A Week of Challenges

This week started out with a bang with me being asked by my boss at work to attend a week-long training on Quickbooks. Why would I be asked to attend a Quickbooks training when I'm not an accountant? Well, that one I'm still trying to completely figure out. Basically, I think he wanted someone to attend who could institutionalize the knowledge and really absorb what was being taught. I could attend and then later help our administrator (who is not very good at computers) to set up our accounts and get them running. So, I willing jumped in and then realized, duh, it's going to be taught in Swahili!

Luckily, I caught most everything that was being said because the program is in English so the class was pretty much more Swanglish than straight Swahili and that's a lot easier for me to understand.


The training class listening intently.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately because it got me out of 3 more days of training?), on Tuesday night I got sick with malaria and an infection and have been pretty much in the bed ever since. I had malaria (first time ever) last week, took 2 days of medicine and thought I'd kicked it. But then over the weekend I started feeling signs of a bacterial infection. I tried to rest, drink water, take care of myself so it would go away, but alas "nimeshiwa" (I didn't succeed). 


This is my breakfast for the next few days. Since arriving in TZ I've pretty much constantly been on some sort of preventative or curative medicine. I don't even remember the days when I didn't take medication.

What sucks even more is that Chris is sick too. He's got amoeba and an infection. They say misery loves company (though I wouldn't really go so far as to say we're "miserable," more just uncomfortable), but I would argue against that notion in this case. Although it is nice to have company while being confined to the house, it also is a pain because neither one of us feels much like doing the necessary things around the house, cooking, cleaning, making food, etc.

Poor Smokey wants so bad to come in and play because she's been neglected by us all week. Too bad she can't help around the house; but just don't think she'd get the dishes as clean as we prefer them to be.


Looking in from the kitchen door. "Isn't there anything I can do in there?"