Travel mania

Once again, we write... as an effort to feel less far from all the people we love. We are still feeling quite homesick, but really trying to maximize our time here...

We’re just back from a few weeks of traveling, first to Mfuwe/South Luangwa National Game Reserve, then onto Livingstone at the southwest tip of Zambia bordering Zimbabwe. It has been so great to have the time to explore this country, especially under the auspices of “work!”

Our first trip to Mfuwe started 06Aug07. South Luangwa is ~8 hours east of Lusaka. The drive was a bit of a pain, so we think we’ll fly the next time. And there WILL be a next time! I spent ~2.5 days working at the Komoto Mission Hospital. AIDS Relief plans to partner with them this year as another site that will receive antiretrovirals and technical/clinical assistance. They have a decent hospital, but they have some clear gaps, for example, they have one clinical officer that runs the ART clinic (that’s the HIV/AIDS clinic). He does a good job, but he’s one person. Their lab is seriously lacking with no equipment to run the most simple tests, ones that are essential if a patient is to be monitored on anti-HIV medications. The staff were very excited at the potential partnership and welcomed us with a feast for lunch of nshima, chicken, and various relishes. It was odd to sit in the head administrators home and eat lunch while our “dinner” was clucking right outside the window!

Dave busied himself with long walks and runs around the lodge and decided he may take up “birding” because Zambia is supposed to be a hot spot for cataloguing all the bird species – when else in our lives will we have the luxury of birding??! We were able to take an early morning game drive which left at 5:30AM on the last day. It was amazing!! To see the animals in their own environment puts zoos to such shame!! We saw herds of elephants (they’re massive!), zebras, giraffes, hyenas, impala, baboons, ginea fowl, water buck, buffalo, hippos, bushback antelope, and kudu & puku antelope. We weren’t able to catch a lion or leopard, but did see the remains of an impala (leopard kill) up in a tree. We expected the leopard would return – but didn’t on our watch. Although, the baboons were barking, so they must have seen it, even if our eyes missed him. I guess we’ll have to do another safari!! They said that you see the predators on the night drives more often.

We had one day back in Lusaka between trips – just enough time to do laundry (with our own washer!!) and repack! We left for Livingstone 12Aug07 to perform a 2-day centralized training on tuberculosis and HIV co-infection. I was mostly an observer this time around and helped some with the logistics of putting on a conference. It went well. Wednesday, Dave and I went white water rafting on the Zambezi River. It was incredible. We had rafted before in Northern California, but that was nothing like this! They rate the waves based on difficulty, and in the states the rapids were rated a 4 out of 6, hard enough to require a helmet, but not over-the-top. Well, we decided that based on the ratings here in Zambia, the rapids we rode in CA were closer to a 2. We rode 4s and 5s here and they were out of control! I was petrified. But, of course, in retrospect, I’m alive and LOVED every second. We’ll post some pictures on the website asap. We had another early morning again today because we decided to ride rented bicycles to Victoria Falls to see the sunrise. It was breathtaking. They’ll be pics on smugmug soon.

So now we’re home, already bored, just kidding. It’s nice to be “home.” We miss you and now that we have internet – woooohoooo – we hope to talk more often.

Keep in touch - we love to hear from everyone and get updates so we don't feel so far away.

Love you all,

Kim & Dave

First Post -- a full weekend in Lusaka

Hello!
How’s everyone doing?? I’m missing you and hoping you are all doing well.

We’re doing well. We stayed in Lusaka this week after my trip to the bush got postponed. We leave tomorrow for Chipata, Mfuwe, and ultimately Komoto Mission Hospital, a new AIDS Relief site on the outskirts of South Luangwa game park. Dave is going to join me for the week and we hope to get some game drives in while we’re there. We’re going to start a blog from Zambia so that instead of emails, you guys can check out the blog. We can link pictures there too. The internet company didn’t show up on Friday as expected, despite David walking into their store front rather than relying on telephone communication. As I’ve said before, everything here is SLOW to happen… but when we return from our trip next week we’ll continue working on it.

A few stories of interest from Lusaka…
We met a 13y/o girl on a run Wednesday morning. We were practicing our Nyanja, saying good morning to everyone, and she answered in perfect English, saying, “I want to be your friend.” We stopped to walk with her to her school. Her name is Sikumbuzu, which means memory. She told us she is an orphan from Zimbabwe, living with her Auntie, in 7th grade, and wants to be a lawyer. She offered to come over and teach us Nyanja. We decided that she is an amazing motivator to us and we hope to see her again on our morning runs. Dave joked (?) about adopting her…

Dave and I had a proper nshima based dinner on Friday. Nshima is the mealy-meal corn based staple here. Dave and Lyson (a 15y/o from Malawi) made the nshima and I helped (sort of) prepare the relishes – chicken, tomatoes and onions, and cabbage. YUM… j/k!!! It was the exact same dinner I had had prepared from me in the village a few weeks ago, but Dave hadn’t tried it yet. Dave had asked Lyson to teach us how to make it as a trade-off to Dave taking him to see the movie Transformers. The fun part with dinner is that you’re not supposed to use forks. You roll the nshima into balls with one hand, press a thumb into it and use it as a spoon to eat the relishes (defined as anything you eat with nshima). Ultimately, not too tasty, but an experience nonetheless. We’re going to think of ways to flavor the nshima, even though that’s frowned upon!

The same night, we decided to go to one of the local restaurants for a few drinks after dinner. On our way there, Dave accidentally missed a stop sign (which is SO common by the locals here, maybe he’s getting too comfortable and thinks he’s Zambian!). There was a police truck at the stop sign that pulled us over. Two guys got out of the truck, one was in military clothes, and the other was carrying an AK-47. The military guy was pretty angry and put on quite a show, yelling at Dave about his error and telling him he was going to be detained at the station overnight, actually until Tuesday, b/c Monday is a holiday (Farmer’s Day, what?). I was a bit concerned, to say the least, but Dave handled it very well and encouraged them to resolve it right then and there rather than going to the station. After being told that the cost of his offense would be 600,000 Kwacha ($150 US), Dave shelled out $100 US he had on him, and avoided some overnights at the station. Phew! It was pretty crazy. We had our first experience with the police corruption which was not fun, but now we know the drill.

Yesterday, we decided to take a long bikeride up into the trails we had discovered on our runs. Our bikes are really more designed for road biking, but do have slightly bigger tires for easy trails… if only we had stayed on easy trails!!!! We got a bit lost because there are paths everywhere going every direction. At one point, Dave and I thought we had accidentally entered a game park (perhaps Jurassic Park??!) b/c we came across piles of dung the size of our heads. Seriously. Fortunately, we did not have any run-ins with live animals, but we managed to attract a tribe of children about 30 strong who ran after us as we biked through their township shouting “Mzungu!” and reaching their little hands out to touch our white skin, we took on very rocky steep terrain which I managed to take a tumble, and we rode through fire (it’s common for locals to clear their land with fire). Eventually (3 hours later) we happened upon a ranch owner named Aaron who sent us in the right direction on actual dirt roads, rather than the footpaths. It was quite an experience – and one that we will avoid in the future. I’m much happier on tarmac… although the kids were awesome.

That’s it for now. We’re headed over to the trade show to find some home furnishings… we’re busy beautifying our home so you all can come visit!! J

And, check out some of our pics at http://dave-n-kim.smugmug.com/



Ti konda inu! (“we love you” in Nyanja lesson 4 and still lots to learn)
Kim & Dave