Saturday, May 2, 2009

Beaches, football, cockroaches, and lizards

I'm finally starting to feel like a peace corps volunteer. Last week I woke up tried to turn on my water and realized I had none, not even a drip came from the pipes. Thankfully I had filled up a few big bottles the day before which last me the day, and by the afternoon the water was flowing. I made sure to buy a big bucket with a lid so I would at least have 5 gallons if I was withou water again.

A few days later I walked out into my living room to find a lizard scurrying across the wall, and last night I fought of an infestation of cockroaches. Of course the cockroaches freaked me out I saw at least four, and I feel there were many more. I sprayed to much big killer that I had to leave my house, and I now have roach pellets all over, thanks to the help of my host family. Now that is more of what I expected when I signed up for the peace corps, hopefully the roaches don't come back.

On the work front, my days are filled with incredible joy and frustration. The kids especially the little ones always bring a smile to my face, I live for their shouts of miss Aria miss Aria. One of the children I am working one-on-one with at the primary school was working on reading with me, and after we finished he was so excited that he wanted to share what he learned with the class, the whole class knows he can't read and the all clapped when he finished. He also asked if I could work with him everyday, which broke my heart because I have to be other places and can't at least at this time. Two girls at the secondary school didn't want to participate in PE class because well here girls don't really play sports, after a little convincing they decided to play and by the end of class they wanted to play more and even said they would like a girls football (soccer) team.

After school I am usually playing basketball with kids down by the main catholic church where I live about a 20 min walk from my house, or am playing football with the younger kids at the playing field just 5 mins from where I live. I also am learning a game called netball, which is basically basketball without any movement when you have the ball, in other words its nowhere near as much fun. A few evenings a week I have meeting with different community groups to help me meet people, and to help with different projects.

For the people that went to Greece together and went on that hike the last day we were there, and at the end there were orange and lemon trees next to a church. If you remember at all what I'm talking about I picked an orange and scotty took a lemon, but when I bit into the orange it tasted like a lemon. Well I've recently learned there are sour oranges and it was some mutant orange, but a sour orange I ate. Just wanted to share that bit of info.

I made pumpkin bread last night, it was delicious, and even my host sister, that don't like pumpkin enjoyed it. I also learned that a bag of lentils may look like a small amount before you cook them, but within an hour will be enough to feed 4 people lentils straight for a week. I am constantly learning new things, and with each blunder I have to laugh a little.

Well I'm off to meet some friends at the beach, the perks of living on a tropical island. Miss everyone at home!

Ps I don't have regular internet, but check it about once a week so keep those emails coming.

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