excerpt of a letter

Hi

Today is my second full day in Ethiopia so I'm still getting a feel for
it. I read some African newspapers before coming to get a feel for the
region, and Addis Ababa being the capital, it's pretty modern for such a
poor country. My sense is that even though people are poor here, they
hold their heads up high and value their communities. Food here is
interesting because, aside from regular Ethiopian fare, they have a lot
of Italian restaurants. I had some good ravioli yesterday for lunch,
believe it or not.

Anyway, I'm involved in helping improve management of a center for water
technology education. The center has been running for about 10 years so
they're moving toward becoming more independent and increasing the
number of students and attracting more from the private sector as well.
My colleagues here have been working on this for about 3 years so I'm
just getting up to speed on everything, but it seems like a successful
project.