"you can take a nothing day...and suddenly make it all seem worthwhile"

Gee, I'm happy today! Seriously. I feel almost giddy, bubbling, like Mary during the intro to the Mary Tyler Moore show where she's grinning like a dope, and skipping down the street, and eventually tosses her hat (or is it her beret?) into the air out of sheer joy (gotta love those Nick at Night reruns.) Yeah, I feel just like that, and for no good reason seeing as it's belt-tightening time in Dodoma. You'll notice that I haven't been posting as much lately; that's because electricity and water rationing is in effect from 7 am to 9 pm most days- and unfortunately, I've just been informed that it's going to be cut off in about 5 minutes, so I'll have to make this entry short. Despite the brief spat of rain we've had lately, it doesn't look like it's going to be enough to allay the drought; on February 14th the government appealed to international donors for 100,000 tons of food aid, as currently 3. 7 million people are projected to be at risk of famine. It hasn't affected my life much (besides the electicity and water rationing and a slight increase in food prices- no big deal as I pay inflated prices being white anyway) although as my area of the country is one of the worst affected, I'm anticipating that it'll get worse during the coming months. Being asked for money is a killer here. It happens everytime you walk through town and it's a lose/lose situation; I mean if you give someone money you're encouraging a begging culture, a culture of dependence, and reinforcing the commonly held notion that all white people have money. If you don't though...it's not like New York where you can comfort yourself with the knowledge that there are social services, and safety nets, and that food IS available for the homeless in many aid orgs throughout the city. No, here you can't fool yourself into thinking that all the people begging just want money for drugs or alcohol; here 90% really spend the money on food, it really might make a difference between life or death. I've yet to make my peace with that question, but I imagine I'll have to decide quickly. At least work is going well, I'm back to teaching math, and our school has been busy with the construction- nearly all of our classrooms have real concrete floors and blackboards now! yay! okay, more soon, (much love)
kt