Ice Cream is Here.....!

Hey all! Sorry about not posting in awhile. Things have been a bit hectic. But here I am in Mtwara town- 8 hrs away from my village and the land of Pringles, Snickers, and ice cream. That last item of yumminess only very recently arrived here in my REGION and on my bus ride here it was all that I could think of. Now, one Snickers, two different kinds of potato chips, one juice, and one thing of ice cream later, my stomach is doing some flip flops. But I am happy, essentially :) I am here in town on Peace Corps business of sorts. We just had a test run in case of an emergency. I think the office is gearing up for the event of madness in light of this October's national elections and want to see how long it takes each of us in country to reach our consolidation point. Something like that. Sorry if that didn't make much sense.

So whats new? Not much really. Recently went to Masasi in my secondary school's pick up truck with a peer educator student of mine to pick up stuff for a party that I'm having for my peer eds (13 of em) on Saturday. Mostly in honor of the Form Four students who are graduating from my school. Among my peer eds there are six Four Fours. The kids are cooking early Saturday morn and I promised brownies and nice certificates. Brownies I tried cooking the other day on my favorite mama's charcoal stove and they turned out not bad. Not terribly tasty like my friend Heidi makes em, but not bad at all. Cocoa is available here and the rest is just eggs and flour and sugar and butter (I use tasty margarine instead :) ). It was kind of fun walking around the market with my student and a list of things to get (such as: garlic, onions, rice, tomatoes, cooking oil). I'm excited about this party though my counterpart at the school left me to work it out on my own (he left the last minute to go to a seminar in another part of the country. Teachers here do that a lot in the middle of the school year. And you wonder why the students do poorly on national exams...). I'm a bit nervous about this small speech that I have to make. It has yet to be written but I look forward to working on it with some people in my village so that my Swahili will be in tip top shape!

Sorry, my time is running low here! Check out my friend Brian's site! He's all the way on the opposite side of the country from me, but its still Tanzania and he's a great writer :) His link is on the side under Jens. Or at least I hope it is! Just made the change :) Miss you all.

ONE YEAR mark of leaving hom passed. I have survived!!!! :)