Two weeks in site

On Wednesday I gave my first charla as a volunteer. I walked to the school in the morning with Kristian and Kelvin, my two younger host brothers. I talked about self-esteem, but I kept it pretty short since it was my first talk and I wanted to know the kids better. I had three games, it was really more games than talking, so they really liked it, but I’m not sure how much they actually learned. They’re really cute kids, and they were well behaved. When I finished, they asked me to teach them the days of the week in English. So I taught them that, and then the numbers. They’re really excited to learn English. I told them to think about what they want to learn in English for my next charla.
When I finished with the students, I looked at the three computers the teachers said weren’t working. These computers have been sitting there for three months because no tried to connect them. That’s not really surprising though, stuff like this happens all the time. For the first computer I just connected the cords to the different parts and plugged the whole thing in and it worked. It doesn’t have Microsoft Works, though, which is a problem, I have to try to find the disc somewhere so I can install it. The second computer I got on, but it kept giving me strange error messages that I’ve never seen before. I’m not sure what to do with it, I’ll try it again next time. The third computer, I got working, no problem, and it has Microsoft Works and a really good Encyclopedia installed. So I’m going to start giving computer lessons to the kids. Some of them haven’t used a computer before, so I’ll have to figure out where to start.

On Thursday there was a community meeting at the school to talk about opening a high school. Right now there isn’t a high school, just two grade schools, which go up to 6th grade. So a lot of people just stop going to school after 6th grade, or others travel to the next closest high school. My host parents, my host brother, Kevin, who’s 13, and my host sister Karen, who’s 14, all take classes at the high school in town on Saturday mornings. They spend all week doing their homework and studying. It’s nice seeing them all work together. So it sounds like they’re going to get a high school for when the new school year starts in January. There’s another meeting next Thursday to talk about specifics. This school year ends in early November and school starts again sometime in January. So I think Nov and Dec will be tough months for me, because it’s coffee season, so everyone will be occupied with that, and I won’t even have the schools to work at. I’m hoping to do something with the mayor’s office during that time. Thursday night, three of my host mom’s brothers were over, and we netted some tilapia out of the fish ponds and grilled them. It was really nice sitting outside with everyone, and the fish was really good. I’ve always been afraid of eating a whole fish, but I’ve done it three times now. I don’t eat the tail or fins or head, but even eating around all the bones takes work.

On Tuesday last week, I went to Santa Rosa (our nearby big town) with my counterpart and some other people. They had to pick up some baby chicks, since they raise chickens, and get some other supplies for my room, and other things. I was walking around on my own , and I ran into some other volunteers whose sites are nearby. One of them was from my training class, but from a different project, and the others I hadn’t met before. It was really nice seeing them and getting to talk in English for a while, and compare sites. Current volunteers are a big help because they’ve experienced the beginning phase and know what we’re going through and that it will improve. The baby chicks are really cute. They set up a little incubator up on the little hill where I have to go to use my phone, so I can look at them when I make calls and check messages. I’ve been trying to get ahold of a volunteer to do a latrine workshop for us, but I can’t get ahold of him. We really wanted to do the workshop in October, so we could start the project in January.

Right now a bunch of trees are flowering white, and it’s really pretty. They don’t at all compare to DC in spring, but they’re nice. It’s been raining almost every night, soon the raining season will really get going and it will be rainy most of the time. Some of the coffee is starting to get mature, it’s a pretty red color. They’re have to start picking it soon.

Monday last week, we spent all day working on my room. We put in light switches, hot water, and did some plastering. It’s pretty much done now, we’re still missing a couple light switches and electric outlets, and a screen on one of the windows. My closet doors are beautiful, they’re a pretty wood color and each door has a full length mirror. My host family is also having a table built for me, which I definitely wasn’t expecting. I said I wanted a really big table to make charla papers on, since the paper is really big, and that I would go to a hardware store in town to see about getting wood to make a table, and the next thing I know, they tell me my table will be done on Sunday. They say it’s big and has a large drawer in the center. I’m overwhelmed by everything they’re doing. I´ll be so happy when I can finally unpack everything.

That`s all for now. I miss everyone a lot!