Its been an exciting few weeks here in Zambia with work and everything else. I did my first condom demonstration in the village and it went really well. There were 2 more villages on the schedule but when people found out what I was doing they also wanted me to come to their village to do the demonstration. My PEPFAR counterpart (also my best friend in the village) did a GREAT job with our village talks. In addition to condom demonstrations, we talked about HIV transmission, the importance of getting tested and also gave out condoms as well. I was surprised they responded to me so well due to the fact that I am young and a female but they were open to asking me questions and willing to learn. I felt really good at the end and so did my counterpart. The village also kept saying how good of a teacher I was. Since I am busy teaching their kids this was the first community event I was able to do, it wont be the last.
Also I had an interest meeting with the women at the Catholic Church. The meeting was initially supposed to be just with the priest to see how he felt about me using the Church but it ended up being a interest meeting about starting a Woman's Literacy Group at the Church. It slowly ended up being a empowerment meeting and all the women are really excited about this group. I told them if they raised the money to buy note books for themselves, I would buy the pens. They told me to get pencils to start. There are women who finished grade 10 as well as women who just finished grade 1 so it will be a multi-level class but I have a local woman helping me. We start our 1st class October 4th. They keep reminding me about the class when I see them around the village.
Our GLOW Camp has been officially funded! It got funded really quickly due to all our friends and families donating (THANKS GUYS). We have already started the planning for the week and its going to be great. Also my neighbor is going to be a peer mentor at the Camp. She wrote a great essay about why she wanted to help the girls and how she was an example to them because she was single and completed school/grade 12 (which is a big deal in a village where early marriage and pregnancy is on the rise for some reason) and how she believed that girls should have rights. I helped her get her thoughts together but she wrote the essay herself. I was really proud of her. Now I am submitting a grant for a World AIDS Day event my PCV neighbor and I are doing. I will also be doing a teacher training the same week on HIV and how to care/support orphans and vulnerable children in our Zone. The guidance and Counseling teachers as well as the Anti-AIDS club matron/patrons from each of the seven schools in the zone are invited. On World AIDS Day, people will be getting tested for HIV, school groups will perform, a person living with HIV will speak as well as several other activities. We will also be holding a raffle to encourage people to get tested. The prizes will be....local items but mainly shirts, hats and bags. If anyone sees any hats, bags or shirts with things/scenes/advertisements from America on them and want to send them my way...I would greatly appreciate it. Also I have been getting a lot of support for the resource center I am working on. THANKS AGAIN! Things are really coming together.
Last but not least the most exciting thing by far, were the elections held last week. Zambia has a new president, Michael Sata. Sata is actually from Mpika district so everyone in Northern Province was really excited that 'one of their own' is now the President. The elections were relatively calm and people were excited for change in their country. I went to the school on polling day and except for lines outside the door, it was exactly the same as home. I walked around the village encouraging people to vote and explaining why I myself couldn't vote. They didn't think my being an American was a good enough excuse. 2days later around 2am, I heard screaming and cheering in the village and knew that Sata had won. I was very proud of Zambia. The former president stepped down gracefully and showed the world that there can be free and fair elections in Africa. Zambia remained the peaceful nation that everyone claims it to be. I constantly find reasons to fall in love with this place, and this is one of them for sure. I am excited about how things are going in my life as a volunteer and in general and Zambians are excited about the route their new government is going to take!
