Where and How I Live: My Ward, Kgosi Ward

Hello everyone, sorry to be a day late, but here is the second part of Where and How I Live.  Today we will be focusing on my ward, the Kgosi Ward.

 

First things first, what do I mean by my ward?  Well, Gumare and every other villages, town, or even city in Botswana are broken into different wards that represent their historical chiefdoms.  For instance, Gumare has seven wards (I don’t know them all so will not attempt to name them) and seven corresponding sub-chiefs.   All of these sub-chiefs are born into their positions, which are passed down from generation to generation for that specific family living in that specific chiefdom.  Today these chiefdoms and chiefs act as more localities and local elders who have the final authority on traditional matters.  But legally they also have the power to sentence criminals to traditional punishments like lashings or fines.  This traditional punishment can be in addition to a formal court ruling, so in essence if you say steal someone’s property and get caught you could get lashed (yes, when I say lashed I do mean being hit in the back or buttocks by a stick) by the traditional court and then sentenced to jail time by the formal court. 

Now, as their name suggests the sub-chiefs are under the purvey of one ruling chief that has the final say in all the traditional and social matters of Gumare.  Finally, I tell you all of this because my ward, Kgosi Ward, houses this one ruling chief.  Thus, the Kgosi Ward literally translates into the Ward of the Chief, and this fact is one of the more interesting things about my immediate surroundings. 

Almost weekly, I walk past the Chief's office (see picture on Flickr next week), which consists of a five-roomed one story brick building, an outdoor community meeting space where the chief hears cases and complaints, and the main Krall where cattle is bought and sold.  As you can imagine, this is a hotbed of activity and it is not unusual for me to walk past while traditional court or community event is being held.  In fact, with my work here in Gumare I have helped organized and put-on some on these community events.

Other than the chief’s office, the Kgosi ward’s next biggest attraction is the hospital, which is just a five minute walk from my house.  It is the only hospital in all of the Okavango Sub-District and services residents from up to 200km away, though there are clinics in every village in Botswana.  With this said, Gumare Hospital is not what I would call a hospital.  It is small and under resourced compared to many of the hospitals in Botswana.   Yet, it is does have things that the clinics don’t like a maternity ward, which makes an invaluable health asset to the Okavango Sub-District. 

Moreover, the constant flow of people has enticed some entrepreneurs to open up little stands and a butchery/restaurant right next to the hospital.  So it is here where I get some of my lunches like meat-pies, beef, chicken, and bread (again, all included on Flickr and I will explain more about the food in the next chapter of the blog).    

And it is also at these lunchtime stops where I get a sense of my integration.  For example, at first when I walked into the butcher by the hospital the owners would look at me like any other foreigner and ask what I was doing there.  Fast forward to today and now they not only know me but comment if I have not come by to see them in a while or joke with me about my language skills.  Like a wise person once said, you truly feel like you’re part of a community when the local butcher knows you by name. 

Other than the hospital and the Chief’s office, Kgosi ward is mostly made up of a mixture of compounds like mine that have some brick houses intermingled with the more traditional mud hut rondaval.  I know this was short, but I’ll post pictures next week of everything I wrote about here so you can get a better understanding of what I mentioned.

As always, I hope everyone is doing well and please feel free to drop me an email to let me know how you are doing (jefflyle30@gmail.com).

Where and How I Live: My Compound

Hello again everyone, I am going be switching up the theme for the next probably three posts and will be talking about where and how I live.  This will include everything from seeing into my house to the surrounding delta around me.  I have mentioned these places before in some of the earlier posts, but with this theme I hope to go into more detail. 

First things first, let us start with where I really live, sleep, eat, and do some of my works: my house and my compound.   As you can see in the picture, my house relative to some other Peace Corps countries is pretty nice.  It has two bedrooms, a full kitchen, bathtub, toilet, sink, pretty large living room, running water, electricity, and internet hook-up.   Also, all of my furniture is taken care of by the District Aids Coordinating office and as you can see in some of the flickr pictures not that bad.   For instance, my bed is a queen size and probably one of the nicer beds I have had in my life. 

With all of this said, there are some things to get used to because it is still different than what I am used to in the U.S.   Take, for example, the bathroom.   In the U.S. we are used to the toilet, sink, and bathtub being all in one room.  Here in Botswana about every house I have been to the toilet, sink, and bathtub are usually in separate locations.  Like in my house, as you can see in the pictures on flickr, the toilet and bathtub are in their own separate small rooms and the “bathroom” sink is between the two.   That’s probably the biggest difference but their other subtle ones too like here my whole house is made of concrete and has a corrugated steel roof, which keeps thing cool in the winter and hot in the summer. 

So far though, I have really been comfortable in my house.   I do, on occasion, have to deal with the water and/ or electricity not working for maybe a few hours or even sometimes a few days, but you get used to that and prepare by having candles and bottles of water stored away.  In fact, I actually enjoy when the electricity goes out sometimes because then the whole village becomes dark and the sky at night is as clear as it would be if I was camping.

Now that is just my house, but really I am not living in just a house.  No, I live on a compound with about three to five other people living in separate living spaces that drastically differ from one another.  For example, the structure closest to me on the right is just a one room thatched roof hut made of clay.  Yet, in this hut my landlord’s son has a fridge, a T.V., a bed, and a hot-plate.  The farther structure on my right is a little bit bigger than the hut.  It has three rooms and one common space where the tenants share a hot-plate, fridge, and T.V. Neither structure has a bathroom, so they use an outhouse at the far corner of the compound (shown in flickr). 

I mentioned in an earlier post the kids who were living here but a few months ago they and their sister who was taking care of them moved to another compound.  Replacing them was a group of guys working at the construction company updating the roads around Gumare.   There is one girlfriend who stays with them and is home usually most of the day.  This new group of people has been really nice and we get along fine.  In fact, it’s at the point now where I feel safer because they are here.  I even ask them to take of the dogs when I am gone. 

That’s pretty much it for the first chapter of Where and How I Live, in the next I will focus more on Gumare as a whole.  Hope everyone is doing well! 

Where I Work and What I Do: Voices of the Community

First things first, the answer to last posts riddle: The horses name is Sunday (i.e he left on Sunday the horse and came back on the same Sunday the horse).  I don’t know how many of you got that, but if you didn’t, don’t feel bad because no one really gets it either, including myself. 

Okay, so now that the riddles are over, let’s move on to what I think is the fourth and concluding chapter of Where I Work and What I Do.  The organization that I will be highlighting for this final chapter is a brand new NGO that a crew of past and present Peace Corps volunteers have been working with for the past year called Voices of the Community or Voices for short. 

This group all started with one of the Gumare Peace Corps volunteers before me who recognized the need here for a group that specifically dealt with issues of gender based violence and children’s rights.  So with this understanding, she started to recruit members from the Gumare community who wanted to help start this group.  Initially, a small group of women met weekly to offer support for anyone facing abuse in Gumare as well as to plan for ways to become formalized.   This all started just as the previous Peace Corps volunteer was leaving, so they asked Dave and I if we would like to continue on helping. 

We both agreed that we would and first met the four-five initial members probably within just a few months of being in Gumare.  At first, Dave and I were just helping with the administrative chores of getting registered and drafting a constitution for the group.  Once we became official, it was obvious that we were going need help in training and planning for how to be an effective gender group so we asked for other local volunteers to assist.

 Fortunately, two local Peace Corps volunteers had experience working with gender groups before and were more than willing to help.   After these two Peace Corps joined the group, they organized trainings for the ladies and walked them through all the gender basics like what is the difference between gender and sex and the different types of gender based violence and abuse (i.e. mental vs. physical, etc.).  Dave and I again helped more with the administrative details like getting the word out about the trainings and making sure people would attend.   

These trainings took maybe two to three months to finish, but it was perfect timing because immediately after the local government office dealing with HIV sponsored the Peace Corps in the Delta to organize youth camps targeting teenage pregnancy.  These camps were the perfect venue for the initial members to get practice talking about their group, gender issues, and facilitating group activities. 

Those camps ended a few months ago, and since then a few more members, including some men, have come aboard, but not enough.  So right now we are going forward trying to grow the group and host events to spread awareness about abuse and gender based violence in Gumare.   

The first one of the activities was actually today.  We organized a Kgotla meeting (pronounced Kota and is kinda like a town hall meeting with the local village chief, a picture explaining what I mean will be included in flickr very soon) with government representatives talking on topics like the relationship between gender based violence and HIV, frequency of rape and other gender based crimes in Gumare, and the status of orphans and vulnerable children. 

With this being the third attempt at holding this meeting, I would consider it a success.  We had in attendance over thirty community members, twelve representatives from local government departments, the chief, and one local politician.  More importantly, people eagerly listened to the speakers and were interested in learning more about our group.  At least, twenty people signed up as wanting to attend our next meeting.    

That’s where the Voices of the Community stand right now.  It’s going bit by bit, but it is a group I am very much interested in continuing to help.   Finally, check on Flickr sometime next week for pictures of the Voices of the Community. 

Next week I’ll be changing the topic, so check back in two weeks for something different.  With that said, I’ll continue to update how things are going with the different projects.  Also, always feel free to email any questions or comments @ jefflyle30@gmail.com.

Hope everyone is doing well!

Where I Work and What I Do: The Schools in Gumare

Hey everyone, I finally uploaded the pictures of GCC, so check Flickr to see the office, compound, and of course at least one picture of the dogs hanging out their.  Okay, with the pictures uploaded of GCC that pretty much wraps up what I was “assigned” to do here in Gumare.  The rest of the Where I Work and What I Do posts will be about other activities that are not really official but just things I am involved in.  The first type of these activities that really takes up most of my time outside of “official work” is the activities Dave (for the those who don’t know, Dave is the other Peace Corps in Gumare that I work with a lot) and I do at the schools here in Gumare.   At each school we meet with a group of students after school one day a week to talk about life-skills like leadership, goal-setting, etc. and how they relate to what is going on in their country and life (i.e. HIV prevention). 

To start the week off we go to the Okavango Junior Secondary School- which is the equivalent of middle school-every Tuesday at 4:30pm and meet for about an hour with have 15-20 mostly girls aged between 14-17.  Right now we are in the midst of practicing the kids public speaking skills as we have 4-5 members each week give a short presentation on a topic of their choosing.  So far they have been great!  Surprisingly, many of the girls have given their opinions on very serious subjects like abortion, politics, and corporal punishment.  Yet despite some unfavorable looks from their fellow classmates they many continue to speak their mind with poise and confidence.  Like just last week a girl in the class stood up for her presentation and started attacking the majority party as corrupt.  Even though the majority party has been the majority in Botswana for the past five decades, they still have an almost blind loyalty throughout the country, so it was not surprising that she got a few heckles from her classmates.  But even with these heckle, she continued to make her point and finished without being dismayed.  This is just one example of why working with the Junior Secondary School is a highlight of the week.   After the “formal” kinda class room like setting, Dave finishes off the meeting with a few brainteasers and jokes.  The kids love this so much and have so many of their own that it usually goes on for about an hour.  Though, if we didn’t finally call the meeting they could go on for hours telling jokes and riddles. 

Following the Junior Secondary School on Wednesday and Thursday at 3pm are two primary schools: Gumare Primary School and KeleKele Primary School (equivalent of an elementary school).  At both primary schools we have the same purpose for our meetings as the Junior Secondary School but a very different style.  This is for two reasons.  For one, the kids at primary level do not speak English very well.  And two, they are much younger and only really come for the games.  With this dynamic we have tried many different tactics to at least try to get some message across before we lead them in games like Simon Says, Red Rover, Capture the Flag, Red Light-Green Light, Duck Duck Goose, and other children’s games we can remember from our youth.   So far we have tried everything from discussion groups to skits to artwork to group work.  Yet, the kids are still kinda crazy when we do the lesson part and are constantly talking, moving around, or just flat out not paying attention.  I understand this, they have been in a class-room all day and don’t really want to be sitting anymore, so we are going keep trying more interactive sessions to see how it goes. 

Outside of these clubs, I have just started to help with Okavango Junior Secondary School’s brand new basketball team.  I don’t get to their practice as much as I like because I am already committed to the clubs I just mentioned, but when I do it is really fun.  As most of you know, I love basketball and everywhere I have gone it has been a part of my life.  Here in Gumare, for the first time, that really stopped because there is no court, no one to play against or with, and really just no interest.  Now those challenges still exist, but since about a month ago one of the newly transferred teachers took upon himself to start up a hoop team with basically nothing but four basketballs and pavement. 

Literally, this is all they have.  I was walking to a meeting at the junior school and saw one of the teachers holding a basketball and a few kids without schools and still in their school uniforms throwing the another ball back and forth.  Immediately, I did a double take and thought I was hallucinating.  The only time people ever mention basketball is when they confuse it with some weird version called netball.  Yet, here I was seconds later telling this guy I used to play and how I would love to help out.  He said that would be great, any help would be much appreciated, and to show up when I can.  So needless to say, I have been going whenever I can make (usually two times a week) and helping run the kids through any drill I can think of that doesn’t require a hoop. 

And in fact, you would be surprised how much you can actually do.   For instance, I dug back in my memories and have made the kids do defense chops like the ones we used to do a local high school camp.  I have also put them through some rebounding drills we they have to box out enough to keep their opponent from even touching the ball right in-front of them.

So far it has been very fun and relaxing to be around basketball again.  With that said, it has also been challenging because some of these kids have not even touched a basketball before let alone dribbled.  It is work in progress but one that I am very excited about. 

That’s pretty much it for the schools; hopefully soon we can start taking our groups out on trips and show them a little bit of the delta besides Gumare.  I think doing this and getting them out of their environment might calm them down and help us get across our life-skill messages.

Before I leave though, I will give you one brainteaser that Dave has used for the kids.  If you are really curious and can’t figure it out, wait for next week and Ill post the answer.   Here it is…..

On Sunday, a man left for week-long trip horse trip through the local mountain trails and returned on the same Sunday.  How did he do it?

Oh on admin note, I will post pictures of the schools next week sometime, check back by Thursday.   

Finally, I would like to end by saying that my thoughts and prayers go out to the city of Boston, especially for those families that have lost someone in the bombings.   

Where I Work and What I Do: Gumare Counseling Center (GCC)

Hello again everyone, I am going continue on with the theme Where I Work and What I do.  

This time I will be highlighting my secondary project, the Botswana Christian AIDS Intervention Program’s Gumare Counseling Center, or as we like to call it GCC.  Like the name suggests we working specifically with HIV/AIDs counseling and prevention.  At the office in Gumare we have three full time staff, one coordinator, Emmanuel Segotso, and two HIV testers/counselors, Golesego and Lesiela.  Outside the office, we have about 26 part-time staff throughout the Okavango that implements numerous programs made possible through a grant by our very own U.S. Agency of International Development (USAID).   Below spotlights a few of those initiatives:

•         Orphan and Vulnerable Children’s campaign where volunteers run kids club at schools and teach them about HIV/AIDs prevention.
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•             TB and HIV Prevention campaign where volunteers go out to the community and give health talks about the TB-HIV relationship (TB is an fatal opportunistic disease that people with HIV contract because of their low functioning immune systems) and HIV prevention like condom use and abstinence.
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•            TB Care campaigns where volunteers enroll TB patients into the program do an initial assessment of their TB and then provide non-clinical follow up care like referrals and wellness advice.  They do this until the clients “graduate” from the program.

Similar to Sekgele, I help more with the organizational part of all these programs and do not really do the implementation.  For instance, just last week my coordinator was busy preparing for his upcoming wedding, so I went with a full-time counselor and did all the monitoring and evaluation of these programs.  That meant we traveled throughout the Okavango, collect the volunteers papers, and then transferred the data onto excel sheets for submission to the main office.  Recently this type of administrative help is mostly what I have been doing. 

Last year we applied for a grant from the U.S. Embassy to build sort of meeting hall where we were going show movies once or twice a week and organize other community events like talents shows, plays, and concerts.  Since there is not much here for entertainment the idea was that this would be a good outlet for kids as well as a adults and also a great way to get out more information about the work we do.  We are still waiting for the U.S. Embassy to get back to us about our grant, but the lady who coordinates the grant really like it so we are optimistic.  I’ll keep you up to date on how that goes. 

That’s pretty much it for what’s going on at GCC.   It’s been slow at the moment because my counterpart, Emmanuel, has been on break for his wedding, which was last Saturday, but when he gets back there are more ideas we are floating around about programs and generating income.  Ill keep you updated. 

Oh, pictures of GCC will be up on Flickr tomorrow.  Thanks for reading.  I miss you guys and hope all is well back home!

Where I work and What I Do: Sekgele Training Home Society

Hey guys, welcome to the revamped Jeff in Botswana.  Since I so epically failed in both consistency and content in my previous blogs, I have decided to change things up a bit and start theming together blogs with the goal of posting something new every two weeks.  This means better content, more pictures (updated on flickr so follow the link there), and a commitment to keeping it updated.  Essentially, everything my last attempts were not. 

So without further ado, let us now continue to the first theme, Where I Work and What I Do, which will cover all the job related aspects of life in Gumare.  The first will be Sekgele Training Home Society, my primary assignment here in Gumare that focuses on people with disabilities in the Okavango.

Where I Work and What I Do: Sekgele Training Home Society

I have mentioned Sekgele a bit in previous posts, but not nearly as much I should given that I am either at their office or home working on projects for them at least fifty percent of my day. 

Now what does that fifty percent consists of?  Mostly, it’s fundraising and more recently setting up a website with the help of my fellow PCV Dave's son, Nathan Lafratta.  The address is www.sekgele.com, but it’s in its infancy so if you visit it keep that in mind.  Somewhat surprisingly, this means that most of my work is on the computer either helping to write and research grants, keeping track of our contacts with local businesses we have approached through excel, and lastly formatting and filling in our wordpress run website.

With this said, not everything I do is on the computer.  Every week my counterpart, Gosalamang (pronounced ho-tsa-la-mung), Sekgele’s admin assistant, OG, and I get together to map out a game plan for the week.  Usually, this turns into them telling me that I will be brought along to meetings with various governmental organizations, board-members, and other partner institutions.   

Right now all this translate into some pretty cool projects:

•       Project 1: Sewing Workshop

Before I got to Sekgele they applied and were awarded a grant from Botswana’s Women Affairs Department to build a sewing workshop on our compound.  The workshop is going allow Sekgele’s members and clients an opportunity to earn money mainly through selling the government school year uniforms it gives to Orphan and Vulnerable children as well provide Sekgele with a small percentage of the profits to cover operating costs.

Recently, the money has been released and construction has started so I am helping with the implementation of this project.  So far this has meant helping my counterpart and Sekgele’s board identify the builder and even negotiate a lower construction price (we saved over $100!).  Eventually, I hope to help Sekgele broaden what the sewing workshop produces and maybe even get an online store going through Etsy.com to sell traditionally African patterned aprons.  

•        Project 2: Beads for Hope

About six months ago, we applied for a grant from the U.S. Embassy to start our Beads for Hope program.  Like the sewing project, Beads for Hope is another one of Sekgele’s projects that will give Sekgele, its clients, and members a source of income. 

Through the grant we will receive enough money to purchase materials that the members can use to produce beaded jewelry through recycled magazines and posters.  This project should get underway within the next month, but right now we are starting to lay the ground work to again market our products international.  The website is just the first marketing step, with the next being developing a product line and then getting together a store on Etsy.com.  Then finally, at the trainings the members of Sekgele will be producing the jewelry which we hope to sell online at this store as well to local business and lodges. Again, special thanks to Dave Lafratta's son, Nathan, for helping out with getting the website together and giving me great advice on how to get started!  

•         Project 3: Engagement of the Private Sector

      For about five months now, Sekgele’s staff, the board-members, and I have been meeting somewhat regularly by Botswana’s standards to discuss the progress of our fundraising model that a former Bots 12 in Maun, Mary Sue Barry, helped us develop.   This may sound mundane but asking the private sector for money besides through grants simply does not happen.  So what this trend does is leave all the ngos in Botswana applying for the same grant money from the same large organizations.  In most cases, the local businesses are simply not asked for money.  So when we asked Mary Sue to help us out she had a great model that does exactly what no one else does, approach local businesses.  And so far it is what we have been doing, though I say so far because recently we stalled after a few months of having great response from our twenty to thirty meetings.  Actually tomorrow, we are supposed to meet to revamp our fundraising model. 

As you probably notice, these projects are not really hands on working with Sekgele’s clients.  Rather the hope is that by helping Sekgele develop much needed fiscal sustainable, I am contributing to the greater goal of better the lives of people with disabilities in the Okavango.   Since they are mostly at the beginning phases, we will just have to wait and see how it goes.  For more updates on Sekgele, keep checking our website periodically.  Finally, I have put up pictures of what Sekgele looks on my flickr account, just follow the link to the side and find the Sekgele set and you will be able to see where I spend some of my days.  

Oh, and one last note, I will mention the people I work with in much more detail in the next theme Friends and Colleagues in Gumare so to keep this post’s brevity.  Wait, one more last note, for those who are wondering I have been here for a little over 11 months now, with a short trip back home for Christmas which was so great, and have about 15 months more to go. 

Things Starting To Pick Up

Hello everyone, sorry for the delayed response.  The last few weeks have been pretty busy with trainings and projects starting to move past the planning page.   With that being said, those projects will be the primary topic of today’s blog post with a conclusion of some random stories since we last spoke.  To make the organization of the projects easier to read, I’ll discuss them in list form.    

Gumare Women’s Group

Since our in-service training a couple weeks ago things have started to pick up for some project.  For instance, as soon as I got back from the training a lady from a women’s group that Dave and I are helping with came over to seek some advice on registering her group as a non-profit.  When she first called and explained this I expecting maybe an hour or so to discuss a plan for registering, but this was not the case.  She wanted to get this group started and do the application at the meeting. 

So not having anything else going on, Dave came over and we sat in my house with this lady writing a letter to the ministry here that handles non-profits outlining what the group’s objective; coming up with ten possible names; and calling the members for a meeting to formally record minutes from a meeting discussing registration. 

Even though Dave and I were somewhat caught off guard, the outcome I think turned out okay.  Below are the objectives of the group:

·         Provide quality, caring, and nonjudgmental support in a manner that fosters self-respect and independence in persons experiencing intimate partner abuse.

 

·         Lead the effort to end domestic abuse through advocacy, outreach, and community education.

 

·         Have the knowledge and expertise for directing persons experiencing abuse to the proper professional care providers

The next steps with the group will be organizing training for the members around these objectives; introducing ourselves to the community through some marketing; coming up with programs and projects around the objectives; and finally come up with some sustainable methods for resource development.

PACT Club and Camp Glow

These projects are essentially the same: Working with the youth around Gumare to develop their confidence, decision-making, and other important life-skills that will help mitigate their chance of contracting HIV/AIDs.  

Dave and I are currently running one PACT Club with about twenty kids aged 10-14 at an elementary school on Wed afternoons.  Basically, we start off with interactive learning about a like-skill topic and then play games the rest of the time.  It usually lasts about an hour and half. 

In addition, the PCV’s in this region, myself included, will be putting on a Camp GLOW for about thirty elementary school kids.  The camp will be for a week and link life-skills with avoiding teen pregnancy, which is pretty high in this region.  Hopefully this camp will happen at the beginning of December. 

Sekgele and Gumare Primary Counseling Center

These are my two primary assignments so I spend most of my time there, but I am not doing too much project implementation.  Currently, I am just working on developing some training in basic computer skills, Microsoft Office, and business skills.  Hopefully next month we start doing these trainings at least twice a week.

After the trainings, I hope to start getting incorporating what we learned into more projects that the organizations have going on so look for more posts on that in the future.

When I am not doing these trainings, I am helping my organizations with any administrative help they need whether it is creating fliers or inputting data on a spreadsheet or helping write grants. 

Random Happenings

So these projects are basically what I spend most of my days working on and like I said earlier they all started to pick up more after the training.  It has been good to busy, but I do get some time to relax and do things I like. 

For instance, I have started to play soccer on Mon and Wed.  Actually, it is not really playing as much as it is me embarrassing myself.  I have not played soccer in probably over ten years and don’t really know what I am doing.  In fact, the first time I played I didn’t even know the positions.  One of the guys told me I was positions 11 and everyone started calling me top striker with big smiles on their faces.  I was laughing along but then had to finally stop and say where does the top striker go and what does the top striker do?  This immediately got more laughter, but eventually someone answered me.   With all this said, it has been really fun and a great workout.  All the guys are government workers here at the hospital, schools, or government offices so they do speak English.  Also, like everyone else I met here, they are extremely friendly and never get upset if I do something stupid like completely miss the ball when trying to kick the ball off a bounce.   

In addition to playing soccer, I hope to start going fishing regularly with a group of guys that go every weekend.  The idea happened about two weeks ago when I hitched to this lagoon area with an old Zimbabwean guy going fishing.  I didn’t plan of fishing that day, but ended up sitting with this guy for five hours and talking about politics, Africa, and the US while he was having barely any luck with the fish.  After the five hours, we exchanged numbers, and he told me that a group of guys usually goes out every weekend and to call if I am interested.  Hopefully, I can get a fishing pole soon and join them.  But again, like soccer I am not much of a fisherman so it will be interesting and potentially embarrassing experience. 

That’s pretty much it for this blog post.  Sorry it was so random, but things here are always random, so it just makes sense to do the same for my blog post.  I hope you enjoyed.  For my friends and family, I miss you all very much and hope everyone is doing well.   Please send me some updates through email on how you all are doing. 

Oh, I put some pictures up on Flickr and will keep adding them slowly but surely.