I'm still in Lusaka for now, but I've been cleared to go back and there is a PC vehicle going tomorrow that I was told I could get a ride with. I got approval from several people in PC, but I just talked to the driver and he says he doesn't think he will have room for me bc he already promised other volunteers that he would take them even though I was told last Friday that I could get a ride in this vehicle from his boss. I never talked to him personally bc I didn't have his number and I don't know him. He is the driver for a different province and he wants to take the volunteers from his province and told me to go with the driver from my own province, even though the driver from my province isn't going back until Monday and I am not allowed to stay that long. Sometimes I get overly frustrated dealing with PC staff. Not to mention m

Most of the people that I have been meeting with or talking with about the move and the issues at my site have been incredibly unsupportive and one person who is supposed to provide support to volunteers actually hasn't returned any of my phone calls or tried to talk to me in the past almost 2 weeks even though I told her I really needed help becuase everything was going so badly. It may sound horrible, but part of me thinks maybe they just want to leave me here in Lusaka or Serenje until I actually go stir crazy and decide to quit PC and just go home. Technically they shouldn't want volunteers to quit but in this case it would save them from having to move me and organize all of that. Which by the way they still don't have a date or a plan for my move. It kind-of would make sense not to bother planning anything if they are secretly hoping I will just go home so they don't have to deal with me. I don't really believe this yet, but it has crossed my mind, and it does potenitally explain the behaviour. When I met with another staff member to explain that I felt like they were just letting me fall through the cracks and not actually providing any support when I could really use some after dealing with really rough village issues for the past 2.5 months. Then at the end of the meeting with her she asked about my new site and then even implied that I wouldn't be as good of a volunteer as the person that I'm replaceing. I thought wow how is that for support when you need it. I'm getting really fed up with PC staff, but as of now I have no intention of quitting. I plan to stick it out and I really hope that if I ever do get to move to this new village, that things will get much better. I hope i will be able to work on projects and be in a village where at least someone actually wnats me there.

Aside from that craziness I have been trying to enjoy my time here. I've seen two movies: Valentine's Day and the Princess and the Frog. I went to a really nice Italian restaurant for dinner once. I've had chinese, ice cream, cheese, fresh fruit, yogurt and so many other goodies. Yesterday I bought a really nice big soft rug that will be wonderful in my new house if I ever get there. As frustrated and disappointed as I have been lately, I'm trying to be positive and optimistic my planning things for my new village and think of how I will decorate and arrange furniture now that my house will be twice as big. On a happy note, I just found out that my cat is still alive and my old house has not been broken into yet. Luckily my counterpart is taking care of things for me there. Hopefully I will pick up my stuff and my kitty before anything bad happens to them. I know for sure I won't be able to move until Tuesday at the absolute earlier, but who knows if that will even work out. I wish I could leave this on a more positive not, but trust me the ice cream was a super plus and really did help make up for a lot of the bad stuff.

On a funnier note: When we went to the Italian restaurant, it seemed pretty nice for Zambia so like a trypical sit down restaurant in America. I walked up to the hostess and asked for a table for the three of us. She asked if I had a reservation, when I said no she gave me a look of disgust so I quickly said we don't mind waiting. She asked if we wanted to sit inside or outside so I said whichever is available but she said both were available. It turned out there was hardly anyone else at the restaurant at the time. Before I could choose she looked all three of us up and down with a nasty face as if she couldn't believe that we had the audacity to enter her restaurant dressed as we were. Now even though I had showered that day, my clothes had been worn for 3 days straight but still it was jeans, a black tank top and flip flops. She seemed most offended by the flip flops. Aside form my clothes not being so clean the fashion would have been perfectly acceptable in America. At this point I quickly requested a table outside and we chose one off in the corner away from potential stares at us PCVs that were clearly not very welcome there. I was a little shocked to have a Zambian woman look at me with such disgust as if I weren't good enough to be there. It was kind-of funny. Needless to say the service wasn't too great, but the food was delicious so overall well worth it.