Twenty-Two Days and Counting

7/29
I finally got my blog sent out so I guess it is time to write another one!  Twenty-two days left till I fly home!  I am still confused how this whole flight works.  I am first flying to the UAE from Addis which is about four hours in the wrong direction, then my flight heads to Miami.  That means I am flying a full eight hours round trip extra!  I mean, who comes up with these things?  Anyway, sadly my layover is too short for me to get to explore Doha, I am disappointed that I get to fly in without actually seeing the country at all.  But, since I won't get to leave the airport I guess I will just have to gorge myself of FOOD!  Don't get me wrong, I like Ethiopian food just fine.  But, there is NO diversity, just getting to eat foods that I don't have everyday will be such a treat. 
Things are getting together for my camp.  I have people signed up to do training, and all but one of the slots are already filled.  I should have my grant money by now, and the supplies I need are all easy to come by.  Two weeks from now we will be training sixty kids (assuming I can get them all to show up) on gender equality, leadership, sexual health, and HIV.  It should be a lot of fun and hopefully the students will come ready to learn. 
Life is pretty much the same old every day.  I have been working on my bees and learning from my mistakes.  I am hoping that when I come to the states I might be able to meet some keepers and just get a little experience from them.  I feel pretty confident in what I am doing, but there are some things I would really like to do at least once with a professional.  It is a really fun hobby though and I can't believe that it is so out of fashion in America.  It is so common here that people actually keep bees by their front doors.  That sounds fine and all until you realize that African bees are MEAN.  I was trying to plant some flowers for my bees the other day, I was digging about four meters or so from the hive (13ft) and they started bouncing off my head warning me to stop.  Then as I ran away I ran past the building where I keep my other bees and THEY started going after me too!  So considering that the bees here are so mean and they still keep them around their kids, why when Americans have access to bees that you can literally open the hive and touch the bees without them stinging do we not do it more? 
I am officially out of water.  My landlady has stopped helping me get water, I am not sure why, and I have had to get water from a friend.  Still, all my laundry is dirty, I haven't had a shower in a week and a half, and my socks STINK!  I have had to buy bottled water to drink, and to water my chickens.  It is really not fun not being able to even wash my dishes.  I have got to figure this out and get someone I can trust to fetch me water.  On the bright side the power has been crazy good recently.  It has been on at least 90% of every day and sadly this has led to me watching more movies and reading fewer books.  Honestly I kinda wish it would go out so I would be forced back to books.  Still, you can't get something nice like that without a sacrifice.  The internet cell network has been out for weeks.  I have not been able to check my email since I have been at site so yesterday I got permission to use the governments satellite internet just to check email.  Still, that isn't open to everyone so I am very grateful they let me do it.
This week is all about preparation.  I am getting students signed up, having penis models built for condom Olympics, finishing up the schedule for camp, and finalizing details.  I also will have to go to Robe this week to send out the training materials, schedule, and information to the people helping with the camp.  That sounds like it will keep me busy, sadly that is all less than half a days work every day this week.  (I could probably finish it all in a day, but then what would I do for the rest of the week?)
Obama was here in Ethiopia this week.  I was a little miffed about it when I heard about it for reasons I can't get into on this blog.  But, I was happy to see that he was far from out of the loop on issues here and that he seemed to be heavy handed with dealing with issues that are unbecoming of America's allies. I was very proud of the way he handled some of the questions about certain human rights issues and was not afraid to back down.  Finally, I missed it, but was told that he also spoke proudly about Peace Corps volunteers and I hope that we can all live up to the high expectations laid on us.