Home Stretch

     First and foremost, Merry Christmas!! Ive been out of touch this last month or so since doing Thanksgiving here in Zambia then heading home to celebrate and early Christmas stateside. Here are a few pictures to give a quick overview of how we throw down PC Zam style:

The infamous pig

Manly men (and Katie)

We slow cooked him overnight, in a covered pit, and this was the result.  80 lbs of shredded juicy pork, potatoes, garlic, and butter. They are so proud! 

Others choose to spend their Thanksgiving in more relaxing ways 

 The Northern Provence Crew - Theres no pro like NoPro

The spread.  More food than Id care to admit

Obviously we had a dessert table. 

Christmas morning banana grams

Cooking up lasagna 

The fruit of our labors

Merry Christmas! :) 

     Ive only been back in country for a week, but things have been rough.  I was already kinda feeling worn, unmotivated, and exhausted with a lot of my time and work here, and coming back to Zambia for my remaining 4 months took some deep digging and stubborn will to finish strong.  I was also informed of some saddening and unfortunate events in my village which I know will dramatically change my service these next couple months, making leaving family, friends, loved ones, and the familiarity of America all that much harder.  And yes, there is a part of me that whats to be back.

       Not to say I regret my time here in the least - yes there are days I want to rip my hair out, that Ive cried harder on the side of the bush path than Id like to admit, where all my efforts seem to blow up in my face, my farmers hardly ever feed their fish, and I seem to be the only one in my village that cares that things work or get done.  Im tired of being stared at, being asked for money, harassed in town, and sometimes being treated like a stranger and outsider in a place I have come to call home.  And yes, Ive realized all the expectations that I came into country with, all the projects I wanted to do, the results I had expected to see, are completely unrealistic.  But that not to say these last 2 years are all crying, frustration, and a whole lot of sitting around.  There was a lot of joy and memories in between all those tears.  Ive grown and learned a lot, made a new family here in Zambia (both between my villagers and my fellow volunteers), found new passions, a new drive and strength in myself, and had one hell of an adventure.


 Matt Young, a fellow PC fisheries volunteer from Luaplua Provence, describes this conflict that we feel perfectly, and in a much more eloquent way than I could ever hope to convey - check out his blog at:

 https://fishinginzambia.wordpress.com/2014/12/25/is-the-peace-corps-worth-it/

Even if you just skim through, he is an amazing photographer and his pictures are well worth it.  Its also nice to see how similar but different all our time is here - even within the same country.


     Ive also realized in America, that Ive done a poor job of conveying the spirit of Zambia through my blog.  Ive mostly focused on my work here when I write, and many of the questions I received back home where culturally based.  At this point many of them were norms for me, so Ive just forgotten to explain them.  In the future Ill be making an effort to write up daily anecdotes and being a bit more descriptive.

     Thanks for sticking with me friends, and for all your support in letter, text, FB, email, or driving around the country to visit when I was home.  See you in 2015.