We have arrived in Kara for the week and its been great. We have almost finished our project back in Sotouboua..take the amount of time it would take to complete any task in america and multiply it by about 5 and thats how long it takes things to get done in togo. Frustrating, but getting used to it. Yall are going to think I'm a snail when I return. The goal posts are stronger than any around which we are rather proud of. We ended up making the endposts of 10 cm diameter PVC filled with reinforced concrete and the top post of the same PVC but with milled wood in it so it isnt too heavy. Turned out great and only sags slightly. The villagers are supposed to complete the other goal while we are in kara. Sad to say I won't be there for the first official game. boo. Speaking of football and sad times, villagers were NOT too pleased when ghana lost. Bar cleared out in like 3 nanoseconds after they missed their 2nd PK.

Mark, a grad student who is in cameroon for ETHOS, has come to togo for 2 weeks to help us out. He's been in cameroon the past 5 summers so he is quite the african veteran.

In kara we are staying with this fantastic woman who is a full time nurse and also just so happens to take in local orphans. She has 21 kids staying with her in her compound and they are all so great. Exhausting, but great. They swing on me like monkeys, make me play duck duck goose (and other games I haven't played in 15 years) for hours, and force feed me orange candies. They also have the tiniest puppies I have ever seen in my life!!! Its been super fun to stay there.

We went to Benin the other day (the neighboring country about 2 hours away from kara) to check out potential projects for upcoming years. Went better than I wouldve thought--TONS of potential. They are building a new school and a new brothers house there and it will be ready in October. They have prepped the buildings for future solar panels which students could analyze and determine the correct size they'd need given the daily energy consumption, they could have their land surveyed and put into autocad for future expansion use, they could have a rainwater collection unit to use for all water uses other than drinking, and they have severe drainage problems on their land that need addressed. Very excited for future years to hopefully come because there is a lot of doable technical work that would help them immensely. We have written up a proposal to the brothers and are working on one aimed at the ETHOS project. Very happy:) who knows, perhaps Dominic or I will come back to help the newbies next year (they ask us to continuously).

Now the fun stuff that has nothing to do with engineering..

We went to this little german owned restaurant that our british friend told us about to celebrate 4th of july (a british girl told us about a german owned french food restaurant in togo that we went to to celebrate an american holiday..just how you spent your 4th, right?) Anywho..they had PIZZA..AND ICECREAM!! Ay ay ay I thought I had died and gone to heaven. We allowed two of our togolese friends to celebrate with us since they lived in new york for 2 years haha. We had very interesting debates including and not limited to:
-mixed race adoption
-eating dog meat
-whether america has a culture or not
-blacks in america

It was fun. After overhearing me talk with mark about why one of our friends is vegetarian.."HAHA. animal rights. that is funny.we just eat them" -togolese friend.

One of the girls at the orphanage is bajillion feet tall and is so skinny and pretty and I tell her everyday I'm going to send her to Tyra. Another one is deaf and braids hair and i got her to braid my hair today. Ummm its awesome. Never taking it out. Totes how girls did their hair when they went to bahamas or some other sweet vacation destination circa 7th grade.

Depressing news..I'm afraid I've developed an intolerance to lactose. I havent had dairy all summer and after I had that pizza and ice cream I about doubled over with pain the next morning. I then tried real milk (no idea how they got it, first time ive seen it in togo) with my milo and got sick again...hope I can take those fancy pills when I get back home to allow myself to eat cheese again.

About to go to the market, happy tuesday!