4 for 4: A Complete Team!

We are happy to say that our team is finally complete! Fernando arrived tonight from Johannesburg and we were surprised to see that even his bag arrived! We all voyaged with our client H back to the airport to pick him up and were excited to share all of our stories with him. The first was a quite comical episode from last night:

At around 2am, Beth walked into my room (we have adjoining rooms) because she heard some noises (which was me, since I had a bit of jetlag and was up, but she also mentioned she heard something drop, and that was definitely not me). About 10 minutes later, I saw a light go on in the hallway, and about 10 seconds later it went off. I immediately ran into Beth’s room, only to scare the daylights out of her. When she realized it was me, I asked her if she saw the light, and when she said no, I said, “I think someone is in the house.” For a few moments we contemplated how we could get out of the house, or at least lock our doors, and then we decided we needed to find out if Ron was the culprit. (Meanwhile, you must realize that our house is about as secure as Fort Knox. We have a guard, a concrete wall around the house, and electrified barbed wire. AND the doors all have double locks) So instead of venturing into the oh-so-scary hallway we decided to call Ron (who was across the hall) only to find out that he had turned on the light in his room, and all was secure in the house still. Of course H heard the whole story and I’m sure that he thinks Beth and I are complete basket cases now.

So far, I have learned many things about my teammates, spending lots of quality time with them. First, I have learned that we have very different eating habits. Beth prefers low-carb and lots of veggies, Ron prefers anything meat and high carbs, and I would prefer vegetarian. Nonetheless, we have managed to enjoy some delicious meals both at home and at some restaurants. Today we enjoyed some shawarma at Manda Hill, another strip mall which apparently has a much better Shop-Rite (yeah for fresh produce) and a store called “Game” which is basically equivalent to Wal-Mart. We also saw Woolworth’s and “Blockbusters” (yes, that is spelled correctly) along with some nice bakeries and bookstores. After we finished lunch we found a Subway that has the exact same food as the States but you can get a sandwich for less than $2. With the exchange rate of 5000 kwacha = $1 USD, most of our excursions are quite a good deal.

Ron has also befriended a friendly taxi driver, who has agreed to be our personal driver (well, sort of...) while we are here. This is especially convenient since he knows where we live. You might think that this is a minor issue, but let me explain further: We don’t have an address. I know that we live on #28 of no-name road, somewhere near Los Angeles Avenue and it’s located in Lusaka on some dirt road. It is very interesting to call a cab (actually, not too hard, since we’re right near a hospital, so that’s a good landmark, which reminds me that they’re having a party outside right now and there’s some really loud music, have you ever heard of a party at a hospital, it’s quite random).

So back to my story: Interestingly enough, when we asked the cab driver what else we should see in Lusaka, he looked at us quizzically, and said, “Lusaka? Um, I don’t know…” But he was quick to point out the gravesite of the former Zambian president. Apparently he doesn’t think that there’s too much to see here, but we beg to differ!

Other things that we have learned: The fruit here is ok to eat. Beth and I nominated Ron as our test case, and he seemed normal (or as normal as Ron gets). After he purchased some apples and peaches at the store, Beth and I convinced him to eat a peach and decided to observe him for the next 24 hours. Since he did not appear to have any negative effects, we have been enjoying some of the local fruits. We have a guava tree and a mango tree out back so we’re hoping to enjoy it! Also, we have learned that insect repellant comes with varying levels of DEET, such as mild, moderate, and toxic-grade. I chose the latter since, well it’s Africa and I’d prefer not to arrive home with malaria. We also have mosquito netting in our rooms but I realized that I can’t turn on my fan while the mosquito netting is around my bed, and I’d rather get some sleep than suffer the excessive heat and humidity.

We are also happy to report that our Professor, Anjali, will come and visit us next week in Lusaka. We’re hoping to have completed some of our data analysis and provide an interim analysis to our client by the middle of next week, which will be very exciting.