Celebrating Desarae's birthday was really fun and really challenging at the same time. It's hard to plan anything even close to a surprise when you're with that person 24 hours a day. I finally just had to tell her I was leaving for a few hours, and she wasn't allowed to ask why. That was fun because D-rae is a curious little friend, and really hates not knowing what is going on. Her birthday started off a little differently than I had planned because I was sick (more on that later) and unable to do a few of the things I had planned. So poor birthday girl had to teach by herself while I stayed home and tried to get better. We actually spent most of her birthday laying around, napping to make up from the lack of sleep we'd been getting, and not doing much of anything. That night I had planned a little surprise party for her at Agip Motel in town, but I pretty much had to drag her (and me) there because neither of us felt up to doing anything. But thankfully we went and enjoyed the party with the rest of our team. During football season, one NFL game is taped and replayed on Tuesday nights at Agip so we watched football and had a football themed party. Here is a picture of Desarae wearing her birthday hat/helmet, posing like the Heisman trophy, and holding her brownies. And no, I didn't really think that Des was turning 24. I know it looks like that on the cake, but I actually did that on purpose just because I thought it would be funny. Turns out it was, especially when Emily Glisson, who is the queen of throwing really cute, themed parties, was watching in horror/amazement as I tried to make the icing look as funny as possible.
The next day was Halloween and we had one of the best Halloween celebrations I've ever been a part of. We decided to have a progressive dinner, starting with appetizers at our apartment, salad at the Gage's, and dinner and dessert at the Glisson's. The kids showed up at our door at 6:00 in their costumes, yelling trick or treat (I think our neighbors were slightly confused at this point). We had a gladiator, an Indian, a princess, a ballerina, and one cute little chicken. Of course, Desarae and I decided to get in on the fun at dress up as well, which is really hard with our limited resources. So we wrapped Des up in cling wrap, me in aluminum foil, and went as leftovers. It was fun, but amazingly hot, so the costumes only lasted long enough for a few pictures and laughs. I think the highlight of the night might have been scaring Emily with a fake, but very real looking cockroach 4 different times (great birthday gift). We hid it in her cup, in between a few chips (my personal favorite) and Scott even threw it from across the table back into her drink when she wasn't looking. It was hilarious, and we were all crying from laughing so hard. Nights like last night really make me thankful for the incredible team that I'm a part of. They challenge me, love me, support me, and make me laugh. They have become some really great friends, and I thank God for allowing our paths to cross for this year.
We've also had a very special visitor for all of the festivities this week. His name is giardia lamblia, and he is a parasitic disease that loves to camp out in our small intestines. We think we might have drank some bad water in the village on Saturday, and as a result, we've had our worst case of giardia yet. D-rae got it first, on Sunday, but being the great friend and roommate that she is, she passed it onto me because we love to share everything here...even sickness. We've both been up all night at least once this week, and we're having trouble getting rid of it this time. We bought our second dose of medicine today (for $3...Uganda is incredible) and hopefully that will do the trick. Desarae has done a little research on this little disease, and she found out today that it is also called Beaver Fever because it tends to be prevalent in artificial lakes that are made by beaver dams. So there's a free little fun tidbit for you today. Just to let you know, Beaver Fever is awful and you should avoid it all costs. Don't say I didn't warn you.
So it's been a really fun and really full week. Keep us in your prayers as we're trying to get better so we can keep up with our schedules. We've had to cancel several things this week, and we hate doing it, but it's hard to plan to go to the village when you know you're going to be needing a bathroom every 10 minutes. I know this is kind of a pointless post, but I really wanted to share some of these pictures with you guys. Thanks for always reading this thing and wanting to keep up with my journey. It means the world to me.
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