Today I took my first ever dosage of a malaria prophylaxis, which happens to be called MALARONE (or otherwise: atovaquone and proguanil HCI). Tomorrow I am traveling to Mozambique for two weeks for work and I’m hoping this keeps me safe from the Anopheles mosquito.

East Africa is considered a malaria-endemic area. For Mozambique the malaria risk is predominantly due to Plasmodium falciparum and exists throughout the year in the whole country. P. falciparum, the most deadly of the four types of malaria, is resistant to chloroquine and sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine, which are two different types of anti-malarial medications. I’ll see how Malarone does.

The following is more info on malaria from the Travel Doctor website:

Malaria is a serious and sometimes fatal disease which is widespread in many tropical and subtropical countries. It is caught by being bitten by an infected mosquito that is carrying the malaria parasites in its saliva.

The malaria parasite is a microscopic organism called a Plasmodium and it belongs to the group of tiny organisms known as protozoans. There are four types of plasmodium: P. falciparum (the most dangerous), P. vivax, P. ovale and P. malariae. The species of mosquito that carries the malaria parasites is the Anopheles mosquito.

These parasites enter the host’s bloodstream when bitten by an infected mosquito and then migrate to the liver where they multiply before returning back into the bloodstream to invade the red blood cells. The parasites continue to multiply inside the red cells until they burst releasing large numbers of free parasites into the blood plasma causing the characteristic fever associated with the disease. This phase of the disease occurs in cycles of approximately 48 hours.

The free parasites are then able to infect any mosquito that feeds on the host’s blood during this phase. The cycle then continues as the parasites multiply inside the mosquito and eventually invade its salivary glands. (see the plasmodium life cycle below).

Malaria occurs in over 100 countries and more than 40% of the people in the world are at risk. Large areas of Central and South America, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Africa, the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and Oceania are considered malaria-risk areas.

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I have not seen it, but there is a daily television show that airs on Kenyan national television called StraightUp. I think it mainly focuses on arts and media and events around Nairobi…plugging the hip youth into what’s going on, or something. Over the weekend I had been asked to be a part of the audience, so I signed up. I was supposed to show up at 3pm today at the studio downtown. However, this morning I got a call and was told that the slots had been filled, so I had been taken off the list…and so goes my chance of being famous. Ha!

Other news…yesterday I moved into an apartment with my friend Chris. It puts me closer to friends, to town and makes the drive to work much shorter. Chris and I are continuing our house search. I looked at one today, and will go look at another tomorrow. One of these days we’ll find it!

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During last week I was in the company of several songs that played over and over and over again. It was a week where I didn’t need reason and didn’t want reasons. I found that I was often lost in half-thoughts, or mas bien, sighs and groans — they were from the heart and the heart doesn’t really think, curiously in regards to love and loss. The words of the songs met me half way and brought some sort of completion…and solace. I think by the 100th, or 500th, time that the songs began their echo, I realized that this was amounting to a wallowing and was probably bordering on the unhealthy.

Yesterday afternoon was a sunny, lazy one. After climbing a couple trees to hang a swing for some friends, I found an axe and wandered down into the woods to a tree that was recently felled. I set to work splitting the sections of the trunk into fireplace-sized pieces and stacking them to dry. I was at it for at least a solid 30 minutes, if not longer, and managed to work up a sweat. It was good to use muscles and physics. Quite therapeutic. Afterwards, with the axe leaning up against “my” stack of firewood and me collapsed in the warm grass, I thought of a quote from one of my favorite books, Till We Have Faces.

“…work and weakness are comforters. But sweat is the kindest creature of the three — far better than philosophy, as a cure for ill thoughts (C.S. Lewis).”

As I lay there, another trickle of sweat ran down the side of my face, and I smiled. It was a good start to another week.

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As most of you have probably heard and/or read by now, a massive earthquake hit coastal Peru south of Lima on Wednesday, 15 August. Currently the death toll is over 500 and thousands have been displaced.

Food for the Hungry (FH) began working in Peru in 1982 and has had a long-term presence there since the early ’90s. FH’s Relief team is now actively responding to help the victims of this quake. I have been involved in responding to two different earthquakes, one in El Salvador and the other in Pakistan, so I guess I have a special interest in the ongoing efforts of this crisis. I spoke today with the FH relief director to catch up on what we are doing. Feel free to check it out! There is an information page for general Peru relief efforts on their website as well as a blog that is being updated daily to follow what is going on.

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do i ever get it right? i’m not so sure…and definitely not in the present. i can play the events, the attempts, over and over again in my mind, but it leaves me in the same place. i keep trying, and i hope that i always do. it’s just that i wonder if life lived ever stops feeling like an awkward first draft. there are moments when the sentences flow well and it reads effortlessly, but those chapters are often short or interrupted. Then it’s back to a blank sheet of paper and trying to find more ink.

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I moved to Nairobi over a month ago. One of many things I’ve done while settling into life here was to start looking for a capoeira group. Through a series of attempts and friends, yesterday I managed to meet the instructor of what appears to be the only capoeira group in Kenya. I start today! Can’t wait!

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I’m back online. Same guy, different site name.

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