We moved to our permanent site on Friday, August 30. It was an impressive operation, considering the number of moving parts, with a dozen or more vans, khumbis, pickups, etc. arriving before 7 a.m. at the training facility, helpers from the previous PCV group helping move, and one of the full-time PC staff in each vehichle going with of the new volunteers to site. We were dropped off at our site by 10 a.m. I confess to feeling a little low as the PC SUV drove off. The wind blew hard all day and the tune running through my head were “They Call the Wind Mariah” which I think is from Oklahoma.

The next 4 days we spent buying and getting furniture delivered, and settling in, and we are now feeling more at home and more comfortable.

A 9 year old boy and 6 year old girl are living at our homestead for about a month during school break, I think because their parents work back towards the capital. They are quite cute and clever, and we've enjoyed reading to them and playing with them, but they are horribly bored because adults do not play with Swazi children, so they hang around our place, calling to us and peering through the windows incessantly. They are endlessly fascinated with all our stuff, and can easily make nuisances of themselves, such as one time padlocking us in our house. We're going to need to reach some understandings.

Our family is going about 70 miles NW to Barberton, South Africa Friday evening for the wedding of the niece of the father in our household. The family repeatedly asked us to go, and we got special expedited permission from the Country Director to leave the country. Thursday morning the women raked and picked up the homestead ... dog and chicken poop, litter, leaves, weeds … Katherine joining the effort and family started to arrive. Friday is the gift giving day, here at the homestead. We have delegated one of the aunts to get us an appropriate gift, with we hope an appropriate ceiling cost. Friday evening we take go in a hired coach with 2 dozen family members to the wedding site, although the bride's mother and grandmother are not allowed to go?

Pictures: I am now able to connect my camera to email , a little - we get a little signal very early in the morning through a complicated deal KUF figured out with our 3G smartphones creating a “personal hotspot” to which we connect the laptop; it is very slow and expensive – we really can't download atachments. (I was using my iPhone to blog in July and August.) I had a few pictures on the camera which are now dated, but I thought might be fun.

For our “break weekend” after mid-terms at the end of July we visited a recreated “cultural village” on our way to the game reserve. Seeing the way Swazis lived “traditionally” helped me understand a lot about current mores. They did a high-kicking traditional dance, and then got some help from visitors, particularly those (unlike the typical PCV) accommpanined by spouses/parents who appeared likely to leave a tip (we did – they guesed right!)