Tuesday, January 5, 2010. Tabcom Guest House. J. City. Room 4

Thank you, my King for blessing me with 21 years of life!! This is the best birthday I could have asked for- the sunrise over this country, punctuated by sounds of the early morning- birds, roosters, trains int he distance. It reminds me in so many ways of our days in Mexico, long ago. Everyone knows it is my birthday, and Mr. G. (an older, believing national partner who is the president of the NGO we are working with and the director of our water project- he's wonderful!) says we will have an A style celebration. However, with all of my team mates except Dave and Sparky still sick from a wickedly uncomfortable food borne illness, it may be a pretty solemn day overall. A. says we are experiencing first hand what many people here experience on a daily basis from food and water borne illness, for there are millions who do not use good health practices such as filtering or boiling contaminated drinking water and thus experience a general sickness nearly constantly. Today we walked a mile or two to a primary school in the area, a distinctly Christian one, opened by the baptist church here.