lusaka...

so, after 7 days and many many trips to my cimbusu (toilet) i am in lusaka for medical tests for a runny tummy... :-/ i'm still not sure what it is and it's definitely a bizarre sickness because mostly i'm feeling better except for my stomach just not feeling "right." i'm hoping to get test results today and head back up to kasama for peace corps meetings tomorrow and then back up to my site by sunday! :-) we'll see. fingers crossed.

that said... a description of my adventure down here might be amusing. i talked to the peace corps medical officer on sunday morning. all the buses from mpika to lusaka leave around 8 in the morning, so as i looked at my watch i realized i had missed all of them. so, sick, on a sunday morning i was going to try to hitch the 7 hours to lusaka.

i packed stuffed up, got my soccer balls back from the kids, got my cats to a new friend in town and walked down to the gas station. i waited for about an hour with about 5 cars passing me, until finally two guys in a white van stopped and asked where i was going. i said lusaka, a bit anxiously, hoping that they wouldn't laugh that i thought i could possibly go that far. to my amazement they said "well, today we're heading to serenje (about two and a half hours south of mpika) and then are continuing on to kabwe (two hours north of lusaka) tomorrow. but, if you want to come to serenje and continue on from there, you're welcome." i hopped in and got to serenje where i decided to spend the night at the peace corps house instead of sitting by the roadside with my fingers crossed and that i would have another ride at least half of the way the next day.

so, i hung out at the PC house where i took one of the hottest showers i've ever taken in my life. it was amazing. honestly, i know i've talked about showers before, but i think a hot shower is truly something i will forever be thankful for from now on. standing under running water, even as i know how much less water i CAN bathe with, is amazing.

then, i continued on the next day with chris, my new friend the driver, to kabwe. we spent the entire ride chatting, which was really nice... about zambia, about american political candidates, about egypt (which he travelled to for the africa cup last year and loved), about marriage and having children. he laughed that i thought i would start having kids around the age of 30. he said "that's when we STOP here in zambia!" then he dropped me off at the bus stop in kabwe and i waited to catch one of the many buses on their way to lusaka. luckily it only took about 20 minutes and i was in lusaka by 2 in the afternoon, only 28 hours after i had left my house in mpika. oy. and then made it quickly to the pc office.

since being in lusaka i've been staying with a family, which has been really nice. the peace corps has a bed and breakfast program that sets us up with american families in lusaka, which is so nice. it's nice to be in a house and the family i'm staying with has an almost 3 year old daughter who is the cutest thing. they are so sweet and worried about my tummy, which as it settles a bit can actually eat the food that they are feeding me! i've moved on from soup which is what i ate for most of last week. and they are just interesting to talk to and it's interesting to imagine a life as an ex-pat in lusaka...

lusaka has developed so much in the last 5-10 years that i think living here is pretty easy. a lot of the comforts that americans are used to are becoming easy to access in lusaka. whether that's reliable electricity and running water or spices from the new south african brand grocery stores or soft serve ice cream, you can find it. but lusaka is also a bit strange... each house is guarded and gated, each family seems to have a maid, a gardener, a guard, and struggles with how to be employers but not development workers but also kind and caring. it's definitely a strange world to try to navigate.

anyway, i'll close there and maybe get another update up soon. kisses! oh, also, i got SOME (very few!) pics up and unfortunately they are on facebook. so, check them out. but the computers even here can only put up pics slowly and one at a time. so that might be slow forever. but i might get a couple more up today. so, if you don't have facebook, get a kid to show you how to use it! haha.