I would like to start this blog by pointing out how ridiculous kenya is. today I was walking down the street...mind you this is in almost the middle of downtown mombasa....and all of a sudden on the sidewalk there was a goat squirming around gushing blood from where its head had been chopped off. blood was going all over the sidewalk and i had to jump so i wouldn't get soaked in the river of blood. i kinda freaked out...and a guy next to me started laughing and goes, "take a picture!". needless to say...it led to me laughing for the next five minutes. those are the moments i love kenya because that just would never happen back home.

I can't beleive I have one week left in Mombasa! that means two weeks left in the program...then 2 months of travel! I'm excited to be back on my own...but I am going to miss my organizations sooo much! the boys in the youth organization I work with have become some of my really good friends, and saying goodbye to them I'm sure will mean alot of tears. Going to work never seems like work because we have so much fun together. We have a ritual where everytime I come to work we do what we like to call "topics"...where they ask me questions about things in the US (like zombies, employment, the south) and then I ask them about things in kenya (why guys grow their finger nails long...you don't even want to know the answer, student responsiblity, etc ect) I always know that we are going to have great coversations whether they be about prom night in the US...or how to distigmatize communities about HIV/AIDS...the conversations are always no holds bar and tend to get pretty raunchy and usually end with us both learning something. they are all so smart and full of potential and I love them so much for it. If I come back to kenya...much of the reason will be to see them!

Today was the first day of a 2 day workshop for Hope Maintainers (youth org) where we are working on coming up stratgic plans for the organization. Today was extremely successful and we reworked their vision and mission statement. We also came up with specific goals they wanted to acheive in order to fufil their vision and mission. I could not have asked for a better turn out. Tomorrow we will be working on coming up with strategies and activities to fulfil their goals. We will also come up with a timeline for when they want to do all these things. I think all of this will really help them to focus and take ownership of the programs they are doing. It has been a great learning experience for me as well. I'm actually getting to put into practice the things I want to do with my life which is awesome!

Overall, I am totally stressed, but generally pretty happy. Once all of these papers are done...it's playtime and I am really excited for that!

ok...thats all until next time