Bande - First Week at Site

I have made it safely to my site and have survived my first week at my new school. The trip was long from Nairobi, but my principal and I were able to buy a few things in Migori before we headed to Bande. I am living on the school compound, and my house is really really nice! I have four rooms (which means a guest bedroom for visitors!!!!) and have my own latrine and wash room behind my house. There is no electricity or running water, but that's fine with me. My school uses solar panels and a generator to run lights in the classrooms at night, so I am able to charge my electronics from that, which is really I all need to stay happy. Bande is much much smaller than Loitokitok, and that has taken some getting used to. There is no hoteli (restaurant) where I can grab some food if I dont want to cook, there is no supermarket, and there is only open air market on Wednesdays. The things I was accustomed to being able to buy on a daily basis during PST are now much harder to get here. The hardest part is the new language barrier. While all the teachers at my school and all the students there speak english and kiswahili, there are very few people in the town who speak either of these languages. The more common language in town in Luo, and I only know a few greetings in Luo. I need to ask a teacher, or find someone in the community who can teach me Luo, because I know that will go a long way to my intergration into the community. For now, I am focusing on my school and teaching the students.

This week I spent a lot of time in the staff room preparing lessons, as all the students are taking opening exams this week. Unfortunately for me, that meant that I was mostly bored, and wasn't really able to get to know any of the students. The other teachers are all very nice though, and I had some interesting conversations. I am looking forward to next week when I will actually be teaching, and hopefully coaching volleyball after school. But, the week was now totally boring, I did have some exciting things happen to me.... Last Saturday I went to Kisii with Chris so we could buy things for our houses like jikos (stoves) and water filters, and when we were driving back to our sites between Migori and Bande, our car hit a COW, yes a cow! The cow had been on the side of the road until just before we reached it, when it decided it wanted to be on the road.... There was no time to break and swerving would have put us in a ditch.. so we hit the cow. The cow suffered a broken leg, and probably had to be slaughtered that night, and the car lost a headlight and broke its bumper, but all of the passengers were fine, thank god. The other exciting thing happened when I returned to my house on Tuesday after a staff meeting. I opened my door and was going to open all the windows in my house to let in the breeze when something dive bombed my head. I can out of the house in a panic, and from outside I could see a bat swooping over and over again in my house. I have no idea how it got in, since I keep the windows closed when I'm not around, but there it was. With the help of one of the prefects I was able to chase the bat out of my house, and hopefully it will not return for a visit anytime soon.

I think that is about all for me now, next time I head into Migori I will bring pictures to upload. The landscape around my village is gorgeous, and the sunrises and sunsets are always amazing! Everything is green right now because it is the rainy season, but I am told soon enough everything will be brown and dead... That is also about the time I think I will die from the heat as well... Cheers!