Old and New Volunteers.
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It's almost exactly one year since we arrived in Asmara and, while work sometimes seems to progress very slowly, it's been very eventful in other ways.

We talked about the wedding of one of our original group (there were seven of us arriving together this time last year and one left in October having completed her planned short placement) last weekend - very fast work really! Well, this weekend two more of the seven left early for various reasons ... and then there were four. So we have to say "all the best" Tom in your bicycle travels in West Africa and Jennie in your new volunteer post in Uganda and that we're going to miss you.

Coincidentally, there were a couple of parties to attend on Friday evening thrown by the expat community meaning Tom was able to go out with a pretty good hangover early Sunday. With a lot of volunteers being in town and, due to the kindness of Sean and Julie, we descended en masse to take advantage of a different world complete with barbequeued sausages and shrimps; and alcohol. There was not much food left at the end (VSO's have been likened to locusts before).

In the summer our original group of seven will become only two - we still intend to stay for our two years though, I must admit, we're already planning a very long wander through North Africa and Spain on our way back to the UK delaying our return until the spring of 2010.

The cycle continues though. The six new January volunteers have finally arrived, visa problems have been sorted out, they've been welcomed by us and, after two weeks of In-Country Training, they'll be on their way to placements as far away as Barentu and Agordat in the West of Eritrea.

The Motorised Wheelchair Appeal.
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We haven't had quite the response we wanted and the slide of the pound versus the dollar has moved the goalposts a little but, on the other hand, our house in Cambridge has just been rented for the next two years so we feel we can make up the shortfall. Please, if you do feel like contributing, send your cheques (any currency) to the VSO address on the left - it's never too late.

For us the next step is to move on and try and find one of the machines in question even if it means having to import one ourselves ... at least we still have time.

As for Dawit - he's on the same street corner every day, still selling his small items on the street, still ready with a cheery "Kemay hadirkum?", "Dehan do?", "Serah kemay?", "Kulu tsebuq?" and so on ...

Early Morning in Asmara
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This morning (Tuesday 3rd) up at 5:30 am and out by 6:20 due to Caroline taking a bus to the Mai Nehfi technical school on a teaching assignment. At 6:30 the streets are really empty and we almost have the sunrise to ourselves apart from a few scurrying ghostly figures (women in traditional white shawls). Such is the lack of traffic that we can clearly hear early morning birdsong and I have two thoughts - "life is not so bad" and "I really need a coffee".

P