Email from Feb. 23

Hi everyone!!!

My sister Audrey has graciously posted my previous e-mails on a blog at http://summerinzambia.blogspot.com - feel free to leave comments there! Hopefully within a day or two she'll post this e-mail as well.

TRAVELING TO ZAMBIA
I've been here awhile now, and I'm really starting to wonder why on earth more people are not visiting Zambia. This place is beautiful, safe, authentically African, English-speaking, with amazing weather, and unspeakably cheap. Even flights here aren't that expensive - you can get tickets from New York to Lusaka for about $1,500. Even though there are really few whites, people try hard to be polite and I get harassed less than I do walking around New York! (Admittedly, my no-nonsense New York-style walk does help with this.) For short trips, you just need to bring sunscreen (Coppertone oil-free is the best), Malarone (a no-side-effect daily malaria prophylactic that any doctor can prescribe), $100 for a tourist visa, a Visa card, the Bradt guidebook to Zambia, and that's it. Seriously, consider visiting at some point, you will love it here.

WHAT I'M UP TO
I'm teaching sex ed to 1,400 students, grades 5-12, each week. Imagine talking about private parts to a classroom of up to 90 tiny, giggly little 10-year-olds! Fortunately, talking about sex never gets old. Consider this gem: I was talking with the 11th grade boarding students, and I asked them, given the extremely limited space and privacy available, where exactly do Zambians have sex? They laughed, looked at each other, and then all agreed: Zambians have sex in trees!! =>

WHY IS ZAMBIA POOR?
Of course part of the reason I'm here is to develop my own opinion about why exactly Zambia is poor. The problem is a complicated one, but I think I've discovered a major contributing factor: pervasive bad management. Zambians tend to rely on exhortation: "Now really, I really want you to be here on time tomorrow" rather than the far more effective management tools of setting clear expectations, monitoring, and following up: "Tomorrow we will be taking attendance at 8 AM, please be on time, thank you!" I've seen this pattern repeated in a lot of contexts. The problem is not just within leadership at the top, but throughout management at all levels. It is, however, a mistake to think that bad management is somehow "cultural" and can't be changed: Zambians are rational people who know good ideas when they hear them - they do, however, need to learn better management skills on a large scale.

MORE ABOUT AIDS
Deborah and I have met a best friend! Her name is Chibeka, and we met her because she found out she was HIV positive the day we arrived in Nampundwe. We met her and talked with her - it's an understatement to say she was pretty down - what unbelievably bad news. Amazingly, though, she snapped back in a remarkably short time - maybe four days - and turns out to be a charming, funny, outgoing girl - and our new best friend, as I've said, plus an excellent baker who sometimes gives us buns and scones. The kicker: Chibeka got HIV because she was raped when she was about 10. She hasn't had sex since.

Chibeka's story illustrates the basic AIDS juxtaposition I keep noticing: (1) people are unbelievably resilient and (2) AIDS is horrible.

CONGRATULATIONS TO WINSTON!!
And finally, a big congratulations to Winston Hotels, which announced its going-private transaction yesterday! I worked on the transaction while at JF Capital Advisors and I'm thrilled to hear that things have been progressing successfully!!!

Love to all,
Summer