An exciting few days

It’s been an exciting few days here in Playa del Haramaya! Firstly we are almost ready to move into our mansion!! Well it’s not quite a mansion but we are reliably informed that as the university’s academic vice president’s house it is one of the nicest on campus. Said vice president is off on a year sabbatical so we get to live in his house in the mean time. It is certainly big – two large double bedrooms, big living/dining room complete with 4 piece suite of the variety your grandmother would love, kitchen and bathroom.  The bathroom appears to have a leak and although the toilet flushes and there is some water in the sink there is more water on the floor than in the bath/shower and the boiler seems to be broken so I think we’ll be on cold bucket baths after all. The kitchen is also pretty grotty at the moment and we are just waiting to get in there and give it a good clean. We do have a fridge which works and a cooker / oven but only one of the four rings works at the moment. On the plus side we have functioning broadband and satellite TV!

Then we have a visit from some Canadian volunteers – a photographer and journalist who are recording volunteers stories and experiences to use as promotional material to encourage more volunteers. Hence lots of photos of me in action with African children and medical students. I have been promised a copy of them so I’m looking forward to that. It was really nice to have some new people to talk to and we had a good laugh with them (not that are fellow volunteers are not lovely and great company of course!)

Then there was the arrival of my rescue packages – dairy milk, almonds, dried fruit, hand sanitiser... all the essentials! Was really brilliant to go to the post office and find a little yellow slip in the box telling me there was a parcel for me – especially when it actually turned out to be three parcels and a card, courtesy of my folks and Calum (thanks a million) I am down one bar of dairy milk as it was demolished with a lot of help for my friends here last night, but very very worth it. Yum! (plus when it’s shared i don’t feel so guilty).

Finally I am now the proud owner of an office – hurray. I’ve never had a office or a desk just for me before. Very exciting!!! Photos of all of the above to follow (except perhaps the dairy milk).

Jo x