Christmas

oh walter!

enosh and mussa. they're regulars at my house.

another sampling of the crew i roll with

full moon over my tin roof.

Another christmas has come and gone. For me this one was a little different. and a lot quieter. no presents or decorations, (or grandma's hot punch!). Christmas eve was a church service, on the shorter side only 2 hours. it was getting dark and without electricty we cut it short. There was lots of singing, dancing, and druming...my favortite combo. I was asked to do a sining solo for everyone. i graciously declined. They don't know it, but they're all glad i did. They assume everyone was born with a beautiful voice and instinctivley knowing how to harmonize...like them. turns out i don't fall into that category. i tell them its part of the plight of the white man... :). Christmas day started off with a call from mom and dad and amy. it was fun to hear them talk about having just finished the christmas eve chili and were waiting now to go to midnight mass....sad i missed the chili, not so sad i missed trying to stay awake for midnight mass. In the afternoon i went over to my neighbors and had an early dinner. Delicous as usual. I came home with walter and we sat around our fire and read to each other and listen to garth brooks's christmas album. ok i just read to walter but he wanted to read to me too i could see it in his eyes. i capped of the night with another call from home. Grandma Luce's christmas brunch crew called and I got to talk to everyone there. That was awesome and it was hard to choke back the tears while getting to hear grandma's and all my aunts and uncles voices. i finally broke down when i talked to my cousin molly. thanks molls, i was doing so good.

christmas eve i was also greated with the happy diagnosis from the area vetrinarian that walter has contracted a sexually transmitted disease....you didn't know dogs could get those right? me neither. until my dog did. so embarassing. appararently walter has been participating in some extracurricular activities that i was not aware of....i'll be keeping a closer eye from now on. he got his antibiotic shot and is now back to his old self... so natrually i'm worried.

i've now started my next travel adventure. i've started off for dar es salaam for a camping trip. our first stop is here at the district capital of iringa. tonight we will be treated to hot spirings and an indian barbeque by some indian friends of ours here. i'm sure you'll get updates about all of.

much love, and best wishes for the new year!

new phone number again

i had to get a new phone number. why? because i signed up for BBC newsupdates through text messages. what i did not do was check to see how much it cost before i did that. dumb. and there was no way to stop them either and since there isn't a friendly verizon store on every corner... i just had to get a new number. so here it is +255788221863. feel free to call or text anytime, the time change is 11 hours ahead of california just if you were wondering.

waiting....

...for the rain to stop.

...for food to cook

...for walter to stop stealing eggs from the neighbors chickens

...for my packages to come.

...for electricity to return

...for the internet to work

...for christmas and new years



the rain is making me crazy. i spent the last few days under house arrest. i'm going a little stir crazy. cooking is harder than usual because my charcoal is wet and won't light. and walter is causing problems with one of my neighbors who doesn't appreciate him going around the yard stealing eggs before she can pick them up. its a little awkward. anyhow, as soon as the rain let up today i was out the door on my way to town to see if my packages arrived. rumor is that i have some coming. nope not yet. no mail at all. its ok, i'm really sharpening my waiting kills. its good practice. so now i 've waited for the electricty and internet to come back on here. it did. good.

and now is a waiting game for the rainy season to end. it just started but i'm already ready for it to be over. its virtually impossible for me to get any teaching done because the schools and health center are all at least a couple km away. most things shut down anyway so i guess this gives me more time to plan. and wait.



with all this this rain i've had a lot of visitors that stay a while as we wait for it to lighten up. my three favorite kids came over one morning and decided to stay the whole day. Enosh 4, Musa 5, and Nathan 6, spent the day with me listening to garth brooks christmas carols and U2, helping me light my fire (i literally was letting kids play with fire...oops), and helping me plant some beans and pumpkin. we would sprint out the door as soon as the down pour would break. i would poke the holes in the garden and they dutifully followed dropping one seed in each whole. they were great helpers. i've also been watching the women here a lot. i know, yes, that sounds kind of creepy but its not i swear. i just have noticed how relentlessly they work. this morning i was taking walter for a walk in the rain and i saw a woman, with a crying baby strapped to her back, hoeing her farm, another women, again with a baby strapped on, was carrying water on her head while herding her cows down to pasture. amazing. there is a quote in a book by barbara kingslover that describes east african women as "ballet dancers who are completley unaware that they are unstage." so true. the book is called the Poisonwood Bible if anyone is interested. it paints a pretty accurate picture of east africa and and the missionary efforts here in the last century.

i miss you guys and love you! happy holidays!

10 things i've learned in africa

Tomorrow marks my having been here for 6 months. These are the ten most valuable things i've learned since i've been here
10. Swahili (obviously)
9. How to haggle...if you thought i was fiesty before, you should see me now
8. the right drugs to treat HIV opportunistic infections with ...since they have me play doctor here
7. make compost
6. cook
5. to like the smell of charcoal
4. light a kerosene lamp
3. not barf when someone slaughters a chicken in front of me
2. wash my hair with regular bar soap
1. pick insect egg sacks out of my foot

but mostly (i couldn't number it) is how much i miss my family and friends and how much i miss you all. its especially hard right now during the holidays.
also to answer some questions i've gotten about donations: there are about 20 kids that need sponsorship. if you can't completley sponsor a kid, give what you can, don't worry about it. also marebear asked if you can forward the message to people that don't know me. YESSS! as long as they feel comfortable with the deal, then i'm comfortable. i'll send emails, letters, phone calls to whomever wants them. just send me the info. thanks everyone for all your support, seriously. i feel it and it means a lot.

Begging for money

Happy Chanukah, Christmas, or Kwanza (which only exists in America and Africans think is hysterical)!! I hope the holiday season is treating everyone as well as it has been treating me thus far. I had amazing thanksgiving with lots of friends, little kids, food, and drumming. All the essentials.
Well, you knew it was coming. I’m sure you did. Once you heard I was joining Peace Corps and coming to Africa on some misguided attempt to save the world, you knew the inevitable plea for money would shortly follow. And you weren’t wrong, here it is. I don’t like doing it, no one likes asking for money, and I’ll only do it once I promise, so this is it. I know it’s the holiday season and everyone is already spending money. And I know the economy is bad, really bad, but I’m asking anyway because the kids here need it bad, really bad.
I the kids that I am requesting money for are orphans from the village, Lwang’a, I live in. They all have passed the test to go to secondary school but can’t scrape up the money to afford it. They are all bright kids but have had to struggle thus far with loosing one or both parents to HIV and depending on an impoverished village to support them. Here are the numbers:

School fees for the year: $16.00USD
Uniform Set (skirt/pants, blouse, sweater): $20.00 USD
Shoes: $12.00 USD
Math set (required): $2.50 USD
7 Notebooks (one for each subject): $23.00 USD
Paper: $2.50 USD
Misc (Id card, bookbag, pens): $8.00 USD total
Total :$ 84.00 USD to send a kid to secondary school for a year

Since I’m asking for money and I said I’d only do it once, there is also another project I’m working on. The primary school has over 800 kids attending and only two toilets. Once for boys one for girls. It is a health and sanitation problem. The school committee and I are working on a plan to build at least 6 more toilets. They have asked for donations from the community in the form of money, materials, or labor and we have a had a great response. Everyone understands that this is really important. BUT, we’re still short on the cash. Here’s how much it costs:
1 bag of cement: $12.50USD
1 sheet of tin for roofing: $13.00 USD
1 kg of nails: $2.00 USD
1 rolls of fencing: $11.50 USD

What we need is 13 bags of cement, 15 sheets of tin, 5kg of nails, and 12 rolls of fence. Lumber, paint, and labor is being donated by teachers and village members.

So here is my plea: if you have some extra money, donate it. Please. You can donate however much you want to go to whatever you want, this is just the breakdown so you can see how far your money is going here. It goes a long way and actually changes lives here. If you donate you’ll get a letter in the mail from a student, his or her picture and your name painted on the outside of finished bathrooms. (I know just what you always wanted, your name on a toilet)
Here is the weird part, getting the money to me. I’ve set up a separate savings account for this village but it is under my name with Washington Mutual. That means you have to write the checks to me. I feel weird about this but it seems to be the simplest and fastest way to get money actually working for these people. You can write the checks to me, Kimberly Heller (if you didn’t know who was writing this), and on the memo line include whether you want the money to go to secondary school sponsorship or you want it to go the primary school bathrooms. If you don’t care you can just say “Lwang’a schools”. Send it to my home address in the states and my dad will put it in my account. As soon as I get it, I’ll send you an email verifying.

What do you think?
Can you help? I’d think you’re a rockstar and kids here will owe their future to you…. no exaggeration. And just all those people you can’t figure out what to get for Christmas, you can donate a bag of cement in their name…. perfect. Just an idea. If you can’t right now cause things are just too tight, I totally get it. Don’t worry I’ll take donations all year!!! I’m asking now because the new school term starts in January so I’d like to get some of these guys started but its never too late to donate and there are always kids here to help. Ok that’s it. That’s the best I could do. If you have questions or ideas let me know. Email me, write me or even call!! Oh and feel free to forward this to someone you think might want to help
Happy Holidays and much, much love,
Kim

Send checks to:
425 Churchill Rd.
Sierra Madre, CA 91024

My email: kheller@ucla.edu
My address here: Kim Heller PCV
S.L.P.469
Makambako, Iringa
Tanzania
My phone number here: +255787404897

p.s. all my pictures saved on my jump drive got deleted when i actually used a computer with an antivirus....hugggggge bummer. ugh TIA right? and sorry if you already got this in an email or facebook message. just covering all my bases :)