hey. so im in my second week in togo. things are quite slow. it turns out that volunteers only have to work in the mornings and it seems that even though i have been trying to work in the afternoons there is usually nothing to do. i am going to start looking for other organizations to work for in the afternoon.

i met a really cool kid last week. his name is thomas. he is one of the kids that pdh works with. currently i have to argue his case to get antiviral drugs paid for. it is so frustrating that the organization is willing to pay 5000f for healthy kids to go to school but not 600f for really really sick kids to feel at least a bit better. even though the mission of the ngo is supposed to be to help those who are sick especially with aids it seems that they have drifted really far from their starting point. although back to thomas, he is a lot of fun. we went to his house twice last week and ill go at least once this week which is good because he is quite sick and there is really no one at home during the day to care for him. oh and i get to go meet jaques this week. i am so excited i have been waiting for months to meet him.

i walked into the city of lome yesterday. it took four hours all together but it was fun. i really got to see how life exists for togolese people. people here are nice although sometimes too nice. i thought that i had made friends with a couple of guys last week and i gave them my email only to receive one back in which this guy declared his undying love for me and said that he couldnt sleep or eat because he was thinking about me. i swear we had only talked for five minutes and our conversation only started because he and his friend thought that i was a franciscan nun. i take a walk each evening before sunset and there is this guy who is digging a hole a huge hole. the other day he asked me to come by and look at his hole. it is rectangular in shape and probably seven feet by four feet. i told him it was a nice hole very deep and profound. he then proceeded to invite me down into his hole. yeah it was pretty hilarious.

ive been playing a lot of scrabble with the other volunteers a bunch which is cool and we went to the beach again today. i seem to always get sunburnt no matter how much sunscreen i put on. oh although today i only got burnt on all of the places i forgot to put sunscreen on. haha.

okay that is all for now. it is so awkward to have this blog it is way too much like a public journal.