Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Shout

An American was murdered, it wasn't us or anyone who had anything to do with Peace Corps. Kristy and I were nowhere near the city it happened in, do not worry about us. You'll know more before we do you cause your news stations are in English, you lucky dogs. This may change our travel plans though :(

Have You Ever Seen The Rain?

The rains have started and the Sahel drinks deeply, there is new growth on virtually every plant that I see and there are now plants where there were not plants before. Grass has started to grow, it is one of the more beautiful things that I have seen in quite a while.

When it rains, it pours, we rarely just have a light sprinkling of rain. The rains generally start with a sand storm, the wind is violent carrying away anything not well fastened and it carries particles of sand that coat everything, these are best avoided. After the sand passes the rain commences, and it is glorious. The rain is carried by the same violent gusts of wind and thus is comes not from above but from the side. The rains last only a couple hours at their longest so far.

The other side of the coin, is that the insects have started to rally, and from what I remember this is but the beginning. Kaedi, like all of the cities I have seen here was not built for draining away rain, there are quite a few deep puddles that will become the brackish breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Kristy will be making a cream from leaves of a local tree called, Neem. Neem Cream is an ongoing project that PCRIM tries to urge the locals here to use because it works as a natural mosquito repellent and therefore reduces the chances of catching malaria.

P.S.

We have been in country for over a year now, it's been an interesting experience so far. It is still sad that we have yet to hear yea or nay on new Peace Corps Trainees. Kristy and I will be going to St. Louis and then a camel trek - keep an eye out for fun pictures :)

Saturday, June 6, 2009

With A Little Help From My Friends

The following message was brought to you by the lovely and talented Kristy

Hi Everybody!!!

My Peace Corps Partnership project was approved and now I just need to raise the money. I need to raise a total of $1341. It's a school improvement project at one of the schools that I work with. The school is amazing with some great teachers and a very effective director. For my part, I work mainly with the 5th and 6th grade french speaking teachers (science, math and of course french are taught in French, everything else is Arabic). We had an eco club this past year with 20 students where they were able to learn more about the environment. We also planted 12 trees on the school grounds. The teachers I work with are always open to the ideas I have and so is the director. I really like working with this school and they make me feel like my time here in the country is worth something to them. This is why I want this project to get funded so badly. It entails the reparation of the school well and latrines. There is more information on the Peace Corp's website. Some of you (those who I thought wouldn't be too annoyed by this) will be receiving information in the mail about the project and how to donate. If you happen to be part of an organization, church, workgroup, club, etc and could possibly raise money for this project, I and about 560 students and teachers would be very grateful. I'm trying to raise the money by August so the repairs can at least be started before the beginning of the next school year. The donations are tax deductible too, woohoo! Anyway, that's the end of my "please donate" propaganda. Thanks for reading this.

Here's a link to the project and how to donate: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=682-117

You can also just go here: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors
and search under Smiley or the project number, 682-117

There are pictures of some of the kids from the school here: http://picasaweb.google.com/draconismoon (the Eco Club Stuff)