So it has been a few days since I have written and a lot has happened.

I am so tired. I expected to be tired but I didn't realize how exhausted I would be at the end of every day. I wake up early to leave by 8 (there are 12 other people in the hostel, almost all girls, and only two bathrooms. It takes a while to get ready). Walk 1.5 miles, fight to get on a dala dala, ride for 30 minutes in a very very very cramped van, and then walk for another 1.5 miles. By the time I get to the kids I am hot and tired (even though it is winter here, the days are still brutally hot) but my day has really just started. They have lessons until 12:30, lunch until 1:30, a small nap and then we play outside until 5. Around 5, I leave, walk, dala dala and walk. I'm very very tired every day.

On top of the tiredness, I'm very homesick. Those of you who know me know that I love to travel and that I travel a lot and though I was expecting to miss my family, I didn't think I would miss them as much as I do. Last night, I texted my mom and dad saying I wanted to come home. But, they wisely told me that I could do this and I don't think that I actually do want to come home (I mean I do eventually), its just hard not being able to communicate at all with anyone and being utterly exhausted all of the time.

I decided to stay in Dar and work at Malaika instead of going to Bagamoyo. The kids are great but the past few days have been frustrating for both them and me. My first few days here, Emily (a volunteer who had been working with the kids for 7 weeks) told me that they knew their alphabet and were learning words to go with each letter (for example two days ago, the letter of the day was P and the kids learned pig, pencil, plate, pen, etc.) She had been going through the alphabet that way and thought that the kids were following along (to be fair, so did all of the volunteers and the staff at Malaika). But, two days ago, I was sitting with one of the kids and I started singing the abc song. A few of the kids started to sing along but stopped after the first few letters. That caught my attention so I went to the alphabet chart and pointed at the letters and asked them to say what letter I was pointing to (sema tadfadhali). Almost all of the kids (all but two) couldn't get past the first four letters. That was a huge shock to all of us! So yesterday, I figured out a plan to get them reading 3 letter words by the end of my 6 weeks. Now I know this is sort of impossible and maybe ridiculous but the kids are really smart and I think they will be able to do it if we keep on task and have few interruptions. Today we worked in three small groups, each group at a different level. I think this worked very well so hopefully we will do this tomorrow.

Today is my birthday and when I came to work this morning Amita (the house mom) and all of the kids were waiting for me outside. I came up to the front door and they started singing Happy Birthday, gave me hugs and presented me with a birthday cake. It was amazing and so appreciated. I cried (of course) and got a second round of hugs from the kids. Marianna even gave me one of her markers as a birthday present (this was a huge deal). Also, Taz, one of the older kids, found out that he was sponsored to go to America to play soccer for few months coming up. According to Amita, he will be leaving in the next month or so. So, lots of reasons to celebrate today!

This might be one of the hardest things I have every done in my life. I'm so torn because while I miss home so much, I am starting to fall in love with these children. They are the cutest and sweetest things ever and it makes it so much harder to know that in a while I will have to leave them and return to a country where I have clean water, am guaranteed food and clothing and have a luxury like air conditioning. It is so hard to think that Modi and Yosini and Dula and others will leave the orphanage with little chance of getting any higher education ( "higher" including high school and university) or job and will regularly get very sick and not always be able to get and find medicine to get better. These simple things are just ripping me apart. I really wish that every one of you could be here with me, experiencing what I am experiencing because it is so, so hard to put it into words.

I'm having trouble uploading pictures but I am going to figure it out soon so expect a post in the near future full of pictures.

As always, I really appreciate your comments and please keep me and the kids of Malakia in your thoughts and prayers.

Namaste!