Protea Hotel Lusaka

... crammed next to the window and hung her head outside the window almost the entire time to avoid the effects of chlaustrophobia and avoid the body odor of the bus. Brittany was smushed in between Lindsey and a young big-boned Zambian woman with a baby. The lady took up half the seat and was breastfeeding her baby the whole way while he kicked Brittany. Brittany was pretty miserable and after 4 hours made Lindsey switch seats with her. Lindsey was ...

... of the road is much better than we were led to believe. There were just a couple of patches with potholes, and yes they were large, but on the whole the road was very good. Quite a bit of traffic but the lorries do not seem to travel too fast, just beware of the minibuses (kombi's) as they pull in and out of the side of the roads quickly to pick up travellers. There are also quite a few police checkpoints, but as we slowed ...

... were very happy. The open house ceremonty was very nice. The girls were introduced and they wore traditional clothes and danced. Even though they are 12 years old, they are at a grade level of 4, 5 and 6. I wrote earlier of the Reptile Farm Visit that we took everyone to. That was more expensive than we originally thought because we had to rent a bus. But the children loved it soooo much. They could ...

... body scarification, drinking cow blood, polygamy... They have survived genocide, communist occupation, dictators like Idi Amin, post-election violence, Tamil Tigers, overpopulation, poverty, malnutrition, HIV/AIDS... And yet through all this devastation you find the friendliest people in the world. They say "hello" to you as you pass them on the street and hope you have a few minutes of time to spare so they can find out more about you. They'll offer to buy you ...

... before early bed. The stars were amazing and the Milky Way was really bright so Kirsty was quite impressed with that. Although Kirsty had said she was happy to sleep in the ground tent on her own I said that maybe she would be better sleeping with Granny upstairs on her first night because first time you hear the African night it can be quite daunting - she agreed and I retired to the tent. I heard hippo during the night and the lion roaring along with the Puka and Bushbuck ...

... 2 more checks but were just waved through - hopefully it will be like that for the rest of our stay. The T1 road deteriorated about 40km before Zimba with potholes that would challenge the Nata to Kasane road for the title of worst road in southern Africa but after about 20km the road was closed with a diversion that took us the rest of the way to Zimba as the road was being reconstructed - at least they were doing something about it unlike Botswana.The road beyond ...

Back in Lusaka, finally! This last week was another interesting one, as we had all of our big-wigs from our headquarters and all of our country directors from around Africa (in addition to Zambia, we have programs in Africa in Ethiopia, Malawi, Botswana, South Africa, and Tanzania) descend on Lusaka for a week long 'Africa Regional Leadership Conference.' This is absolutely not the type of event that a peon like me would normally be privvy to, but because I ...

... cleaning, seeing as how I was "so busy and always on my laptop." :) He particularly pulled at my heartstings by telling me about how they were raising their own children and then many orphans. Alright! I said that she could come by after church on Sunday. EVERYONE here goes to church on Sunday (except me and my muzungu friends it seems). Sure enough, 7AM on Sunday morning there was someone banging on my door. What happened to church? Turns out she ...

... We were inspired by their commitment and their hard work to serve under difficult circumstances. Inflation is so out-of-control that the Zim-dollar as they call it, is worthless. The society is breaking down because the economy can't function. How could businesses function when the inflation rate can be 100% per day?! That is, prices can double overnight. By the time a paycheck is deposited in an account and one works through the ...

... he was fine. Bare in mind, of course, that it had been less than a week since his earlier diagnosis and that he&#8217;d been confined to his bed for most of that time. It seemed quite apparent that she was wrong. When we told her this she responded calmly, but not without a little nervousness, that perhaps the reason for her inaccuracy was that he hadn&#8217;t signed in officially via the patients&#8217; book, which of course, is a pretty daft explanation indeed.<br><br>Had she been a ...