Misoatra Betseka!

A HUGE thank you to all of you who donated funding to my Peace Corps Partnership - the money has all come in, and I am in Mahajanga today to start work on purchasing lumber for the desks (along with my school district "super"). It feels really great to be working on something that will be in my adopted town for years to come (Insh'allah), and I couldn't have done it without your help! I will be putting up photos and updates as we progress.

On a seperate note, life is great. Can't put it any plainer than that. I absoluely love the people in my town, in my pseudo-site (Mahajanga), and the PCVs in my region who remind me of the American things that I forget about, like iced coffee. Delectable. Work has been a little slow lately, but it has giver me a chance to spend time with people that I hadn't really connected with before, and I have made some great friendships in the past month.

I tend to forget a lot of the time that I am different from everyone around me (until someone points out how white I am), and how different my life here is from life in America. Take for instance, my trip to Mahajanga this morning: I woke up at 5.30 because my friend Andry swore that we would leave in the speedboat by 6.00. Well... we left at 8.30. And I travelled with eight other people and sixteen pigs. When the pigs started to try and climb over the side of the boat, people shifted positions to counterbalance the weight change,and the handlers pulled them back down by their ears. (Don't worry Peace Corps, there were lifejackets for everyone!). Got to Mahajanga half soaked and with a huge smile. Life is good.

Sorry for the random topic changes; I'm running on far too little sleep combined with far too much caffiene. In May I will be back to post photos and updates on the library and desks. Hope that life is good in America, Russia, Mexico, Australia, Austria, Ecuador and wherever else my lovely family and friends are off exploring these days.

Besos! chan