all things liquid are better

so i’ve pretty much determined that all things in liquid form are better (even meals… sigh). i’m really trying hard to embrace non liquids but it’s just really hard… i mean water! water is so good! i’m not really talking about water specifically here but water is the base for it all so yes i love and miss water so much. drinking as much water as i want, running water to wash my hands with, running water to shower with, water is great. don’t take your water for granted! ok so anyway i’ll start with conditioner. i purchased solid conditioner from lush and it’s just ridiculously hard to use. and i don’t even know if its good cuz the couple times i’v used it i don’t think it really worked out. it’s hard when you’re standing stark naked in your outhouse shivering from the cold and keeping an eye out for uninvited guests (frogs, cockroaches, spiders, mosquitoes) in your bathing area, to get some in your hand and try to get it into a lather. so i said to myself ‘yeah dude i’m in africa i can rough it and not use conditioner… that lasted about a week because when i didn’t use conditioner my hair wasn’t soft and got tangled and it was dirtier quicker! i was feeling like i needed to wash my hair everyday! that’s just not possible! i mean i don’t even do that when i do have running water showers! so yeah i caved and bought wayyyy overpriced conditioner and it is seriously a universe of a difference… oh conditioner how i love thee. my hair is silky smooth again and lasts for like 3 days~ the less time i have to spend in my bathroom the better! the next is liquid soap. hand and body. bar soaps SUCK. SUCK SUCK SUCK. and i use it up so quickly! and again the whole lathering thing… so hard when there’s not running water over it. trying to balance soap and the water cup and still trying to get everything to lather? yeah totally awesome. the other totally annoying thing about bar soap and not having a real bathroom is that you have to let the soaps dry before you can store them again… which is easier said than done… yeah when we went to maputo to buy phones we were in a department store and using the bathroom and washing your hands with running water? GLORIOUS!!! i went to my friend donna’s the other day for lunch(who made us awesome mexican food with tortillas from scratch) and she bought liquid soap so i got to wash my hands twice with her pouring water on both my hands!!! oh the simple things in life~ next? laundry detergent… blue liquid fresh scented tide in the orange containers. why oh why do you not live in mozambique? i brought a few ‘sink packs’ and i washed my undies in that, but everything else? you guessed it – bar soap. they do have powder laundry detergent here, but my family said that it’s too harsh for clothing so to use bar soap instead, but i think i may have to switch to the powder even if it ruins my clothes cuz my ‘clean’ clothes just don’t smell or feel clean. as this is my ode to liquids, i won’t mention the washer and dryer, but you get the point… so yeah all my laundered clothes are stiff with soap still left in it because getting all the soap out of it would just require so much clean water and it’s just not practical… so yeah i’m trying to not think about how nice clothes feel when they come out of the dryer… the warm soft fresh smelling awesomeness of freshly laundered clothes… yeah maybe just one last moment of silence for the death of my clothes………………..

ps. My family will tell you, but quite contrary to my ranting in this entry, I’m actually super happy and absolutely loving it here!! Every single one of my family members has mentioned that I sound surprisingly upbeat so don’t worry!! Haha

pps. As I said earlier I did buy a phone so call me if you can afford it!! Skype is pretty cheap and there’s also a website called www.nobelcom.com that sells really cheap phone cards! So call me anytime!!! The country code here is 258, and my number is 822.948.194!!!

ppps. The elections are this coming Wednesday here in Moz, and the cell service has been really horrible, where we don’t have any kind of service for like entire days, so if you call in the next week and you don’t get through “it’s not you it’s me!” haha

love,
panda

as promised more pictures~

all the moms greeting us as we arrive to namaacha


i couldnt turn the picture over but this is my room... not a great picture sorry ill try to get more but yeah u get the idea~ = ]

BYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

namaaaaaaaacha

HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!

greetingsh americanosh from namaacha(best said with a newyakuh accent), mozambique! i’ve now been away from home for 3 weeksh and in namaacha for 2 weeksh! so far it hash been an unreal experiensh. let me introdush you to my family firsht! i live with minha mae (my mom) essineta, and my brother (technically he’sh my mae’sh step grandshon, but i just call him my brother ash to uncomplicate my already very complicated mind) eduardo. they’re both super chill, laid back and are unbelievably warm and welcoming. portuguesh has been going great. luckily my spanish really ish helping a lot and after jusht 2 weeksh already feel like i can form sentenshesh fairly well, but i still have a long way to go before i can be stranded in a small village all by myshelf! ash you have probably notished i’ve mishpelled a lot of wordsh by adding ‘sh.’ that ish becaush here in mozambique when the ‘s’ ish in the middle or end of a word and not between vowelsh, you say it with a ‘sh.’ it’sh pretty aweshome. speaking of aweshome, i have the besht language group everrrr! it’sh made up of our professor, nelson, and then my fellow trainees, camille, tim, allison, amanda, timotheo(we had two tim’sh so we had to change one of their namesh, but he lovesh it! he’sh also my soulmate here~(sorry colin ur just the p2) cuz tim was the other madagascan that got relocated here and his phone number is one digit off from mine, AND his birthday is the day before mine! crazy freaky coincidencesh plush we’re both aweshome!) and me! we pretty much spend half our lessonsh laughing becaush our teacher is the MAN, someone will do something ridiculous, or in my case, the most ridiculoush thingsh happen to me. (yeah ok quick side story… i’ve had a kid come up to me and point a plastic gun to my head and shoot, a man selling stuff in maputo come up to me and make fun of me being asian first, and then make fun of my rain boots, which are aweshome by the way thanksh migum = ], and then call me ridiculoush asian obshcenities, and then try to sell me stuff, ash my friendsh were dying laughing, and then some random middleshchool girl came up from behind me to hug me and tell me she loved me… but it was all made better when a random kid that’s like 3yo charged towards me, but then just stops right at my legs and then held my hand and passeared the rest of the way with me. it was pretty aweshome~) we alsho already have the most amazing side group project in the worksh so be on the lookout for that! besides language we alsho have a lot of group seshionsh where we learn more about the culture here, teaching skillsh, and about HIV/AIDSh. the food has been pretty great! i really wash expecting to have to do a lot of adjushting, but i mainly eat eggs, bread, rice, chicken, potatoes and this amazing cucumber, tomato, and onion salad. i’ve had a few specialty dishesh here and there with local produce, but yeah it’sh been great! oh and i know you’re thinking wow that’sh a lot of carbsh, and yeah it really ish, but i alsho walk what feelsh like 5 milesh a day. they LOVE LOVE LOVE to passear here, which basically means to wonder. so even for some of our language classesh, we’ll passear down to the mercado(market) and talk to the vendorsh and just convershar(converse) along the way! what elsh can i tell yall about… ohhhh… ohhhh… the rooshtersh… oh the rooshtersh… well a. they are EVERYWHERE… and when i say everywhere i really mean everywhere… im pretty sure there are more rooshtersh here than mozambicansh! and i was lead to believe my entire life that they only cry at sunrise, but no… no no no… they cry at 6pm, 3am, 8pm, midnight, 11am, anytime they see fit! they’re going during class, while im trying to sleep, when we’re eating, when im on the phone… ALL THE TIME! and we have a hen – she’s mad cool, and when we got her i named her donna becaushe she’sh mad chill but crazy popular and bringsh all the rooshtersh in the hood to our yard hahahaha. love and missh you donnaroooo! man i could go on and on with all the storiesh but i don’t want thish to get too long so i’ll save some for my next entry! i can’t believe i’ve only been here 2 whole weeksh! feelsh like i’ve been here a lifetime already! i leave you with picturesh from the firsht two weeksh here with more to come!

with lotsh and lotsh of love,
panda
(ps i promise this will be the only entry with the “sh’s,” and don’t forget to shush your local shusher! SHUSH THE SHUSHER!!!!!)


all packed up... well kinda...


the beautiful sunset view from our hotel in maputo~

real real safe~ one of the modes of transportation fron maputo to namaacha!


my house~

ok so there are a lot more pictures but it's taking too long to upload so i need to find a better way to do this! but love you and more stories soon!!

noooo... africa?

as i re-read my last post and began writing this one, i realized again just how terrible a writer i am. i’m thinking maybe i should just post a link from this page to another volunteer’s page… eh whatever you’re stuck with me!
so anyway… I’M IN AFRICA! IN AFRICA!!!!!!!!!
yep that’s right folks, after 2 years i’m finally here! although… i don’t even know if i can technically say i’m in africa when i’m staying at a waterfront hotel in the capital city with a pool and air conditioning!
i guess the story is that there’s a hotel here that the peace corps always uses, that’s well… not as great according to the past volunteers and staff, but that hotel somehow lost or overbooked the reservation of 70ish rooms, so they had to put us up in a much much much nicer hotel! but hey i mean i’m not complaining and it’s definitely a nice way to get over the jetlag and injections. i’m now up to 5 shots, but i have no idea what i’ve gotten… they just kinda shoot you up with whatever it is they think you need, then you’re on your merry way! i also just popped my very first malaria pill so i’ll let you know how that goes! not gonna lie still pretty psyched about those side effects!
so orientation today was pretty standard- safety precautions and procedures, medical issues and instructions, meeting our training staff and portuguese teachers, oh and we got our training info. our schedule for the next 10 weeks is insanely busy! from learning portuguese to how to be a teacher to living with a host family… i’m getting tired just thinking about it (or maybe that’s just the jetlag), but man am i excited! so we leave tomorrow for training in namaacha so i may not be able to post til training’s over, but i’m sure i’ll have much better stories to tell at that point!

love and miss everyone so much!
panda