Africa update

OK, this isn't Charlie, it's her daughter, Karin.  But Charlie sent me some pix she took in Botswana, and I thought I'd put a few on here so that anyone following her blog can see them.  Some look like postcards, don't they?  My mom is all kinds of talented!

Charlie has finished her training and is now an official Peace Corps volunteer.  She is stationed in Mabustane, a village of about 2000 people.  I'm not exactly sure how far "Mabs" (as my mom calls it) is from Gabarone (capital of Botswana, where she was training).  She has her own house with electricity and plumbing, but no central heating.  It is winter in Botswana, and one morning it was 56 degrees inside her house. 

Here is how she describes her job:

"I am assigned to the District Health Management Team, which is the equivalent to the state health department for the district. So far I have been doing projects like setting up a purchsing system for supplies on Excel for them. They recently transferred the entire district health clinic system from the Department of Local Government to the Ministry of Health, and that stripped out all their administrative systems. The MOH has never had health clinics, health posts, and mobile health stops in its system so doesn't know quite how to handle it. In the meantime there are people getting service and we need supplies. So I am making stopgap systems until everything gets rolling.  

I am also working a bit with the District AIDS coordinator, the person responsible for coordinating all the activity aimed at fighting AIDS."

The internet is very slow in Mabs, so she isn't able to access email or update her blog/FB pages as easily as she'd like to.  I will keep pestering her to do so, as each day for her is an adventure, and I'm sure we'd all love to go with her!