"I'm going to be a clinically obese child in Africa."

First, khanga is spelled like that. Whoever spells it konga is stupid (aka, me).

Second, I forgot to mention that I am HIV negative. Probably an important detail. My bruise today is not longer swollen but it is huge. Doesn't hurt as much anymore, but it looks intense. I should take a picture of it.

Third, don't tell any of your teaching partners that you are HIV negative. Especially if his name is Yonas. He's a jokester and really enjoys making inappropriate jokes. First he tells Mara that Daniel (one of the workers for SIC) dropped off condoms at his house for the condom demonstrations... and for Yonas. Then later he asks me about our testing. I said I tested negative. He said he tested negative a year ago and since he hasn't participated in any risky behavior since then, he's still negative. Apparently this means we are able to have unprotected sex.

Today Rachel, Mara, and I went to check out Emmanuelle's house. She lives in a mansion! And they have sinks. All I want in my house is a sink. I love everything about my house, but a convenient place to wash my hands everytime I have to touch a child playing with a dead fish would be lovely. But her baba (father) didn't go to secondary school and he started his own business. It's a super successful hardware store and he lives in a huge house. Emmanuelle was also saying that the gender roles are very different in her house, which is cool. In my house, our mama always serves us and gets us what we need. But E said that her baba often serves them and does the "womanly" stuff. That's so awesome.

After E's house, the four of us stopped at the supermarket to pick up bread. Then we went to the market and got parachichi (avocado), some tomatoes, onions, and pilipili (pepper). Then we went to my house and made some guacamole. Mama Ali (the one who usually cooks for us) did not like it one bit. Mama Halime (the head of the house) said she liked it, but we're not quite sure. Our bibi (grandmother) wouldn't even try it. I think our brother Ali liked it, though. We enjoyed it. We also decided it's probably a bad idea because an entire loaf of white bread is not a good snack. But we're doing it again tomorrow, this time at Rachel's place. I'm looking forward to it. We got really intense with our pocket knives cutting the veggies. We got some real Bear Grylles around here.

I also touch our cats too much for it to be healthy. I'm going to get a serious disease. Mara likes to joke that I'm going to get feline AIDS. Not possible, but some other strange African cat disease is totally possible.

Okay, I'm going to do another post on our daily lives in the near future. Just you wait. It's exciting. I will be providing some serious detail, too. You'll almost think you're here!!