Our first day at work in Kasaroni

After a full day of relaxation, we were up and ready to get to work! Today was a day of greetings! Maryann and Jim enjoyed catching up with all of their colleagues here, while I had the chance to put faces to all the names I have heard in the past 2 years of this partnership. It was great to meet so many new people.  We moved into our office space at ICIPE. I call this space the "Efficiency Room" where we will "get things done!" as Lauren would say.

Today was our day of organization (Maryann's favorite day). Almost everyone involved in this project got together for a meeting to talk about all of the experiments we will be conducting here and strategized about how to get everything accomplished.  We even brainstormed about some future research ideas based on the knowledge we have after year 1 of this 2 year grant. I am sure we will have a lot more ideas as we follow through with the experiments and being the record keeper I am going to try to keep track of all of them. It was great!
When the meeting broke up we all went our separate ways to prepare for the start of field work tomorrow, making up datasheets, inventorying equipment to see what we have and what we need, etc. We are ready and rearing to go for tomorrow and I can't wait to get in the field and see what the African bees are all about!!! ---Sara