First day in Lilongwe!

We arrived in Lilongwe today! Richard (the director of KASO), Charles (the head researcher from KASO) and Essu (our driver) picked us up at the airport. I asked them to make a detour to KASO so I could show Tiane and Kim where we'll be working. It was exciting to see that things have improved a bit. KASO has a new sign and all new buildings. When I was here in 2006, there were two small buildings, one for operations and one for the pre-school programs. Now, there are three larger ones: a dining room/kitchen, a preschool building and a building for general activities. They have also changed the color scheme from white with blue trim to dark green. I'm really excited because one of the volunteers I worked with last time, Jonathan, will be helping with our project.

They dropped us off at Korea Garden Lodge in area 3, one of the nicer areas of Lilongwe and where a lot of government agencies are located. The room is huge, it’s basically a bedroom/kitchen/living room all packed into one.

We were actually supposed to land in Lilongwe yesterday, but our flight left DC late and then we missed our connection in Addis Ababa. So, we ended up staying in Ethiopia for the night. As soon as we landed in Ethiopia I got sick. Really sick….I’ve been doing oral rehydration therapy all day (drinking lots of gross sodas) after passing out on the bathroom floor last night. I don’t feel great, but I’m better now that we’re in Malawi.

Aside from my sickness, it was neat to be in Ethiopia for a day. The airline put us up in a hotel and gave us three meal vouchers. It’s the rainy season in Ethiopia, so during the day there were major downpours. We decided to stay in and have $9 massages instead of trekking out in the rain. Before dinner we walked around a bit. I’ll post some pictures if I can manage to keep the internet up long enough.

Tomorrow we have an orientation at KASO. They’ll introduce us to their programs and mission and will provide some cultural training. We’ll also go over some logistics for the project.

We’re waiting to begin our study until we receive approval from the National Health Sciences Research Council. They meet on July 30th. So, we’ll have lots of time to plan and prepare before we start collecting data.

On a side note, Richard told us today that KASO received a grant to fund transportation of children from home to Baylor University’s pediatric AIDS clinic. They require monitoring and evaluation in order to demonstrate effectiveness. It looks like one of the first uses of the data we collect might be to serve as a baseline, as far as the numbers of kids on anti-retroviral treatment, etc.) for the transportation program.