ALIVE

Hi friends and family,
I am in Tanzania...it is Friday night at 11:40 and we are just relaxing in our hotel! This was my second full day in the beautiful country of Tanzania and it feels like I have been here 1 week! After 19 hours on the plane I was finally able to get some sleep. Upon arrival in our hotel at 11:30 pm, the kind workers had a dinner prepared for us which came to no surprise! Our first morning the group ventured into downtown Arusha and made lots of friends with the locals! We met our host families for the first night and shared tea with them which is a common thing to do! My host mama and baba took my roommate and I to their beautiful home. We spent the evening there helping prepare traditional African food and sharing stories about our countires. I was automaticlaly reminded of the genorisity of the Tanzanain peope and how hospitile they are. After waking up at 4 am to an animal in my suitcase, my roomate and I bathed in a bucket and ate breakfast. Our host mom and all the other host families said they had a surprise for us. Little did we know that the surprise would result in a 3 hour drive to Kilimanjaro National Park for a picnic...yes, a picnic. About 3o family members jammed in the bus with us for 3 hours and we ate a wonderful meal at the base of Kili. We bonded quickly when thunder showers forced us to huddle together under a small shelter! It was quite the surprise. I enjoyed the drive because we passed through a town called Himo which I visited in my previous trip to Tanzania. I felt right at home! Once getting back to our hotel, we ventured back into the town into a local market which was quite the experience to say the least...

Everything is going extremely well...tomorrow we head to Kilimanjaro to hike the base of the mountain and then Sunday we are going to spend the day at Rehamas orphanage. I miss you all so much! I am doing very well and feel as if this is a second home!