Communication of all sorts

I have become somewhat notorious with my second year students for saying very bizarre sentences in Swahili during class. The word zero sounds like cooking pot, so now, seven minus seven equals cooking pot. There is also a greeting "U mzima?", which pretty much means, "are you complete?" or "are you still in one piece?" Originally, I would give them a different fraction everyday (hapana, ni nusu = no, I am half). However, one day, I decided to invent a new word based on Swahili grammar rules. (-ote means the entire if it has a singular prefix and all if it is plural. I applied it to the first person singular pronoun, which is not done normally. Mimi mote.) Now, most of the students and some of the teachers have adopted my new word.

One of the students was discussing the conduct of the students this week at the weekly assembly and she announced "I want to congratulate you on being very co-operative this week." That's a pretty typical announcement if there haven't been big discipline cases. Then she continued "I also want to congratulate you on so many students coming late. Let's not have that next week." Hmmmm, I don't think congratulate was the word she was looking for there. Well, they need to build their English vocabulary and I need to build my Swahili vocabulary. I'm sure if they kept blogs they would make fun of the words I use (e.g. when I was sick, I told them that my stomach was a house of bacteria).

I got a really nice email from Dr. Patty, who recently left Peace Corps Kenya staff and is now working in Boston. She will be meeting with the IDDS organizing staff, so we exchanged a few messages. She is really wonderful, and we were sad to see her go. Still, it sounds like everything is going very well for her. Her email made me really happy.

In sadder news, one of my favorite puppies (well, she's 12, but still a puppy in my book) from back in the States is being put down. She was definitely a sweetie.

I got a few emails that I had been waiting on for a bit longer than I would have liked. Still, the responses were positive, so I was very happy to get them. I had another email where someone was concerned that I was spreading myself too thin. As usual. I should probably figure out a way not to do that. Eventually.

I had a phone call this week that made me very anxious. I hate waitng. Too vague? Probably. Well, that's all I will say for now.

I even started using facebook on my phone. I'm not terribly thrilled about it, but I know that for some people it is the only way that I'll be able to keep up with them.

I found out that one of my friends is in the hospital. It sounds pretty serious, but he is always really upbeat about everything. I just have to hope that this all passes soon. Scratch that. Two friends. :-(

This weekend, I will finally go to Mombasa. Very excited about that! Should be a blast.