I’m back in Usa River at the orphanage, hanging until I go home on Friday.  I went on my first run since malaria today and it wasn’t pretty.  I’d like to blame it on the illness, but I’m thinking it has more to do with the fact that for the past two days, I haven’t eaten a fruit or a vegetable unless you count Bounty Bars or Fanta…which I actually do, but still, three servings of fruit a day is not enough.  (So not looking forward to the results of my physical on Monday.  My sugar and cholesterol counts are going to be unreal.)  

Some background info before I get into this mini-story.  ”Pole” means sorry in Kiswahili…but more than that too.  It can translate to “I feel for you” or “that sucks” or “glad I’m not in your shoes.”  It’s also what you say when you see someone working really hard.  And hard work in Africa is hard effing work.  Like it’s not “Pole about manipulating that Excel spreadsheet for thirty minutes in an air-conditioned office this afternoon.”  It’s more “Pole for having to break up that mile of pavement using just a pick and your sweaty, sweaty muscles for ten hours every day for the past two weeks while traffic is whizzing by.”  So, that’s pole for you.  

Anyway, I started running today and it wasn’t feeling that good, but I kept going, thinking I’d get into a groove at some point.  I realized I probably wasn’t going to feel any better about the run when the guys at the corner who normally get up and run with me or at least shout something flirty or vaguely racist saw me coming and instead of any of that, yelled “Pole.”  I took that to mean that I looked about as pained as the guy hand chipping cement down the road.  An