Sunday, September 14, 2008

Terms of Use

OK! Everyone! I have a couple "rules" for the blog.

First. Everyone who reads a post, please comment. I WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! I'm "away in Malawi," and wont be able to be able to get into any real contact with anyone from home. In fact, I'd even like to hear from people I don't know! (Apparently Mr James' Icons class and SJV will be reading this) There will be nothing more depressing for me than going on to make a new post and seeing that the only people who have "looked"(commented) on my last one are my parents. So let me reiterate. PLEASE LET ME KNOW YOU CHECKED UP ON ME, COMMENT!

Second, please don't make me moderate. I don't want to have to delete any comments because they are vulgar or somesuch.

And as I type this It strikes me that some people may not have all of the info on what I'm doing. Well, I be called Billy, Bill, or some variant of the name William,(except Willy, call me Willy and you die) and I am leaving tomorrow to a small country in Africa called Malawi, which is...let me check...the 7th to 9th poorest country in the world (out of 180) based on how much money the average person makes a year. In fact...the average person in Malawi makes $44 a year. Take a minute to digest that. Now I'm going to this country to work in an organization called Project Peanut Butter, an organization dedicated to reducing child starvation by feeding starving young children an enriched peanut butter solution until they are healthy again, while also teaching the families how to keep then from relapsing. To put it into perspective for you. Before PPB started working, almost one in four died before their fifth birthday. (23%) Now that has been almost halved into a little over one in eight. (13%) You can find out more details here if you are so inclined.

Anyhow I'll be staying in the city of Blantyre with two medical students on sabbatical, Jay and Eleanor. I will probably be getting up around 4-5 every morning, and will be either driving to a village to help treat the children there, or help work in the peanut butter factory. Either way, I will probably be getting back to the apartment by early in the evening, and will probably collapse around 9. Repeat. Not sure what my weekends will be like.

So thats my overview as I understand it. If you have any more questions, post them as a comment and I will be oh-so-happy to answer them. =)

5 comments:

Kathleen said...

Have a safe trip. What a great adventure for you!

Mrs. Campbell

medium bill said...

My you have fair winds and following seas.

Medium bill

Malawi Mom said...

Billy, I'm sorry. When you get back, you owe your dad $10. Just couldn't make it out of the airport...

I hope you had a comfortable flight with someone good to talk with. Remember to email ALL our accounts as soon as you can after landing. (Work accounts for both Dad & me as well as our home account.)

Love you!

Momlet

Anonymous said...

BobJames is reading this!!! I knew I should have taken his class...


Oh, and I believe that your only names that count were "Billy", "Bill", and "William". No more than three, that's cheating.

Also, Rich had to send me the link here because you FAILED at doing so before you left....grrr...

Also, I hope everything goes AMAZINGLY!!!

-Rita

PS I made this anonymous because I'm too lazy to get an account...

Anonymous said...

Billy! Well here I am FINALLY reading your blog! And don't worry now that I've found out where your lengthy publication begins I will read it all through and post where you might actually see :p But as it might take me a while to get there what with my crazy school/choirs/band/work (I'm a waitress now!!) schedule... just wanted to send you a salute! I'm so incredibly impressed that you took yourself all the way to Africa! I cannot wait to read about all the amazing things you're doing out there. Right now I'm mostly blown away by the fact that (I mean once we get past the whole being on another continent doing amazing service bit... :)) you're volunteering to wake up at 4 or 5 every day! You're inspiring :) I'm so glad that I'm gonna have a chance to find out what your up to since I assume you'll be absent from any visits I make to your family this year... We'll all miss you, Elisha especially! So I definitely hope to keep in touch this way <3 Oh and some miscellaneous comments: you write hilariously naturally- I'm very impressed. AND at our first band competition our guard got second in our group by HALF a point!!! Our second comp didn't go as well but overall I'm really excited for our girls this year. the end LOVE! becca