Well, I'm back!

Back to the land of lions and elephants. Back to the land of crazy traffic, Swahili, and rice and beans. Back to many amazing friends and the place where I feel I belong for (at least) the next chapter of my life. And, unfortunately, back to the land of dirty water and food and parasites. I just overcame my first (parasite) and am well acquainted with my new bathroom.

My travels went flawlessly despite my skepticisms about being picked up at the airport in Kenya and actually having a hotel room booked. My trip across the Kenya/Tanzania border was short and sweet and I'm slowly adjusting to life in Arusha. Moving from Dar es Salaam to Arusha is like a transition from Toronto to Sudbury and so I knew to expect it would take some time. Luckily my Swahili is strong and so, with a head on my shoulders and a hand on my purse, I am quite capable of safely wandering the streets of Arusha alone. (I've always enjoyed getting oriented in new places alone).

St. Jude's is more than I expected on every level. It is an absolutely amazing organization and the most sustainable and well-run NGO I have ever encountered. I work among a staff of over 50 international people and 400 Tanzanians to provide a high quality education to over 1500 gifted Tanzanian children from situations of extremely high poverty. The school is comprised of 3 campuses and is honestly nicer than any of my schools were in Canada. St. Jude's has this amazing way of thanking every single person who supports the school in a personal manner. Working in donor relations, I make every letter and picture personal and unique to the person donating money. For example, today I had students take a thank you picture with a CD that was donated and sent it with a personal letter to the donor... just 1 CD!! It is incredible that they are able to run such a huge organization solely off donations, but being here and seeing how connected St. Jude's is to supporters, I understand completely how this organization has been able to become what it is today. I encourage you to check out the website and learn more (http://www.schoolofstjude.org/). I must have looked at the website a hundred times before coming and I am still in awe of how amazing St. Judey's really is!

My first week was a bit odd as Tuesday was the 10th Anniversary party for St. Jude's all day, I went on a home visit to a student's home on Thursday, and it was a long weekend with Friday and Saturday off (I work 3 hours every Saturday...).

Since I am unsure of when I'll next have a long weekend, I took the opportunity to travel to Dar to catch up with some friends. It's a 10+ hour bus ride, but I made the trip seem short by staying out with new friends until 4am Friday and leaving to catch the bus at 6am. Needless to say, I slept nearly the entire way!

Things in Dar were great and it felt like I was going home. Saw many friends, wet to a great concert, stayed up until dawn, and spent a day on the beach. It was strange to return to Arusha because arriving back here also felt like getting home. I'm sure my brain will sort this all out soon... or maybe it isn't so bad to have multiple homes!

With such a large international staff, things are always busy. There are African dance lessons, drumming lessons, walking clubs, yoga, isometrics, weight training... And every night almost all of the staff gather at a little beer stand to sit, chat and unwind.

All in all, things are great, but I think I still have a week or so of adjusting to do before I feel as if I've established a routine. I'm making great friends, love my colleagues and love the cause I'm working for!

Although I genuinely despise taking pictures, I took a bunch in my first week to post with a blog and introduce you all to St. Jude's, but my room completely flooded last night due to a water tank in my ceiling bursting, and I had about 2 inches of water on my floor. Obviously, being Erica Hall, nearly all of my possessions were on the floor, including my camera. My camera is working, but somehow in the shuffle of taking batteries out of it to dry it, I lost my memory card. It sucks. I don't think I'm meant to have pictures because they always somehow get deleted or lost. Bad things keep happening to my room including a cleaning lady accidently throwing some of my stuff in the trash, but I think I'm a good person for bad things to happen to because I don't take any of it too seriously.

I think that's all for now. I do intend to blog a bit more but I cannot promise that it will be frequent... I'll try!

One last thing - some girls in Dar have kept my girl empowerment program going while I was away with weekly sessions at their school, so I am working on running a workshop in Arusha with my old R&S colleagues! It's very exciting!

Much love,

Erica