Liberia 1

So I definitely thought I would update this more, but although there is internet, it is WAY slow. I've also been working like a mad woman...which is good and a bit unexpected. Plus I live in a house with no electricity or running water so life takes a little bit longer. Anyway, enough with the excuses. Here are some thoughts and I put wrote to friends a few days ago:

On Work: 

"Basically we implement non-formal education programs throughout 6 counties in Liberia. After the war there were thousands of teenagers who hadn’t even finished primary school yet, so we designed programs to get them through their primary education. Now that people are beginning to get caught up we are phasing in to a more traditional non-formal education program. Basically, we teach adults who live in small villages and have never gone to school how to read, write, add, and subtract…pretty cool! We roll in to villages for night classes and there are 20 adults huddled around flashlights (no electrical system in the country) learning how to write their names….I was nearly in tears the first week out and about…SO inspiring."

On Africa:

"In general, I’m really enjoying Africa. This is a difficult place, though. The war is still present here. I walk by burned out, bullet riddled buildings every day as I go to work. My co-workers, neighbors and friends tell horrifying stories of the 15 year war. I have one neighbor who sold herself for sex so that she could eat while on the run from the rebels. Junior hid in the woods from much of his childhood so that he wouldn’t be forced to fight. My boss, Flomo, left his house in the middle of the night with a few pairs of underwear and didn’t return home for 12 years. Everyday on the way to work I walk by the taxi stands and think about how those young men were probably drugged and holding machine guns 10 years ago. It is just sort of mind-boggling to think about…I don’t know how they process their lives with that much trauma in their past. But they are getting by and moving forward."

More to come.... Love to all you friends and family!