My host family is a young couple with a 2-3 year old child, i have my own hut on their compund and it's pretty nice. So far no rats, spiders, bugs etc. I did have the neighbor kids chase away the two skinks that were living on top of one of the walls and they haven't been back so thats nice. I also have a bathing shelter and a pit latrine. my host mother asks me what certain english verbs are like the verb for "to hang your clothes out to dry" or "to carry buckets on your head", she is very disappointed when i say that we don't have words for those things. then what do you say and I explain that we rarely hang things out to dry we have machines for that and we don't carry things on our head. we have had some interesting conversations on these types of topics. The language classes are from 8 to 12:30 with a few short breaks. There are 5 of us in the language class (and my teacher as well as my fmaily sends there greetings) so we get a lot of time to practice in class and i guess we are learning fast. WE had an evaluation on friday and i got almost perfect although i still feel like i can barely communicate in bemba, fortunately most people speak english as well, my family is fluent so that helps. Language is 4-5 k from my hut and i go there every monday, tuesday, ednesday and friday morning on my bike then bike home for lunch then bike about 2k into town fro technical training from 14 to 17 those afternoons. On thursday and Saturday i have to bike over 7k into the training center where everyone from out intake has health and HIV sessions. I get a little tired of the biking sitting biking sitting combination especially with the muddy, sandy, bumpy, hilly, pothole filled road that is also used by cars, pedestrians, ox-carts and cattle, but i'm getting used so it's not as bad anymore. When i come home around 17:30 or 18 i bathe and relax until dinner then i talk with my family until about 20 and then despite how tired i am i stay up until 21 reading/ I feel like an old lady going to sleep that early, but it's dark and the after an hour my eyes hurt from reading in the candle light and theres really nothing else to do. Then i wake up at 5 and do stretches and exercises until the sun starts to come up then i get dressed and ready and read my Bible grab some fruit for breakfast and head off to class. By the time Sunday comes I am ready for a break and i truely enjoy the day of rest. The first week i went to church in nyanga which was super confusing and last week i went in english so i could understand although i still didn't really like the service (it's catholic mass) but i go because it's where my family goes and i don't know anything about the other churches. I think i will be posted in Luapula province after training, but it's possible that i will be in central province. I filled out an interest with requests, such as being close to a boma/privincial house and preferable having a protestant church nearby. I have no preference over a pioneer site or a replacement site where someone else has been working for the past 2 years. I can't wait to find out were i will be. Time seems to be flying by here. Also, i bought an internet phone so i can get emails out at the training site. It's too difficult to respond most of the time, but it is nice to hear updates from home every now and then.
PS. We have already lost 2 or 3 people from our group, one guy didn't show up in DC, another guy left last week because he has not been feeling well and the last girl was sent home because she is allergic to bees and they had planned to send her to a beekeeping project in northwest. They should have already klnown she was allergic because it was in her med file and even when they found out they could have sent her somewhere else. The peace corp administration processes can be very annoying at times, they seem very unorganized and they waste a lot of time talking to us, but they never really tell us what we need to know, even when we ask sometimes they act like it's a big secret and they can't tell us, i don't really understand them , but i don't really care either, just as long as they don't send me home over something stupid.