emotional stuff

We're now at the end of week 6 of our training, and next week is the biggie: my health group is giving an 8 hour lesson on HIV/AIDS in Kiswahili on Tuesday; on Wednesday, we have an oral Kiswahili language test; on Thursday we have the big written Kiswahili test; and on Friday we have the biggest of all: the FINAL oral Kiswahili test. Am I stressed? Yes. But there have been some small successes: I baked two chocolate cakes and one carrot cake with my family, and this was a BIG HIT!! The carrot cake was baked on a kerosene stove, with charcoal on top of the lid; now I know it can be done! And the language is starting to come out of my mouth a bit easier--Tony and I use Kiswahili words mixed in with English now, and it's actually really fun. But we're having some struggles too: we continue to realize that life is happening without us in the US, and realizing this makes us feel isolated and sad. People are sick, people are having babies, people are working hard, people are falling in love, people are relaxing and eating in restaurants with friends, people are baking cakes in lovely kitchens; life is going on, and we knew it would, but as we continue to hear from people, the reality of just how far away we are is setting in. I think this realization is part of the process of uprooting your life to live in another country; I have to keep reminding myself of WHY we're here: because we want to try to make this world a better place. We miss our family and friends so much, but we want to stick this out. We're healthy, we have lots of good new friends, and we live with a wonderful Tanzanian mama: we're ok. This is our life now, and we're adjusting and growing.