Mandy and Clay's Big Adventure

2003-12-17T16:35:00.000-08:00

Railay Beach - Krabi - Bangkok - HOME

Our last day abroad, running and few errands in Bangkok and figuring out how to get home the extra luggage of various fun stuff we acquired while away.... If all goes as planned, we'll be back stateside in about 24 hours (although, in a quirk of international dateline stuff, it will only be a few hours after we left Thailand even though we're flying 16 hours or so) to meet our new nephew -- a healthy new son born on Monday (yea!!!!) to Verna and Josh. We can't wait - it's time to come home...

Barry Manilow's "Mandy" is playing right now in the guest house cafe next to me...too funny. So here are a few last thoughts of SEAsia before we fly out (*I'm trying to reacclimate to stateside time, so have a few hours on my hands this morning :) Forgive the indulgence in one last blog of final thoughts while still fresh...*).

- Noodle soup for breakfast
- No coffee shops open in the morning
- River taxis in Bangkok rule
- If you go to the Oriental Hotel, wear pants
- Wish I had a nickel for every tattoo on a traveller i've seen
- Cilantro
- "I like your pants. They are very SPEcial!"
- ML rappelling for the first time down from Diamond Cave!
- Fresh fruit juice everywhere
- Bodysurfing shorebreach waves at Lanta
- Endearing, and often humorous, English translation misspellings
- Sandals and flip-flops as footwear of choice
- "Sawatdee kop"
- Watermelon shake for ML, Mango shake for me
- Big Chang, official drink of khao san road
- Don't eat the phad thai on side streets in Chiang Mai
- "Thank you one million times."
- Flawless knock-off Bathing Ape, Diesel, and Paul Frank tshirts
- So so smiley and so so friendly... even to clueless farangs
- Hugo the Thai star next to me on the plane
- Karaoke at the laundromat
- "We buy everything"
- Gilded horn curlicues on the points of wats
- Red, yellow, and green tiled roofs
- Email, no 2 after backpack, as most convenient travel innovation
- Climbers in Railay without shoes heading up limestone faces
- Limestone stalactites on Thaiwan wall
- Pineapple slices in plastic bags on the beach
- Andaman sea, where it's possible to live without shoes
- Vented sidewalk sewers and the occassional hot waft of nastiness
- Plastic water bottles: environmental scourge of developing world (they should charge more, for recycling costs, we decided)
- Cheap haircuts
- Kid friendly, esp the beaches!
- Buddhist monks in orange robes packed on to a rush hour Chao Praya river taxi
- Funky snack food flavors (Nari Sea Weed chips weren't a big hit at Railay minimart)
- Fire spinners on the beach: cheesy but cool
- Gold spire of Wat Phra Keow
- "Beware fake monk" sign
- Mosquito nets (no longer so 'romantic' anymore!)
- Plastic buckets, the workhorse of street food stalls
- 125 cc scooter-motos, the workhorse of seasian transportation
- Great food, smiles, more English spoken everywhere than we farangs deserve, living the good life cheap cheap cheap!

My final thought of this adventure of service work and travel is how incredibly lucky and fortunate Mandy and I are to have been able to have this experience together. As we've remarked to each other often during these past few months, and many of our friends and fam have noted as well, what an amazing and special and memorable way for us to begin our lives together as spouses and life-partners... I love Mandy even more after these experiences together than I thought I could before, and that's saying a lot. I'm proud of her for all the new challenges we had and faced together, and most especially I'm amazed and so happy that we could start our married lives together in this way. It may take some more time for it all to sink in, and for us to "process" (as ML says) all that we've done and seen and heard and tasted and smelled and moved through together on our extended honeymoon --- but the lasting impression I'll have from the end of our journey together is one of a deeper appreciation for my wife (it's still fun to say, and hear, "husband" and "wife"! when does that go away?) and a stronger love for her presence in my life and for our lives together after this little adventure.

OK< enough --- thank you thank you thank you to all our friends and fam who've kept in touch with us by email, kept us informed, done all kinds of errands and favors for us on our behalf while away, and generally reminding us often of what "home" is really all about for us during these past many months. We love you and we are as excited as we've ever been to see you and re-connect without keyboards and internet connections.

Much love to all, congratulations especially to Josh and Verna and all the Levenbergs on the addition of a new Leven-baby to the growing family.... we'll be home very soon.
xoxo CM/ML
Thursday, Dec 18, 2003

2003-12-11T20:48:00.000-08:00

Phuket - Ao Nang - Ton Sai - Railey Beach - Ko Lanta

Love to all from the island of Ko Lanta, southern Thailand. Esp. love to my grandpa Art, who just turned 89!

We are doing a whole lot of nothing and generally re-living all of our experiences and places visited from here on the beach. Although the weather has been a bit up-and-down, we've only had one real day of late monsoon season rain and despitea few clouds it's warm and very very relaxing. We keep remarking that it's hard to believe we are going home in less than a week - and for the first time in a long time, we're actually aware of the month and the date, as we have started talking about what's going to be happening with us at later dates in December and January back in SF, Florida, and eventually in Seattle.... and by contrast, it makes us aware of how close "Dec 11th" is to "Dec 19th"!

We spent 3 days on Railey Beach before coming here to Ko Lanta 3 days ago. It's very nice and although the beach is quite small, it's a very dramatic place since there are huge limestone cliffs covered in green trees, caves, big hanging stalactites, and such all around... The monthly "full moon party" was happening one beach over - on Ton Sai - so we went and tried to convince ourselves that we weren't among the oldest people there, sipping vodka and red bull and watching a bunch of dudes spin flaming balls around on chains above their heads all night long...
Railey is world famous for rock climbing, as all of the limestone cliffs are perfect for climbing and have had routes put up on them in the hundreds through the years. Any time of day, no matter which direction you look at the cliffs you can see climbers slowly making their way up multi-pitch routes on the yellow rock, or quickly rappelling down in pairs. I hired gear and a climbing partner/instructor from one of the many climbing shops on Railey and practiced lead climbing and tried to improve my belay technique in prep for eventual return to the gym (winter) and Exit 38 back in Seattle (summer) climbing with Bruce, Jack, and the gang. Mandy is now convinced that it is as fun as I've been saying it is, and I think we're going to get her on the rocks for a day or so (no worries, parents - it's very safe, I'm ensuring that!) when we go back to Railey in 2 days for our last couple of days of chilling before we head back to Bangkok and then SF...

So now we are spending 4 or 5 days on Ko Lanta, a small island south of Krabi and Railey. It's definitely a little older and sleepier here, which is fine with us! Big long beaches have allowed us to start running again, after many months off. Legs are a bit sore, but it feels good to start some cardio again and our new best friend, Tou the massage therapist, is getting the kinks out of our long-unused muscles each night for the modest fee of $5 an hour --- we highly recommend Ko Lanta to all of our friends, both younger with little ankle-biters (this island is very family and kid-friendly), and parents, for whom Ko Lanta is a 1/10-cost alternative to Hawaii.

All in all, it's a very lucky thing that we are amazed about each day here that we are able to be here, have the time and mental space to think back through and talk about everywhere we have been these past 4 months... and remember all the while the Africare experience, the fact that this is still our honeymoon (albeit a long one!) and we haven't left the year in which we got married yet, etc. We feel really lucky, and so thanks to family and parents and friends who have been our emotional, financial, logistical, and everything else safety net while we've been away.

Happiest of holidays to all -- we've not exactly gotten into the "holiday spirit" this year, given our location and temperatures, but we are more excited than any year to get back together with our families for the holidays and new year very soon and start the process of hearing -- first-hand! -- how YOU are all doing these days too!!!

Much love, probably not much more to say until we're on the way back to SF and home... so until then if any of you want to send us a brief email to our shared address with your cell-phone/contact info over the holidays, that would be great (our palm pilot died long ago on this trip).
We'll probably do one last post with our cell #'s somewhere around Dec 22 after we've gotten back and plugged back in to phone lines again....

Love, xoxox Clay and Mandy

2003-12-05T18:18:00.000-08:00

Pai - Chiang Mai - Phuket - ??Beach

Pai -- a little town of Lisu, KMT, and Thai people northwest of CHiang Mai about 4 hours up into the hills, almost to the Burmese border -- was small, settled in a valley surrounded by green hills all around and plateaus of rice farmers who are harvesting this years crops. We rode a motorbike all throughout the Pai valley, and generally did a lot of nada. Hiked and biked around the hills one day, visited a cool Wat halfway up one of the many hillsides to get the view of the whole valley. Many "farang" (i./e. westerners) have adopted Pai as their spot to "drop out" and hang out, many with Thai partners. It's very very laid back - Tom and Christie, you'd be amazed at how many new guest houses are opening every day - apparently, Pai is no big secret as a northern Thailand destination anymore! But it's pretty sleepy still....

Last night we killed an evening in Chiang Mai sipping cold beers at a sidewalk cafe and treated ourselves to a rare departure from local cuisine - a pizza and gnocchi, which wasn't half bad (but nowhere near as legit as the gnocchi at La Spiga, which we missed as we ate last night!). Took in the spectacle of Dec 5th, the Thailand King's Birthday, a national holiday and absolutely the most important day of evening celebrations here. Gigantic gold-and-multi-colored lighted pictures of the King all over town, including a huge stage and celebration in the main square. Ah, to bask in the glow of royalty....

Today we're off to Phuket and then transferring somehow, boat or minibus or something, down to Krabi and hoping for a good bungalow somewhere in the RaiLeh area. Happy day to all, much love and everyone wish Dick Levenberg good luck and "break a leg" in your big piano concerto coming up soon!

xoxo Clay and ML

2003-12-01T05:23:00.000-08:00

Hanoi - Bangkok - Chiang Mai - Pai (soon)

Hi and love to all,
today we had our first full day cooking class on the delights of thai cuisine, it was fantastic and i only wish we could have had second helpings of the Mango and Sticky Rice dessert we learned. I'll be making it for you all soon.
Chiang Mai is full of many centuries of the ornate, curvy, beautiful (mandy might say "gaudy", i say "colorful and detailed"...) Wats which show how this region of Thailand was the center of Theraveda Buddhism for all of SE Asia for many many years during the mid-2nd-millennium. After more cooking learning tomorrow, we're heading up to the small town of Pai near the Burmese border to hike and see the northwestern hills and the "hilltribe villages" of Karen, Hmong, and other lesser-populated peoples which dot the Thai border areas near Myanmar (Burma) and Laos here up north. After stretching our legs for a while, we're down to Andaman coast to find a (relatively, this time of year) remote beach with cold beers and fresh fish and chill with a sack full of books until we return home to the fam and the holidays.

Sending our love, all is well and aside from a few brief stomach traumas (which are now, thankfully, over for both of us!), we are safe and happy and learning new things and enjoying the last few weeks. Happiest of Holidays to you all --- xoxo

2003-11-26T03:54:00.000-08:00

Hanoi - Halong Bay - Cat Ba Island - Hanoi

We're in our last day in Hanoi, and Vietnam as well. Tomorrow heading to Bangkok, where we're going to drop off a few more fun items we've picked up along the way in SE asia and plan to head up to Chiang Mai for a week, then down to spend the rest of our rapidly-waning trip on the southern beaches....

We're both kind of ready for chilling hard on the beach and learning some new tricks in the kitchen with cooking classes up north in Thailand, to tell the truth! The last 4 days have been amazing = 2 kayaking among the 3000+ craggy, green, striking cliffed islands of Halong bay, and 2 days wandering around French colonial hanoi and eating everything in site, mostly following our noses to treats from various stalls along the streets...
Hanoi impressions, for the sake of documentation (our own, as much as for sharing with you...):
- everything is yellow, fading, french mansions abound, as do trees and paris-esque cafes and shops
- ho chi minh's mausaleum is mind-blowingly huge and set apart, iconic in its placement and setting alone. Think lincoln memorial times 3.
- estimated number of motobikes in Hanoi= .96 x local population, or 1 jillion, whichever is smaller
- estimated number of times per day we are asked if we'd like a "motobike?" taxi ride while walking: ~100 (really)
- weather in hanoi kicks every other se asian city's butt
- grilled pork on a stick at the don xuan night market, delectable (and greasy)
- estimated number of total stoplights or other traffic directing devices in all of hanoi: 10-12
- most impressive local feat of strength: very very old ladies, complete with sandals and conical hats, shuffling along with bamboo pole "yokes" dangling ginormous twin baskets of fruit, veges, and ready to heat grub
- lakes and trees slow down the pace, just a bit, here compared to Saigon
- the older the person, the kinder and less jaded they seem to be about us vulgar westerners wandering the streets and poking ourselves into all the shops and food stalls!
- vietnamese coffee, with its slow slow drip and strong strong taste (tempered by "sua", sweetened condensed milk, over ice) rocks
- go to Hoa Sua non-profit cooking and serving training school restaurant if you ever visit here, best combination of good food, good cause, beautiful restored French colonial home, and price in the city (at least that we found!)
- the 3000-dong (about 20 cents) local ice cream fave, Kem Trang Tien, and have a cone (or three) any time of day
- watching the looms grind away according to punch-card instructions for patterns at the Van Phuc silk fabric production village outside Hanoi (mom, get ready for some projects as there are many meters of colorful vietnamese silk coming back with us...)
- the vietnamese work HARD. i mean, really really hard. any given shop/restaurant is open on average 15v hours a day, and when people tell you they are going to serve or make something for you by a certain time.. they DO it. some pho (noodle soup, staple of the diet) joints are only closed a few hours each night. it feels like new york city circa 1930 or so in hanoi and saigon.
- SeaGames 2003 mania!!!

OK, enough brain dump on vietnam... Mandy's ultra-efficient gastrosystem has seemingly flushed the hateful yucko-bug that found its way into her tummy yesterday in record time, so we think (and anxious me especially hopes!) that she'll be back to normal and feeling good to jump into our Thai cooking classes in Chiang Mai this weekend. I'm going to sample a few "bia hoi"s tonight (local macro-brew beers, served in buckets at road-side stalls for a fraction of the cost of bottled beer and chock full of chain-smoking vietnamese dudes at all hours of the day) for my vietnamese swan song. Mandy is seeking out silk or Sapa-inspired blouses.

The main entries for our list of "things we want to do the next time we come back to Vietnam":
- visit to high western hills of sapa
- another dinner at Hoa Sua and more young rice flavored ice cream
- day or two at the floating markets on lower mekong river, near Can Tho
- 10 days or more in laos
- dining at La Bibliotech restaurant in Saigon, famed to be fantastic (and confirmed by pompous-but-funny chef Anthony Bourdain in "A Cook's Tour", in which he falls head over heels in love with Vietnam and its cuisine on a commando world food tour in a book we both read while here...)
- taking the leap and eating a "banh thit heo", the steamed bun filled with pork which didn't make it on to our plates this trip
- karaoke with some teens
- another kayak trip, this time longer, to Halong Bay in the China Sea
- pho, pho, and more pho
- renting our own motos and braving the utterly insane city traffic, instead of relying on our wits as street-crossing pedestrians and the fast-twitch reflexes of our moto-taxi drivers
- a custom made tuxedo and ball gown from Hoi An's tailors
- one more cup of that strong-but-smooth weasel poop java

We've loved our time in vietnam -- mandy fell hard for the geography, the food, and especially the people here, and i just laughed my way through the determination of the 80 million people stuffed into a string bean of a country ramping up a hard-working, entrepreneurial, and fairly successful capitalist economy under an archaic communist government... and chowing down noodles, home-brew, and cheap cigarettes at all hours of the day five feet from their motobikes as they do it. (Sidenote - vietnamese men, and its almost exculsively men, LOVE smoking. i mean they really really love smoking cigarettes - almost all males smoke everywhere, all day, while doing everything. it's almost like a collective national male habit.)

Off to Thailand tomorrow, for more heat and humidity, cooking classes, hiking near the Burmese border, and finally at least 8 or 10 days of serious vegetation time on the southern beaches before returning to our loved ones (whom we dearly miss, more so by the day...). Forgive the 1000 words, I know a few photos would usually suffice in place of my endless blather, but the connections are too slow here so we'll have to wait until Bangkok or we return for images -- we're anxious to see them on something other than the 1-inch screen on the back of our camera too!

Love to all, happy thanksgiving tomorrow to all celebrating turkey day, we're thankful for the presence of all of you in our lives -- never more so than when we are so far away from you all here! congrats on finishing reading another too-long blog, for those of you who made it this far... love and hugs and less than a month until we can hear your voices and share what's been going on in YOUR lives too.
xoxoxo Clay and Mandy

p.s. you may have noticed a "food" theme to our vietnam experiences. it's not an accident - we've been grubbing. as resident documentarian of our fave foods of the last 2 weeks, mandy has expressed her desire to post a blog on here at some point in the near future with her list of favorite sweet and savory local foods for the other foodies among our fam and friends who might be intrigued by such info.... don't be surprised if such a blog appears soonish. xo

2003-11-21T05:18:00.000-08:00

Hoi An - Danang - Hanoi

love to all - we're here in Hanoi, capital city of Vietnam, lovely as everyone says and with nice cool weather to boot. spending next week or so here and in Halong Bay kayaking and sleeping on a boat (as soon as we can sort out the details on that part...). more great food - today had lunch at oldest restaurant in vietnam, "cha ca la vong", serving one and only one dish: cha ca (mandy's favorite!). had a spontaneously large amount of clothing made from scratch - at low low prices - in hoi an, so we'll be researching shipping options tomorrow! much much love, thinking of you all and the crisp autumns and thanksgiving dinners we're sad to miss this year...
xoxo Clay and Mandy

2003-11-17T22:50:00.000-08:00

DaLat - Nha Trang - Danang - Hoi An

now we're in the most beautiful city we've seen yet in vietnam - anywhere else would be hard to top this... Hoi An is full of fading yellow french colonial buildings everywhere, mellow dark-wood cafes with icecream and fresh slow-drip coffee, a gigantic green vegetable market right on the river, it's muggy but not too hot. small town feel. so so great. everyone reading this should, at some point in their lives, try to come spend some time in Hoi An - just lovely here.

last night on a quick one-nighter in Nha Trang we had a meal of fresh crabs right from the China Sea -- our friendly waiter brought them out in a little catch-net he used to select them from their tank and brought them over to show their little blue-and-white pinchy selves to us. we were the only non-locals in the joint, but after much smiling, laughing, the extraction of the handy Vietnamese-English phrasebook I picked up in saigon, and some crab-size-hand-gestures, we found ourselves with an hour of extracting the crabby goodness from 3 shelled eight-legged former ocean dwellers: 2 fried in chillis and green onions, one steamed in coconut milk. some rough translation produced shrimp-and-sugarcane spring rolls, which were delectable as well. we found our tally to be the equivalent of about $9 (including 3 oranginas, what can i say we went wild.). culinary delights abound here. i'm sure you'll hear more about this from mandy upon our return, as well....

off to wander Hoi An for a few days - will write from Hanoi in afew (and will *try* to keep our food intake documenation to a minimum!). much much love to all, hope the Levenberg fam had a wonderful gathering and celebration in chicago last weekend, and mandy and I are getting more excited by the day for reunions with our fam in a month.
xoxo Clay and ML

2003-11-16T01:36:00.000-08:00

DaLat, Vietnam

here we are in dalat, which is almost the only place in this whole region where it is cool and breezy since its up in the western hills and its cool at night and so delightful during the day. aside from the nice break from the hot hot weather, it's also quite hilarious/.cheesy around here b/c its the preeminent destination for honeymooning vietnamese couples -==- flowers, stuffed animals of every color imaginable, numerous man-made lakes, and candy-colored hotels abound... as well as a 1/4 scale (or so) replica of the Eiffel Tower, to drive the point home that Dalat is "le petit paris" of vietnam to all who visit (though i'm not sure that the genuine tour Eiffel is covered in quite so many cell phone dishes as the one here!). Amorous couples walk around, or more frequently put-put around on their Honda Hero Econo-power II 100cc motorbikes two-to-a-seat. Everyone has got something to sell here, but we're mainly saying yes to the dried strawberry candy vendors but denying ourselves the luxury of motodop rides around, choosing instead to walk everywhere as a proxy for the cardio exercise we are sorely missing on oru travels (and to try to work off a few of the suger-coated strawberries). This area of vietnam produces a lot of the fruits and veges of southern part of the country, and we haev been marvelling at all the tasty vittles available in the central marker here day and night. Mandy's new fave fruit is the custard apple, a SE asian native that looks like a little artichoke but has white sugary yum inside.

Have we mentioned before in an earlier blog that the most highly refined type of coffee sold in vietnam, among the many excellent and tasty (and STRONG) coffees here, si the Ca Phe Chon -- locally referred to on the english menus as "weasel coffee"? It is produced - and i am not making this up - by feeding high-quality coffee beans to a certain species of vietnamese weasel, collecting said beans from the weasel's excrement, then roasting grinding and serving to you. Mandy and I enjoyed a piping cup each - mine hot, hers in the vietnamese cafe style over ice - and we can attest to the truly magical effect that a weasel's digestive system must have on the coffee bean curing process. (How they figured out this method of coffee bean production, and then scaled it to availability in the cafes here, is beyond me... but they've done it. I'm going to pick up a kilo or so of Ca Phe Chon beans in Hanoi and bring them back for my fellow Seattle coffee lovers to experience first-hand....). Cafe culture is huge here -- although the vietnamese twist, as we've learned (and mandy loves!) is that fresh ice cream in a variety of local fruit flavors gets equal billing in the ubiquitous cafes as does Ca Phe and tea. I suspect we'll be sampling the local "kem" (i.e. ice cream) cafes in several of the towns we visit here!.... So far, Mandy's fave flavor by far is the young rice from Fanny's on Pasteur in Saigon.

Other than that, things are great - we're headed up the coast to Nha Trang, danang, Hoi An, and Hue, then on to Hanoi and Halong Bay before we figure out how to get ourselves over to Lao. Sad to be in our last month of travels, but happy to be starting to entertain the thought of seeing all our fam and friends we miss so much from back home. Highlight of our evening tonight is that we're staying at a funky/wacky joint tonight that the locals call the "crazy house" - a hotel of 10 or so rooms all fashioned inside two big banyan trees (or replica banyan trees, which seem to be handmade out of painted concrete)_ with big carved animals with red light-bulb eyes inside each one. The place was conceived, sculpted, and now run by a daughter of a former president of vietnam named Hang Nga... We're in the "honeymoon room", which is just like all the others in that it is small, totally Alice-in-Wonderland, and features tree trunk-esque individual steps climbing up to the loft bed, round walls, fake bamboo and vines carved all inside it, and a whole ceiling of handmade fake stalactites dripping down (luckily neither of us is over 6 feet tall or else we'd have some issues).

Getting in lots and lots of walking, (mandy tells me, according to her trusty pedometer which she brought with her on the trip and uses religiously, that today is a 8.5 mile day so far... just an fyi). Meeting lots and lots of vietnamese who are excited to share their country, and potentially their services/products, with us. So far, we aer really really liking it here.

love to all, and most of all CONGRATULATIONS to julie and howard on their nuptials, which we are sadly missing today!
xoxoxox Clay and Mandy

2003-11-13T18:35:00.000-08:00

HEARTY CONGRATULATIONS AND MAZEL TOV TO JULIE LEVENBERG AND HOWARD ZEMEL!

We're so sorry to miss your big wedding day this weekend but know that though our bodies are in Vietnam our hearts are in Chicago with you both! On Sunday evening, wherever we are, we'll toast to you and your life together filled with joy and happiness.

xoxoxo

2003-11-12T07:46:00.000-08:00

Saigon (ho chi minh city), vietnam

Hi and love to all,
We are safe andsound in Saigon, after it took us 15 hours and 2 minibuses, 2 boats, 1 moto, and 1 taxi to get here from Phnom Penh. As a bonus, though, we got to thoroughly see and appreciate the slow slow mekong delta life as we put-putted down the rivers to get inside vietnam and eventually here, to the city of 6 million (and everyone's on a scooter, as elsewhere!).

mandy's freaking out with the delicious food everywhere, and i'm really being reminded of the zip and hip of new york here. it's great.

couple of quick things for our doctor friends and those otherwise inclined... One, the cello concert and talk in siem reap, cambodia, was amazing. It was given by the head of one of three hospitals under the name Kantha Bopha for children in cambodia, a guy named Beat Richter. He's an incredible inspiration --- the guy has put his efforts where his beliefs are for the past 11 years (and some before that, pre Khmer Rouge) in Cambodia and the difference it has made is striking. THe medical situation there is veryvery bad, and especially so for children. His efforts, almost single-handedly, have greatly improved things in siem reap and phnom penh. A swiss pediatrician, he has channeled his energy into what he calls "justice" - righting the wrongs of the Western conflicts negative down-stream impacts on Cambodia's politics and economy - hence people - for the past 20 years. Anyway, docs and others should check out what he's done'/doing at: http://www.beatocello.com (perhaps MD's want to think about volunteering at one of the Kantha Bopha hospitals in the future?!). Ok, so that's the plug for that - we were really impressed and we learned so much about the huge gaps that Cambodia has to work on closing in its medical system to properly care for their people.. and they need help, if they can get it.
Two, we were impressed in Nepal by the work done by the Himalayan Rescue Association -- the ngo founded years and years ago by a Canadian doc from Victoria (just up the coast from us!) that uses trekker doc visit fees to fund free health care for the local villagers in Manang and Solu Khumbu districts. Again, super cool potential future volunteer oppty's for those with the med skills and inclination. OK< while it was on our minds (and while I'm recovering from my mystery "flu-bug" as my sis calls these things), I thought I'd get it down..

OK, we are going to run and enjoy the Saigon nightlife and more food -- specifically some Fanny's ice cream, supposedly the best in a country known for it's ice cream delights (incongruously ?!) -- after having devoured a big meal of two fresh pho's and two tasty Saigon beers for $2 total. This place has zip and tons of people moto'ing from cafe to cafe and neon and just really feels like an alive, funky fun city., So we're staying a few days in the "baby Paramount" hotel we found here (modern, funky, white-and-black, but cheeeeeap!) and eating and checking out where all these folks are zipping about at night here...

Much love, xoxoxoxo
Clay andMandy

2003-11-08T03:02:00.000-08:00

Siem Reap, Cambodia

Hi all - a warm and humid typical evening in cambodia, where mandy and i are almost completely healthy, happy, and amazed once again by new cultural experiences. We''ve kicked, we believe, whatever the weird stomach ailment was that we both picked up towards the end of our time in Nepal. It was not debilitating for either of us, but also not exactly perfect for our arrival in se asia and the land of (finally!) tasty, exciting food and drink. so we say THANKS to our doctor friends overseas who provided their valuable consultation from abroad, and we're keeping our fingers crossed that things keep getting better and are all cleared up before we head to vietnam for even tastier vittles...

So Cambodia is amazing. People are so super friendly, i'd say the heat factor is down to about an 8 on a 1-10 scale (with bangkok never changing from having the needle pegged right at 10 at all times, including midnight). It's richly tropical, so wet that even the traditional homes are all on stilts. Yesterday we explored the better part of Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom, including the awesome Bayon towers and smiling stone faces, and tomorrow we're going back to spend a second day taking in the details of the temple carvings by bicycle (first day we went with a moto-tuktuk, riding in style - we felt indulgent but then remembered the bargain it actually is here to do everything except enjoy a morning muffin, a luxury that we've been able to continue at the relatively astronomical price of $1 a day because we're treating it as a personal multi-continental experiment to test the bakeries everywhere we go :). The scale and durability, as well as stone carving artistry, of Angkor Wat is awe-inspiring --- it certainly lives up the billing that chris and em, wrenn, jack, cathy and mike, and others who have been here gave it when we started pestering you all with questions about where to go and what to do so many months ago.

Today, we rode with our tuk tuk friend out to some temples further afield, including Banteay Srei, set 30km out of siem riep in the midst of wet rice paddies, palm trees, and simple stilted a-frame homes as far as the eye could see. Bas-relief carving artistry that was astounding, unlike anything to be found covering base to peak of any architecture today. Everyone everywhere is selling something, many of them literally running out of shops, restaurants, or just alongside you as you walk to hawk... and everyone is doing it with enthusiasm and a smile and interspersing their pitch with questions about where you are from and what your name is... and no one takes it hard when you must say No to them in the end. Pure capitalism mixed with sweet, sweet dispositions and an easygoing attitude about everything. Abotu 95% of the population rides 100cc motorcycle/scooters everywhere and/or bicycles, with the average riders per bike/cycle probably at about 2.5. (i.e. there are lots and lots of people, men women and children of all ages right down to a great many naked babies, bumming rides to and fro on the backs of the motorcycles in particular). The most we've seen riding together on one 100cc cycle so far is 5 -- 3 adults, 2 kids, all wedged front to back on one standard motorcycle seat -- so that's the record so far, but we're going to keep our eyes peeled for a 6-top tomorrow! Amazing to see completely rule-less roads working so trouble-free with such a density of well-packed motos and bikes all sharing 2 lanes -- and hardly any horns at all, even out of the few cars negotiating space with all the two-wheelers, and DEEE lightful change from honk-happy nepal!). Tomorrow's bike trip out and back to Angkor Wat will lower the average siem reap people-per-bike ratio given that mandy and i will each have our own.... as mandy says, "sharing is caring" when it comes to the side of the road here! So, all in all mandy and i are finding cambodia and everyone we meet here very endearing...

Tonight a cello concert (free, with a donation request i'm sure but we're happy to listen and contribute!) given by one of the doctors at the local children's hospital, a weekly gig aimed at converting one guy's talents into donations for the much-needed medical services here --- soundsgood to us, true social entrepreneurship at its best (he promises Bach selections, we're anxious to hear the sounds of a cello on a muggy se asian night).

OK, enough - more 1000 year old architecture ahead, then a boat trip down the Tonle sap River on Monday to see the remains of the annual Water Festival boat races there this weekend and arrival midday, we expct, into Phnom Penh for a quick visit. Probably on to saigon from there but not sure, yet, more LP reading and discussions over dinner tonight.
Love to all, happy birthday to my dad's father Pompaw, and thanks as always for letting us know how you are doing with your emails... we are missing home more and more everyday, and starting to get excited about connecting more closely with you very soon.
XO
Clay (mandy sends boisterous, enthusiastic love as always too)...

2003-11-04T22:19:00.000-08:00

Quickly:
Engagement congratulations to:
Greg and Lisa!! (hooray!)
Brad and Claudia (felicitaciones!!!)

2003-11-04T22:06:00.000-08:00

Kathmandu - Bangkok - Cambodia (soon...)

Hello to friends and fam from Bangkok, Thailand. We arrived here safely two days ago after a typically delayed Royal Nepal Airlines flight from the bustling chaos that is Kathmandu... We were happy to be in a new place -- indeed a completely new place for both of us, aside from the quick 1 day stay we had before leaving for Nepal -- after one month or so in Nepal.

We were even happier to have been warmly welcomed once again by Jack Kneeland (thanks Jack!!!) at his tropical pad near downtown for a couple of nights of recovery and rest and good tasty thai food. It's a pure delight to taste the many flavors, sweet savory spicy and everything in between, of se asia after 3 months of fairly bland cuisine. We quicklybought the requisite Lonely Planet books for the rest of se asia on the legendary Khoa San Road, hunkered down over Phud Thai for a few hours to plot out our next steps, and then treated ourselves to a visit to the incredible Wat Po temple for the local specialty: Thai deep-tissue massage. We've discovered a required treat of any stay in Bangkok, andone that's not even so much of a "luxury" given the low-low price and ready availability of the rub-down treatment almost anywhere around town. More massages are likely to be in our future (as well as some serious cooking classes, at some point upon our return!)...

Tomorrow morning bright and early we leave on a quick plane flight over to Cambodia to Siem Riep, about 5 km from the Angkor Wat temple complex. From there, the rough plan is 4 days there, a one-day boat ride down the river to Phnom Penh, quick spin through town and then heading overland or by air or something to southern Vietnam. It seems like probably 10 days or so there, perhaps a bitmore, is needed to get the feel of both the Mekong Delta area to the south as well as Hanoi and the coastal villages of the north. We're not sure yet. Whatever we do, we'll stay safe and travel with our heads up and we're planningto be in either Lao or back in Thailand by about November 20th or so. We'll see if that plan holds as we make our way around! {and for fam: not sure about internet access, but we suspect that vietnam has plenty of opportunities so we'll do our best to check in as we can... :) }

OK, time to go view some of the ornate temples and gilded Buddhas of the nearby Wat Po and other Bangkok Wat's as we prepare ourselves for Angkor. Mandy and I are a little run-down from lingering bugs that seem to have followed us in our bellies from our time in Nepal, but we both feel a little better by the day and so we're resting and drinking (water) and generally interested to see what the rest of this big peninsula of se asia holds in terms of people, religion, architecture, heat, flora, fauna, and culture.

Thinking about you all, sending our love, happy birthday to the fam members with big days coming up this week, and more to come....
xoxo Clay and Mandy

2003-10-30T05:35:00.000-08:00

KATHMANDU (we're still here!)
Namaste. We've spent the last few days toggling between religious/cultural experiences and mass consumerism (the tchatchkeys and jewelrey are soo great!). Yesterday we walked to the most important Hindu Temple (there were several cremations happening right near the river that runs through the temple complex) and Buddhist Stupa (Bodhnath). Mandy particularly loved the |Bodnath Stupa- there were masses of Tibetan ladies and monks walking the circumference of the stupa in a typical late day prayer session of three or more circles. The site was pretty awe-inspiring.
This morning we treated ourselves to a Budda Air flight above the Solu Khimbu area of the high Himalayas that borders Tibet. This is the area where Mt. Everest sits and we had perfect views of Everest and all of the other amazing peaks in that region. We were laughing about the certificate we were handed when we deplaned, "I didn't climb Everest but touched it with my heart"- we have the "official" certificate to prove it! We went back to Boudha (the neighborhood where Bodhnath stands) again and think we'll visit at least once more before we go- it is just awesome. On New Road- the commerce area of town- Clay found some cheap funky glasses for cheap ($8 per pair- anyone need glasses??) and we also bought a new digital camera (ouch) so we'll be able to document the rest of our trip. We plan to head to Bhaktapur and the Kopan Monastery and also check out a Bollywood flick or two before we split town for Thailand on Monday. We send our love (especially to the new parents in Burlingame!) and we'll write again from Bangkok where we plan to down some pad thai and get our trips to Vietnam, Cambodia,etc. organized on the famous "Khoa San Road". Love to all. xoxo

2003-10-26T03:06:00.000-08:00

Kathmandu- Besisahar - Annapurna Himalayas - Jomsom - Pokhara - Kathmandu

Hello to friends and fam. Mandy and I are safe and sound back in Kathmandu after an amazing 2 weeks in the Himalayas trekking through the Annapurna range.

I'll try to summarize the experience without the usual hyperbole, but expect i'll fail. Mandy may add more later, but for now this will give you a flavor of our past few weeks....

After two days getting settled in Kathmandu, which is both busier and somehow more manageable that either of us expected (at least in Thamel, the main hikers/trekkers/travellers district), we got our trek booked and organized through a local agency to head off to the mountains. Verna and Josh, huge thanks for hooking us up with a warm welcome from the gang at the Kathmandu Guest House -- the place is great, and they connected us with the trekking company which worked out super. thanks.

We set off on the 8-hour bus ride to Besisahar, on the south-east corner of the Annapurna range, from Kathmandu with our trekking guide, Ram, and our porter, Vinod. Mandy and I decided to go with a guide and porter (we combined our gear into one bag - we thought we were travelling light until we saw what the guides and porters bring for 2 weeks in the high Himilayas: a small daypack with about 3 additional pieces of clothing in it and a toothbrush. Outside magazine should write a "fast and light hiking" feature profiling these guys...). We figured, since we're 30 and not 20 why not have someone dealing with our teahouse bookings and helping us appreciate the beauty of the mountains with us. It was a good investment -- we were in the minority, I'd say, having both a porter and a guide, but we got along great with both of them and the added expense was worth it in the long-run for the help they gave with finding "suitable" (as Ram called them) guest houses along the trek to stay and eat in. We recommend spending the extra two bills on a quality guide and porter from a reputable trekking company to all considering a walk through the HImalayas!

A beautiful windy trip through central Nepal to the start of the trek was only marred by having our digital camera picked out of my daypack while en route at a bus stop. Oh well, that's travelling...if that's the worst that befalls us, then that's not bad. We already realized value from Ram when he negotiated the purchase of a replacement camera - film type - in the thriving little town of Besisahar for us upon our arrival. It was $10. It is approximately the dimensions and weight of a brick. It is, as the front of our new camera proclaims, "focus free" (like this is an asset, rather than a liability, for a camera...). Despite our concerns, it did an admirable job of capturing our 2 weeks in the mountains with only a few out-of-focus splotches here and there... as we confirmed happily yesterday when we picked up our developed film here in Kathmandu. And we still had the card full of our Zambia pics and Lisa has great photos from the rest of our Africa travels as well, so no big deal. We are going dig cam shopping in Kathmandu tomorrow, however....

What is there to say about 2 weeks in the highest mountains in the world? Lots, but I will *try* to attempt not to say it all. We walked ~120 km's through almost every type of terrain imaginable -- steep gorges (including the largest river gorge in the world, the Kali Gandaki valley that seperates the Dhaulagiri and Annapurna mountains in the Mustang region of Nepal), green forests, high alpine above-treeline mountains, glacier fields, and finally the high arid plains of the Tibetan/Nepali border. The distance of the trek was just right for us in the end - long enough to feel really far afield, but not so long that we got bored or tired of hiking. The elevation gain was significant -- more than either of us expected (we didn't really read up on how challenging a trek the Annapurna Circuit was before we set off -- we figured, "it's the most popular trek in the world, it can't be that hard..." - but it is pretty serious business for the last few days of it, as we learned). The lowest point on the trek was the start, at about 850 meters. The highest was "the Pass", Thorung La Pass at about day 10 of the trek if you start in Besisahar as we did, which was over 5,400 meters. As the sign reminded us in our oxygen-deprived, huffing-and-puffing state when we crested the pass, that's about 17,500 feet up. No Everest, to be sure, but it is about equivalent with Everest base camp over 200 km's east of where we were -- and at least 3,000 feet higher than either of us had ever been before. Even with a slow acclimitization process that had us only gaining about 400-500 meters per day over 5 days or so to get there, we were still struggling a bit on the climb up the last 1000 meters to the pass and really sucking wind. Luckily, neither of us had any symptoms of altitude mountain sickness, which is what all trekkers to this area and Everest as well get lectured on endlessly. This is for good reason, as apparently plenty of folks get it, and it's not fun (headaches, nausea, etc. etc. - only cure is to go down, and when down is 8-10 days back the other direction rather than 2-3 days to the end of the trek, it's kind of unappealing). Again, luckily neither me nor Mandy had A.M.S., but neither of us felt too great on the day we headed up 1000 meters from Thorung Phedi and over the Thorung La pass and back down to the relatively oxygen-rich (but still quite high) cityof Muktinath on our 9th day or so of the trek. Mandy did some deep breathing about 2/3 of the way up, and my legs were a bit rubbery, but we made it after 4 hours or so of slogging away on the last uphill portion of the trek. it's pretty humbling and kind of emotional when we made it -- and it reminded us that there are lots of lots of fit people in the world if it was that challenging and it's still the most popular trek, with 12000+ people doing it each year!

The Annapurna trail is quite crowded/busy, so much so that teams of donkeys are lead but Tibetan Nepalis through the mountains with supplies to stock the tea houses along the route with beer, fanta, rice, etc. By consequence, the trail is often full of donkey crap. We therefore renamed it, on day 3 or so, the "Annapoopna Circuit". We weren't expecting blissful mountain solitude, and we didn't get it (except occassionally late in the day on our walks, due to our slow pace! :)... but we didn't mind it, since some of the trek is so remote that it's nice knowing there are plenty of other hikers out there in front and behind you. Plus, we made some friends who were trekking our pace, too...

Views of Annapurna I, IV, II and the other 7,500 t0 8,000 meter peaks we were hiking at the base of greeted us from different angles each day. Nice smiling Nepali people greeted us at the villages/tea house stops we made each night. Our guide and porter couldn't have been nicer and more accomodating. We met 6-8 other travelers trekking on our same pace, and made a few new friends from Canada, US, Spain, and elsewhere whom we shared meals of the local staple/specialty "dal baht" (rice, lentils, and curry) and stories of the day's walk through the mountains each night at the tea house stops. We saw and visited Buddhist stupas, a monastery with a resident lama (who blessed me with good health and luck for my journey over the Thorung La Pass and onward throughout Nepal), and the beautiful Hindu pilgrimmage site of the Muktinath Temple at 3,900 meters in the high Mustang region of Nepal that borders Tibet. Mandy earned a few new blisters, and we both lived to regret my bad decision to leave my deodorant behind in Kathmandu for reasons of pack weight. Thank goodness for the hot showers and fast/cheap laundry services of Kathmandu, which we've now taken advantage of since returning to the hustle and bustle of the capital city of 8 million two nights ago.

Memorable, challenging, wonderful, cold!, fun, pretty, and higher than we expected. We loved it.

The last few days entailed a leisurely relaxation day in Pokhara (where we flew into from Jomsom, having been advised to just do the northern 2/3 of the "classic" Annapurna Circuit in the interests of time, so that we could return to Kathmandu in time for the annual Tihar festival of lights and colors which started 3 days ago and continues for 1 more day here...). Pokhara sits on the southern side of the Annapurnas, just across the mountains from the northern side where we trekked. Pokhara has a lovely lake where we paddle-boated out to watch the pink sunset on the Annapurna peaks - deeeelightful. As was a cold beer and being able to watch Real Madrid soccer on the tube + catch up on what was going on in the world (and world series).
After a brief mix-up with losing our guide, and an 11-hour bus ride back over the hills on white-knuckle roads (we now know what it's like to be on a bus, passing a bus, with a bus coming at us, on a two-lane road climbing up a hillside with blind turns... not once, but maybe twenty times... what a hoot.), we rolled back into Kathmandu in time to enjoy Tihar -- the second biggest festival in Nepal of the year. Incredibly, our guide and porter had actually arrived back in Kathmandu ahead of us, despite having left Pokhara later, and in one of those "how does this happen in a city of 8 million?" moments, they showed up beside our bus at a random intersection in the city and made sure we made it back to our guest house with no problems to cap off the whole experience. For this, as well as innumerable favors during the prior two weeks, we are forever in Ram and Vinod's debt!

Kathmandu is in the midst of the Tihar/ Deepwali festival --- which we'd hoped we would make it back here in time to enjoy, and did (barely). Last night, lights were everywhere on the porches and windows as Hindus throughout Nepal light candles to welcome Laxmi, the goddess of wealth, into their homes for another year of good fortune. People string up lights throughout the streets from building to building, and flower salesmen make a mint selling strings of bright orange marigolds to everyone --- who use them to adorn doorways, windows, and even the holy animal cows. Kids wander through the city singing songs in doorways in traditional pleas for money. it's quite a sight with cows walking all around throughout the city, in and out of traffic and yards and sometimes buildings (this is quite commonplace and normal), but on this one day with garlands of marigolds around their necks as a sign of honor and yellow and red powdered tikkas on their heads administered by devout Hindus who pass them. it was crazy-colorful and a bit chaotic, esp. after 2 weeks hiking in the mountains, and a cool contrast to the quiet mani walls and stupas of the primarily buddhist northern himalayas up closer to Tibet. Throughout all of our walking here, Mandy and I have remarked several times how striking, and notable, and cool, it is to see a whole country and culture observing two different religions (buddhism and hinduism) peacefully and in total happy co-existence. it's wonderful -- there's even a great deal of "borrowing" and cross-referencing between Hinduism and Buddhism here in Nepal -- the buddha shows up in Hindu temples, Hindu gods turn up adorning Buddhist stupas and prayer shrines, temples such as the one at Muktinath serve as pilgrimmage and worship sights for both Hindus and Buddhists alike, and no one sees any big issues or conflicts with the religions inter-mingling and co-existing side by side throughout this region. It's so very nice, inspiring, and reassuring.

We had a treat yesterday of having a special, personally-made dal baht lunch made for us and served to us by Ram in his small, one-room apartment with his brother Shiva yesterday. Ram did this out of pride that his dal baht could top those that we had eaten prepared by the tea houses along the trail throughout our trek ---- such a nice, fun gesture and experience. It was indeed the tastiest dal baht we've eaten yet...

OK, that's enough. Our pics are pretty good and though a bit fuzzy in places thanks to the Mikona camera, certainly adequate for us to remember the trek by later... For those with the fortitude to have made it this far on my rambling blog posting (if any of you are left after this typically overly-long post, thank you! and sorry for all the details!...) about our time in the mountains, we'll share pictures gladly when we return.

We'll be in kathmandu for another week or so. Verna, Josh, Phoebe, and others have given us wonderful suggestions on food, drink, accom, and sights to keep us busy for at least that long. Stupas, temples, a new camera, some tasty meals, and more wandering among Patan and Bhaktipur are ahead. We're trying to figure out how to get to Tibet, we;ll see if time and expenses allow it. If so, we're interested most to see Lhasa. If not, we'll be content to have met and enjoyed speaking with so many native Tibetans living over the Nepal border in the high mountains in traditional Tibetan buddhist villages throughout our trek. We'll see....

Whatever the case, we think we'll still be on track to be in Thailand by 10 days or so from now. With every day, we feel so so lucky to be able to see these new places together... thanks to all of you who have read this far for the emails and news from home. We send our love and will keep letting you know we are safe and sound, esp family whom we know is tracking our globe-trotting.....

Much love and "namaste".
xo CM and ML

2003-10-09T10:05:00.000-07:00

Zanzibar-Dar Es Salaam- Dubai-Bangkok-Kathmandu

Hello from Kathmandu, Nepal

We’re in a internet café in the busy streets of Kathmandu! We had a long journey here from Zanzibar and we’re glad to stay off planes for a few weeks.
This is Mandy writing and I have to say, I am experiencing the strangest kind of culture shock. I am homesick but not for Seattle, instead for Africa. It is hard to explain but the change we’ve experienced in cultures over the past 24 hours is somewhat unbelievable.

Zanzibar was an incredible, beautiful, rich experience and we are now hungry to know the rest of Tanzania. We recommend any beach/diving/snorkeling/fresh fruit lovers head to Zanzibar and in the money you’ll spend on airfare, your hotel/food costs will be low enough to head to Africa rather than any island near the states. We all (Lisa included) considered extending our time in Zanzibar but instead declared that we must return and bring lots of friends! It was just lovely and picturesque and tranquil. We bid farewell to the amazing Lisa Chick (who schlepped a full suitcase home for us!!) and headed out of Africa.

We had a one night stop over in Bangkok where Jack Kneeland graciously hosted us and gave us a good Thai meal and sleep before we headed to Nepal. We hope to see Jack back in Bangkok in late November. He is embarking on a new adventuring- leaving Bangkok after 5 years with USAID and starting a 1 year masters in DC at Johns Hopkins.

Now we’re in Nepal (Royal Nepal Airlines was only about 6 hours delayed in getting us here!). I am so happy to where two of my best friends, Verna and Phoebe, fell head over heels for this culture, people, and country. We had another “soft landing” due to Vern and Phoeb’s reputation at the Kathmandu Guest House- we’re considered “special guests” thanks to the girls! We spent today wandering around town- talk about a sensory overload. Every possible color and sound and smell reached our senses today! More to come when we’ve taken it all in and can make sense of it in words. We ate momos and then tuk (at Dechenling) and then had a drink at Maya --- hats off to Verna and Phoeb! We’re thinking of you.

We leave for a 15 day trek on the Annapurna Circuit on Saturday- I personally have never hiked for more than a few days and I wonder how my little legs will deal…but as you can all suspect my dear husband is so pumped for this part of our trip! We hear the Himalayas are so gorgeous and the villagers gracious and we’re very anxious to get started! We plan to be back in Kathmandu on Oct 25 just in time for the Depawali festival.

2003-10-02T10:48:00.000-07:00

Namibia - South Africa - Lesotho - Tanzania - Zanzibar

Hello to all, we are happy and safe and well. So much has happened in the past week. Tonight we are writing from an internet cafe on the "spice island" of Zanzibar, off the coast of Tanzania just east of Dar Es Salaam, where we arrived about 4 hours ago. We're still getting our feet under us, its strange to be in such a wildly different place after the past week...

A week ago, we were still in a rental Toyota exploring the desert in Namibia. Barely anyone anywhere, we were drivign for hours at a time on dirt roads among 500 meter sand dunes and rocky hills in central Namibia, after having spent 2 days on the Atlantic coast near Walvis Bay and Swakopmund. There it was 50 degrees and foggy all day, apparently a commn featuer of weather there. We sand-boarded (I did at least!), which si snowboarding on dunes. Hard, but fun. Then we kayaked among pink flamingos and the largest collection of Cape seals you can imagine = at least 5000 all playing in the water around us, hopping over the front fo our kayaks... then we paddled a while with dolphins (porpoises? you know what we mean!) swimming right with us at every stroke. so amazing.

Then we drove through aforementioned desert to Sossusvlei, the sand dune desert in central Namibia. Again, stunning and amazing. Thanks to Pat and Dick for hooking us up big time with a lovely free night at the wonderful/luxe Kulala Lodge in Sossusvlei =-= delightful! Hiked to the top of the dunes all alone one evening, took in the beauty of the harshest environment for vegetation in the world (or one of them apparently - i guess the sahara woudl be worse), then bounded down the steep dune sides and filled our boots with sand all the way...

After a bumpy and gravelly drive back to Windhoek (miracle we didn't get a flat tire, or "puncture" in local terms, in the rent=a=toyota) and flew off to Jo'burg. As for Jo'burg, don't believe that it's a dark and dangerous place. it is indeed dark and huge at night, but with some city smarts and good directions one is A-OK. We met our friend from Africare, Dorothy, for a wonderful meal at a super-cool and funky restaurant rigth downtown -- I had ostrich steaks for a pittance. Mandy had some fish curry that was unbelieveable. Delectable. Dorothy and her husband Poopsie (yes, they are as sweet as their names sound) were so kind to put us up at their home for the night, where we met their two youngest children -- Kobi, an articulate and kind 4 year old boy with unique fashion sense, and Sister, a 2 1/2 year old sweetheart that behaves the way you want your own children to behave someday. Mandy and Lisa stayed up until 2:30 a.m. chatting with Dorothy and playing with the kids, until they finally pooped out. We were so appreciative fo the Nairne family's generosity, story-telling, restaurant choices, hospitality.... and we hope we can pay them back some day stateside. (We again benefitted from their kindness briefly last night, on our 10-hour stopover back through J'burg before our early mornign flight today to here, Tanzania, from Jo'burg thsi morning. More laughs, playing with adorable kids, and a tasty meal ensued. what a treat!)

OK< that takes us to Lesotho. How did Lisa, Mandy and I choose to go to Lesotho? We are not sure =- we hatched the plan 6 days ago in a guest house over dinner in Namibia. 4 days ago we were renting the car in Jo'burg. And then\, after a 5-hour drive through Booooooring South Africa farmland, we arrived to the towering amazingness fo the "Kingdom in the Sky", Lesotho. Words cannot describe how beautiful this tiny country (all of it si above 1000 meters/3500 feet elevation, which is saying a LOT in southern Africa...) is, or how nice its Basotho people are. Briefly, we spent two days and nights at the amazing Malealea Lodge (http://www.malealea.co.ls/) - , which is the closest we've ever seen to a real community-friendly, communit-involved eco=tourism setup. And it was dirt cheap, with good food, nice people, and all the ancillary services like hiking guides, crafts, etc. all provided by local villagers, so it really benefits the people where its located. Awesome place - anyone considering a trip to South Africa should absolutely spend 3-4 days in Lesotho hills hiking the green mountains and talking with the friendly and kind Basotho villagers. Each village is essentially a cooperative group of communal farmers and herders.... and each one we hiked through over the course of 2 days met us with smiles and handshakes and warm "How ARE you?" greetings.

Back across the border into South Africa again after 3 days in Lesotho, the last punctuated by a comic telephone experience (ask us later = lets just say Lesotho telecommunications national infrastructure is a little less solid than other spots we've visited!). Also a wonderful visit to a women's mohair wool weaving cooperative, which is doing amazing things otu fo their own initiative and with teh help over the last year from a Peace Corps worker. You can see their stuff, online!, at www.africancraft.com. We were particularly impressed with their weaving looms workshop, on the outskirts of "T Y" city north of Maseru, whcih appeared to be built entirely out of aluminum cans which they had stacked one atop the other, in adjoining columns, to form unique recycled "walls" for their building. So so cool to see community businesses run by strong, smart women among the remote green hills of Lesotho. One of the proprieters is flying to Washington, DC, in two days time (first airplane flight ever, first trip away ever) to show their wares at a big craft show there -- we assured her, despite her fears to the contrary, that she would be able to get mealie-meal "pap" (corn meal porridge, staple fo southern african meals) during her tiem in the states...

Anyway, crossed the border in our rental car (this time a sky blue Nissan - yes, it was as smooth as it sounds) and stayed the night in Clarens, South Africa, in the equally stunning and beautiful Drakenberg mountains that form the northern and eastern border of Lesotho with South Africa. this area is the self-proclaiemd "adventure capital of south africa", owing to the sheer mountains and ribbony sandstone cliffs that are all around there =- perfect for rock-climbing, hiking, etc. Also perfect, as I learned, for little run-off streams which hold rainbow and brown trout that were stocked all throughout central and south-eastern South Africa 50 years ago. Although it's been a dry spring this year, and therefore water levels on the rivers were so low that they were all still closed to fly-fishing, I did at least talk to the local trout-outfitter in Clarens (which we took to calling, in typical crass americanese, "Clarence") and learn that there are plenty fo fishable rivers and lakes stocked with trout throughout the Drakenberg Mountains. Perhaps a future exotic flyfishing trip for me, Ty, Ralph, dad, others someday?... We'll see. I couldn't get on the river, but I did at least pick up a few of the hand-tied flies produced right tehre in Clarens, South Africa by the Caledon Flies fly-tying factory (I met the manager, a mellow guy named Wiseman who learned to guide on the Clarens rivers as part of another community development home-grown initiative by a local businessman/sportsman named Paul -- check his program out at www.riverrangers.com) for presents. Ralph, dad, and Ty, you'll have to wait until I get somewhere I can mail stuff to receive your direct-from-Africa flies (Ty, I took particular care selecting a cinnamon ant pattern for you, perfect for - hopefully - some epic ant hatch back on the Fork together next year.... it would be too great if an African ant pattern eventually tricked a wily Fork pig someday...). Anyway, oru brief time in Clarens was a fun chance to talk trout and play "what if" on a future trip to fish a new continent sometiem down the road. We quickly returned to Jo'burg -- just last night, hard to believe == and enjoyed another nice night and tasty meal with Dorothy (until last night I had never tasted mango-chilli sorbet, which is as wild as it sounds...).
Had a quick snooze, woke up early this a.m., braved the crazy Jo'burg rush-hour traffic in the rent-a-nissan, and boarded the plane fro Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. SO here we are....

After a quick hopper flight from Dar to Zanzibar, we now are lodged in a delightfully decrepit hotel among the narrow crumbling streets of Stone Town, Unjuga ISland, Zanzibar, Tanzania. Lisa, Mandy, and I will be here 4 days, probably a mix of taking a "Spice Island" tour (this place is legendary growing fields of all the pungent spices of Africa, we'll learn more when we get out tehre with a guide...), learning about the history of this primarily Muslim island , and probably chilling on the northern beaches with some other backpackers for a couple days too. We'll get it sorted tomorrow - tonight we chomped super-cheap seafood and fried plantains cooked outside by a crazy mix of characters under the stars next to the water side, we're catching up on emails and reviewing the state of affairs in Nepal (our planned next destination, if all still goes according to plane tickets...). Zanzibar is a tangle of thin thin streets, barely wide enough to allow bicycles and mopeds through, with people everywhere and everyone, as in the rest of southern africa, is nice nice nice and quite enterprising. All new environment, all new sights and sounds, all new flavors and foods, all new people, wild wild and so different to be at sea level in hot humid weather just 2 days from the green, cold, lush hills of elevated Lesotho. Our eyes are filling up everyday, as are our journals.

OK, enough - wanted to let all (esp family) know we are well and safe, and where we are now. Lisa is due to return to states Oct 7, Mandy and I leaving via Dar the day before, so until then we'll be here...
Love to all, send us news via our shared address, congratulations to Cyn and Drew on their great new arrival (thanks for the news J&V!), happy birthday to those family members of mine with early October b-days (you know who you are!@), and all our best....
XOXOXO

2003-09-23T10:18:00.000-07:00

NAMIBIA

Howdy to all - esp families who may be wondering how we are now that we've launched into a new country and new part of our travels. We are great! Had our final farewell from Ruth and Lovemore earlier today in Otjiwarongo (for those with a map of Namibia handy), where we had our last official Africare work meeting a few days ago. We met up with Lisa in Windhoek two days ago, after having driven nearly 1500 km's from Lusaka to Otjiwarongo with the Mufutes -- long haul, but much preferable to a plane ride due to cost as well as teh fun company in the car!

Our transit day of note was 1000 km's in 13 hours, which took us through 4 countries in one day (anyone else done that, without airplanes?) Zambia, ever-so=briefly in Zimbabwe again, then through the extreme corner of Botswana, and finally about 7 hours driving through the Caprivi Strip of Namibia and down to just shy of Windhoek ==- all in one day. (for those with maps, check out the funky Caprivi Strip - it's the guitar handle looking thing up in the corner of Namibia above the Okavonga Delta.. where mandy was 2 years ago!).
So anyway, safe and sound to Namibia and 4 new passport stamps in one day.

Next day met Lisa WITH no probs in Windhoek, and we were off to the races in our rental toyota. Last two days we spent in the amazing Etosha National Park. Saw everything in the way of animals on the awesome white plains of Etosha pan -- two sets of male lions, elephants aplenty, giraffes, etc. -- and even the elusive rhinocerous. Great great game viewing, all DIY in our own car. SO cool. Namibia, compared to much of the rest of southern Africa, is buttoned up and the evidence of how lucrative the tourism industry (and diamond m,ining) is for this place and its relatively small population of inhabitants is everywhere. Good roads, good signs, and nice nice houses almost everywhere.

Today we drove through the Damaraland desert, which seemed to stretch forever, to the Skeleton Coast. This is the most desolate and bizarre landscape i've ever seen. Words cannot describe how open, vast, and strange it is to see 200 km's of sandy desert terminate at the rocky pounding and foggy coast of namibia. strangest geography i've ever seen. Stranger still is teh authentically german coastal beach town of swakopmund, with the expanse of skeleton coast stretching to the north and the imposing huge red sand dunes of sossusvlei sitting just to the south -- with ocean pounding 200 feet from our pensione windows. is this africa? germany? egypt? sahara? a blend of all of them. And it's moist, foggy, freezing (~50 degrees F), and everything is written in german. again, "africa?"

tomorrow i'm trying sandboarding (snowboarding on sand dunes), ml and lisa re planning to go kayaking in Walvis Bay and check out the seals and birds of the atlantic african ocean up close. next few days we'll be spending in style (special deal - thanks Pat!!!) in the sossusvlei dunes, then heaading out of namibia. not sure where yet, but eastern south africa and/or lesotho is potentiallty on our list, before we are heading up to dar inb tanzania and then over to zanzibar. and all with Lisa Chick - hooray, what a treat to have our great seattle friend here to explore a new continent with us (and mandy as "old hat", having explored namibia once twoi years ago with Ben!).

ok, better go - time for a german lager (?!) and some seafood (a delightful change from mealie-meal and chicken, staples of our diet for past 5 weeks) and strategizing about what will fill a few of our days between namibia adventures and zanzibar beach/spice exploring. love to all, we'll give an update when next having access to internet somewhere...

xo to all - CLay, Mandy and Lisa
p.m. tuesday 23/9

2003-09-18T07:16:00.000-07:00

FAMILY BIRTHDAYS AND ANNIVERSARIES

We are celebrating our parents and grandparents from afar!

Mattoon shout out:
Happy 82nd birthdays Mimi & PopPop!!! (9/14, 8/25)

North Carolina shout out:
HAPPY 60TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY TO NANA & POMPAW! (9/18 today!)

Chicago shout out:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MOM/PAT! xoxo (9/18 today!)

(East coast Hurricane shout out: We’re thinking about all friends and family along the East Coast, particularly our friends and family in Florida and DC- stay dry and safe!)

2003-09-17T01:26:00.000-07:00

LATE NIGHT SOUNDS = Not exactly Lion Roars (although we did hear that at night one week ago in South Luangwa National Park…)

You never know what you are going to hear in the African night. Three nights ago in suburban Lusaka it sounded like a rock and roll concert was happening until 2:00 a.m. Then two nights ago, there was a faint hint of a church service or some kind of chorus singing… Which brings us to last night, which started off with the melodious strains of a church service chorus and switched abruptly sometime between midnight and 1:00 a.m. to a rock concert. We were uncertain upon waking up whether this concert was live or just being amplified by loudspeakers into the Lusaka night by one of our neighbors. Whatever the case, even earplugs didn’t work – and this is inside a concrete house. Always a man of action, Lovemore managed to summon the Zambian police in the middle of the night and eventually isolate the offenders and quiet them after a few hours. This is nothing short of a miracle in a city where getting the police to the scene of a fender-bender can take the better part of a day…. Every day, and night, brings something new!

2003-09-15T12:02:00.000-07:00

LUSAKA – ZIMBABWE WEEKEND TRIP – LUSAKA – LAST WEEK AT AFRICARE…

Typed this all up once and it got erased by the testy Zambian internet connection.. so this one will be shorter….

Went to Zimbabwe on a whim last weekend with ruth and lovemore. It was great, just as warm and beautiful as we remember it. Harare is so much more developed and full than Lusaka. Comparisons bring insight – even with mugabe’s disaster, the economy is still so much more robust, the city so much more clean and nice than Lusaka. Zim will one day be a fantastic economy and place, but it will be some time.

We spent another weekend in ruth and lovemore’s cottage next to their house, where we were 2 years ago. Returned to dinner at wombles, the best (and cheapest) steak in the world. Had a ½ kg – that’s 1.1 pounds – steak with Wombles sauce. Ben, eat your heart out – I have pics to prove it. Long drive back and forth to Harare from Lusaka, but worth it for a fun weekend back where our southern African experiences began. Keep the zim people in your thoughts as we are for a new govt sometime soon.

One more week of work with Africare, then we meet up with Lisa and begin the next phase of our honeymoon. Lots and lots of work to do to complete our Africare volunteer commitment, but we’ll get it done…. Off to Namibia on Saturday – we’ll meet lisa in Windhoek. Then to etosha pan, sossusvlei, pacific coast… then who knows. Eventually to dar and Tanzania, then over to Zanzibar. Can’t wait!

OK gotta go =- Zimbabwe is still wonderful, despite all the dreadful mismanagement of govt, finances, etc. Southern Zambia is covered with hills, many slowly burning in the omnipresent brushfires that you can smell everywhere. The zim-zam border is hilarious – baboons everywhere, waiting for open car windows to dash in and steal food. Some border guards care and look in your car, some don’t. Passports almost full of stamps, it confused the guy on the Zambian side this time. I was sick as a dog, had fleeting fears of malaria but then realized it was just a flu/cold mix and was over it as soon as I ingested some wombles steak.

Fish eagle is official bird of Zambia, but it might as well be the chicken – it’s at every meal! How would you like to be a small business person in Zimbabwe, like Lovemore is, with 400% inflation per year – you need to raise salaries every 3 months by doubling in order to keep up!. No one has cash in zimbabwe, much less gasoline (all the gas stations are dry dry dry), so the banks are issuing these funny just-invented “travelers cheques” instead of cash (because they don’t have cash, because the reserve bank doesn’t have cash, because they’re out of money). We haven’t found the dual CD with Zambian music legend J.K. in duets with Zim music legend Oliver Mtukudzi, it’s sold out everywhere… but we will.

Our dear friends, we just found out, had their first child a healthy daughter this weekend… we are delighted!!! Love to them, to their new daughter,
Thanks to all of you with the uypdates to our shared yahoo email, we love them! All is well, we’re excited to wrap and drive Africare volunteer work to a close and begin the next phase of our honeymoon and travels, and excited to see Lisa our friend from seattle, now down south and on the other side of the world… see the deserts and etosha pan of Namibia, and see what’s ahead…. Love and thoughts to all, to the seattle friends we miss so much in the midst of a beautiful late summer September, to families in nashville, Illinois, California, north Carolina, florida, -- to friends and all we miss!
==p.m. September 15
Xoxo love ml and cm

2003-09-11T03:46:00.000-07:00

FAVORITE THINGS SO FAR...
Mandy and I just remembered, and had to post while we had the chance, a few of our favorite things about Zambia so far -- to balance the serious thoughts and things we've learned that occupy most of the prior blog posting...

Favorite expressions of Zambians:
-"Yes, please", "Thank you, please", "You are most welcome, please." (people say Please after everything, it squeezes its way into the funniest oddest places in zambian responses here!)
-"What would you love, madam?" (any waiter or waitress)

Favorite smells:
-the everpresent wafting smoke of brushfires, which are burning throughout both the cities in empty lots and roadsides as well as in the rural areas everywhere...

-nshima (stirred mealie-meal corn, the staple food of southern aFrican diet -- on every, not most, every plate at lunch and dinner here) cooking over open fire

Favorite sights:
-men holding hands while walking (friendship indicator here, rather than intimacy...)
-the striking bright purple jacaranda trees, which are now starting to flower and bloom (even in garbage lots in downtown lusaka)
orange-ball fast-drop sunsets (followed by pitch-black nights)
-Mars at its closest ever to earth, big and bright and orangish and clearly not an ordinary star

Favorite ideas:
-notion that soybeans, organic crops, and others are potential ways to supplement the basic corn-and-greens diet here.

-"Juju" - the primitive witchcraft practice that is common in rural, and sometimes urban, areas throughout southern Africa (there are too many different juju's to count, but our favorites involve what husbands and wives can do to put a spell on each other surreptitiously, so that their partner will get permanently engorged private parts if they are unfaithful -- sounds crazy, but crazier still is how many people we meet believe in juju.)

-Ruth and Lovemore's decision to complement the traditional Shona names of their sons with English middles names based on singers (Tinashe Steve Mufute, steve for Stevie Wonder, and Farai Eric Mufute, eric for Eric Clapton...)

Favorite sounds:
-birds and bugs and night.
-"pecky" the crazy pseudo-pet bird who incessantly runs into the dining room window of the mufute's house each morning (purpose? unknown...)
-Bicycle bells ringing up and down the streets of Chipata.
-Oliver Mtukudzi on the radio in a remote rural village.

Favorite tastes:
Authentic indian food at Dil, the bizarre restaurant down the street
Fresh nshima from hand-ground, hand-grown, hand-harvested corn at Chiwe village.
the difference between a Village Chicken (scrawny, loud, rambunctious) and a hybrid chicken (white, fat, boring).
Imported south african chocolate candy (a daily guilty pleasure) and the licorice "all sorts" candies that mandy cannot stay away from...
Mosi beer - people complain, but thin sweet beer is really tasty when it's consistently 90 degrees fahrenheit+

Favorite Senses:
- sleeping on a reed mat
- mandy having to kiss my beardy prickly face with irregular whiskers growth(sorry!)
- feeling my hair get buzzed off at the local barber shop (pronounced "saloon" by ruth)
- shaky-dancing with traditional Zambian dancers (you know it when you see it - lots of hip moving, not much else moving) all over

OK, bye!

2003-09-11T03:31:00.000-07:00

ROAD TRIP/FIELD WORK: LUSAKA-CHIPATA-LUNDAZI-CHAMA-LUNDAZI-CHIPATA-MFUWE-CHIPATA-LUSAKA

(Warning to those with low tolerance for stream-of-consciousness rambling – this blog entry is a biggie for us!…)

We’ve been out of touch for the past few weeks…We were on the road and we traveled far! If you look at a map of Zambia- we traveled to Chipata, Lundazi, Chama, and Mfuwe--- to the South Luangwa Game Park… and back again. We traveled about 1900 kilometers over about 10 days – mostly doing field work reviewing and consulting on small business projects -- and we’re pretty beat. The roads here are the WORST I have ever experienced- potholes, dirt patches, crumbling sides, and out-and-out ditches stretching all the way across the road surface abound, and you have to travel really slowly – we traveled about 70 miles in 3.5 hours the other day- and we were all bumping up and down the whole time. Apparently whenever the president of Zambia needs to go the areas we were in, he flies. We have learned through this experience that investments in infrastructure are not a priority for the Zambian government… we’re not sure whether they can’t afford it, don’t view it as important, or just don’t care – but whatever the case, the roads all over the country (except for a few merciful patches in and around Lusaka) are dreadful and apparently have been like this for over 2 decades. It’s clear to us now that basic infrastructure – consistently covered roads and reliable electricity – is a core requirement for any other national development to occur. Given that these requirements are not being met in Zambia – at least not in the sections up in the direction of Malawi and Tanzania – nor have they been many decades, we better understand why Zambia is in such dire economic straits.

The overall situation in Zambia is so strange and somewhat depressing and utterly frustrating. While the country is exceedingly poor (much less economically solid or promising than even Zimbabwe was 2 years ago, and we all know the degree to which Mugabe’s policies have decimated that place in the last 20 years…), the prices for food and lodging and other basic necessities remain incomprehensibly high. We keep getting so surprised at how much things cost- it has not been cheap being here at all! We are still learning but in general are feeling somewhat discouraged about prospects for rapid progress here- from what we’ve seen, and as we’re learning more about southern Africa in general, we appreciate more and more that it will take a long, long, long time at the pace things are moving here for any of the countries in this region to achieve something resembling economic self-sufficiency or sustainability. It is almost as if the government doesn’t want to see improvements for the economy or the quality of life for its citizens – there’s very little discussion of what’s to be done, or where the core problems lie with the federal oversight and management… instead, officials appear in the papers every other day insulting each other personally and/or deflecting blame. I’m not sure if we’re less sensitive to it or if it seems somewhat under controls, but HIV/AIDS seems to be getting a fair amount of attention- there are no major political issues (besides a tacit acknowledgment by the citizenship of a continuation of major incompetency, zero representation of voter interests, tax revenue mismanagement and lack of accountability, and outright corruption- sadly, so often the norm among Zambia’s and nearby governments for the past several decades…). There are over 3000 NGO’s registered to do work here. There is quite an influx of people and $$ focusing on AIDS. HIV/AIDS is undoubtedly one of the largest challenges and societal, economic, and political problems of the southern African region… but it has also lead to major international investments and focus on this area, while hunger and political abuse and stagnating economies have not attracted nearly as much focus. The World Bank just decided to dedicate $42 million to Zambian HIV/AIDS programs. We have talked about how ironic it is that while HIV/AIDS is killing a large part of the continent, it also employing a lot of people- it is a large part of the economies/employment base for many countries in Africa- a silver lining to a horrible cloud? It’s apparent how much international NGO’s and aid is driving some of these economies as you move around throughout the country. There are undoubtedly some entrepreneurs and business people operating here in Zambia and elsewhere, but we can tell you that when you drive around Lusaka, or the rural areas, when you see well maintained 4x4’s and well-dressed people, more often than not they are working on behalf of an international NGO. And many – not all, but many – of these NGO’s are trying to target and work on the “triumvirate” of development problems here in southern Africa: HIV/AIDS, hunger & food security, and poverty reduction. So the international aid organizations, in an odd twist, are increasingly the “models” of successful enterprise in countries like Zambia where so few other examples for business – retail or otherwise – exist.

[OK, ok, enough of the soapboxing… but one funny story I’ll relate which will help provide an example of what I’m talking about here. Phil, dad, Rob, and others from Kellogg, you’ll particularly enjoy and appreciate this… Yesterday I opened the paper here in Lusaka (the independent, non-government controlled paper, that is), and learned from an article that the prior day had seen the exciting activity of ONE trade on the entire Zambian stock exchange. Apparently, this is not so unusual. As I glanced down the page at the small box showing the sum total of all companies listed on the Zambian stock exchange, I noticed that it totaled 12. Last week, only 5 of these companies experienced any equity trades at all. Checking the address of the Lusaka-based Zambian stock exchange, I noted that it is located in a small room on the 3rd floor of a downtown building (additional note – I’ve not seen any buildings in downtown Lusaka over 3 stories but 2, and one is abandoned). Ah, capitalism at it most youthful. In other, less promising/amusing developments, last week the federal reserve bank of Zimbabwe literally ran out of all of its cash. Yes, that’s right, the national bank is out of money. Nor can they print any, because the country is so broke that they cannot afford the ink and paper required to run the presses. As you may imagine, this makes administering a fiscal policy – any fiscal policy, even the disastrously bad ones maintained for 10 years in Zimbabwe – impossible. As usual, Mugabe deflected any responsibility or blame from himself or his inept administration or cronies – instead charging that the problem was caused by (who else?) the citizens of his country inappropriately “hoarding” cash. Hmmm, wonder why people would want to hang on to their cash when inflation is running at 300%+ per year and money seems to disappear from banks – especially the federal reserve bank – with alarming regularity. OK, OK, enough economics – just a few illustrations of the challenges faced by the small number of honest, hard-working people who are participating in the formal sector here and in neighboring countries. Sorry, one last point I learned – what would you guess the tax rate would be for a country like Zambia which delivers very close to zero in return to its working citizens (no utilities such as water or garbage or sewage, no reliable electricity, no road network or maintenance of public buildings or resources, no pension or retirement income, and increasingly rare compensation for its public officials, etc. etc.)??? Well, friends and family, the tax rate (for those lucky few who can secure steady employment in the “formal” sector of the Zambian economy – only about 10% of the citizens here) is 30% of gross pay. Yes, that’s right – 30% right off every paycheck to the federal govt, in return for which people have grown accustomed to expecting very close to nil. And Zimbabwe is currently at about 50% effective tax rate. Appalling to someone like me that studied economics at an earlier, more naïve point in my life… OK, I’m done – just thought the business folks and others who are following our travels and who haven’t been to this part of the world would benefit from a few dollars-and-cents examples of the shape that the economies are in here --- and how little of it is the fault of the average, working person.]

Our volunteer work with Africare has been interesting end enlightening as well, not only from a humanitarian aid but also just a basic economics perspective as well --- During our time here, we’re particularly focused on the YES project – this stands for Youth Empowerment & Support. It is the second part of an adolescent reproductive health education initiative funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation— and is currently running in Malawi, Zambia and South Africa. There is a component of the program (beyond all of the great HIV/AIDS prevention/education, etc that really is the core of what the program is seeking to accomplish with young people in particularly destitute communities here…) that is called the IGA piece--- for “income generating activity”. The youth groups created business proposals and asked for little grants from Africare. Africare Zambia chose 10 groups to receive little grants and start little businesses which they, hopefully, would be able to start up and eventually run on their own. The net benefits are, at a minimum, to keep youths busy and active and learning some basic business skills and, at a maximum (or most optimistically), to get a group of youths to actually be running a sustainable community business in the long run. The idea is for the profits to then fund local needs, ongoing HIV/AIDS education activities, and growing the business so that more youths from the community can get involved. At least that’s the idea – but getting from theory to reality is quite a challenge, as you could imagine!.

Ruth asked Clay and I to visit all of the groups, assess their progress and advise them specifically on the businesses they had started, and recommend ways to assure that the businesses (which support the HIV/AIDS activities in the youth groups) are sustainable beyond May 2004 when the grant runs out. We were all over the map- if you look at a map of Zambia and look north of Lusaka, we were in Chipata, Lundazi, Chama –again all on the worst possible roads in the middle of nowhere! The kids were generally highly motivated, articulate and interesting- their businesses ranged from a piggery (raising pigs and selling them), a video rental shop, a chicken run, a tie dye dress making shop (teen mothers youth group started this and are doing well!), etc. Ruth asked us to identify the “gaps” in the program and quickly we saw that the kids needed more attention, support and training. The kids had enthusiasm but little business “know how”- so we spent most of our time out on our site-visits training them, answering specific questions about their businesses, and introducing them to the Community Business Manual -- which is an updated, similar one to the Manual that Clay, Ben and I wrote in Zimbabwe in 2001 for similar income-generating projects there. Africare is struggling a bit with having a lot of highly trained health and agriculture workers but few folks who are trained in business, so we also conducted a training with all of the staff in the Chipata offices and we’re doing another one at the all staff meeting next week here in Lusaka. This is about 100 people, so we hope to make some progress in tuning in Africare employees with business principles so that they can advise their grant/loan recipients on how to be successful with their small businesses! It has been eye opening and funny at times and at times so hard b/c we are such short-termers here and we can only help so much in this short visit. But we are trying our best to communicate what we see as the biggest opportunities for improvement in the projects, and to transfer as much knowledge as we can to the youths directly as well as to the Program Coordinators, while we are here…

Overall, in terms of HIV/AIDS issues, though prevalance is extremely high- official infection rates are among the highest in the world, there are billboards on the streets about anti-retro-viral medications and condoms, there are youth drama groups performing plays about abstinence and feeling empowered to “say no” (we saw a few performances in the villages) – HIV/AIDS is really on people’s minds and in their words here. It’s probably that we are 2 years further on into the pandemic here in southern Africa, but overall we think that there is more openness and discussion going on – both in private and in public – about HIV/AIDS than when we were in Zimbabwe. Some of that might be cultural here in Zambia, but I think that with every passing year the discussion is growing. It’s good that Africare is trying to be a part of the dialogue, and get everyone talking openly and directly about not only the threat, the danger, the tragedy…but most importantly, what needs to be done to reverse the infection rate trends. That’s the hardest part here – unifying a strategy, by country or, even better, by region – and getting it communicated and understood and adopted. This hasn’t happened yet… but there is positive movement in the direction of at least discussing frankly the situation – and that’s an improvement over even 2 years ago, it seems. There is still hope, undoubtedly, and the faster the clear, honest, action-oriented talk occurs, the better chance for survival this region ultimately has (in my/our opinion, of course!). Anyway, again, enough soap-boxing – there is a lot to say when the topic is so near, and so difficult…..

OK, on to new, unique, and special personal experiences that have complemented all this learning we are doing.

CHIWE VILLAGE
We had a really special experience about which we wanted to share just a bit.. . Last week while in the field, we spent the night in a traditional rural village -- , Chiwe Village- they were not part of the YES program, but instead Africare’s RCF program- which stands for the “rural credit facility”, where Africare gives loans to groups of villagers for agricultural projects. These women, the women of Chiwe, are a great success story for Africare. The women banded together and have created a co-op working society full of incredible products which they have grown, harvested, and processed together with their own hands --- maize to use in the village and sell, sweet potatos, pigeon peas, beans, etc. They have received 4 separate loans and paid all of them back but one, which they are in the process of paying back this year. They have transformed their village into a little factory and apparently when Africare started working with them 5 years ago there was a lot of malnutrition and now everyone looks well-fed, confident, and (modestly) secure in what their future holds! It was quite impressive and they made a really nice meal for us, we stayed up late into the night having a discussion about HIV/AIDS with the women (their husbands were noticeably nowhere to be found), and they had some really interesting comments about the delivery of the message about HIV to their children- that NGOs sometimes just come into their village and scream out messages about condom use, etc without consulting the elders and this often makes their job as parents very difficult. It was great for Ruth to hear and so interesting for us- they had questions about AIDS in the USA and how we all deal with it. The women had an unusual situation- they had all gone to get tested and also had convinced their husbands to go and get tested. This initiative was lead by an older woman in the village who is also a teacher in the schools- she was translating for us a lot as her English was very good- she was great! That night, Clay and I slept on the floor of one of the huts in the village ( we admittedly were pretty sore in the morning, but what a wonderful night to connect with the experience that our hosts have experienced every night of their entire lives!) and when we awoke we all helped make some breakfast over the fire. Afterwards, there was a whole ceremony where the women sent Ruth, Lovemore, Clay, and I off with gifts of a guinea fowl, a chicken, beans, maize, etc. and they toured us to all of the production sites. The village chief, or “headman” (a man), surfaced to give us a warm send off- Clay and I were laughing a bit b/c he was wearing a billowing shirt – probably the nicest he owned, hence his donning it that day for his meeting with “the visitors from USA” -- that had the design pattern of Saddam Hussein’s face all over it. Just to be sure there was no confusion, the shirt designers had made sure to write his name in flowing script below each portrait. The irony and cross-cultural wackiness of this situation was too much -- we made sure to take a photo with him, we’re quite certain he has no clue what his shirt is shouting to the world! It also shows how many different middle –men are in between the production of clothing and what ends up being worn way down the line by rural villages throughout Africa, after being bought, worn, given away, transferred, and resold numerous times over. (If I had a photo of every young boy I’ve seen in tattered t-shirts with US collegiate names, small-town American sports league logos, or wacky 80’s wear from our grade-school years miraculously come back to life on kind villagers 500 km’s from Lusaka, I’d have a full camera already…) Before we left, Ruth and I asked the chairperson of the women’s group, how much it would be to become members of the Chiwe women’s group and for 20,000 kwacha ( - the local currency, equivalent to about $5) we became members, I’m proud to say that I am an official member of the Chiwe Women’s Group (I had to sign their registration book!). We have some great photos of this incredible group of ladies that we hope to be able to post soon!

Incongruously, this amazing experience was followed immediately by the surprise of the…

Weekend in the SOUTH LUANGWA GAME PARK
In our 10 days on the road we also made a stop at South Luangwa Park- supposedly the best (of the 19) game park in Zambia. Again, the road to get there (the ONLY road) was a mess – 130 km’s of un-attended ribby, washboard-like gigantic bumps, all dirt, occasionally pocked with surprise potholes that could flip your car if you hit them at more than but once we arrived, it was quite an experience. We stayed in a very crazily fancy lodge that Ruth stayed in once in the “off-season” and was “sure that it wouldn’t be costly.” In the meantime, with every fancy feature offered Clay and I kept mumbling to each other, “we are dead meat”…we could tell we didn’t quite fit in when we found out that all guests charter flights into the park and we were the only ones who had driven…not to mention the rooms, the food, the views, etc… it was a big fat change from where we had been the night before. And in fact, we were all a bit shocked at the price in the end but b/c we were with Africare it softened the blow a bit b/c we got the “national rate”- oh well, we did have a great time there! The park is amazing and chock full of all kinds of great animals- our first 20 minutes into a game drive on Saturday we spotted two male lions and spent a good 30 minutes observing them, there were elephant, giraffe, impala, hippos, zebra, the whole lot. The landscape was very pretty and it was good to be off the road for a few days! On our way out of the park, we spotted just off the roadside (the park directions are clear about not leaving your vehicles when driving around in the park – this is why..) a male and female lion lazying about next to each other in the shade. They were actually kind of flirting for a while, and we thought we might get to see a national geographic moment of giant cat mating, but sadly they plunked back down next to each rather than having a Barry White moment in front of us. Oh well – an amazing last memory from an unexpectedly luxurious and special weekend of once-in-a-lifetime game viewing of great big predator mammals and a whole lot of beautiful carmine bee-eater birds (unique to this part of Africa).

So now we’re back in Lusaka, working to get our project review and recommendations summarized before planning to head down to Zimbabwe for a quick weekend jaunt back to where our love affair with Africa and its people all began two years ago… (Ruth and Lovemore want to go home for the weekend- so we’ll get a chance to see Harare with two more years of Mugabe’s mismanagement and reign of oppression under its belt). We can’t wait to see familiar faces, spend some time with Ruth and Lovemore enjoying th country and city where they really will always feel is their home. Then next week we finish up at Africare with our volunteer services and head to Namibia to meet Ms. Lisa Chick and start some personal travel on our own through the rest of our southern African destinations!! She is spending a week in South Africa and then meeting us and we are excited to see her! We will be in Namibia, Malawi and Zanzibar before we all leave Africa on Oct 7! Yee haw.

This will – far and away – be our biggest blog, we’re sure, until we arrive at some other destination with reliable internet access. In the meantime, we’re safe and sound, happy and learning lots, enjoying seeing new faces, new countryside, and experiencing the many challenges and joys of southern Africa. We miss you all, in special personal ways, and talk often of the weddings, birthdays, dinner parties, and conversations with you all that we’re missing. If our stories and blogging runneth over, as they say, it’s mainly from yearning to share with you what is filling our senses here. (so apologies if its on –and-on-and-on!). Love to all, we’ll pop on when we can for updates, new experiences, and occasional “where in the world are we” notations so that anyone reading this regularly knows where we are. The next week or so should include Lusaka, Harare, Lusaka, and hopefully Windhoek if we can get our acts together and make it down there to meet Lisa next weekend without breaking the bank… Keep sending us your own news to our shared email on yahoo, and know that we’re sending our love to you from across the world…
XOXOXO

2003-09-09T09:54:00.000-07:00

Return to Lusaka from 1 week+ in the Eastern Province.

Quick blog - mandy and I are rushing to get out emails and do some planning for our next few weeks before Lovemore and Ruth come back to collect us from the internet cafe.
We've just arrived back in lusaka from a week in eastern province doing field work with the income-generating activities projects that Africare is funding with youth groups there. for those with maps, we were in chipata for several days, then lundazi, followed by chama... back to lundazi, back to chipata... then on to mfuwe and the South Luangwa national park and game reserve for two days of complete relaxation and luxury, (more stories on this weekend experience later..), followed by return to chipata for a couple days and now finally back here. so much to tell... don't know if we';ll have time tonight (we're rushing to get mails dealt with, travel plans done, etc. on a short visit to internet cafe before lovemore and ruth return to pick us up...)
\If we do, then we'll post another blog. briefly, a few impressions from the time in field:
eastern province of zambia has the WORST roads mandy or i have ever seen anywhere in the world. if you are reading this and live in teh U.S., I can guarantee that you can't even imagine the road conditions we've experienced travelling over 1600 km's on in the past 9 days. more on this later...
Zambia has some serious infrastructure and development challenges ahead of it... but amazing people.
we stayed overnight in a real village outside lundazi. it was amazing. more on sleeping on floor of a thatch-roof hut later...
We have had more starch than we could believe -- craving some veges and fruits!
We saw male and female lions from 30-feet away... and many many more amazing animals.
So much to tell about the amzing projects we visited and children and adults we met while in the field... more (much more) on this later!
xo and love to all for now.
Clay and ML

2003-08-30T23:42:00.000-07:00

Today we’re heading to the Eastern Province to do a bunch of field visits and small-business consulting with the biz projects that Africare sponsors. We’re excited to see more of Zambia as we’ve only been in Lusaka thus far. Our time in this city has been eye opening, interesting, somewhat depressing – or at least enlightening as to the many infrastructure challenges that developing nations need to address before a functioning productive sector can get underway. We got downtown for the first time last week and we found what Lovemore had told us all along was true- the city of Lusaka is about 50 years behind even Zimbabwe’s capital city Harare. The infrastructure is minimal, most buildings are half built, roads are in need of repair, street lights are out, and the trash. Oh the trash-- in all of my travels to Latin America and Asia, I have never seen a city so full of unattended, loose garbage. Apparently the government cannot seem to work with the public utilities group here and thus the garbage has gone uncollected for years. So Lusaka is really depending on a more effective public sector until it can become the city of one million people that it needs to be. On the other side, everyone is very very nice and we’ve not been hassled once or felt any of the undercurrent of fear that we seemed to sense from time to time in Zimbabwe. While the economy is in shambles here, with 85%+ unemployment, it feels largely stable and steady on a daily basis despite ongoing government management issues.

We’ve been learning about the development environment here in Zambia because we’ve been lucky enough to attend a few amazing meetings, courtesy of lucky timing of our arrival and Ruth’s kind inclusion of us in a few key places. The Canadian High Commission hosted the U.N.’s “Consolidated Appeal” meeting last week, where all the U.N. aid and relief agencies discussed all the projects underway sponsored by the U.N. here. Amazing to hear the depth and breadth of U.N.-sponsored development work here. Then, we got to attend the World Bank’s kick-off meeting for the various NGO’s and country ministries (civil groups) that are responsible for managing the $42Million that World Bank is giving to Zambia for AIDS prevention and mitigation. It was a huge room full of all of the health development community in Zambia – such interesting topics discussed when its that much money, and a donor as demanding as the World Bank. Aside from these, we’ve been as helpful as we can be with reporting, donor appeals, and other things around the Africare offices. Clay has been appointed unofficial “computer guy”, thanks to word leaking that he was formerly at Microsoft, so he’s been running around de-bugging PC’s and doing anti-virus updates. Mandy’s been helping write everything from weekly reports to annual donor renewal appeals for Zambian projects. In one week, we’ve learned a ton already about Africare’s projects here in Zambia so we’re really ready to see them in person out around the rest of Zambia.

What other funny things have happened? Our systems are now finely tuned on oats for breakfast every day and chicken and beans for dinner every night. We have discovered a wonderful Indian restaurant down the road where we get our curry fix – who knew – whose looks outside did not match the tasty dishes inside. Mandy’s got some stories to tell about switching malaria medication, and we attended an amazing crafts market yesterday where the crowd looked like a U.N. meeting – people from every nationality and age were milling around between the clothing, food, and crafts stalls. It was fun and we found a few reminders for our time here, including two cool masks from western Zambia.
OK, that’s enough. Time to go – we’re off to Eastern Province and Chipata… followed by a couple days at South Luangwa National Park, the largest game park in Zambia – can’t wait. Love to all, more later….
Xo Clay and Mandy

2003-08-24T06:54:00.000-07:00

OUR ZAMBIAN WEDDING
I'm writing with the news that Clay and I had our second marriage yesterday- Zambian style. Ruth and Lovemore surprised us and arranged for a Zambian traditional wedding celebration! They invited a bunch of people and had tables and chairs and a caterer set up in the backyard. Then two "aunties" who are from Zambia came and took me into the house away from Clay for a few hours to teach me how to be a good wife. They wrapped me in traditional clothing, gave me symbolic beads, wrapped my head and then brought in the women experts on marriage. Who were they? A troupe of 8 women who are all related, one leader Mrs. Sacara was on the eldest, and leader of the drum players. There were 3 women on drums beating traditional songs and then about 4 dancers who danced and sang and taught me the lessons of marriage via dance and song. It was amazing! The aunties translated for me- the dances were about how to keep your man happy--- they were not exactly PG 13! I was so surprised that they were showing me via dance how to move my hips and pelvis to please my man, "so that he never strays". And they did a whole dance about not having violence in the house, another dance about respecting the elders, another dance about not gossiping... But the most graphic were the dances where they showed me how to show Clay that I was ready for the "act" as they called it (sex!). They showed me that there were ways I could indicate to him that I was ready and then there were other positions to try with him so that I kept a good amount of variety. I was laughing so hard- and after a while they made sure that I could do the dance and had me try. I kept moving my hips (salsa dancing !) and they stopped me so that i would only move my waist and pelvis! Apparently these women travel around and work with brides sometimes for a full two weeks before the wedding--- this is a Zambian tradition to prepare the bride--- I need the two weeks if I am ever to move my pelvis like they were- it was amazing!
Then they covered me and had a special song for Clay to come in and visit and look under the cover to make sure I was the woman he was to marry. Then they lead us outside and kept us covered and sat us down and revealed us to the crowd. Then they had people get up and tell us about what they had learned in their marriages (common themes: communicate, don't go to bed mad, trust in god, become each other's best friends), and together they all blessed our marriage. Then they had a big traditional zambian meal for us and everyone danced! It was our second wedding! I was so touched-- Ruth and Lovemore did such a nice thing and these people who don't even know us came and spent the day with us to celebrate our marriage. So, in a matter of 1 month, we've been married twice! We're starting our honeymoon all over again.

2003-08-24T06:36:00.000-07:00

sunday, a weekend of sun and relaxing after our first few days of work in the africare offices. so much to tell... i'll try to keep it brief as we are writing this from an internet cafe (one of just a few in lusaka, so forgive us if the updates are not so frequent while we are here in zambia for the next few weeks....)

our first few days in zambia were occupied with learning with open eyes and ears about the state of things here. it's generally more politically stable, it appears, than zimbabwe is -- and was, while we were there -- although the effects of the past administration's misrule are still quite apparent around lusaka. infrastructure and social services are almost non-existent, especially when considering the size of this city -- 1 million, comparable to harare. however, there was a generally peaceful political transition to a new president some months ago and the primary issues are those that result from the legacy of corruption and generally un-sophisticated civic and social planning (read: barely any). Interestingly, all of the infrastructure here seems to have been provided in the past as humanitarian assistance by Japanese, canadian, swedish, and other int'l development agencies. i haven't seen yet any truly zambian modern infrastructure. that said, people here are just as friendly and kind and, above all, welcoming as the people we encountered throughout southern africa last time. so, our arrival and settling into zambia and lusaka has been effortless -- everyone smiles easily, and the people we're meeting through ruth andlovemore especially have been so wonderful. the africare offices are larger than zim's, and it appears that with 9 different field offices located around zambia and namibia, there are interesting agricultural, AIDS education, and food security programs being administered throughout this region. oversight and programs management, as well as development grant fundraising and programs reporting, is all accomplished largely through the lusaka offices of africare --- where we will be assisting with reporting, computer infrastructure work (guess who's tapped with that one!), and other headquarters admin stuff for the next several days. we have already had one fascinating "sit-in" on a meeting where the local U.N. development offices hosted a variety of development donors and grantees + other NGO's for a big review of Emergency Food Security in Zambia programs proposed for this year ahead. Mandy and I got to basically observe and hear the proposals put forward to address a variety of emergency needs around zambia -- later we discussed with Ruth and the Programs manager at Africare and got additional insight into where the biggest areas of need are from an "emergency", (vs. long-term development -- another focus of other Africare and NGO programs...) perspective. One of the most fascinating things was hearing the head of U.S. AID speak candidly about their priorities for investment for the next year -- so interesting to be at the point of implementation for U.S. tax dollars here at the other end of the U.S. govt's allocation of tax revenues for international aid and development work.... Amazing learning for us, on our first day back with Africare!

It appears that in about one week we will leave Lusaka for a couple weeks working in the field at the rural areas, at the point of implementation for africare's agriculture and AIDS educ programs. we're hoping to really get the feel for the lives and experiences of the remaining 9 million people who live in the rest of zambia when we are out in the field... ruth and lovemore have also discussed the possibility of a weekend stay at a game reserve or similar remote part of zambia -- which would be amazing, especially iwth ruth and lovemore who are also learnign their way through zambia as well.

personal experiences that are new and fun include getting to know the 4 nephews and nieces of ruth's who have been staying with us all at the house here in lusaka since we've arrived. they are on holidays leave from zimbabwe, and they are the cutest and most kind, well-behaved kids i've ever met. Tatenda and Tafwadza are the two boys, 8 and 14 respectively, and Charise and Kudzi are the two girls, probably 12 and 7 respectively. They are such a hoot to play with and talk to =- we've got plenty of photos to show upon our return. they are learning to swim, there is a pool in ruth and lovemore's backyard (quite nice for here, for sure, as is their rental property -- we are comfortably lodged in one of their bedrooms, which is so nice of them to spare space for us durign the length of our stay). the other ngiht, mandy and i got ingredients for some distinctive food with a Europe-by-way-of-America feel -- pasta with homemade tomato sauce and French onion soup -- we cooked for 10 and while different that the traditional zambian dinner of mealie-meal sadza (corn meal thickened), chicken or meat, bean+vege soup, and beans or greens, it was received well by the kids (ruth and lovemore are always adventurous when it comes to mandy and me cooking for them, which is fun).

ok, i've saved the most amazing personal experience we've had while here to the end... our surprise traditional Zambian wedding ceremony, which was held for us yesterday throughout a long day of ceremonial preparations! TO describe this amazing event (which we, thankfully, also have on photos to share upon our return as well), I'll leave it to Mandy and her descriptions in the next post...

ok, we send our love to all and hope to have more photos up on Ofoto or something like that later... until then, these posts will help us and you remember the experience, we hope! xoxo

2003-08-20T14:55:00.000-07:00

zambia- lusaska, we are here at last!
after trains,buses,planes, 5 inflight movies, one stop over in dubai, and about 18 hours on planes, we arrived to songs and dance and ululating at the lusaka airport last night. ruth and lovemore greeted us with open arms and we felt we had landed in our family',s lap when we arrived at their house to more hugs and songs from their little nieces and nephews waiting for us at the front door. we are so excited to be back in africa and curious about this unknown country. while it looked similar to zimbabwe when we looked around today, we know that is vastly different . there are over 70 tribes here and 70 languages spoken, the infrastructure is not as developed as zimbabwe, africare offices and programs are twice the size of those in zim, and there are tons of immigrants here from china, india, japan...should be interesting! over dinner last night with ruth and lovemore we scratched the surface learning about the real story of zimbabwe's nightmare, a bit about the state of zambia and a lot about what we are going to do in our short time here with africare. ruth, as usual, has lined up a bunch of work for us and there is more for the taking if any one of you is interested. we know that we'll be spending some time out in the field advising small businesses but also time in the headquarters documenting progress of grants/projects and sending along letters and reports to the donors (bill and melinda gates will likely hear from us this summer). we feel so lucky to be with ruth and lovemore, to be back in africa and able to learn more about how a struggling country and its people survive and thrive despite the difficulties they face. more to come.

2003-08-20T14:41:00.000-07:00

stockholm = the start of the looooong honeymoon!
the first week of our trip was just the right way to start our travels -- since it involved great food and architecture + a new city for us both... we started off from london for stockholm about a week ago and we hit our first travel snafu. seems london stansted airport, in addition to being extremely inconvenient and a total zoo at all times, is unattainable by public transportation for early flights -- specifically the 6:30 to stockholm. after waking at 4:00 and taking the earliest train possible out there, we missed our flight check in by 5 minutes and therefore had to return to london and then back to airport that night for next flight - at considerable cost. so much for a cheapie trip to a new locale in europe to start out honeymoon! oh well, no biggee, we rolled with the punches and made it in to stockholm and our nice little pensionat hotel with no more problems... a lovely 3 days were spent among stockholm's beautiful old pastel buildings, waterways and harbors, and especially in the amazing delicious modern restaurants that are throughout the city. stockholm is hip, expensive, but generally worth it and particularly when it comes to food quality, presentation, and inventiveness. then we took a day trip all the way out the swedish archipeligo which lead us to the baltic sea- and some 24,000 islands. we had one final meal of swedish meatballs and lingdon berries, an underrated delicious delicacy from sweden, and headed back to london to get ourselves down to africa. we recommend stockholm for well preserved architecture, cutting edge design, amazing 80s fashion observations, innovative and incredible foods. keep in mind, the dollar is NOT strong in sweden but you get great value for what you pay for!

2003-08-13T16:21:00.000-07:00

wednesday, the adventure is underway. we've learned that the key to conquering jetlag is procrastination the night before final move out from one's house. patrick has been a fantastic host for our brief time in london, facilitating our emergency run to the travel health clinic in london due to my belief that mandy had thrown away our 5-month supply of malaria pills for our trip. after we arrived at patrick's and i removed all items from my pack it became apparent that mandy had "thrown away" our malaria pills into the depths of my pack (that's my story and i'm sticking to it...). tonight we returned to a rivington street pub in shoreditch and i had nostalgia while we enjoyed a new moment with best friends and new stories to accentuate the memories i formed there solo 4 years ago. then we had another pint. now we prepare for a brief jaunt in stockholm followed by arrival in lusaka on august 19th. we can't wait to see lovemore and ruth and learn what our new experience with africare will entail. love to all, we can feel the flexibility of travel settling into our overly scheduled lives. cheers....

2003-08-07T12:25:00.000-07:00

Let the fun begin (just after we get the house packed and car stored...)
More to come after our adventure has begun...