"Autumn" in Atlanta

I had a couple weeks in Atlanta in October between getting back from Tanzania and leaving for Madagascar - time to try to scramble and get work done! I was amazed that the Madagascar trip actually came together, given the extraordinarily brief time (2 weeks) I had to put it together. It always takes me a day or two to get back in the swing of things at work after a trip, but I actually got a lot done. So, not too many pictures, but I managed to get some fun into the weekends!
Ed and I went to the zoo one gorgeous afternoon - I have taken far too many pictures at zoos since I was six years old, but at least they're digital now, and I won't bore you with many. :)Ed making friends with a goat at the petting zoo.
My favorite was the joey poking his head out of his mother's pouch - I had never seen it before - how funny!
We also carved pumpkins with some friends, since I usually have a pumpkin carving party and was going to miss Halloween. Here are the pumpkins we carved - mine and Ed's is on the left. The one on the right is a bat.
And us with our kitty cat pumpkin - don't you love the ears? Between the two of us, we have three cats, so it's quite appropriate! (The cats haven't been introduced yet, but I'm sure there will be plenty of growling and hissing at first.)

I'm actually writing this from Madagascar. I'm here for the Measles Malaria Campaign - a group of donors and the government of Madagascar have collaborated to try to give every child under 5 a mosquito net, a measles vaccination, vitamin A, and worm medicine within a week-long period. I'm here as an campaign monitor, especially for the net distribution. I've spent the past couple days meeting with national malaria control program, Canadian and American Red Cross, USAID, UNICEF, and WHO folks about campaign monitoring and the post-campaign evaluation. It has been fun to be a part of - I've been glad to plug in and help wherever needed (and have a chance to influence the process in the direction I'd like to see it go). It's sort of strange to be "the CDC rep". Starting tomorrow, I'll be traveling with the WHO malaria rep to the region of Menabe to drop in on distribution posts all along the way and see how they're doing. I think it will be very cool!

I get back to the US November 2nd, and then go to the annual meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, where I have a poster to present about the results of the campaign evaluation in Niger.

I'm finally back in Atlanta the week after that for a couple weeks, and then after Thanksgiving am going back to Cameroon for the dedication of the Vute New Testament (the one my parents worked on) in the village I grew up in (Yoko). I can't wait!!

So, in 2007, I will have been on 7 trans-Atlantic trips (5 work, 2 personal) to 5 different countries, 4 of them for the first time. According to my calculations, I'll have over 200,000 frequent flier miles at the end of this year. Platinum status is nice - getting a free breakfast and a nap in the lounge in Paris was a treat, and it means I can take more for my family when I go back to Cameroon! I don't know how sustainable this amount of travel is for a long time, but for now I'm loving it!