Monday, July 30

·        7:30 – Wake up (late) and sweep. Make oatmeal and coffee for breakfast (thank you to my Grandpa Frank for both!) Eat and clean dishes.

·        8:30 – Clean dishes, set up on porch. Make to-do list for the week, write in journal, and do a couple of crossword puzzles.

·        10:00 – Walk to commune office to find the adjoint mayor. Both my counterpart and the adjoint mayor are there and I ask them about using two outside walls of the EPP (primary school) to paint a big malaria mural and a World Map, a common Peace Corps project. They love the idea and Nicholas says he will find the director of the EPP later in the day to double check about using the space. Also catch up with Nicholas about our well project. We have found a technician in Ambilobe who is willing to build the wells for a great price and Nicholas says he will talk to him further when he goes into town this weekend.

·        11:00 – Walk home and get my bike to ride over to my family’s house on the other side of the village. Spend an hour grating coconut for hair oil and gossiping with my mom, help finish the day’s cooking, and eat lunch. There’s so much kabaka (the side dish served along with the obligatory rice) today: fried fish, leftover crab sauce from yesterday, and beans. My sister, Belia, and our zoky (older sister), Bebe, who is visiting are in Ambilobe for the day so I play ball with my two nieces, Jenny and Noela, and my nephew Pauly in front of the house with the new rubber ball Bebe and Paoly brought as a present from Diego.

·        2:30 – Bike home. Stop at market for phone credit and they tell me there won’t be any until Thursday, market day. Buy cucumbers, onions, potatoes, and soap.

·        3:15 – Heat up leftover coffee from this morning and set up on porch to start a new book – “Restless” by William Boyd. The Peace Corps doctors call me to say I have to go up to Diego within the next two weeks to get a flu shot they are flying up today to the meva. This is a big hassle but apparently required.

·        4:00 – My kids stop by and I give them magazines to look at on the porch. They love flipping through the pictures and choosing their “families” from the pictures. All of the white women are either my mom or me and all of the darker skinned models are in their families.

·        4:45 – Go for a 30 minute run and do 30 minutes of strength exercises in my house before it gets dark.

·        5:45 – Bathe.

·        6:00 – Make dinner by candlelight. Tonight is cucumber, tomato, onion salad with vinegar, salt, and pepper.

·        6:45 – Get in bed and read.

·        8:15 – Prepared for the termite symphony tonight, I put in earplugs (thank you Jill Beckerman!) and go to sleep.