her body. But in reality, there really is no need to take a temperature because 90% of fever cases in children are due to malaria and children need attention immediately. Still, maybe it would be good to have a temperature reading. We continued walking along the building and entered a dispensary where the pharmacist stocked medicines. They had all sorts of medicines, and of course, we were looking for the artemisinin-based drugs. They had a few courses of them, which they got them from Uganda and other hospitals because the government had delayed their supply (obviously). Some still use quinine IV since ACTs are relatively new phenomena. We saw a lot of drugs exported from India because they were cheap and good quality. Ed told me that India’s pharmaceutical companies also provided the best AIDS medicine because they offered the best combination in their pills. It was kinda amusing. We then went to a surgery room, which was really just a small, dark single room with a bed, sink and some medicines lying on the tables. We went to the adult’s in-patient facility, which was very empty in comparison to the children’s facility. The set up was exactly the same, except there were about 4 people total, each on separate beds. There was one man in the middle of the room whose leg rested on a sling because it was shot with a bullet. I thought I would be disgusted at the sight of it, but with courage I came in closer to take a look at his leg. There was dried blood and yellow coloration on the bandages tied around his leg, but it was not as terrible as I imagined it to be (which gave me some comfort if I actually do decide to go into medicine). Since the hospital does not have a means to store blood, their own staff often donates blood on the spot for their patients. Talk about generosity!

We then went into the laboratory, which was my favorite part of the whole hospital. It brought back some memories of lab in Berkeley…which I guess I have been missing because I felt right at home in front of that microscope. It was so cool to see malaria parasites in the blood sample slide. We had been studying this protozoan forever, and now I actually got to see it live! At first I couldn’t tell where it was on the slide, but then they were just these big, dark hooked blobs…the parasites. I tried to bust out what little picture-taking skills I gained from Bio 1A Lab and tried to take a picture of the parasites through the microscope’s ocular lens, but it took me forever to finally get a decent photo of them. It is strange…walking into that laboratory and feeling a surge of excitement at the sight of that microscope (there is only one in the whole hospital). It made me realize that I like the laboratory and bioresearch aspect of public health. Maybe because all I have taken so far are technical science courses, and I have yet to delve into public health courses.

We went outside where there were a lot of TB patients, women, children, and men sitting under a large tree. I was not fully vaccinated for TB before coming, so I was a little hesitant to walk through. But whatever, I sucked it up again and saw a woman with lesions around her chest area. TB here is treated much like leprosy was in the United States; people do not like to come out and admit they have it for fear of being ostracized. The great thing about Eastern Equatoria is that there has not been much multi-drug resistance to TB because the Diocese has a really good TB program and does good follow-up, which makes me happy.

We walked over a hill and entered the maternal ward. There were two midwives who greeted us and let us in to see the place. We were actually pretty surprised to see two because the people at the health conference (DCP2) were complaining that there were only 10 midwives in all of Southern Sudan. And then Ed tells us that there were probably 10 Sudanese midwives; these two were from and trained in Uganda. The whole place was pretty much empty, except for two pregnant mothers waiting outside. I was really pleased to see mosquito nets on top of each bed in the ward. J They get about 40-60 mothers who come in for their antenatal clinic every week, which is ok. But unfortunately, they only get 40 pregnant mothers to deliver in the hospital the whole year. Oftentimes they have to refer their most complicated cases all the way to Kitgum, Uganda. They tell us that pregnant women would rather be at home around their families and get delivered by a traditional birth attendant (TBA). After looking at the delivery room, we could see why they wanted to stay at home. It was not very comforting to see the bed and the room, and Ed suggested that they build a tukul or some home-type of environment in the room to make the mothers feel more comfortable. We really feel that it is best for mothers to be delivered in hospitals than by TBAs because the maternal mortality rate is so high here and TBAs usually do not refer complicated cases to hospitals because they get paid for each delivery. The DCP2 conference recommended that we train more midwives, but if mothers are too terrified to deliver in a hospital, it does not even matter how many midwives there are. Instead we have to increase maternal attendance in hospitals, and the best way to do that is by educating women. The more educated the woman, the more likely she will come to a hospital for delivery. We also thought it would be a good idea for one of the midwives to travel around the homes and deliver, and have the other midwife stay at the hospital, until the mothers trust the midwives and start going to the hospital by themselves. We should have told the midwives that.

We got really hungry and went over to the Sister’s for lunch. The lunch was just as terrific as breakfast: pasta, spinach, boiled potatoes, warm bread, and other good stuff. I really loved Sister Helen’s cooking; I wish she could stay with us at Torit haha. Sooo goooood. Yum! Haha. We met an Italian doctor who took us to the church after lunch. This church was beautiful; we went inside and there were pictures on the walls, rows of benches, and at the very end, the alter. There were also some drums and some string instruments in one brightly lit section, and we started banging on them for some fun. Some schoolchildren started piling in to check out what was going on. They were really hesitant to approach the khawajas, but then they started playing along with us. It was cute. We then went out to the children’s boarding school. It was just several long brick buildings, and the school was in session.

Finally we went back to our rooms and took a small nap before Ed woke us up to go to a monthly staff meeting under a tree, by the hospital. We pulled up our chairs and listened. Sister Florence, Dr. Fred, and some others faced us, went over the agenda, and started addressing the concerns they had in the hospital. They brought up problems with people being late on their shifts, people not putting trash in the correct baskets, people not asking permission before they leave to go somewhere, and about paternal leave. Basically they wanted to be a little bit stricter following the rules of the hospital. Then it started to rain and we all gathered our chairs to sit inside a room within the maternal ward. Emmanuel came in (surprising) but came in late (not surprising). I was furious when I heard from Sister Florence that Emmanuel was not in Isoke when we arrived. And then he finally showed up after Sister pushed him to come today. Good. I can start working on this UNDP interest, which was due in like 2 days. This meeting was supposed to be 2 hours, but it ended up lasting for 4 hours. Everyone talked forever, and Emmanuel talked the most. He wanted to emphasize that it is important for each person to register how many patients enter and leave the hospital so that the donors know and receive the funding necessary. I agree.

So we walked back to the sister’s in the dark for dinner. Dinner, again, was stupendous. Stupendous because there was CHICKEN! Haha. And there were plenty of pieces to eat haha. We also had beans, more pasta, boiled cassava chips, potatoes, and more spinach. Gosh it was so good; I really did not want to leave this place. The best part of it, beside the scenery and the food, was definitely the weather. It was about 10 degrees cooler in Isoke than in Torit, and it made sleeping under a net bearable.

During dinner, we watched the news on TV. This was the first time I had seen television since Nairobi. Obama and Hillary Clinton made a joint appearance, Mugabe won the Zimbabwe elections, and Nelson Mandela was celebrating his 90th birthday. Emmanuel came in, late, and ate with us. Even though his unreliability irritates me, I gotta admit, Emmanuel never fails to make me laugh. Emmanuel, our Health Coordinator, does not vaccinate himself because he is afraid of needles. Pathetic! Haha. Even when there are outbreaks, he claims that his immune system is strong enough. This guy… Then Jerome started to talk about elephants and hippopotamuses at Nimule, and about eating crocodiles. Africans eat some exotic creatures, but even they admit that the Chinese eat animals they would never even dream of eating—snakes, cats, dogs, anything. Hahah I kept laughing at that because it was so true. Then a Sister talked to us about her experience during the war. The SPLA came into Isoke and started to burn down the hospital and the school. They escaped into the mountains and waited until the ceasefire. At one point, the Sister wanted to give up and run away, but then the children piled on top of her to prevent her from leaving. Because of them, she stayed and took care of them. These people never cease to amaze me. Then Ed started to say that forced disarmament would start another civil war because it would stir up tribal rivalries between people like the Dinka and the Taposa. The Dinka soldiers would try to disarm the Taposa, but then the Taposa would get angry and buy their guns from Khartoum. This is a possibility, but people definitely say that the best way for another war to happen is to get the South fighting amongst each other. I just hope that no war happens during our net distribution over the next five years. Nets better help peace in someway, showing that the government is indeed helping its own people.

Saturday, June 28, 2008
We heard a march of children outside our window early in the morning. There were men accompanying them as well, chanting and singing. Apparently they do this every morning as exercise around the town, and it is actually quite festive. Jerome and George went up to hike where the waterfalls were and brought back some tamarind for us to eat. I got up and went to eat breakfast with the sisters, taking in all that good honey. After breakfast, I wanted to get started on the UNDP Interest, but Emmanuel was nowhere in sight…again! He was at another meeting (boy he loves talking in those meetings), so I just sat outside under the trees with Emma, George, and Jerome. I saw Emmanuel come in, and I forced him to sit and draft a letter for the Interest. But then lunch came around (pizza haha!), and he ran away. I hunted for him at the hospital, found him at Sister Florence’s office, and waited until he gave me all the documents he prepared onto my flashdrive so that I had some sort of knowledge about the Diocese’s TB and HIV treatments for me to write these letters on my own. Ed was calling us to leave for Kimatong, so I let Emmanuel off the hook this time around. I pressured him to come to Torit tomorrow so that I could finish this Interest with him, but we all knew he was not going to show up.

So we drove to Kimatong because we wanted to start a small distribution of 500 nets in that small village. The money for these 500 nets were raised by a high school in Palo Alto, and Ed was the one who got them to make sure they would get distributed in time for the rainy season. Kimatong is also a place where Lopez Lomong, the runner, is from. We wanted to make sure this distribution was successful and would serve as a model for our greater distribution throughout Eastern Equatoria.

The road to Kimatong was also very pretty; there were palm trees along the road and dried up river beds surrounded by greenery. We drove on top of a bridge made up of stones, and it was called a lagger. Down the road, closer to Kimatong, we saw herds and herds of cattle in the middle of the road. Just when we thought we passed through one crowd, there were more ahead for us to honk through. The men around the cattle were holding spears, rifles, long bows and arrows, and some bloody meat over their shoulders. They had jewelry around their necks and some had nose rings; their outfits were really mismatched. We waved to them, and they smiled and waved back. Some came over to shake our hands. We got to Kimatong, and it was like another hut village, except that it had some nice buildings set up for school and other purposes and the village was set underneath a big rocky mountain. There were goats walking up it, women coming down with huge barrels of water on their heads, and men sitting along the slope. We parked near a building, and multitudes of children and men greeted us. There was this one man wearing long ragged clothing, who immediately came up to us and attempted to speak English with an American accent. At first I thought he was trying to act cool, but then Ed said he was drunk. He asked us where we were from, and I told him I was American. He tells me as clear as possible, “You know, you are in the Sudan and we here (pause) are black people.” Not shit, Sherlock. He then said I was small and that he should take me as his sister. Let me just tell you, this guy was creepy. We hurried away, behind Ed, and safely by Jerome’s side. We find a group of men sitting in a circle, and they get up to offer us seats. We meet with the chief Hillary, who is very old and thin. There was a man who sat across from us, wanting to give 140 cattle for Emma to marry his son. At first he said 140 bulls (which is obviously a big no), and at first we thought HE wanted to marry Emma. He already had three wives who were all pregnant, and then he had the balls to ask whether he could get a net all to himself. But then we find out he asking for his son to marry, and Ed priced 140 cows. This was all while Emma was away. We always thought 400 cattle was reasonable for someone like Emma, but Ed said that number is merely to impress someone…when someone is really talking about a serious marriage offer, 140 cattle is realistic and very good. Regardless, I couldn’t believe Ed placed a price. We then talked to Peter Lomong, who was very nice but seemed nervous about taking the responsibility to register his people for these nets.

It was getting dark, and I really wanted to get back because I was afraid of bandits on the road. Ed assured me it was safe, but even if it was, it was the most uncomfortable bumpy ride ever. It is harder to see as night, so Ed and Jerome drove over what seemed ALL the potholes on the road. At the same time, George and Emma were trying to scare me about the wildlife nearby. They were waiting to see some leopards, lions, baboons and hyenas jump in front of our car, but I was really happy that the only animals we saw that dark night were cute foxes (or was it deer?), owls, guinea fowl, something small with a long tail, and terrified porcupines! Aww those porcupines were so cute, wobbling ahead of us. Whenever we would stop to switch drivers, I would always imagine some animal launching over the grass, onto where our car was, and attacking us. It never happened, but Emma and George really wanted to come back to the United States with some stories and scars across their shoulders. I was just happy to get back home to Torit, 4 hours later.

Sunday, June 29, 2008
So guess who wasn’t here today again? Emmanuel. Gahh I got so frustrated because the UNDP Interest was due tomorrow, and I had no idea where he was at. So I started on both letters, for TB and HIV, and I kept emailing him throughout the day. I started to get real stressed out because we were supposed to leave for Juba tomorrow and Ed was leaving, so I did not have enough time to do all the other work I wanted to do before he left. Instead, I was stuck doing letters for a proposal I never planned to be doing in the first place, for someone else, but then again, I had the whole Diocese in mind. Dinner rolls around, the U.S. Embassy emails us about a Polio outbreak in Juba, where we were supposed to go tomorrow (I curse because I was last vaccinated in ’92). Pressured, I complete the letters and email them to Emmanuel to print out and sign. I threaten him to come to Torit by 7 AM to deliver his documents otherwise we would be leaving without him for Juba. That was a lie, of course.

Monday, June 30, 2008
I wake up at about 7:30 AM, and I do not see Emmanuel anywhere. I see our Health Clinic Officer, Moses, who brings the documents for Emmanuel instead. But then there is last minute trouble. Emmanuel erased Father Amayo’s signature on the letters, and Ed, Ydo, and Father Amayo are infuriated. I am annoyed too because I spent so much time on those letters and the whole Diocese should get credit, not just Emmanuel. So they have an intense meeting, and Ed comes out to tell me I have to edit the letters again and print them out for Father Amayo to sign. Joseph, who has been in the compound since yesterday, would sign on Emmanuel’s behalf. So we finally get it printed and out of the way. I feel stressed and tired, pack, Ed finishes packing, and we ride off to Juba at about 10 AM.

It was strange driving down this same road without Bishop Paride. I really missed him. We saw a group of furry monkeys climbing a tree at one point on the road, and we really wished we had some bananas to give to them. We stopped by Kudo’s Primary Health Care Center (PHCC) to take some pictures and look around. It was built recently, but it is not yet operational. After much traveling, we finally reached the entrance to the bridge over the Nile. We were at first worried whether we would be stopped at the security checkpoint because our license plate was expired. Ours still had NS (New Sudan) on it, but the government wants everyone to have state license plates (like EES for Eastern Equatoria State) probably for more money. But we did not get checked because it was too hot for the policemen to bother noticing our car’s license plate.

Since we were really hungry at this point, we stopped by the Sister’s Yunice Corner Restaurant, which we ate at nearly everyday with Bishop Paride the last time we were at Juba. I really missed the food, and we had chicken, rice, and chips. We then went straight to the highly-protected UNDP office to turn in our Expression of Interest to this Japanese guy. It was such a huge lift off my shoulders once I handed those papers over to him. Glad that was done. We then dropped off George and Ed at Census for mapping information, and Jerome takes Emma and me to search for hotels. We pick up his other friend, Emmanuel (called Emma…or “ding-dong” for short). They take us first to look at the Sunflower Inn, but it looked really sketch, especially with all these men passing by and looking gleefully at us. Already Emma and I did not want to stay there, and we were relieved when we find out the price was way beyond our reach ($160/night for a single). We then travel to White Nile Lounge, and bargain down the price to $100/night for a double. The place was a lot nicer than the other hotel, but it looked a lot like a trailer park. Even though many things were not working or not even there (like toiled seats or shower heads), the air conditioner worked…which was great for me. :-) There was also wireless internet, which was great for Ed.

We went to pick up Ed and George at Dahabashil (sp?), the popular money-exchange bank, but their group taxi driver dropped them off somewhere not even close to Dahabashil. So we find them under a detergent billboard sign and head off to our meeting with Steve at Malaria Consortium. It was a great 2 hour meeting to update him on all our research and work. The best thing we learn from him is to open up the bags with the mosquito nets when giving them out to people. This decreases the net’s retail value, making them less likely to be sold off to the market. We also got the idea to get a flip chart demonstrating how to use and maintain the nets.

We then went to our hotel and relaxed a bit outside the bar, which overlooked the Nile. It was very cool and nice. We headed over for our dinner party at an Ethiopian restaurant called Queen of Sheba because Steve invited us. The restaurant was in some sort of big Christmas-lighted, beach-style hut, and there were about 20 people at our table. It was very chic, I guess. You could tell a lot of khawajas like to hang out there. The food was very good, especially the chicken curry haha. Cutting the injera with my hands and dipping it into the various vegetables reminded me of Indian food. For a moment, I thought I was home, but it was not spicy enough haha. JK.

We drive back, drop off Jerome to where he was sleeping for the night, and expectantly, get lost. We drive in circles, meet the Sunflower Inn about three times, get closer to our hotel (according to George’s GPS), but find roads that lead into unkempt forest-looking environments. We finally reach the hotel after much testing of roads, and Ed claims he has never felt so happy to come back to a hotel.

Then Emma and I spray our room because there were no mosquito nets, but mosquitoes still managed to enter the room and buzz around my ears the entire night.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008
So today was the day Ed had to leave us. He was supposed to leave at 12:30 PM, but he pushed the flight to 1:30 PM so that he could squeeze in a meeting with the head of PSI in Sudan, Marcie Cook. I am actually glad that he did end up coming because this was a really big meeting for us; this was the woman we were going to send our proposal to for review and possibly approval, and Ed did great with his smooching. Haha JK…he did great in general, providing a lot of useful knowledge about Sudan that the three of us did not know much about. We learn a lot, find out some details about the RFP and when it was possibly coming out, and find out some more about changes in PSI’s plans for net distribution. We find out that the original plans they had written out a year ago in their proposal to the Global Fund will be slightly different, so we are going to take those into account when the RFP releases. I liked her a lot. So far, PSI has made some really good impressions on me. If I actually do decide to go into Public Health in the future, I really really would not mind working for an organization like PSI that is so knowledgeable, so successful, and so on top of their shit the way they are. They have done a lot of successful campaigns in other countries…they are just so good.

We then raced Ed to the airport, where he still had to buy his ticket. It took a good hour before he said his final goodbyes. I tell you, right when he left, there was definitely a void in the car. I already missed his endless talking and around-the-clock urgent work meetings. We went to the Sister’s for lunch again, but it was unusually quiet and empty. At one moment, we thought we saw Bishop Paride, and my heart lept. But it was someone else. We went to census again, but the guy we were looking for was not there. We then went to an auto mechanic shop to get our Pajero fixed, but it took way longer than we expected—about 3 hours. I just slept in the back of the car as they were fixing it, and then I was so happy to get out of there once it was fixed. Juba is a lot different than I remembered it to be the last time we were here. It is a lot more dusty…and dirty. The dirt roads seem narrower, meandering, and extremely bumpy. There is a lot more sewage, dilapidated tin-roofed shops, and people walking around then I recall. It was also less…green. I never thought I would like Torit more.

We went to the hotel, relaxed, and then headed out for dinner. Jerome picked up his friend Emmanuel, who took us to another Ethiopian restaurant, but this one was well-lit and had no khawajas in site. We shared all our dishes, surprisingly chatted for a good 2 hours about things not even closely related to work (we were not with Ed anymore, so what do you expect?), laughed a lot, while I drank water and the 4 of them shared beers. Man they drank a lot.

We got back safely and slept.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008
We still woke up really early so that we could leave for Torit as soon as possible. Emma and I wanted to get out of icky Juba, but we still had to go to census. We waited around for the person, but he never came. So we left, stopped by WFP (World Food Program) for Jerome to pick up something, and headed over to meet Dr. Charles Lewis from Tearfund. He was super sweet and gave us some good tips about letters to the Minister, the health budget for 2009, and about the intimidating Dr. Baba we were planning to meet the next time we came to Juba. I am so glad we established a connection with Chris Lewis; I see his name in so many of the South Sudan Health Forum messages.

We go over to the Sister’s for the last time and shake our hands with the schoolchildren as they politely ask, “Morning! How are you?” So cute haha. We then leave for Juba. As expected, this 83 mile trip took 3 hours, but it felt even longer without Ed. We arrived at our compound in Torit, but the whole place seemed empty. I greeted Father Amayo and talked to him for awhile. Ydo had left for the Netherlands. I got back to the rooms and noticed a nice office set up about two doors down. Guess whose it was? Emmanuel’s. He was here finally, doing some work. Although I wanted to snap at him for his behavior, it is really hard for me to get mad at him. Even when I resist, he somehow always manages to make me smile. Jerk. Haha jk. We did not do much today because were tired and wanted to get some rest after all that traveling. So I finally caught up on some blogging...and munched on a lot of sweet dates Father Amayo brought from Khartoum.

Thursday, July 3, 2008
Just when I thought I would be able to sleep in without Ed being here, I cannot. I still wake up pretty early and check my emails, only to find Ed on google chat. So I talk to him about business we needed to do today. With George, I work on a health budget spreadsheet that Dr. Charles Lewis wanted all the NGOs to fill out for the Ministry of Health. The deadline was tomorrow, but we finished it fairly quickly. And then I continued blogging; now I have already caught up (except for my days at Juba).

We are waiting for Emmanuel’s MOU and the letter from Chris Lewis to get our ACTs from other counties. So as of now, we have been having a fun time planning out our small party for tomorrow’s 4th of July celebration. There will be about 15 or so people, and we are going to get a whole mess of food: chickens, beef, sodas, beer, bread, home-made fries, ketchup, beans…just an all out obnoxious American time. But of course, we are going to help out with the cooking because no one knows how to grind up beef and make hamburgers here. Also, chickens take some time.

George managed to set up speakers in our Pajero and play music from our iPods. Haha it was great. I never thought I would miss hearing some hardcore American music so much. Everyone here listens to sappy songs. I have heard so much Shania Twain, Aerosmith, Backstreet Boys, Westlife, and slow songs in general, which gets really old when you want to here some rock or hip hop.

So tomorrow we are going to wake up early, buy some chickens and other food items from the market, prepare the dinner, build a bonfire, and sport our red, white, and blue American clothing. Haha. Too bad there are no firecrackers here.

-Neesha

Reminders (I should stop calling these reminders…they are not really reminders):
Mom, I have lasted for a long time without owning anything from Apple. But now…I want an iPod. I gave in after listening to Emma and George’s today.