It's Christmas.

So I was prepared to be bitter and sad as I wrote about Christmas today. But I’m not. I feel lucky. I am experiencing new places, meeting new people and doing amazing work. Even though I don’t get to be with my family in the comforts of a traditional American Christmas, I am waking up in Africa. The rain is pouring down, I am drinking tea and I will get to spend the day here in Mongu with new friends as we pull together to create a day celebrating where we are. And I feel quite lucky to be here.

I hope that wherever you are, you enjoy this day. Merry Christmas! 

The amazing Patrick and Carl - my own Christmas miracles.





Our feast.  The squash at the top were for my benefit.





I had some trouble setting the automatic timer.



But we finally got a group photo before sitting down to eat.

Can Talk.

Suppose you were given a random topic to talk about for 3 minutes in front of a group?  What would you say?   It doesn't sound that difficult until you are standing in front of the room trying to make something up.   Talk about your first love.  Explain a recipe.  Talk about the most boring meeting you have ever attended.  The idea is to use your creativity to make it interesting and engaging.  So I just finished a workshop where we had to successfully complete this exercise which was done as a way to get people comfortable talking in front of groups.  The training was done both to teach us about the essential medicines and medical supplies logistics system used here in Zambia and then we also learned how to teach others about this logistics system (a training of trainers).  Eventually, I will get the opportunity to teach health center, hospital and other ministry of health staff how to use the logistics systems that are essential in the process of ensuring that drugs are available for use here in Zambia.  So during the training we were being molded into trainers.  The training was actually quite good.  Long.  But good.  We stayed in a hotel which was in a town called Kitwe which is in the Northwestern part of Zambia (the Copperbelt) for a couple of weeks.  This is where they have all of the mines.  They mine mostly copper but also other minerals.  We passed one of the largest open pit mines during some of our travels there in the region (I will try to post pictures later).  The town itself wasn't much but it was quite big and more developed in comparison to Mongu (I’m learning most areas are more developed than Mongu in general).  So, I took advantage of shopping in the big grocery store, going to the market to buy material, enjoying some decent food, and hanging out with my fellow JSI friends.  One of the staff who was with me in Mongu mentioned that I didn’t have my “Mongu face on.”  When I questioned him as to what this meant he just said that I looked more lively and happy during the training...being out of Mongu.  I guess having a social life and friends around will do that?  Hmm…I have got to find some social networks in Mongu.  This is not going to be an easy task.