life

ok my goal this week is to put up some pictures of my room/place where i live. I've finally got it all fixed up except the bathroom which needs a new cement wall (I have however bought the cement for said project).

Workwise life's been good. Last week there was a fact finding mission from the capitol, Dakar, by USAID and the NGO Family Health International. They came to Kedougou after Matt, a fellow Kedougou PCV brought the AIDS problem to the attention to the director of FHI Senegal. It was a really productive three days involving all of the key players in the region. At the end of the three days we came out with an action plan as to how Kedougou will continue the fight against AIDS. I don't know how much I've talked about it but the things here is that there is a growing prevalence of AIDS cases amongst (mostly migrant) miners who mine for gold around Kedougou. Whole new villages are built at the mining sites, for miners who have left there family behind for a long period, they seek comfort in the arms of a growing number of prostitutes. It's more complex than that, but that's the general picture. So now we're planning a few projects financed entirely by USAID. The first one is a series of interviews the discover the knowledge of AIDS and then create a new pedagogical model to teach about AIDS in junior highs in the area. Another protect is financing some billboards and posters, to encourage people to get tested for AIDS. Hopefully we will also be doing something for world AIS day on December 1st. Tomorrow I'm going to start going the the regional hospital to see how to solve a problem they had with condom distribution. I may end up going there on a regular basis. the head doctor seems very motivated and I think there could be a lot of joint ventures undertaken between us.

Oh yeah during the three day fact finding mission I had to miss out on a day because of an uncomfortable case of pink eye. I am thankfully on the mend, but I've been wearing glasses for the last week which is really annoying.

ok so that's what I've been up to... oh and i got a lot of suggestions on how to deal with annoying guys. I like uncle Roger's idea of showing them a pic of him and my dad...