June 25, 2008
Wells project- Fully funded!


Dear everyone,

I recieved official word yesterday from Peace Corps that my wells project has been fully funded. Thank you extravagantly for your contributions. If you didn't get a chance to donate and now are wishing you hadn't missed your chance to help African villagers... you haven't! There are many more volunteer projects on the Peace Corps website, and those volunteers and communities will be just as thrilled as I was to recieve your help.

Thank you.

I'm heading back to my village this weekend, for more crazy adventures that will eventually result in more e-mail updates for all of you!

Nan

June 16 2008
Waterfalls and Willy Wonka

Hello everyone!

I apologize for how much time has passed since my last update. Things are going very well here, and I hope you're all enjoying the onset of summer.Thank you IMMENSELY for supporting my wells project. Work on the project (step 1 being carrying and crushing rocks.. by hand) has begun, and we're waiting for the last of the money to be donated and then for those dollars to be converted to Kwacha. I am incredibly grateful for your investment in the lives of my villagers.

So what has happened since I last wrote? Jane Eyre has 4 babies, adorably little animals that I have trouble imagining as dinner- but after a couple weeks in the village I'll probably start doing that cartoon viewing-animals-as-cuts-of-meat thing! When I get home I hope to send them out in the first wave in my grand scheme of rabbit multiplication.

I haven't been in my village since mid-May. I've been working with a group from Michigan State doing a food security survey throughout Luapula province. My role, along with a PhD student and a Zambian staff member from Lusaka, is supervising the teams of surveyors. The actual interviewing is done by people fluent in Bemba, and we're checking to make sure they're asking all the right questions and recording the responses correctly.

It's been a good change from my village routine. During the training process I was actually working 9 hour days, heightening my respect for those of you in full-time employment that doesn't involve 2 hour hunts through market places trying to find healthy village chickens for dinner! Now we're travelling throughout the province visiting the teams in situ. I'm getting to see some beautiful places in Luapula- waterfalls, gigantic lakes, vistas of palm trees with the Luapula River and the Congo in the background. ANd we had a spontaneous tour of the Kawambwa Tea Estate processing plant. That was a delightfully Willy Wonka-esque esperience. The conveyor belt wasn't working and instead there was a man shovelling tea from a wheeled cart into the waiting arms of a giant drying machine (fueled by a few hundred hectares of eucalyptus being grown in plantations for firewood... my forester self couldn't NOT ask that question!)

Saturday my touring ends and I will be happy to go back to the slower pace and different challenge of village life. Tomorrow marks 1 year since I arrived in Zambia- crazy, huh? It's been a great year. And PLEASE, update me on your latest adventures! I love hearing news from the home front.

Stay well all,
Nan