Rain rain rain

The rainy season is here in full affect. That said, the temperature is more to my liking. Or maybe it's because i'm in an air conditioned office all day, so it just doesn't seem so bad. Office work does have its perks. I was awakened last night by a forceful storm with so much lighteining I felt I was in a night club with strobe lights...and the rain on the tin roofs so loud I had no choice but to lie awake listening to it. Once I accepted that I wasn't getting any sleep I just enjoyed it. Until I realized that houses in the shanty towns where likely being destroyed as hillsides are usually wiped out in these types of rains. Then I feel asleep, woke up, swam in my pool, ate breakfast and left my dirty dishes in the sink for the maid who comes to clean today. Guilt is a strange thing.

I leave Monday for the RAAN, (Caribbean Coast northern region) where electricty, never mind internet, will be scare. I'll be interviewing people about the prevelance of (and measures taken to prevent) HIV in their communities. The main problem I'm having gathering information is that the government is full of conflicting reports. So I'm trying to get the information directly from the health clinics and determine what is really happening. One of the first reasons I became interested in developing countries is that I felt you could actually do something that hasn't been done before, and contribute to improving the situation somehow...everything is the US is so developed and set in place, it seems harder to actually influence things. Here, no one's ever done any study to determine what the impact of HIV is on the communities. The information just doesn't exist. So this will be a first shot at comparing gov't reports to what's actually happening.

Will report back when I return in a week or so.

Love,
Amanda