Monday, January 16, 2006

August 15th

Dear Everyone

I have been told that problems have been occurring when sending mail to my jabo###@hotmail.com address. It seems like this is in part because when I don't check my e-mail for over a few days that my account fills up. It seems like when it fills up that they do not let me accept anymore e-mails.

I right now am very limited in what I can do about this but am eventually planning on changing things over to another email account very possibly the jabo38###@yahoo.com which anyone can also send mail to now if they please even though it is not my main account I still use it and check it. It will probably be at least a month maybe two before I will be able to really resolve how I am going to switch out of hotmail. Two reasons for me to switch out of hotmail is that it is significantly slower than other e-mail like yahoo and has a smaller mail box and accepts considerably more spam.

Other happenings have to do with the electricity going out. It has been very unreliable the last few days with the power only coming on a few times for short bursts. I am confident that since this last time it came on it might lasts for a while though. It is kind of funny that when the power goes out in America everything stops but here in Africa since electricity is still so knew and most people don't have it anyway when it goes out not really much stops. People just keep on going on about there business what little they were doing anyway if they even had business.

I did get to go to South Africa today. Another guy and I were going to get hair cuts but it turned out to be a chance to go to the Internet and do some "quality" South African shopping. I almost don't like to admit it but it sure was nice to go someplace not so desperate. Lesotho is so destitute and the lives of people so poor here it can be quite depressing and it was nice to see a nice little clean town with a working economy and people on a large scale living a life to be considered a good one. It was also nice to see the style of businesses, roads, cars, clothes, and even attitudes in the people that one typically finds in the West. I am really feeling like I am getting a choice assignment here. It is like when I get tired of the poverty of a third world culture and the ways that I don't feel are right with the Basotho culture I can take a thirty minute taxi ride (which is a short ride for here) and be eating, walking, shopping, and relaxing in a westernized city. I really did not know how good it would feel to get to see that again until it actually happened today. Anyway back to the point which is I did not get my hair cut because the two places we went to were still busy. As it is though I not to upset about having to got to do a little shopping, hanging out at a coffee shop, and going to an Internet cafe.

You know though I think they are finally about through giving us most of our shots. We have got so many shots that I feel like my immune system should be really boosted up. I was even part of a conversation the other day when one volunteer said to another, "man, I have got so many shots my immune system is so strong that I think if a dog bit me that it would get cured of rabies" haha. In actuality I have only been given fourteen inoculations with two more to go some of which did not hurt but some of which did. I know some of which include, yellow fever, typhoid, rabies, hepatitis A and B, meningitis, flue, measles, mumps, and rubella. Just to clear things up I have not been given any medicine for malaria but if at any time I do any real traveling to any other countries besides South Africa I am to be given medicine for it.

I was asked how my radio is doing. It seems like me bringing my solar powered or wind up radio was definitely a good idea. It has so far been very useful. I mainly listen to only two different radio stations. The main is the BBC Africa I listen too. It is to me not quite as good as the regular BBC is actually quite nice, but quite often repeats the same programming over and over. They also report some stories that I am just not sure of like Boeing is doing experiments with anti-gravity technology. That a scientist in the USA can with in ten years put chips into people's heads to give them extra-sensory cyborg like senses, and often a new core for this and that like today they are reporting that soon there will be a vaccine for malaria. Anyway all of which might be true but are for me to be taken with a grain of salt. The other station I listen to is an African music station that plays music from around the world with every few songs being one from America they play a range from Elton John (yeah I know he is British but he is popular in America), Eminem, Will Smith, Phil Collins, Michael Jackson, Dido, and more. They do also play some South African music to that is fine but most of the stuff from around the world to me seems elementary and decades behind American music.

As it is though I am going to be busy during the next week and may or may not have access to the Internet or phone so I am not sure how my communication availability will be. This is because I am going to my actual site to stay for a couple of days and then am back to training for some final classes and testing and if everything goes fine my actual ceremony to be a Peace Corps Volunteer.

Love ya Jeff

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