Project updates - health and hygiene classes, spirulina

Once again I am so sorry for the lag in my blog posts! Unfortunately since I was sick last week and trying to play it safe the rest of the week, I have been fairly MIA as far as work goes. But here is what I have to update everyone on:

I did 2 health and hygiene classes - one yesterday with the street school kids (older - 8th to 10th grade) and one today with the boys. Both classes went very smoothly as before. I have gotten my rhythm down so the lecture goes nicely from point to point. It's weird being a teacher - have never actually taught classes or anything before or worked with kids in a classroom setting, but it is a very rewarding experience, though I catch myself often thinking back to my elementary school days to think of how to handle discipline etc in the classroom! The kids are very fun to be around and although they can get distracted, they love and appreciate having an outsider take time for them.

It's also time to get going on the spriulina stuff since the guy running the project is gone until November and we have more powder! Good news and bad news on this front. The good news is that we got the capsules to one of the HIV families to start taking. The other two, Karan and Tejaswari, are proving to be a little bit difficult. They are refusing to take their tuberculosis medications - too many side effects, don't understand the importance, combined with no real supervision to enforce things. Some people are working on some ideas to get things moving with them, but for now we're just focusing on getting their tuberculosis cured so that they can start on their anti-retrovirals for their HIV. But the other family - husband, wife, daughter (4) and son (1) - all have HIV except the son who has so far tested negative. Gave capsules to the husband and wife. The wife was very sweet - haven't met her, but she had someone call me to thank me for giving her the capsules. I told her to get started on them and take them regularly and then we will come by with powder for her daughter and for her and her husband to switch over too. My idea is that if they start the capsules and feel a difference it'll be easier to get them to take the powder regularly and without much fuss. The kids in the street school have stopped taking the powder because it seems there is some sand in it? Looking into that now, so things are on hold with the powder, but at least the kids have been asking about it and want to take it because they felt better while they were on the "smelly green powder". :)