Let the (Mis)Adventures Begin!

With the closing of the workshop--130,000 TSh (about a 100 bucks) poorer from a frustrating theft incident--I was definitely ready for some time on the road. In a unheard of burst of speed, B and I went into town to pick up our dresses, which, in my opinion, turned out really well! All the workshop students were snapping their momento pictures and B and I decided to join in. Why not? At the risk of repeating what has already been well documented, here's a glimpse. Hopefully I'll end up wearing it in the States. Yes, I know it's short. That's probably why Dundy insisted on calling me "legs" for the duration of the night.


After a nice closing ceremony to the workshop (that I missed because I was burning CDs with pictures and powerpoint presentations) and dinner at Dragonaire we all headed back to pack, but not after a picture of what we termed the "Kids Table"--not quite esteemed enough to sit with the faculty from the likes of BMGF or Oxford and talk hard science but at the same time not even really wanting to.

Workshop, Workshop, Workshop

One full week of the workshop down and another to go. Yesterday I got the opportunity to stop stapling and preparation of the workshop CDs (to be passed out to the students at the end of the workshop) and got to listen to some of the talks. A senior grant officer from BMGF--can I please have your job?--spoke on clinical trial design and the malaria vaccine pipeline. In small groups we--I actually participated this time--put together our own TPP (target product plan) for a transmission blocking vaccine in Phase IIa trial. P assigned me to the TBV (transmission blocking vaccine) group because of PapaBear--my Dad worked on a transmission blocking vaccine for year at the NIH. We were given about an hour to do it and present a powerpoint with it. Let's just say that it was a hectic hour. People spend months on this stuff and I wasn't really impressed with or proud of the result. However, the exercise got me thinking, especially about possible thesis topics.

The general theme of the week has been exhaustion. For some reason waiting around for that burst of urgency is extremely tiring. I'm sure the pizza and the party that followed over at our place hasn't helped. I was the first to excuse myself from the get together we hosted last night which made me feel a little like the first girl that falls asleep at a sleepover.

More Pizza!

So it's finally here. After months of planning, because in Tanzania everything takes months, the East African Regional Training Workshop is finally here. (You can read more about it here) I've been looking forward to interacting with the faculty and the students, and having something to stress me out a little. My time--mostly with regards to my internship--here so far has been relatively stress free so a little nervous energy was exciting. B gave a presentation on sample size calculation. Apart from being fun and nice, she's also crazy smart--especially when it comes to biostats.

Most of the faculty arrived yesterday and we went for a dinner at Dragonaire--twice in one week!!! The ride there and back was part of the fun. I rode in the back of the truck in the flat bed. Luckily P went slow on the unmarked speed bumps and on the side "road" to Dragonaire. One of the workshop faculty members tried to talk me out of Med school. Not happening. High on my list of things to do while I am here is start on my post-bac program applications. Apparently I still haven't learned the garlic-in-moderation lesson and paid for it dearly with a weird sort of stomach ache all of last night. The faculty all talked a lot of science...lucky I am so cute because I certainly couldn't keep up with them.