Let me begin by clarifying the title of this post. When I say “amusing” I generally mean that the journey can be called amusing NOW, but at the time it didn’t appear quite so funny to me.

I recently went down to Maseru for a few to days. I happened to make the mistake of leaving on a Sunday…when there are fewer taxis and cars on the road making the trip much longer. The trip down was relatively unexceptional, apart from the fact it took me forever. I usually start my trip by taxi, going from Mokhotlong to Botha Bothe, and then hitch hike from there. One the way down I saw two things of interest. 1) SNOW. Yup, snow…in April. It was not a welcome site. 2) A large overturned truck on the mountain pass. This wouldn’t be considered of interest usually because its fairly common. But this time it was surrounded by what I can only describe as the Lesotho version of an environmental hazmat team. It was super strange. Hitch hiking is really common among PCVs here, but to Basotho we’re crazy. This one guy who was on my taxi even offered to pay for my taxi so I wouldn’t have to hitch hike. It was a sweet offer but no thanks. I was lucky to get a hitch (that’s cool kid slang for hitch hike for those of you not in the know) with a big truck, which was lucky. I finally made it to Maseru at around 4:30.

My trip to Maseru did have some high points though. One of the main reasons I made the trip was to meet with the US Ambassador, Michele Bond. I had met her a couple of weeks ago at the Peace Corps 50th Anniversary Press Conference. She was nice enough to agree to meet with me to talk about the Foreign Service (something I’m strongly considering for those who didn’t know). She has had an incredible career and it gave me a lot to think about. Later that day, I met with another member of the embassy staff who had recently gone through the whole Foreign Service Officer Test process. The meeting was really helpful and he gave me good advice about preparing for the exam, which I’m taking in June. Overall: good day. (Plus I got to hang out with Melissa so obviously it was going to be a good day  ).

The journey back home is the amusing part of the journey. A fellow volunteer was nice enough to let me crash at her house for the night before heading back, thanks Chante! I was out at the road in TY looking for a lift at around 6:30am. It took me a little while but I finally landed one. These two ladies picked me up, a mother-daughter pair it turned out to be. Things started off pretty normal with them, typical small talk. Then the conversation turned. They were almost sneaky about starting the religious conversation. It began with politics, then turned to evolution v creationism. Then before I really knew what was happening they were reading to me from the bible! In Sesotho and English! It was really hard not to laugh because all I could think was “OMG this is really happening!” They legit spent a good 45 minutes subtly trying to convert me into a Jehovah’s Witness. They were really nice about it though lol. And when they dropped me at the road they gave me some literature to read.

My next lift was with a police officer and nothing particularly exciting happened. I was still in shock from the Jehovah’s. My final lift was with a group of young people. They were really nice and were going to Mokhotlong! I thought I was pretty lucky…until I found out they were only going to Letseng Diamond Mine (2.5 hours from my house). When we finally got to Botha Bothe I decided that I would be better off taking a taxi to Mokhotlong. So they dropped me at the taxi rank and I got myself a taxi. That turned out to be an excellent decision because we drove past their broken down car later on. The taxi rank is always a little bit funny (and entirely frustrating). You never know what you’ll encounter. This time I was witness to a young man trying to stuff a fairly large dog into a maize meal sack. The dog was not thrilled with this plan, but he eventually succeeded. To paint you a word picture of the scene: a big white sack with a dog’s head poking out of the top. Luckily my taxi driver made him take a different taxi. Things were going pretty smoothly until we reached Moteng Pass (a steep mountain pass as you enter Mokhotlong). All of a sudden the taxi stops, there’s some chatter and then people start getting out. Now all this happens in Sesotho so I had to ask the guy sitting next to me if I’m supposed to get out. Getting out of the taxi is not desirable for two reasons: 1. Moteng Pass is steep and walking up it is not fun, 2. it COLD OUT. The taxi couldn’t make it up that particular part of the road with all of us in it, so out we went. But it was almost worth it because another taxi was stopped as well. We all had a front row seat to the dog show. The dog I mentioned earlier had attempted to escape by poking its legs through the sack and running away. It was really funny. Eventually I made it home and took a long needed nap.

Technically my journey was over. But yesterday something happened that relates to the overall craziness of the trip. I was walking home from town and was about 3 minute from my house when I came across a woman and her 2 sons. The woman approached me and claimed she had seen me before. I figured, sure ok, chit chat and all that…be polite. Then, all of sudden BAM. It happens again! Out comes the bible and she’s trying to get me to join the Lord. That makes twice in 2 days. I swear something about me must just scream HEATHEN!

Anyways, I hope you all enjoy your Easter holiday!

So this post is going to be brief. Its mostly just to quickly update on my least favorite kind of weather....WINTER. It has arrived. What does that mean exactly? It means that I'm extra cold and that soon it will snow. For those of you who've forgotten or are new to this blog I'll remind you about my housing situation. I live in a concrete house with a tin roof...aka a freezer. Bummer for me.

Other than that there isn't too much new to report on my end. My garden is thriving (which is shocking). I have exactly 2 cucumbers (they're about 3 inches long at present, and were planted before thanksgiving lol) and the tomatoes that I did NOT plant but grew anyways are doing excellent as well (although this cold weather is threatening their well-being).

On the American side, this government shut down has my attention (Peace Corps is a government agency you know). I'm sad I'm not there to really follow the action...sigh.

Ohh well...that's all I really wanted to say. We're having a bit of an after work dance party at WFP now.

3 more months to go!!!!!

So I this is the first chance I’ve really had to sit down and write an update…and there is quite a bit to update so I apologize in advance for the length of this post.

At the beginning of February my mom and sister came to visit me! It was a total blast. I took some public taxis to Joburg so I could meet them at the airport when they arrived. Good news being that I survived the Joburg taxi rank all by myself! This for those of you who don’t know, is a pretty significant feat because that particular rank is quite intimidating. I stayed our backpackers for a night by myself and went to grab them at the airport the next morning. Almost immediately after we got to the backpackers we set off on our adventure for the day: the Joburg Elephant Park. We got a tour of the park in a van and saw lots of animals (zebras, springbok, etc) and then drove through the lion sanctuary. The lions are really cool; there were two kinds, regular lions and white lions. Then we saw some cheetahs and other cats. After the driving tour we got to go and touch a bunch of lion cubs. They are sooo cute and soft. Then we went to feed the giraffes. You stand on this raised platform and the giraffes just come up and eat the food right out of your hand. It was really fun, but also kind of gross. Giraffes have super long, black tongues that can seriously wrap around your whole hand…if you don’t believe me just check out my facebook picture (Jess caught my complete surprise at the nasty tongues!). It was a great way to spend our one day in Joburg.

The next day we flew to Livingston, Zambia. The weather was AMAZING…which for my family who came from the snow covered US was a treat. The backpackers we stayed at was really cool, great pool, cool cushions all over the place to sit on, good food, etc. We went on an elephant safari on our first full day. It was amazing! We each got to pick an elephant to ride (with a handler who chatted fun facts to you) and ride around the park on an elephant. We saw cool birds and got to walk/ride through the Zambezi River. At the end we got to sit on our elephants’ leg and feed them! My elephant was hilarious because he’s apparently an eating machine. Throughout the safari he would veer off and grab a tree to eat. After the feeding was over they fed us humans some breakfast and showed us the video of our ride. It was such a fun day. That night we went on a sunset booze cruise on the Zambezi. It was gorgeous and we even saw a crocodile. The next day we decided to be adventurous, mom less “decided” and was more “forced.” We went zip lining over this huge gorge. Jess and I opted to go “Superman,” where the harness was behind you so you flew like Superman. Mom chose option number two, where you are essentially sitting and can hold the rope. It was EXCELLENT. Also scary. You legit run and jump off a cliff. They even let us go twice each…mom of course thought once was more than enough for her lol. Then we got dropped off at Victoria Falls. If you ever have the chance, go to Vic Falls…its incredible. We decided to walk down to the bottom of the falls first, called the Boiling Pot. The walk down is crazy. There were baboons that would walk right in front of you…ask Jess how close if you get the chance (she had a not so great experience with one lol). The walk is totally worth it. The view from the bottom is insane! The walk back up is less fun. Then we walked over to the top side of the falls. That time of year has SO much water that once you get anywhere near them you’re soaking wet. We ran into some crazy Zambian twins who took like 100 photos of me and Jess who were absolutely drenched. We opted to rent ponchos. We got soaked but the view is more than worth it. So beautiful! After leaving the Falls we spent some time in the market outside getting some souvenirs. I even bartered my hair elastic to help Jess get a drum or something. The rest of our time in Zambia was pretty relaxing. Chilling out by the pool, checking out the local craft market, reading books and magazines. Then it was time to leave.

We rented a car in Joburg so we could drive to Lesotho. At the airport we were lucky enough to run into my friend Rocio, who was going to miss meeting the fam to go to her sister’s wedding in America. It was one of those crazy chance meetings that never happen in real life lol. We stopped over in Clarens, SA before heading to Lesotho. It’s a cute little town with lots of B&Bs. Then we set off for the mountains of Lesotho. It was a crazy drive; the weeks of endless rain wreaked havoc on the roads. We all took turns driving, with mom being the maniac who punctured the tire. But we managed to get a guy to help us change the flat and we made it safe and sound to Mokhotlong. It was nice to get to show my new home to my family and for them to experience the kind of life I live here…bucket baths, pee buckets, sheep everywhere. We spent a relaxing few days in Mokhotlong before heading down to Maseru. In Maseru I got to introduce the fam to the Peace Corps Office, and a bunch of my friends (who were awesome enough to come in for the day to meet them!). We all went out to lunch at a local Chinese food place where mom and Jess got to see first hand some of the cultural differences that exist between Americans and Basotho. The next day we set off early to go to the tiny Bloemfontein Airport. It was sad to say goodbye to my family. It had been almost two years since I had seen them and we had a really fun time together. But I think they had a good vacation and it was a nice break from the usual for me.

Things have been fairly slow since the family left. It took me a few days to readjust back to my life here. But things are just about back to normal now lol. The weather is starting to get cooler, the kids are back in school…everything’s moving forward. I only have about 3.5 months left so everything is moving really fast. The future is exciting and terrifying all at once. Not having a job or place to live is scary. But I’ll be taking the Foreign Service Test in June and am starting the job search. Two years goes by pretty fast…4 months goes by even faster. I’m looking forward to getting stuff done in my last few months and spending time with the friends I’ve made here.

Its funny, I was thinking about “life” on my walk to town today…you tend to contemplate weird stuff while you walk around here, what else are you going to do? I’ve been looking back at my two years here a lot lately. The thing I’ve noticed is that with Peace Corps you might not have the big obvious “successes” that you have in other types of jobs. I don’t necessarily have things to “show” for what I’ve done here. That used to make me uncomfortable. I think it’s culturally ingrained in us that successes need to be tangible in some way…you do your job well you get a promotion/raise, assignments get done and you move on to the next, and the next after that, there’s a structure and a system to doing everything. My life here is nothing like that. Many of the “accomplishments” I’ve made here you can’t even really quantify and its difficult to put them into words. I’ve lately been redefining what I think of as “success.” I've had some great break throughs...awesome workshops that I designed and facilitated, getting my organization to do condom demos at HIV events. But many of my successes are less related to structured “work” than to more abstract random events…like getting a four year old to call you by your name and not “white person,” or walking through a school campus and giving high-fives to little kids, even having people come to your house to hang out with you. I don’t know what effect I’ve had on people, or if anyone is any better off because of the work that I’ve done here, but I like to think that I’ve made some kind of a difference, if nothing else than that all the kids in this town know what a high-five is.

Well...I'm back in Lesotho, which means my vaca is OVER...sigh...

But GOOD NEWS! It was AMAZING. Here's what happened...

First, I went to the lowlands (Mafeteng) to stay with my friend Melissa on Christmas Eve (which is where I was last year for those of you keeping track). We had a blast getting all excited for CT...highlights of that visit being watching Melissa get her head straight razored...SO funny.

We met Elissa, Jessica, Mike, and Evan at the border and set off for Bloemfontein where we would catch the bus on Christmas Night. Everything was closed at the mall so we obviously had to take advantage of an empty mall to take funny photos with their xmas decorations...Eventually we all split up and saw some movies to kill time (also to splurge because thats what we do). The bus ride was long (12 hours) but not too bad. When we finally got to Cape Town it was awesome. Big buildings, lights, people, sidewalks...We spent the first day walking around. It was technically a national holiday so not that much was open. We did have this SUPER good Mexican food. I feel like this would be a good time to inform you all that food is going to come up ALOT in this post, to put it into context for you, there is VERY LITTLE ethnic food in Lesotho so we get REALLY excited about variety. The next day Jess, Elissa and I want to Stellenbosch.

Stellenbosch is the hub of the SA wine region. Our first day we went on a 6 hour wine tour. Fun times all around. We even created our own 5 star rating system. We also learned some tips to be snobby when drinking wine in public (ex. you don't "smell" or "sniff" wine, you "nose" it). The best part of the day was this one winery with cheese...I can't even describe to you how delicious the cheeses were..in particular was this one goat/cow cream cheese wrapped in garlic and herbs...OMG. Needless to say we all bought some lol. Stellenbosch was a cute little city/town (kind of like Gloucester is a "city" but is much more like a "town").

When I got back to CT I went with the girls to the V&A Waterfront...aka a huge mall by the ocean. Ohhh developement....

One really cool thing to see in CT is the Bo Kaap. The Bo Kaap is a tradtionally Muslim neighborhood built in the 1870s (I think..) and all the buildings/houses are painted different colors. After visiting the museum we realized that there is really no reason for doing so..which is sort of anti-climactic but still a site to see. Ok. So many of you know I was going to Shark Diving...sigh...I did. However, I happened to be on only the second tour that year to see no sharks. Did you just hear my heart break? Because it did. It was still fun though. I learned about sharks and wore a wetsuit and still went into the cage.

One of the biggest attractions in CT is Table Mountain. Unluckily for us, the weather was not really cooperating with visiting the site! Just about every day it was closed because this super cool looking cloud was just sitting on top and also it was quite windy out...hence the closure. But LUCKY for us it opened on our last full day in CT!! It is SOO BEAUTIFUL up there. We took the cable car up, which does this cool floor spin thing that allows you to see 360 degree around. It was the perfect day weather wise and we set off on a little walk/hike. Well of course 5 mins into it my shoe broke...typical lol. Jessica and I turned back..with me walking around, looking like a total freak mind you, with no shoes on (my theory was that it looked less dumb walking around with NO shoes than with just one). Me and Jess still had a good time being silly tourists and making spectacles of ourselves...we may have taken a nap on a big rock...maybe...

There happened to have been many PCVs in CT while we were there. They we're staying too near us but we did manage to hang out. Especially at night. I'll tell you this. CT at night is FUN. We didn't NOT stay out dancing til 4am...

Overall I had a spectacular time with the ladies and have discovered that CT is EPIC. GO THERE IF YOU CAN!!!

It took me 27 hours to get home, which was NOT fun. Also, returning from a sunny paradise to a rainstorm mud pit sucked alot. One funny thing that happened was that Haley (another PCV) and I got a lift from this one man who once finding out we worked for Peace Corps, decided we were really spies. AWESOME. Except I'll tell ya RIGHT NOW there are no pertinent secrets to be found here lol. It was good to be back in my own house again though.

Since being "home" basically 2 things have happened. I became friends with my deaf neighbor who I estimate is roughly 16-18 years old. She has these SA sign language posters that she brings out to teach me...PS American sign language is NOT the same. It has been a really neat experience for me. Challenging though because some stuff she tells me is not on the posters...

The second thing is that my group finally had our Reconnect (a training workshop type thing that happens at your year mark but was REALLY delayed for us). It was great to see my other group mates again and hear about what they've been up too. We only have 5.5 more months!! CRAZY!

Other than that its pretty much been business as usual. Right now we are having a belated birthday dinner party for Parker (who is adorably caring for our neighbors puppy at this very moment).

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Years!

Hi All,

Today is Christmas Eve, so first off let me wish you all a Merry Christmas. Christmas here pretty much is like any other time of year, you wouldn't know it was near Christmas by looking as there are no festive lights, music, or any of the things we've come to know and love about this time of year. Also, its summer haha.

I've had a lot going on lately, but unfortunately I haven't had internet in 2 months (gasp!) and haven't been able to update. Work has taken a surprising turn since Novemeber. I decided that I would make some manuals to build up the capacity of my organizations faciliation of workshops and trainings. The first was on games and activities to play that can enhance workshops and make them more interactive. It also made me realize that Simon Says is a very difficult game to describe using only words...seriously, try it. The second was on facilitation skills. GROW is starting some new projects right about now and its my job to sort of organize them and keep them on track. To be honest I don't really understand what exactly I'm supposed to be doing, but I figure I'll figure it out. At least its something to do.

In November I also got my first taste of the African stomach parasite/amobea. Let me tell you, you don't want one of those! A bunch of people got sick around the same time but no one knows for sure what caused it. It was incredibly NOT fun at all. But a round of antibiotics later I was good as new. Hooray!

We had a really fun Thanksgiving this year. I went with some friends to Semonkong and celebrated with a bunch of PCVs. Here are the highlights:

-Donkey Pub Crawl. Its exactly what it sounds like. Irena, Karolina, Brandon and I made t-shirts and were a "team"...Team Top Deck and we were each one suit in a deck of cards. Karolina was also a pirate haha and she painted our faces. She also made us pom poms and wrote some cheers for us to perform on the crawl. Then we all set of atop donkeys to various local bars in the area. It was so much fun. Pictures will come later :)

-Beautiful scenery. Semonkong is beautiful, especially this time of year. And it had been raining a ton so the falls were BOOMING.

-Fun Turkey hats. Our friend Ronan had all these craft supplies and helped us make hilarious turkey hats to were to dinner. They were all different and really funny. Mine was a gangster in case you were wondering.

-Amazing food. The Lodge made a traditional Thanksgiving meal for us that was absolutely amazing. First, I've been dreaming about turkey for about a year and a half now, so that was a major plus of dinner. Here's the menu: a carrot mouse with a leek and scallion sauce (soooo good), then mashed potatoes, grean beans, bread, gravy, cranberry sauce, turkey, stuffing, and fresh salad. For dessert, which we barely had room for but somehow managed to eat, homemade pumkin pie and homemade vanilla ice cream. Yum.

In the beginning of December the High Altitude Marathon was held in Mokhotlong. My friend Eric from TTL ran in it. It was really fun to watch. Eric did an amazing job and made it in under 4 hours! After the marathon we a had a little party at TTL with Rocio, Kevin, Eric, and I. We ate lots of food and drank tons of beer (hey, Eric had been training for months and therefore a drunken celebration was called for).

This past weekend, GROW had their annual party. I managed to convince all the PCVs and assorted white people to come. So Me, Rocio, Sara, Parker, Kevin and Eric rolled into the party together. It was a total blast! We danced to crazy Bastho music and basically just danced the night away...with the help of some local beers. It was a good end to the year and a good opportunity to interact with some locals in a fun way.

Well, I've pretty much said all I wanted to say. I'm headed down to Melissa's house in Mafeteng today so we can leave for Cape Town tomorrow! Can't wait!

Merry Christmas!

I know its been a really long time since my last update, clearly I haven't gotten any better at keeping this blog updated.

Since my last update many things have changed. All of the volunteers who went to America returned, with the exception of one. Its been great having them back. Luckily for me, my friend Rocio recently moved into my district and we're essentially neighbors! Its been amazing having her around.

October was a pretty eventful month for me. I spent some awesome times with the people in my district, especially Kelsey and Sara. (Although Kelsey is saddly living in a new district now). We all needed to de-stress a bit and had some spontaneous adventures together that I can't really get into the details of right now...Peace Corps rules and whatnot. But it involved a super fun fake bachelorette party, mixed drinks, and shopping :)

I also went on a mini vacation to Bleomfontein with Irena. We mainly went so we could go to the zoo. Turns out that the zoo is kind of ridiculous. They don't seem to know very much about the animals they have there. For example, the leopard area. There was an "informative" sign outside the leopard area read "spotted leopard/cugar/puma." FALSE. Those cats are not the same as the zoo would have you believe. Other animals areas were unlabeled, or labeled incorrectly. But it was fun all the same. A highlight was when we first got there and there was a man cleaning some small cages and changing the lightbulb in a snake cage. Sensing an opportunity, I asked if I could hold the snake (not thinking at all that he would say yes...its a zoo, not a petting zoo after all). But to my surprise the guy was like "ok." So I got to hold the Commn Corn Snake at the zoo. Oh Africa....

I got to do some actual work during October as well. At the beginning of the month I finally got to hold my Peer Educator Training Workshop. I had written the workshop about 2 months earlier but it was cancelled on me again. Sara and Kelsey attended it to help out and be supportive which was nice. I worked really hard on it and was really happy with the outcome. I taught them about being a leader, leadership skills, communication skills, and important qualities in a Peer Educator. I'm hoping that its something that can be repeated by GROW after I leave, because the Peer Educator Trainings that they currently hold are not particularly effective or appropriate. I also met with my youth group a few times (in Spetember I think though). In our first meeting we made tortillas at my house. Many students live alone or with extended family and are responsible for their own cooking and traditional bread can be a lot of time and work for them to make. Tortillas are fast and easy to make and require less ingredients (and therefore money) to make so it suits them. They had a good time making them. At another meeting we did arts adn crafts. We cut out their first initial from cardboars and then collaged it with magazine cutouts of things that describe them/they like. It was really funny and they get something to hang in their houses as a bonus.

One of the most fun work related things I got to do was go to a former PC Volunteer Lorian's Habitat for Humanity event in Maseru district. There were a bunch of houses built in one village and there were tons of volunteers to help complete them. Most of the PC volunteers were at one house where we plastered the walls. It was so much fun. Its surprisingly hard work and it was just a blast to hang out with people and help build a house for a family in need.

Some misellaneous stuff that have happened in October were crazy. First, I had my first official Couch Surfer stay (Couch Surfering is through an internet site where people let you stay at their place for free which is great for traveling on a budget). He was a really nice guy and it was fun having someone new to talk to for a day. I unfortunately had to take a lot of public transport and it was certainly eventful. For my 4.5 hour taxi ride to BB (closest camptown) I had to ride with the biggest, grossest SHEEP behind me..less than a foot from my head. It was unpleasant to say the least...they smell...BAD. It took up the whole first row of the taxi. But its makes for a good "this one time in Africa.." story I guess. One the return trip, on the route my taxi broke down 3 times due to engine overheating. The driver, while pouring river water into the engine to cool it down, sprayed boiling dirty engine water all over my purse...I was less than enthused about the events of the ride.

November hasn't been too eventful. I happened to be in Maseru while Irena's mom was visiting and so I got to meet her have lunch at this amazing place in Ladybrand. Her mom is so cute and I'm so glad I got to meet her. I'm currently in Maseru, due to leave this afternoon and it is unlikely that I'll get to return anytime soon. Policies have been changing a lot lately and PC has decided to close the Training Center where we stay here in Maseru. They are doing it because they want us all to be safe and Maseru is becoming a problem. But no need to worry folks, I've lived in much more dangerous places, and in Mokhotlong there is a greater danger of being ran into by a sheep than attacked by a criminal. :)

Looking forward to Thanksgiving and my Christmas/New Years vaca in Cape Town with my girl friends! Miss you all

So by this point I'm sure most of you have heard about what happened here earlier this month. Our friend and fellow Peace Corps Volunteer was shot and killed. It was a very difficult time for our Peace Corps family. The majority of volunteers came to Maseru to be together and there was a beautiful memorial service for Tom as well. A handful of volunteers chose to go back to America for counceling and hopefully all of them will return, but our thoughts are with them now. Things are slowly returning to normal, but unfortunately things will never be the same. But I wanted to quickly update you all and say thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers over the past few weeks.

Love you!

Well, first of all I feel like I should begin by stating that the title of this post was fully stolen from Melissa's facebook photo album of our trip. Now that that's out of the way I want to tell you all about it!

Melissa and I just got back from our Moz (that's what the cool kid's are callin' it) vacation the other day. It was spectacular! We took the bus from Bloemfontein, which is about an hour from Lesotho. We decided to kill time waiting for the bus (11:10 pm)at the mall...so to paint you a mental picture there was me and Melissa with huge backpacks, a tent, and various bags, essentially hiking through the mall. We looked ridiculous, but it was just as funny to us as the people who stared at us lol. Our first bus was 2 hours late, but eventually we made it all the way to Maputo in Moz. We only stayed for one night though before taking the 5:30 am shuttle to Tofo.

Tofo was so much fun! One of the coolest things about Tofo was the fact that the whole Tofo area was built on sand! The roads are sand, backyards, markets, everything! We stayed right of the beach and pitched our tent in the sand too. On our first full day we went snorkelling and were up close and personal with WHALE SHARKS! It was pretty much the coolest thing ever! We were so close to them! We also saw dolphins :) While in Tofo, we also watched the final matches of World Cup, shopped in the market, and met really cool travelers.

Next we headed further north up to Vilankulo. To get there we had to take a few taxis and even a ferry boat! It was funny because on the ferry we'd hit shallows and teh man in front would have to use a big stick and push us through. We had a super amazing time in Vilankulo. Our backpackers was really laid back and the people staying there were really fun. On our first day we decided to go snorkelling again, but this time we took a dhow boat (sort of like a sail boat but different) to the Bazaruto Islands to 2 Mile Reef. Melissa and I had the whole Island to ourselves pretty much. We walked the beach and then went in the warm water to see some fish. Before we left the backpackers, and before we went in the water we had been repeatedly warned that "the reef is sharp." But aparently that didn't quite sink in with us...until we hit the reef and left the water bleeding lol. The reef surrounded the island, and to get in and out you had to step on the reef. Melissa cut her feet and I cut up my hand. But I saw an octapus, a neon blue lobster, and tons of fish. Then our guides made us a lunch of fresh crabs and salads...delicious. That night we went to this local place called Mohammed's and had the best calamari and crabs ever, which were fresh from the market that day. The next day we found out that just about everone from our backpackers was going out to the islands so we managed to squeeze our way into that trip too. This time we went to a different island that had incredible sand dunes and all kinds of cool fish. It was really fun to bond with the other travellers. Unfortunately I got sick that night, but luckily it didn't last long. Our last day in Vilankulo was a lazy day which was nice.

Next we took public transport back to Tofo for a night en route back to Maputo and Lesotho. Our shuttle left Tofo at 4 am so instead of going to bed we just stayed up and went dancing all night :)

Our last day in Maputo was pretty nice. We went to the market and got lots of crafts and ate good food and basically had a good time. We really didn't want to leave though! But sadly all good things must come to an end and we had to return to our Lesotho lives...and the freezing weather....

So I'm breaking my pattern of waiting weeks in between postings because this is a bit of a slow week and I had a really fun morning.

So I've mentioned in this blog before about the other NGO in Mokhotlong called Touching Tiny Lives (TTL). TTL is an organization that works with malnurished and sick babies, which is pretty amazing. It's nice because I get to go over there whenever I want and play with the adorable babies...they're REALLY cute. This is all just background so you understand about my morning. About 2 months ago TTL took in a little girl named Nteboheng. She is turning 5 years old this weekend actually. When Nteboheng came to TTL she was just shy of 5 years old and weighed only 9kg (or roughly 20 lbs). It was heartbreaking to see her. She was SO thin and weak and frightened about being away from home. In addition, she was really sick and is HIV positive.

However, since coming to TTL Nteboheng has made amazing progress. She has gained weigh and is really outgoing and just plain adorable. She happens to be the oldest child at TTL, and as a result has very little to do during the day. So last week I decided that I would visit her at least once a week for some one-on-one "big girl" time. Today was the first day.

I brought a coloring book (thanks mom) and some crayons so we could color together. It was really fun. Nteboheng is still really young so she doesn't speak any english so communication is interesting with my limited sesotho. She's really smart and she would repeat the names of the colors we were using. I brough some nail polish and painted her fingers and toes too. She loved it! It was so cute watching her hobble around, feining wet nails, to show the women working with the other babies her new nails. It was pretty much the highlight of my whole month just wrestling around and tickling and playing with this little girl. The most hilarious part was watching her play with her doll. She was acting like a typical basotho woman with it. She put the doll on her back and then tied it around her with a little blanket just like the women here do with real babies. I can't wait to go back with my camera and film her doing it.

I'm really excited to spend more time with her because she's such a sweet little girl. Next on the agenda is outside playtime, and finger paint if I can get my hands on some! Overall it was a fabulous day and I thought I would share it with you guys!

TTL has a blog as well if you're interested in what they are doing check them out at touchingtinylives.blogspot.com

So it's already May...Cinco de Mayo actually. I really had very little going on this past month so this is more of a random update.

I spent the first two weeks after coming back from vacation battling a nasty cold...and NO I did not have malaria if that's what you were thinking. During that time I did some business stuff with the mico-loan project with TTL at GROW, but not much else. I did however have a pretty major victory though. Here's the story: GROW was putting on a hastily-put-together HIV/AIDS Sports Tournament in Malfiloane (west of me). I made some inquiries about it because I was curious what they were going to talk about and found that they had no plan, so clearly I needed to insert my skills. Well during the meeting with the GROW guys I managed to convince them, after a heated debate, that we should distribute condoms and do a condom demonstration. It was like a mega high-five moment because culturally Basotho are really closeted about sex related things. The event itself wasn't my favorite time. It's REALLY cold in Malefiloane for starters. But the day began with a road race which was fun to watch. Many people were running either 4 or 10K and not even wearning shoes...dang. But everyone had a good time. I ended up doing a condom demo for a group of like 40 married people, the girl sitting directly in front of me was only like 16 and had a baby. It was really fun for me and was the first time I had ever done one so I was excited about it. The real highlight for me was after when everyone was gathered around the MC table and an older women walked up and grabbed a handful of condoms in front of like 200 people. You have no idea how huge that is...I was super pumped, but obviously I sat there calmly as if this were a normal occurance that didn't surprise me at all. One of the GROW guys even walked around passing the condoms out.

I also managed to meet some new people this month. I randomly got a phone call on Friday afternoon from a girl who got my number through the PC grapevine. So long story short, I had two girls from Holand spend the night at my place. They were super sweet and have been traveling around Southern Africa for a bit. It was nice to chat with them about their experiences and stuff. I had Sara sleep over too just in case they wierd, which as it turns out, they weren't.

My lifeskills classes have been going pretty well, alhtough my 6th graders are not very well behaved. I had them all do an exercise where they had to draw pictures of what they wanted to be when they grow up. Pretty much all the girls wanted to be either a nurse or a teacher, whereas the boys were either doctor, police, or soldiers. I did have an interesting question put into my anonymous question box last week. One of my grade 6ers put in a question asking for help because the people she is staying with, because her parents are working in South Africa, accused her of stealing money and are beating her for it. It sucks. My friend got one the other day from a little girl whose uncle and father are repeatedly raping her. We're both trying to find the best ways to help our students though.

I'm pretty sure that's all that really happened this month. I've read some really good books, hung out with the awesome volunteers at TTL.

thats all for now I guess.

I don’t know about all of you, but it seems to me like March FLEW by. I was lucky enough to have a lot going on. I’m just going to break it down bullet style.

1. Work. So work still isn’t ‘great,’ but at least it was busy. I am now in charge of the microloan project that GROW is doing with the other Basotho organization in Mokhotlong, Touching Tiny Lives. I have been working pretty closely with the two Americans there Kirsten and Kevin on getting things rolling. We are working with 3 groups who are starting small businesses—two chicken projects and one candle making project. Its not super exciting but it’s a chance to get stuff done. We even have to drive through a river to get to one of the groups—I’m being totally serious, we literally drive through the river.

2. Bloemfontein. I had a doctor’s appointment in Bloem and got to go down to Maseru just before my vacation. It was nice to be able to get some internet time and enjoy luxuries like Pick’n Pay and…wait for it…a movie theatre. (I did take some time to see From Paris With Love one afternoon). I had some time to kill in Bloem before my appointment so I went to the mall next door and did some shopping. Really it was just nice to be in a mall, plus it’s hard to resist the draw of new clothes. However, Maseru isn’t the greatest place to be lately because I’ts getting more and more dangerous. Two volunteers were attacked 5 mins after me and 2 others walked the same road they did on the way to where we were staying.

3. Swaziland Vacation. I went on an awesome vacation to Swazi with 4 of my friends: Kaitlin, Elissa, Rocio, and Jessica. We rented a car and drove there. Somehow it took us twice as long as it should have to get there—18 hours. But part of that was having to wait 4 hours at the Swazi border (Easter’s kind of a big deal over here). But the car ride was really fun…nothing like five 20-something girls in a car together.

We managed to check into our hostel at 2 am, at which time the guard at the night gate told us “don’t afraid.” Our hostel was really cool. We stayed at this place called Sondzela, which is inside a game reserve. We could see warthogs and emu’s, zebras, and deer looking things just walking around.

We slept in a bit on the first day because we arrived so late and then hit the craft markets. Swaz is famous for its crafts. We went to Swazi Candles and it was so cool. You can watch then hand molding the candles into awesome animal shapes. The candles are so cool that you would never actually burn them—and since I’m no millionaire I didn’t buy any. I did buy some amazing soap that they make there though. Everyone had told us to go to this place called House of Fire, so there we went. It was a really cool place with interesting architecture and mosaic tiling and quotes on the walls. Next door was this shop selling weavings—woven bowls, placemats, coasters, baskets and stuff. We LOVED the store and all bought a bunch of ‘send to America’ presents.

On Saturday we had our big adventure—white water rafting. It was crazy! We got to the river with about 12 other people and got suited up in our helmets and life jackets. The boats were two man raft/canoes. Me and Elissa were partners. Most of us had zero experience. We got into the water and started going—unfortunately I’m pretty horrible at rafting and have no gift at all for steering. We managed to go over our first rapid fine. But later on the longest rapid our luck changed. The boat flipped and we were in the water. It was by far the scariest experience of my entire life! Being from the ocean I honestly don’t recall ever being in a life jacket, and therefore didn’t know that mine was apparently not tight enough. My jacket slipped up my body and scared me to death because it made it hard to stay above water. After being in the water for what seemed like forever me and Elissa made it into one of the guide’s boats and to shore. We didn’t give up though, and we continued to the last rapid. We watched as boat after boat capsized. On our turn we almost made it when I bounced out lol. Elissa was one of the 2 ½ out of 10 boats that made it on that one. We decided to only do the ½ day rafting and left after lunch. We met up with Kaitlin and did some more craft shopping instead where we met up with Erin and her mom and god mom.

4. Spa. On our last day in Swaz we decided to go pamper ourselves by going to the spa. The spa was really fun. We got to lounge all day in the sauna and just relax. We got massages and the other girls got facials. Having never had a massage before I was totally pumped about it—especially after realizing how sore rafting can leave you. After the spa we grabbed some dinner at a really good Chinese food restaurant and set off for Bleom.

5. The long road home. We had decided to leave on Sunday night and drive through the night rather than risk getting stuck in hours of traffic at the border. We tried a short cut that a man who used to work in Maseru gave us—but that set us back about 3 hours because the border post was closed. Driving all night is both exhausting and hilarious. Elissa and Kaitlin were the drivers because no one else could drive stick, so they took turns napping in the backseat with Ro and Jess. The drive was long, but we all cheered up when we reached a town at just before midnight that had a McDonalds. Part of the ‘short cut’ put us on a pot-hole filled dirt road for 3 hours in a corn field. It was slow going but funny because we saw bunnies and owls and every once and a while Ro would wake up and yell something which would send us all into hysterics. At about 3 am we blew a tire. We got out to survey the damage and it was pretty bad…stupid pot-holes. Luckily Jess is amazing and she managed to change the tire while we all prayed that no car would drive by or stop. It wasn’t until about 5 that we stopped and took a nap on the side of the road for an hour. It wasn’t until about 12 noon that we reached Bloem and we still have no idea how it took us so long. We were all pretty much zombies but still decided to stop at the mall because some of the girls needed some things. I’ve never been so tired in my whole life. But we got on a taxi back to Maseru and were back at the PC Training Center by 5:30. There were lots of people there because everyone goes on vacation over Easter. I was awake for a full 38 hours!

6. Going Home. So I reluctantly took a taxi back home the next day—primarily because I had every intention of spending the whole of the next day sleeping. I wasn’t very lucky with taxis this trip, there were a lot of people who wanted to talk to me, which was the LAST thing I wanted. At the BB taxi rank (about half way home) I used the gross public bathroom. On the way out an ntate started yelling something at me, which I ignored because every man you walk by in the rank tries to say something to you. About 10 minutes later a police man comes up to me and tells me that you have to pay for the bathroom lol. The man who yelled at me outside the bathroom had got the policeman and followed me all the way to the other side of the rank just to collect 50 cents…

But now I’m home and getting back into the swing of things in my chilly mountains. My vacation was a huge success and was super fun.

Hope you all had good Easter holidays!

Finally I’m updating the blog…again I’m sorry about being fairly terrible at doing so. I blame it mostly on having very little to update about.

So a few things have happened since I last updated.

Phase III—I had my final training phase at the end of January—where my group (CHED 09) was all together again for 10 fun filled days of sessions. I think we were all pleasantly surprised at how everything went. We all got along really well and the sessions weren’t as bad as we all thought they might be. Some of the highlights were going to Semongkong and Ladybrand. Peace Corps took us to Semongkong to visit another PCV, Nick, and learn about gardens. It was a great day. We got to go to the waterfall there, and it was beautiful. I’m looking forward to going back there and abseiling (repelling) down the falls. The next day we got to go to Ladybrand, which is like 30 min. away in South Africa. Peace Corps treated us to an amazing lunch at this place called Living Life, where they grow all their own veggies and it’s basically just awesome. Our program director Charles made this great crossword puzzle for us to use to get to know Ladybrand, so after lunch we had a little scavenger hunt to complete the puzzle. We had 2 days full of Sesotho class and I was actually really glad to be in them. I use very little Sesotho in Mokhotlong and it was great to learn and practice more. It was a fun week all around.

Site Visit—Peace Corps came up to visit me at my house the first week of February. They are making visits to all the volunteers to check on them. They brought me my packages, which was excellent of them. Charles and his program assistant ‘M’e Selloane, had never been to Mokhotlong before so it was fun to experience that with them. They checked out my house and GROW and helped me figure some stuff out with my organization. It was nice having them around.

Lifeskills—I finally started teaching my lifeskills classes at Mokhotlong Primary this past week. I’m really excited about it. I’m working with 4 teachers, all men which is pretty rare around here. I am teaching the Standard 6 and 7 classes (6th and 7th grade). There are about 60 students in each class with a huge age range (10-18 years old). So far things have been going pretty well. The teachers are excited about getting help and starting to teach the program. I am teaching directly with the 6 and 7 teachers and helping the 4 and 5 teachers with their lesson plans. There isn’t time in the schedule to teach lifeskills, even though its mandatory, so the students have to stay after school for an hour each week (Tuesdays and Thursdays for me). The kids are really funny. Many of them live near me and now that they know my name they all call to me on the street—“’M’e Kristina!” Which is a pretty awesome change for me. Before when students spoke to me they were more obnoxious asking me for things or more shy. Yay people are finally getting to know me! This week we are starting to learn about self-esteem. I’m having the Standard 7’s identify their strengths and weakness this week as start.

My Birthday—So I’m 23 now!!! Yay! I had an amazing birthday this year. Irena and Melissa came up to visit me. I was SUPER excited about that (we get very few visitors up here in the mountains). They came Thursday to Monday. On Thursday night we made tacos for dinner and had a total blast putting together the ginger bread house gram sent me. We also played this amazing game Jess sent called the Scrambled States of America to improve our brains. Then I showed them around town for the day on Friday. We played with the cute babies at Touching Tiny Lives (TTL), visited the hotel, and our VRC, and GROW. Then we went back to my place and after dinner had a birthday party with Parker, Sara, this new America girl Andrea, and Kirsten and Kevin from TTL. My house was packed but we had fun. On Saturday Me, Irena, Melisaa, Parker, Andrea, and Sara went to Sani Pass—which is the border to South Africa in Mokhotlong and one of the highest mountain passes in Africa. It also has the highest pub in Africa. It’s so beautiful there! We pitched our tent and decided to go pony trekking, which is Lesotho for horseback riding. That was SO much fun. Its only about the second time I’ve ever done it in my life. While we were out riding we saw this crazy cloud enter the pass—it looked like a snake the way it was moving through the mountains—and by the time we finished our ride we were inside the cloud. We all were joking around that we were literally riding into the abyss. We played cards and hung out that night. It was raining super hard, and our tent filled with water so me, Irena, and Melissa had to sneak into the backpackers with the other 3. Then we went back to my place and chilled out for the day until Irena and Melissa had to go home on Monday morning. Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes and packages!

Work—So things with GROW are less than ideal. To date I haven’t had a lot of actual work to do, which is unfortunate. I’ve helped with some workshops, attended events, held a lifeskills workshop, and done some work with an income generation activity (IGA) project—and done copious amounts of proofreading and time wasting (during which I taught myself all 50 states and capitals, their location on the map, all 44 US presidents, and the countries in Africa). I also may or may not have watched the entire series of Battle Star Gallactica (desperate times call for desperate measures to keep entertained ok)…which does provide funny insight into the things that Dwight Shrute says on The Office. During their visit, Peace Corps tried to straighten out my situation with GROW, but things haven’t gone particularly well so far. I was put with another staff member for a project in Mateanong (about 3 hours west of me) but I’m not super confident about it. So far my work with them has consisted of going to Mateanong one day (after waiting 1.5 hrs at GROW before leaving) for no apparent reason at all, and then being told to come at 8:30am to go back to Mateanong and finding out after arriving at GROW that they left without me at 8am. Ugh. I swear I’m a much more patient person since coming here, however on this particular day I was super mad. But I’ve adopted a new attitude about my work situation. I really don’t sweat it anymore. I check in to see if there’s anything for me to do, and then leave. I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s simply not worth making myself upset over. Now that I’ve stared teaching lifeskills and really started feeling out other projects here in town I have enough work to do; and I have the comfort of knowing that Peace Corps would support my separation with GROW if it ever gets to that point without my having to move.

There’s this man that lives near me who has a crafts business. I’ve met him numerous times along the road and at random times. He is a really intelligent guy and one of the only ambitious Mosotho I have come across. He currently sells his crafts at Sani Pass and brings them to Maseru but is actively seeking new markets. Irena, Melissa and I went to visit him during their visit and I got to see more of his work—which is really cool. He makes crafts and earrings out of cow horn/bone. We talked at his house and I’m going to help him with his business. I’m going to help him make a pamphlet and a portfolio of his work. I’m excited about it because I know it’s really going to help him a lot and it’ll be nice to be a part of that. I will however most likely post the pamphlet for those of you how are curious/interested in his stuff—we’re meeting tomorrow and maybe we’ll even make a website or eBay store…

So that’s about all I can think of to update you all on. Sorry it’s really long and super late lol. I want to take this time to say thanks to my amazing friends and family who sent me packages these past few weeks: Thanks Gram, Mom, Dad, Jillian, Catherine, Aunt Sanna, Sarah, and Christy!! You all are fantastic!

Also, Happy late birthdays to Gram, Sarah, Lindsay, and Hannah!

Final side note: the weather: well its sort of fall here now. In the lowlands I hear it’s disgustingly hot and gross (no thanks) but here it’s cooler and rainy. It rains at about 2ish just about everyday. I carry a neon orange little kids Spider Man umbrella these days. But it’s getting a little too cool…like the ‘oh god it’s only February and I’m using my down comforter at night!’ Which is leading us to believe that this winter is going to obscenely cold here in the mountains. Ugh. Gross. I give it about another month or so before it gets too cold for wearing just a t-shirt during the day…

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all had a good Christmas and New Years, I did. Here's a recap of the craziness.

1) Christmas: I went down to my friend Melissa's house in Mafeteng for Christmas. We made a tree out of paper and decorated it..so cute. We made some yummy food, watched some movies, played with her kittens and relaxed before leaving for our Durban vacation.

2)Durban: We crossed the border in Ficksburg South Africa and took a taxi to Durban, which took about 5 hours. It was me, Irena, Melissa, and an older volunteer Barb. Durban is HUGE. The very first thing we did once in Durban was eat McDonalds...which we don't have in Lesotho (the only american chain is KFC). Then we took another taxi to our hostel by the beach, Ansteys.

3) Ansteys: Ansteys was really cool. The people were really cool and the staff was hilarious. There was Dean and Tony. Dean was the biggest drama queen ever and provided endless entertainment. We slept in a tent at the hostel...in a tiny spot that was too small for the tent. One corner was off the ledge and I had a banana tree in my side lol, still fun though. We hung out with a bunch of Afrikaaners and some PCVs from PC South Africa.

4) The Mall: We went to the mall our first day because the weather wasn't great. The mall was HUGE and so great. Me and Irena got haircuts, and me and Melissa got our noses pierced. I also went shopping....

5) The Beach: The beach was like 2 seconds from the hostel and was really nice. The water was really warm, but the current was super strong. I got kncked down more than once only standing knee deep! But being in the ocean and on the beach again was amazing.

6) New Years: So Tony from the hostel was telling people about this "beach party" for New Years so everyone from the hostel decided to go. It was no beach party. It was essentially at the Elks/VFW/YMCA with a bunch of old Afrikaaners and little kids. We were all pretty horrified....especially since we got there at like 7. Unfortunately, about 10 mins to midnight I noticed my camera was missing off the table. Melissa and Barb saw the guy, who had just arrived and had been just booked at the hostel, being sketchy near us and then immediatly leave on a bike. Bad luck for me and also the family who's tent he robbed. Then we went back to the hostel and went swimming and went to bed around 330.

7) Dead man in the pool: We woke up to the news that the guy from Zimbabwe who had checked in with his wife the day before, was found at the bottom of the pool around 4:15. It was insane! The police/coroner came but didnt ask anyone any questions and not a single person was interviewed or anything. So everyone spent the day piecing what happened together and finding out who saw him last etc. It was a big mystery and really strange all day.

8) Tekwini: We left the next day for another hostel more in the city called Tekwini. It was cool. We went to Victoria Market where they have all these amazing African crafts, and then ate really good seafood. When we got back from dinner Ansteys called and told us that they caught the theif and that they had my camera! That NEVER EVER happens! When you get your stuff stollen you never get it back! Then we went out dancing.

9)uShaka: Me and Melissa went to get my camera from the police and heard all about the scams and fraud the guy committed. They are planning on putting him away for 10 years. Then we met up with Chris, Karolina, and Irena at uShaka water park/sea world. It was sooo much fun. We went down the water slides, did the lazy river, and saw all the cool fish and stuff, including the dolphin show. Then me and Melissa got amazing Thai food.

10) Bye Bye Durban: Sadly we had to leave the next day. So we grabbed one last Big Mac and hit the road for Lesotho. Me and Melissa went to Irena's house for the night and we all got completely soaked by the rain while trying to buy green beans from her neighbors. It was hilarious.

Now I'm back in Maseru chilling out before All-Vol and then Phase III training. I'm sure there'll be more updates later this month!

Sorry about waiting forever to update the blog, sometimes you just have other stuff to do.

So here's a little picture of what I've been up to since the end of September.

1) I went to Bloemfontein in South Africa the first week of October to get my ankle checked out by a specialist. Turns out, my ankle was fractured after all. It healed well but there is soft tissue issues and just yesterday I finally got the rehab routine for it.

2) When I got back from Bloem I was really really sick because I caught something on the bus on the way to Maseru. It may or may not have been swine flu...my clinic is ridiculous so who knows.

3) I went to Maseru again for a week to attend a workshop and had a great time with the other PCVs.

4) Work is boring and I'm working on talking to 2 of the local primary schools about teaching lifeskills for them.

5) Halloween. Halloween was super fun. I went as a highway (thanks for the idea mom). I had been planning on going as another PCV Tara because we look alot alike. People call me Baby Tara/Little Tara.

6) One of the PCVs I was closest with in Mokhotlong went back to America about 2 weeks ago. Sad for me. In another month, Violeta and I will be the only ones in Mokhotlong until January.

7) They turned the water off in my village for 5 days. Me and my neighbor Kefuoe had no clean dishes by the end of the week that we had to eat bread for dinner lol.

8) We've been having killer lightening storms lately. The lightening is really intense and makes me nervous.

I'm sure a ton more has happened but I'm having a hard time remembering what I did. When I think of something else I'll post another better update.

So some of you may remember that I have the worst luck with technology EVER. Well being in Africa has not changed that at all. My laptop is broken  Like won’t turn on broken. Granted, this time it’s my fault, but still it sucks. I am sending it to Maseru and hopefully someone will fix it, if not I have to wait a month until I go down myself in October. That’s the only way all my pictures won’t get lost forever…

Anyways, I had a super fun weekend. I went to Butha Buthe on Friday because a ton of PCVs were meeting up on Saturday. I had a blast. I got to know a bunch of PCVs better and see almost my whole group again! Basically good times all around. I managed to get a ride down to BB (like 2-3 hours away and expensive) with a women who works for CARE Lesotho (which works with GROW). The best part of this story is that it was me and the woman and TWO SHEEP! They were put in bags in the trunk of the SUV. Like 45 mins into our trip one of them totally escaped! We looked back and it was standing up in the back! It was hilarious and we had to stop and ask some herd boys on the side of the road to tie it up again lol….oh Lesotho…

Yesterday (Tuesday) I went to village with GROW and actually participated in a workshop for community based health care workers. I gave a presentation on nutrition. They don’t speak English and I don’t speak Sesotho so I had one of the other presenters translate. Unfortunately it didn’t really go very well. The women just didn’t get it. But at least I tried I guess.

Not that much else has been going on. Clearly I live a boring life. I’m working on taking pictures of Mokhotlong so that when I am in Maseru next I will post them for you. Thanks for the letters! They really help so much!

So, the other night I was laying on my bed doing some work on my computer when out of the corner of my eye I see something move in the corner by my front door. I look AND listen for a minute and dismiss the whole thing. I see something again. This time I’m more curious…and slightly paranoid. I watch for a longer time and nothing. Then I see it. A MOUSE. I obviously gave a little shriek and started to panic. I get out of my bed, grab my broom and headlamp (for the dark spaces), and cautiously look around. No sign of the mouse. I pull everything out from against the wall so I can see better and still nothing. I go back to my bed (broom in hand) and keep watch for the mouse. Those of you who know me may remember my aversion/fear of animals, especially those that can hide. I begin to doubt myself, and think that maybe I just imagined the mouse… house is not that big and I couldn’t find the stupid thing anywhere. So I text my neighbor who works with me and she calls my other neighbor and tells me to talk to little sister. So I essentially run across the room and out the door to her sister’s house. Her sister found the mouse in about 3 seconds, and together with my other neighbor they killed the nasty thing. I legit have goose bumps just thinking about it. Thank goodness for my superhero neighbors who are not in least afraid of mice because I defiantly would have gotten no sleep at all that night!

Aside from the mouse hunt, not a ton has been going on here. I planted my garden! And when I say “I” I mean that my Mphoso came over and planted my garden. Radishes and broccoli…I know, who eats radishes? Answer: not me, but I’ll give them away or something. They have started to sprout and everything.

I finally met my Chief this week! This is the real bug news of my week given that the Chief was the first person I was supposed to meet. My Basotho friend Tifi agreed to go with me (as a translator) and I’m actually going to be giving a workshop to the village’s support groups about HIV and AIDS. In another stroke of luck, Tifi agreed to translate the workshop too! Then Tifi came with me to visit some of the schools here. The visits went really well and I’m super grateful that he was around. It was probably the most productive day I’ve had here lol (I also did a TON of laundry that morning). However, I did get a somewhat monstrous sunburn that day…the sun block is officially in use now.

Last weekend I went to St James again with the other volunteers here for a youth workshop for Ben’s students. The workshop went really well and I learned a lot from being there. I also learned about anther myth floating around: that pregnant girls make all her classmates fall asleep, because when her baby is sleeping in her womb, everyone around her falls asleep. Classic. This week the volunteers are coming here to town and we are having a workshop at the high school here where James works. I’m really excited because I want to start a youth group at the school and will start making connections.

Other than that I’ve been living a pretty boring life. Reading books, watching the 5 movies that I have on my computer over and over again…nothing particularly interesting. Next weekend I am going to the next district Butha Buthe for a PC get together where I will see my friends again! But that’s all I have to say, so have a good one! Thanks for reading!

So basically my life consists of work right now. I’ve also noticed that I start just about every blog with the work “so.” I thought about why I do this and this is what I came up with: I basically write these things the way I think/speak, therefore, when I start all these little stories of my life I would start with “so” if I was talking to you in person. Clearly I’m super bored right now and have filled a solid 3 minutes with a random side note.

I’ve been working with my organization GROW to figure out what I’m going to be doing there. Things are going better, and I guess I’m sort of lucky to have some structure…I’ve also been trying to get out and meet people and learn about my community. When I say my community I’m referring to the camp town. Right now I still don’t know anything at all about my village, although, I have ascertained that there is a bar somewhere in the vicinity of my house because I can hear the music at 3AM. I plan on learning more about my village soon though, so no worries on that front.

I’ve been going out to the rural villages a bit lately. Let me describe to you what these trips entail. (1) a long trip in some old pickup truck (extended cab), (2) the “roads” are bad and therefore you are slamming into the side of the car the whole time, (3) you are squished in with other people (this week I was one of 4 grown adults in the back seat of the truck for at least 2 hours), (4) you become invisible and the people around you speak lightening fast Sesotho, until they make fun of you for something, (5) you never get to go pee and are always starving by the time you get back. Usually I’m at each village for at most an hour and I don’t really do that much. So clearly this is time well spent. Just yesterday the truck actually DROVE OFF THE ROAD! Mind you, there are no rails to prevent you from careening off the mountain. Luckily we slid into the mountain instead of off it—plus there is no cell phone reception that far out. Yikes.

I’m pretty excited because Rachel is in town this week so I’ll have someone to hang out with. Also, PC is coming up so hopefully I’ll get my packages! Yay! This weekend I’m going to go to Ben’s site at St James School to watch a workshop that Rachel and Violeta are giving there. And if I get my packages, I’ll stay and go on a hike with them on Sunday. (I need the ankle brace in mom’s package in order to hike). Update on the ankle: it’s neither better nor worse really. This week it was really sore, but hopefully it will heal eventually.

Anyways, I’m at work right now (so obviously consumed with things to do) and I guess I should wrap this up. Quick note first: I am rarely on the internet. It’s expensive and SUPER SLOW here, so I send my blog posts to Jess and she posts them. The same for my pictures (which are really hard to send and almost impossible to post in Mokhotlong). So don’t think that I’m ignoring you or anything if I take a while to respond to emails or FB messages, its just that I’m a broke volunteer lol. I’ll load a bunch of pics at the end of November when I’m in Maseru.

I had written a blog post a while ago, but I never got a chance to post it—and now its really too late so I’m going to recap because so much has happened since I last updated.

So I’m officially a resident of Mokhotlong now. Living in the mountains is really great, so much prettier than the lowlands. I’ve been busy turning my house into MY house—nesting and whatnot. The first big event that happened since I last updated is that I got sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer; meaning that training is finally over and now I can be a real life volunteer! Swearing in was a pretty big deal this year because the Prime Minister’s wife gave a speech for us. That put us on TV and in the papers! I also had to give a speech for my group in Sesotho. I was nervous but it turned out ok…and it put me on TV and a couple people have recognized me on the street lol.

After swearing in we all had to leave to go to our new homes. I’m never particularly excited to go to and from Mokhotlong because it just takes SO long! In a private car it takes about 5 hours to get there, on public it takes about 9, and it takes at least 6 hours to get to Maseru on public. When I say public I’m talking about the bus. The bus is a fairly standard coach type bus—except that they fill all the seats (including putting all children under 8 on laps) and then proceed to fill the aisles so full that no one can move at all. Its definitely an experience.

I’ve been at site for about two weeks now. I work for an organization called GROW, which works with some of the rural villages. The people I work with are really friendly and I’m excited to start projects with them. I also really like Mokhotlong a lot, and just walking around the town I am getting ideas for community projects.

I live about 10 minutes from Grow, and about 30 minutes from town (walking). The walk is nice and people stare at me and shout “Hi” and stuff…typical. People are slowly learning my name, they confuse me with another volunteer who already left. Town is pretty small for a camp town. Its mostly a bunch of Chinese run stores (they call them Machinas). I’m having fun getting to know my way around, and the other volunteers have been really helpful in showing me things.

So there are 5 volunteers in Mokhotlong now; Violeta, Rachel, Ben, James, and Me. James lives in the camp town too, but the others live a little further away. Last weekend we all went to Ben’s site (a school) for my Newbie Party. It was so much fun. Violeta is a really great cook and made homemade manicotti, Italian bread, and a bittersweet chocolate pear cake (we all helped cook a little lol). It was great to get to know everyone a little better. Ben and James are leaving at the end of November though because their 2 years of service are up.

This weekend has been fairly uneventful—which is exactly what I needed. I sat outside my house yesterday and read a book…and got a sunburn! I know right, surprise surprise Kristine got a sunburn. And today I did my laundry and walked to town for a bit. In case you are wondering, I do NOT like to do laundry. 1) I always spill water on myself, 2) its super tiring to wash jeans and sweatshirts, 3) my neighbors and passers-by always stare at me and I’m pretty sure they are making fun of me, 4) its unacceptable to hang your underwear outside on the line, so a weeks worth of panties are strung across my house. But I fully intend to pay someone to do my laundry for me, so hopefully that will happen soon.

This is a pretty long blog so I’m going to wrap it up now. Thanks for the letters and FB messages everyone. Enjoy what’s left of your summer! I’m almost done with winter and about to start the windy season—please try to contain your jealously.

PS other volunteers have better access to internet than I do and have posted pictures onto Facebook—if you check my FB page you will see if I am in their albums and then you can look at their Lesotho pictures too (they will post more often).

So quite a few things have happened since I last updated this blog. Most notably I got my site placement! I will be living in Mokhotlong, in the camp town (which is sort of like a city). Mokhotlong (Mo-hot-long) is in the mountains on the eastern side of the country. I will be working with an organization called GROW, which works mainly with agriculture. I’m not super pumped about agriculture, but I will work it all out.

The day after we got our site placements we had to give village meeting (a pitso). My village chose to give a presentation on nutrition. It went really well and in general we were glad to just be done with it.

Last Saturday we had a barbeque. We drove to Buhta Buhte and went to this nice mountain lodge for a hike. I didn’t hike though (hiking in the boot is something I never want to do again). The volunteer that works with the lodge was the last volunteer to stay with my host family.

The last week went by pretty fast because we knew that we were in the tail end of training. Yesterday was the official end to community based training. We peeled and cut veggies with our host moms to prepare for the village feast that was being given for us. The feast was really fun. Some of the village girls performed a traditional dance for us and the bo-‘m’e and church choir sang. It was a lot of fun.

So most days I go to Irena’s or Melissa’s house and hang out with them and Chris (the North side of the village). We make dinner and just chill out. The other night we had a dance party outside Melissa’s house with her little nieces and nephews. All the Bokone people went to Irena’s house and we had an amazing dinner. We had Mexican night and made tortillas, meat, cornbread and veggies.

I totally miss my host family already. On my last night I played cards with my sister and cousins and made popcorn. It was really fun. My ‘m’e came in and gave me a t-shirt (all the trainees got them) and I gave her some pictures that I took of the family. About two weeks ago I became friends with my older brother Koali. He’s hilarious and I’m sad we weren’t friends the whole time lol. When Melissa and I taught him Go Fish it was the funniest thing ever! Also, although I haven't had the greatest luck with dogs, my family's dog was FABULOUS! At first I was scared of him because he's easily the biggest dog in Bokone, but ALL he wants to do is cuddle. Kevin (pcv) told me he named him bear because of all the bear hugs he gives. He would meet me at the road and walk me home at night and no other dogs would bother me...he was sooo sweet!

So now we’re back in Maseru at the training center for a few days and on Tuesday I go to visit my site. I took a shower for the first time in weeks and it was AMAZING! Also we all watched movies and are going to have a movie day tomorrow where we all watch movies all day. That’s just about it for now. I’ll let you all know how my site visit was! (a current ed volunteer Violeta is going to show me around on Wednesday).

So right now I am in TY again and we're going to visit Alison (a current volunteer) at her clinic...but we're food shopping first..aka using the internet. There hasn't been a ton of action since my last update, but here's what you missed. We had to give presentations yesterday in front of all of the trainers and the country director and program director, which was a little nerve wracking at first but ended up being totally fine. I did mine on making paper bag hand puppets of what you want to be when you grow up...and did most of the presentation in sesotho. Also I had some laundry accidents this week. First, I accidently set my wool socks on fire by putting them too close to my heater...booth pairs..oops. Second, I did some laundry, hung it on the line outside and when I went to go to school I saw that there was about 6 feet of raw meat hung on the line 6 inches from my clothes...gross. But these things happen and it just makes for another story to tell all of you. Also, I just want to shout out some penpal MVPs: thanks Jill and Hannah for being awesome with sending me letters, they totally made my days, and big shout out to Catherine for calling me!! You totally made my day better after the meat clothes incident!

So this past week the group was split up and sent to different areas for site visits with current volunteers. I went to Berea district with Elissa and Brice to stay with Merrill near the camp town TY. We had a blast. We got to hang out with her youth group and hike a mountain to reach the Ha Kome caves...which were super cool. To get to TY we had to take a kombi...aka a big white van that holds roughly 20 people. Kombis are a crazy experience. They aren't in the best condition and are generally packed full of people...but that just adds excitement to the trip. The best part is when they need to be puched backwards in order to start...much like a wind up toy car lol.

Since I got back from TY I've done some fun things. First I decided to try making Nisu..which came out ok given that I steamed it in a pot. We also took another mountain climbing trip to Thaba Bosiu on the 4th of July. On the 5th we were allowed to have a BBQ at the other training village that the Peace Corps paid for...which was so fun. Everybody was really excited to eat hamburgers. Overall it was a really fun week and when I have more time I will probably give more details, but alas, time is short so thats it for now.

So I haven’t had a ton of time to update this blog lately…but let’s not forget..this IS Africa. I have a new name! Since my arrival in Bokone I have been officially named Limpho Thelingoane. Limpho (DimPo TEdingwane) means “many gifts.” I have a ‘M’e (aka host mom) and Ntate (dad) and 4 brothers and a sister…plus lots of grandkids, cousins, etc.

I LOVE Bokone. Its pretty much the most beautiful place ever. It was really cool the other day because we woke up the other morning and all of a sudden there was snow on the mountains in the distance! Also, we saw the end of a rainbow on Tuesday! When does that EVER happen! I took a picture of it though so no worries.

The first week of village we ate all of our meals with our families, which was cool. My family LOVES to play cards so I had a great time with them. Each day we got to cook something with our ‘M’e, the best thing was cooking steamed bread (which is super yummy). Now, we are on our own and are cooking for ourselves.

Here’s a little snapshot into my life here. My alarm goes off at around 6:15 am and I get up and turn my heater on and start boiling my bath water. I get back into bed for like 20 mins and then go and empty my pee bucket (yup I said pee bucket) into the latrine. Then I take a bucket bath and wash my underwear (they stress the importance of doing this EVERY day, no joke). I then get dressed and started boiling water for my breakfast. I sweep my floor, eat, make my bed (takes like 1 min b/c it’s a sleeping bag) and then head to school at like 8. At school we sing the Lesotho national anthem and usually go to Sesotho class. Then we have been heading to the other village for group sessions on health, youth, agriculture, business etc. We have lunch, then are done at 4pm. After that I usually play with the little kids for a while and then make dinner. Bed time is very shortly after dinner (usually like 8pm).

So there you have it folks, A day in the life of Kristine. I’m heading to Berea tomorrow with Brice and Elissa to stay with a current volunteer for like a week!

I almost forgot to mention some things about living here. First, right outside my house there is a cow/donkey pen, a chicken coop (with roosters who have ZERO sense of time), and dogs and cats. As you know, its winter here in Lesotho. It has been COLD here this week. Its cool because for the past few days when I wake up and walk to school the ground is white with all the frost.

I miss you all!

So sorry about the delay in posting any updates. Actually, I take that back, I’m really not sorry at all…I’m in Africa. But I do have a legit reason for not updating. Let me take you back to 4 days ago (some of you were lucky enough to get an email from me…I must love them more). About 2 hours after finding that by standing on a garden wall and holding our laptops over our heads we could catch wireless here on the compound I had a bit of an accident—shock and surprise I had an accident. I fell and severely sprained my ankle L It totally killed and generally sucks, but my fellow trainees and the PC staff have been super supportive. Dr J looked at and gave me a boot that I’ve been hobbling around in for the past few days and I went to the hospital for X-rays and thankfully no breaks! It’s looking pretty hideous these days with all the bruising and swelling but I plan on hobbling my way over to the internet café today.

We’ve mostly been doing trainings. We’re leaving really soon for our training villages, which is super exciting. Today we are going shopping for stuff we will need. And for those of you who are interested in the “series of shots” we have been getting, for me the shot count is 5 (some people had to get more!). We’re all pretty sore from the 2 we got yesterday though.

Anyways, I’m picking up the language faster than I thought I would. Our teachers (bo-‘m’e) are hilarious and very patient with us. We are on tea break right now. Note to Hannah: the guest speaker we just had works for World Vision! He is the finance manager here is Lesotho.

My computer battery is dying so I’m ending here. Write me letters!

Lumelang bo m’e le bo ntate, (Hi ladies and gentlemen)

So clearly I’ve mastered the local language in record time…obviously that is a complete lie. We’ve had one Sasotho lesson so far and I don’t think that any of us will really “master” the language. OMG this is technically a ‘click’ language too! But only on words that have Qs in them and a lot of people don’t use them. And to be honest the greeting to this doesn’t really mean hi ladies and gentlemen, it actually is hi women and men but that’s neither here nor there…

Since I haven’t updated since I got here I’ll sum up the events so far. At JKF we saw Ben from LOST and sort of stalked him from a gift shop. The plane ride wasn’t bad at all despite being 15 hours long. Once in Jo’Burg we went straight to the hotel where we ordered food and then proceeded to sleep for the rest of the day. Our plane to Maseru was the smallest plane I have ever been on (max like 26 people). Our luggage was 200 kgs over and therefore about half remained in SA….with the added mystery of not knowing whose didn’t make it. Shock and surprise my bag containing all of my clothes didn’t make it. But thankfully they arrived yesterday afternoon.

Lesotho is BEAUTIFUL. The mountains are ridiculously pretty, and I swear the sky is bluer here (side note: if I make up words just go with it). The training center where we live is really different than I thought it would be. It’s actually sort of a commune type setup, we have guards that control the gate. There are 4 bedrooms with 6 bunks in each, and there is a big livingroom area with a big tv and movies, a nice kitchen and a few bathrooms. In the other main building we use there is a dining room type area where we eat that is attached to our classroom area. There’s a library too. We got to go into the city a bit and went to the grocery store today…note to my Florence girls it’s like a million times better than Standa. And we have 2 tea breaks a day, and are drinking tea like 24/7.

Today is our free day to do whatever so most of us played a bug game of volleyball…I eventually will stop sucking at it. Also, we have a current volunteer living with us named Meghan and she’s been super helpful. Next week (on Sunday) we are leaving here to move in with host families in 2 villages for about 6 weeks. We’re all pretty excited about it but we’ll miss the washing machine and hot water showers….

Anyways, it turns out that I won’t have a ton of access to the internet during these 3 months of training so the updates will maybe be once a week at most. But, I’m going to get a cell phone soon and I can text the US! Its SUPER expensive for me to call the US (15 rand a min. for me, 15 cents for you to call me) so for those of you who want to talk to me get a calling card and phone me! I’ll post my cell number when I get it (and my mom will have it as soon as I get one so you can always ask her). (fyi I’m 6 hrs ahead).

So that’s all I have for now. Sala hankle!

So right now I am sitting at the computer in my amazing hotel room (king size bed and everything) in Philly. I got in yesterday and went to "Staging" (aka registration/ pre-pre service training). It was great to finally meet the people in my program. There are 16 of us total and I'm like 95% sure that I'm the youngest one here.

Everyone seems really nice though. We bonded over Thai food for dinner.

So I don't know if there's a time stamp on this but it's 2:45 am....we have to checkout at 3am. You can imagine how excited we all are about this.....

We are about to drive to Laguardia in NY, where we board our 15 hour plane ride to Johanesburg (spelling?). We then are confined to our hotel in Jo'burg until we meet at the airport at 3 am the day for Maseru, Lesotho!

Well I have to go, but I will try and update as soon as I can!

Love you all.

So I have roughly 4 days left here until I head of to Lesotho. And given my ever increasing tendencies towards procrastination I'd say I'm doing fairly well in terms of getting things done. I have almost everything I need...all that's left is the random little things like makeup and drink mixes so nothing big.

Also, I managed to lay out all the clothes I'm planning on bringing. Let me paint you a little picture of how the whole clothing thing is going...first I gave away all the clothes that I'm not taking with me (sigh), then I bought some new "durable" (aka borderline hideous) clothes to replace them. Today I piled them on the floor and just looked at them. My mission for tomorrow is to actually pack them.

A few details: This is the blog I will be writing (obviously) and I will try to update it as much as possible so be patient! I was just reading the blog of one PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) and she seems to update fairly frequently with pictures.

That's all for now...next time I update it will likely be from Lesotho! ahhh!

Also, I REALLY want people to write to me, so try to if you can!