I would classify yesterday as a productive bummer. I woke up at 5:30 in the morning so as to be ready to leave for church at 6:00. I was told at 6:30 that we weren’t going. It wasn’t until around 8:00 that everybody woke up and started moving. With those few hours I was able to make some calls and got started on the heap of marking I needed to get through. When people got up and breakfast was started, I settled in for a few hours at the dining room/ homework table and was able to finish marking one of the two tests.
For most of the morning it was raining, leaving us stuck inside. At 11 Jovin finally woke up and helped cure my boredom for a little while. Very creative is his mind and it helps me to feel young; we played some carbs and make believe games—his favorite activity. He had homework and I had some lesson plans to get done, so back to boredom I went. My only light at the end of the tunnel was a concert I was going to in the evening. Ezekia is finish up his time at university and has a bunch of exams and performances these coming months and I’m trying to use them as a solid excuse to get out and see parts of Arusha. I worked on my lesson plans for today up until it was time to leave for the concert.
The person who was supposed to drive me to the concert, Mgisha, showed up about 30 minutes late. We got in the car drove down the driveway and turned right back around. Mgisha got a note that he needed to go to Lucas’ mechanic office to work on some of the safari cars. My one exciting event of the day was canceled and I was a little upset. I wasn’t worried because I had another test to finish marking, but I felt bad letting my friend Ezekia down. Next weekend there’s another performance I can go to and make it up to him. The rest of the evening was spent marking and eating dinner and then to sleep.
Yesterday when going to the performance was cancelled, I really needed to find something to do to get out of the house—even if just for a few minutes. I convinced the kids to walk with me to a little shop to get some water (this served another purpose as I was out of bottled water). I was also able to buy some bubble gum. You can buy 1 piece for 50 shillings or 100 pieces for 3000 shillings. I opted for spending just over a dollar on 100 pieces. Each piece cost me 1.2 cents.
It’s starting to get to the point where I’m needing to prepare and plan for my next adventure over here. I’ve just found out I will be going to Hawassa, Ethiopia next with Water for Good (W4G) given that everything works out in the coming months. I’m nearing my halfway point here; I think I’ll be starting with W4G around April 12. It feels like I have a long time until then, but I know it’ll be upon me in no time.
I didn’t take many pictures yesterday—there wasn’t much to take pictures of—only this one here of the house dog in his favorite sleeping spot. I’m excited to be going back to school today; it’s raining really hard right now (normally I’m safe from getting wet in the mornings), making me a bit homesick and I’m more than happy to welcome the craziness of school to distract me.