In my New Town

Well I have arrived in my new town in South Sudan and while everything I read prior to my arrival said that there were 500,000 people in this town I can tell you that there are no where near that many people.  The town is nice and surrounded by beautiful mountains but in general it is very flat and dry right now, even though it is supposed to be rainy season.

When I lived in Ghana all of the children would call out to me and call me "white person" so far here I have only heard it here twice and then when I waved to the cute little girl she rain away from me.  Who knows what the children think of white people here.

I have not started to learn the language here.  Some people speak Arabic and others speak a local tribal language and others speak Swahili.  I will try to figure it out at some point soon. A lot of the signs in town are written in both English and Arabic so at least I can figure out some things.

As for the food, because I know you were all worried I would starve over here, I have been eating very well.  The first night I arrived in town I went to a restaurant near the commercial airport (as opposed to the UN airport) and had really good barbecue.  OK so it was goat but if no one told me I would have never known.  The next day my great co-worker Puro took me to a local place for some local Sudanese food and I had bread and greens and once again fabulous.  Then I went to the Arabic chicken place and had a half a roasted chicken and lentils that had been prepared like hummus with bread that tasted like it came from Perrecas in Schenectady.  I told the guys that if I keep eating like this I am never going to loose the weight I gained in the US.

I went to the provision store to get some snack foods yesterday and what did I find but real Nutella and fresh dates that are grown in the northern area of South Sudan.  I am in heaven.  While I did not gain weight in Ghana, I think that I might here.  They also have a type of flat bread here that is almost like a tortilla so it looks like Mexican food will be possible if I can just find some cheese.

The hotel that I am staying at until my house is ready is the place where everyone seems to hang out on the weekends so I have already started to meet some other expats and make plans to learn my way around and learn what is going on.

Work is intense but fun and I have a great group of people in the office and in the field that are truly committed to making things better.  It is just a matter of putting all of the pieces together.

I hope that everyone had a good Memorial Day and I promise to start taking pictures soon.