Day Off

Hey everybody, I figured it was about time for another update.
The Serengeti was absolutely amazing. When we we unpacking the cars at our campsite, we saw elephants marching by maybe 100 yards away. We were truly among the animals. We went on a lot of game drives and saw lots of great stuff. Leopards, crocodiles, and topi are among some of the new animals we spotted. We also did a field exercise on bird identification and counting. That's definitely my absolute favorite kind of learning: seeing an animal, identifying it, and trying to recognize it later on. It's awesome.
Part of our day was spent at Serena safari lodge, where I learned what heaven is like. After days and weeks of no couches, occasional cold showers, sweat, and dirt, it felt like ecstasy to swim in a pool, take a nice soapy shower, dry off with a clean fluffy towel, and lay shirtless on a padded lounge chair with a beer. And on top of all that add a group of amazing friends. I hope to remember that feeling forever.
That night, I stayed up late with some others and watched the amazing stars and listened to animals in the night. We heard hyenas, lions, bats, zebra, and baboons. Also I think we heard something die. It was a squeal that did not sound happy. We also had a curious hyena visitor that I saw come by about four times to sniff our trash can. It was a great night.
Then we went home and it was back to school. We've got a bunch of assignments due over the next few days, and lots of time to work on them. Today's a day off and some of us will be going to some sort of sustainable farm for a little excursion. I think I'll stay here and try to get some work done, considering the near zero work I did yesterday. We went back to the art gallery for ice cream. It was delicious as usual. Then I went on a little hike and we started learning the dance to Thriller. The usual type of excitement that happens here at Moyo hill.
Also, the day after we got back from Serengeti, we held an auction among us to raise money for a community service project we want to do for the local primary school. for $18 I bought a private tap-dancing lesson, a yoga lesson, and Carrie to wash my dishes for three days. I made the auction about $30 for an "amateur pedicure" and a day of servitude. We raised over $500 and had a lot of fun.
And I'm all signed up and paid for my Kilimanjaro climb. It's really going to happen. I'm going with Katie, her bf from home, Barratt, Seth, Leila, and Rachel N. Excitement is rising.
Apparently we're just about half-way through the program. That's very weird. I want this to last forever, but at the same time, there's lots of things from home that I miss.
New pictures are hopefully on the way on facebook. Now it's time to write a paper on differences in gender roles in different East African tribes. Until next time...
-Devin