Girls' Night is Every Night

I am very fortunate to have six American friends (seven counting Sufina) at SEARCH. What I had imagined in my head was that I would be here with the other girls from UNC (neither has arrived yet) and perhaps a handful of other interns and professionals from the UK and Europe that varied in age. Instead what I got was summer camp! As far as I know, the only foreign research interns are all from the U.S. In many ways being at SEARCH is how I expected it to be- the food, the rooms, the environment- but I did not expect to have a whole cohort of friends to discuss our experience with, to eat meals with, to go on field trips with, and to have movie nights with!

I have already introduced Miriam, 19, and Marie, 21, in "Spiders, Snakes, and Scorpions...Oh My!" and I've also introduced the girls from India in "Field Trip!" The only thing I'd like to add is that Miriam is also Jewish which we discovered in probably 1.2 seconds of meeting each other. Now, here are the rest of the girls in the order that I met them:

Amy, 25, attended University of Georgia and is now at Emory getting an MPH in Global Health.

Jessica, 25, is from Florida. She attended Duke for undergrad and is still there doing an MD/MPH. Unlike the rest of us, she is doing a six-month stay at SEARCH. She got married young to her high school sweetheart and will be celebrating her third anniversary this summer. In North Carolina she lives about a 10-15 minute drive from me. She is roommates with Amy. (Miriam and Marie are roommates).

Brenna, 23, is from New Jersey. She attended a small liberal arts college at Drew University in NJ. She is also at Emory getting an MPH in Global Health.

Kate, 28, went to the University of Arizona for undergrad, then did the Peace Corps in Guinea, and is now back at the U of Arizona getting an MPH in epidemiology and public health. She is also engaged and will get married in December 2011 in South Africa! She is roommates with Brenna.

Kate and Brenna have a special room with a western commode. The week that I arrived, SEARCH told them they were going to be changing rooms, but they managed to slip by without having to do so. We have all our movie nights in their room. I have not needed to use their toilet yet, but I'm happy to know it is there in case I do.

I was very excited to learn that after dinner the girls often hung out with one another and watched movies. Last Thursday night, for my first movie night, we watched Pretty Woman. Then on Friday night we watched Aladdin. Marie, who has been in India for several months now, has gotten into the art of Henna. She took turns putting Henna on each of our feet. The picture above is my foot, courtesy of Marie. It's temporary and washes out over the next couple weeks, in case you were worried.

We also use our girls nights to snack on any fruit that we may have bought in town. Kate is really into coconut so the first two movie nights we snacked on raw coconut after breaking it open. On our trip to Gadchiroli last Sunday we picked up mangoes, oranges, pomegranate, and pineapple and have snacked on these fruits for dessert the last couple times we have hung out.

On Monday night, instead of watching a movie, we played a silly game where one girl leaves the room while the other girls choose someone to be the subject of the game. The girl who left the room returns and starts asking questions along the lines of "If I were an article of clothing, what kind would I be?", "If I were a type of cereal, what one would I be?", "If I were a genre of music, what genre would I be?", "If I were a decade in the 20th century, what decade would I be?" etc., etc. The point is not to answer the subject's favorite clothing, cereal, or music, but to describe their essence as a person. After asking a round of questions and learning the answers, the girl who had stepped out of the room has to guess which girl we are describing.

Last night, we watched Kung Fu Panda. I was really tired and anxious about presenting at our research meeting this morning, so I ended up leaving and going to bed 20 minutes in.

Some nights we don't get together because we are all too exhausted or prefer to read in our rooms instead. Each of us brought several books with us (we are very like minded) and we have an ongoing book swap.

I look forward to more girls nights. It makes the experience at SEARCH very fun; it feels like summer camp! It is an added bonus to the international and global health experience I am obtaining here.