Roundabouts

The past week has been a trying test of my attitude and patience. There are a bunch of issues I can't elaborate on due to privacy sake, but things at work are not looking good and home life has been a bit of a test as well.
I'm sure everything will work out for the best as there are still other opportunities available to me for the remainder of my contract, some that look more areas of interest that I would normally pursue.
On Monday my bank card stopped working and I was left with no cash in hand - the debit card, in the ATM, has been getting read as a visa for some reason and said the card had expired. Apparently this had happened to a few others (I use Barclay's for banking) and after trying a few different branches, my card still failed to work. Realizing it was Thanksgiving back in Canada and Scotia would be closed, Barclay's helped me get in touch the following day and unfortunately there was nothing anyone could do to help me from back home.
Being strapped for cash for four days straight was interesting and luckily the card worked yesterday but I lost some money along the way because I had tried so many transactions and some of them registered as withdrawn successfully even though no money came out.
One high point this week was while waiting in the front entrance of my office, a guy passed me and said, "excuse me, I know you work for The Monitor, but where are you from?" After I told him, he said, "oh, do you know Brandon?" "There are a lot of Brandon's..." I responded, then he added that Brandon is a journalist. Turns out this a friend of one of the former JHR interns from the year before. This man started a publication a few months ago called "The Supreme," which comes out twice a month and focuses on reporting in the communities/compounds. I have been here for three months and still have yet to even go to a compound, which is pathetic considering I live right next to one.
I'm really looking forward to getting involved with this publication and will be going out in the field with the editor next week to do some community reporting. It will be a nice change from the usual entertainment (not that I don't live it) journalism and press briefings I have been attending and a break from election coverage.
I'm itching to get out of Lusaka - I haven't left the city since the first weekend of September and it was only for a day and a half to Livingstone. Possible excursions in the upcoming month include Siavonga, Zimbabwe, Chipata/Malawi, or Kitwe.
We had our first rain last Friday, the earliest Lusaka has seen in awhile. And rains like I have never seen in my life; it turned into small fist-sized hail eventually and as my street is unpaved and sandy, made it a challenge leaving the house (I also live at the bottom of a hill). I reckon I'll be buying my first pair of infamous rubber boots at some point otherwise moving to work will be literally impossible.
Tonight I am off to cover the Barefeet festival show, a theatre company which works with street youth, followed by Zimbabwean musician Oliver Mutukudzi (and potentially covering another beauty pageant, which personally I could do without).