9:00am      I’m laying in bed at Namunyak Maasai now.  It’s been a few days since I’ve written last with a lot going on.  My stomach has been angry with me for some reason unknown; to the clinic I go! 

But Monday night, many of the local kids came together to perform a goodbye show for myself and another volunteer.  It was just amazing.  They performed two plays and sang many songs, each person with a solo.  I am so grateful to have made such great relationships with the people here.  The bonds of friendships formed here are truly a gift.  When I left it felt like I was leaving people I’d known forever.  I’m praying for the boys to get back to school and finish without interruption and for a happy and healthy life for all of them.  And they are telling me to come back!

4:35pm     I just returned from the district hospital, I went mainly to make sure I don’t have malaria.  I don’t!  I sat in a waiting room for about 1 hour with many other patients and then finally got to see a “doctor” (I’m not such what certifications he actually had).  He sent me to the lab for malaria, typhoid, and WBC count, etc, etc.  This hospital is quite an upgrade from the clinic in Muhuru Bay; electricity, a real centrifuge, a few important looking machines.  Pretty much I may have drank so bad water or eaten something that didn’t agree with my system and am now drinking lots of good water and taking a few meds for my stomach.  Lesson: when you have diarrhea don’t take anti-diarrheals, your body is trying to get rid of toxins or infections and if you take pills to make it stop this may make it way worse and the infection will stay in your system longer and can spread.  Good to know (it’s not exactly pleasant, but I survived)! 

There are three volunteers here at Namunyak Maasai.  We went with one who had been teaching a sex-ed class for a church youth camp.  Very interesting, I guess this is the first sex-ed class they’ve ever taken.  On talk about condom use: one question raised was about effectiveness.  When we said 99.8%, he said “well that’s not 100% so why use them?” 

P.S. You’re in Africa when you’re sitting on the step of a hut holding a stick playing with ants and it’s actually entertaining.