In-Service Training (IST)

This post will have a bit more substance than the last one (queso), but may still heavily center around food...
We finished up IST yesterday, but 10 of us are staying in Morogoro for an extra day hanging out at a fancy hotel with free wifi. Tomorrow morning the deep-southerners will head to Dar for the day and and night, then back home on Sunday. IST was really fun and it was so good to see everyone again! The days were pretty long and packed with training (8-5:30), with only a break on Sunday. Although some of the sessions were pretty pointless, others were really great and I'm excited to go back to site and do some more things. Our counterparts (another teacher from school) joined us after the first couple of days. It worked out really great and my counterpart (my neighbor/the bio&chem teacher) really enjoyed it and was so excited to participate in everything, so I'm really pumped to go back and work on things together, especially co-teaching life skills (HIV/AIDS, safe sex, girls empowerment, etc.). Aside from some of the good sessions, the best part of IST was getting to hang out with everyone during the evenings, catch up, eat great food (cheeseburgers, pizza, ice cream, etc), and enjoy lots of cold beer. My birthday was especially fun. After we ended training sessions for the day, some of us headed to town to do a bit of shopping. Then we met up with some others at a nice hotel here in Morogoro for bacon cheeseburgers! I also drank a margarita that cost more than a day's salary, but it was so worth it. I got some great birthday gifts that included a ridiculously large party hat, a jar of Nutella, a bunch of snickers bars, a big bag of cookies, and best of all, I was surprised with a delicious birthday cake! Then we moved over to a cheaper bar and had some birthday shots and beer. It was truly a great birthday and I was so lucky to be able to celebrate with so many friends in such a nice town! Two nights later we held the "1st Annual IST Prom" at a local bar/restaurant...it was pretty ridiculous but a whole lot of fun. We even held prom king/queen elections, which were easily won by everyone's favorite older volunteers, Eula and Will. A couple of dance parties rounded out our evening events. We also borrowed the projector a couple of nights to have movie nights in the big conference room which was a relaxing change. I also went and hung out at my host family's house twice...it was really great to see them and play with Isaac! He's so much bigger now (he'll be 2 in July) and speaking a few more words. He can even say my name (kinda like Katie) and points to me in pictures, which is pretty adorable.

I'm excited to go to Dar tomorrow and spend more time there. On our way to IST we spent a day in Dar, which was really our first time to explore the city on our own. I really enjoyed it and we ate some amazing food. We went to this Indian compound/country club thing...we were surrounded by hundreds of Indians and zero Tanzanians so it was really strange, but I literally ate the best Indian food of my life there...it will definitely become a staple of future Dar trips. Tomorrow the plan in Subway (yep, the sandwhich chain) and a supposedly amazing Thai restaurant, so I'm looking forward to it! Then its back down to site, which I have mixed feelings about. I'm excited to get back to normal life, stop traveling and living out of a backpack, spending ridiculous amounts of money, etc. but at the same time it sucks to say bye to everyone again (most of us won't see each other for another 9 months), say bye to good food, and go home to 400 or so midterms that need grading!
Took advantage of free wifi and posted shit tons of pictures...enjoy!