199!

My week started out really busy and ended the same way. Monday we were suppose to have a community teaching in the early afternoon before teaching for our primary school kids. So Sunday evening the 5 of us walked around the small market in our village and spread the word about the teaching. I walked with Gertrude, one of the teaching partners and she made me speak to everyone in swahili. So i said the phrase: we are teaching about HIV tomorrow at the field near the primary school at 11am. Tanzanians think it's really great when you attempt the language or even know a few words so it went over really well. We were really pumped for the teaching and prepared what each of us was going to say and got all the supplies ready to do a condom demonstation. And then no one showed up. Actually, one guy came and my mama Zena came so we had two people. Turns out there was a death in the village on Sunday night so lots of the town was in mourning.

On Wednesday we went to the funeral after our primary school teachings. We got there almost at the end, but were given a place in the very front of the field where they were holding the services. IN Tanzania, guests are treated very well and are always given prominant spots. We were even asked to "say some words" in front of the crowd (there was about 200 people there). We declined this. Completely awkward. After the funeral we were then invited to eat with the priest and the family of the woman that died (she was 110!). We ate corn and rice with our hands sitting next to the oldest and most respected members of our village.

On Thursday we had our first testing day in our village (we will have more testing at our closing community day in two weeks) and we tested 199 people!! It was a record for all of the villages. All five members of our group also got tested. I can honestly say that now I know what it is like to wait for results and I believe this will be beneficial to empathizing and teaching those around us. We also tested ALL of our secondary girls school students and they sang the ABK song that we taught them! It's kind of like a rap so they are really into it. We got a great video of it as well. (SIC uses the ABKs to teach about keeping yourself safe from sexually transmitted HIV. A is abstinence, B is Be faithful and K is use a Kondom. If you pick one of them you greatly reduce your chances and in the case of A, eliminate your risk). We were all so happy at end of the day!

Today we went to the Masai market to buy gifts since this is our last weekend in Arusha. It is so draining to shop there. Bargaining takes so long and it is so mentally draining to argue in swahili.
Next weekend is our long weekend so a bunch of us are going to raft the Nile!! We travel to Uganda and then raft down the Nile for two days, staying overnight in a camp by the river. There is also bungee jumping available so I am going to jump! Anticipate cool pictures and maybe a video.