catching up

So its been about 3 weeks since I returned from my trip to the US from Botswana. I had a really wonderful time! Seeing my family during thanksgiving was fantastic, everyone came over to the house and we had a fun cook out. I spent most of the day before thanksgiving trying to find a deep fryer with my mother for the turkey. She wanted to try a new recipe that called for deep frying the bird. Unfortunately Home depot had sold out so we had to settle for the more traditional roasting technique. It was still very good though. More importantly though my mom made gumbo which is my single favorite holiday food! Nothing says thanksgiving like crab legs! Frighteningly my niece and nephews have grown considerably since I last saw them. See pics below. Ally is still not going to anyone but her mother, though Andrew is a little better. Deiji is running all around and fem and Chris (the two oldest) stand back and observe it all with bored expressions.





At the holidays my family usually ends up playing a game of some sort. Last Christmas it was Wii bowling which everyone, even my mother, enjoyed. The year before that it was trivial pursuit and scrabble. I guess you could say we evolved a bit... Anyway this year it was all about Texas hold'em. My sister had never played before so I think my brothers thought she'd be an easy mark. Unfortunately, for they were mistaken. I was happy to just hold my own. Anyway after that it was on to the conference in Boston.

During the week in Boston we read about various aspects of global health, as well as met with Jim Kim over dinner at the Harvard club. It was generally a good discussion and gave me some good ideas about materials that I could read to expand my knowledge in the area of building health systems. Unfortunately I came back to a ton of work, but with my research assistant we got everything done.

I had a short 6 hour layover in London, and took the time to walk around the city and take some pictures. The horse drawn carriage by Buckingham palace was an odd sight.






Unfortunately a few days after returning I heard of the passing of a high school friend. She died suddenly in a car accident while driving home from a Celtics game. It was definitely a shock. Luckily I was able to connect with mutual friends through Facebook to spend some time reminiscing.....She will be missed...

Christmas was a quiet affair during which I had dinner with one of my roommates, her boyfriend, and one of the Penn Doris Duke students. I also started reading Battlefield Earth... I think that was its called.... the L. Ron Hubbard saga that started Scientology... It was fun to get together and cook and sing along with various Christmas carols streamed through YouTube. Back to work!

Tsamaya sentle

B