5-26-09
Yesterday was a very long day. I woke up a little before 6 and was out of the house at 7am. I´m really not into being awake super early, though Paraguayans seem to love the wee morning hours for whatever reason. I am, no matter how early I wake up, always the last up in my house. My host family--parents and 2 teenagers--are all out of the house before 6am. My host dad sometimes leaves at 4:30 for work. This is baffling to me. I sometimes run into them en route to the bathroom in my middle of the night/their morning. (It is obnoxious, by the way, to have to wake up enough to heave a bucket of water into the toilet.) Anyway, yesterday I went into Limpio itself to do surveys at the big high school there. I don´t believe I´ve explained Limpio thus far. (Excuse me if I have.) It is, at a glance, a mix between a town on the Pennsylvania turnpike (think Breezewood, PA) and a small Jersey town outside of NYC. Again, not a place where many people stop to look around. That being said, I like Limpio a lot. If ou get off the main drag there are nice little places to eat empanadas. The center is the church but since it is surrounded by a fence, it is nearly always completely dead. The church doors are locked and there is only the occasional person napping or playing with children in the far corner of the yard. I´ve also found that it is an excellent place to read since the polka VS reggaetone fight to be heard can be avoided and I don´t have to spend any money to sit.) There is also a good sized market area where I often buy pears and successfully bartered for a comforter last week. (It got so cold one night last week and I only had a sheet, so I wore thick socks, spandex, sweat pants, a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, fleece, and winter hat to sleep!!)
The high school I went to is a national school on the same street as the municipality, police station, and the church. They have morning, afternoon, and night classes. I did a survey with 183 high school juniors asking the basic information (sex, age, neighborhood), if they worked, how much they study, drug use, alcohol, sex, condoms and HIV/AIDS knowledge. I still have to finish tallying the results, then I´ll figure out where to go from there. Some of the kids were rude and rowdy. The smallest class was 39 and the largest was 57. In between giving the surveys I basically drank too much caffeine (I recently found a place that went ot to buy Nescafe after I ordered a coffee), looked over some of the surveys, and finished Crime and Punishment. I´ll definitely have a great deal of down time in the next two years and just started, nerdily enough, my own personal book review. It is excellent.
Anyway, I´m hoping the surveys are at least mostly true, though who really knows? I guess I´ll never know. The night class was the most tranquilo and the nicest overall so I´m going back to observe them tonight. Though, very unfortunately, I´m sure it will be boring. Most of the teachers either have the students copy from the board or from their dictations. There is no way I would have survived in a classroom like this. It is excruciating to watch and I really don´t know how the kids swallow any information. I´ll keep my fingers crossed to be pleasantly surprised...
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
The President Has...Hijos?
5-21-09
I believe I mentioned that the community center has continuing education classes for mechanics, hair dressers, and pastry chefs. The classes are free for students and open to anyone over the age of 14. They have 3 months of classes and then are set up with an internship around Limpio or Asuncion. This is all part of a project between the Ministerio of Justice and Trabajo and SINAFOCAL (National System for Labor Formation and Training). I know that translation is poor but you get the idea. SINAFOCAL have a bunch of programs including microfinancing for small business owners, helping youth find their first job, and helping rural businesses or individuals market their products. Last night I went with the students from our community center to the closing ceremony for thousands of students in Central. There were rumors that Lugo, Paraguay´s president, was going to attend. There were a bunch of camoflaged guards outside with automatic weapons, but my bag has certainly been more thoroughly searched at concerts. The whole set up was really impressive. There were lights, two huge projection screens that frequently showed crowd members for uncomfortably long periods of time, and booths set up along one side with photo slide shows of classes and internships. They also showed two long videos that included lots of techno music in the soundtracks. The head of SINAFOCAL spoke for a while, then President Lugo got up to speak!
He started off with the completely necessary jabs at himself for the most recent scandal. He used to be a Catholic bishop but stepped down to assume his role as Paraguay´s president in August. This marks the first time in 61 years that the Colorado party hasn´t held the presidency. Lugo ran on the fact that he was clean--and a Bishop!--open, and uncorrupt. He was seen as a man without special ties to one political party or other. (Sidenote: He was also very active in Liberation Theology, which was what I wrote my thesis on.) Regardless, the past two months have been full of gossip like you wouldn´t believe. It turns out that Lugo has a two year old son--yes, that means he fathered the child when he was still a man of the cloth. He came out and admitted it immediately upon being accused. This happened during Holy Week--not a great time to be seen offending the Church or one´s family. Since then, many women have come out of the woodwork to claim that Lugo is their baby´s daddy too. The count, depending on whom you ask, is up to as high as 16 kids. Absurd. For mother´s day, one of the major cell phone companies showed a commercial (at nauseum) of Lugo as a baby smiling up at women as his stroller was pushed down the street. The women would immediately become pregnant. Silly.
Regardless, in last night´s event, Lugo obviously poked fun at himself. He had to. In his campaign, his slogan was "Lugo has heart" but last night he asked, "Lugo has WHAT?" Some people yelled "Heart!" but he corrected them..."Hijos!" (Children) I was pleased to have had my first presidential spotting, though hopefully next time I can shake his hand...while avoiding eye contact.
I believe I mentioned that the community center has continuing education classes for mechanics, hair dressers, and pastry chefs. The classes are free for students and open to anyone over the age of 14. They have 3 months of classes and then are set up with an internship around Limpio or Asuncion. This is all part of a project between the Ministerio of Justice and Trabajo and SINAFOCAL (National System for Labor Formation and Training). I know that translation is poor but you get the idea. SINAFOCAL have a bunch of programs including microfinancing for small business owners, helping youth find their first job, and helping rural businesses or individuals market their products. Last night I went with the students from our community center to the closing ceremony for thousands of students in Central. There were rumors that Lugo, Paraguay´s president, was going to attend. There were a bunch of camoflaged guards outside with automatic weapons, but my bag has certainly been more thoroughly searched at concerts. The whole set up was really impressive. There were lights, two huge projection screens that frequently showed crowd members for uncomfortably long periods of time, and booths set up along one side with photo slide shows of classes and internships. They also showed two long videos that included lots of techno music in the soundtracks. The head of SINAFOCAL spoke for a while, then President Lugo got up to speak!
He started off with the completely necessary jabs at himself for the most recent scandal. He used to be a Catholic bishop but stepped down to assume his role as Paraguay´s president in August. This marks the first time in 61 years that the Colorado party hasn´t held the presidency. Lugo ran on the fact that he was clean--and a Bishop!--open, and uncorrupt. He was seen as a man without special ties to one political party or other. (Sidenote: He was also very active in Liberation Theology, which was what I wrote my thesis on.) Regardless, the past two months have been full of gossip like you wouldn´t believe. It turns out that Lugo has a two year old son--yes, that means he fathered the child when he was still a man of the cloth. He came out and admitted it immediately upon being accused. This happened during Holy Week--not a great time to be seen offending the Church or one´s family. Since then, many women have come out of the woodwork to claim that Lugo is their baby´s daddy too. The count, depending on whom you ask, is up to as high as 16 kids. Absurd. For mother´s day, one of the major cell phone companies showed a commercial (at nauseum) of Lugo as a baby smiling up at women as his stroller was pushed down the street. The women would immediately become pregnant. Silly.
Regardless, in last night´s event, Lugo obviously poked fun at himself. He had to. In his campaign, his slogan was "Lugo has heart" but last night he asked, "Lugo has WHAT?" Some people yelled "Heart!" but he corrected them..."Hijos!" (Children) I was pleased to have had my first presidential spotting, though hopefully next time I can shake his hand...while avoiding eye contact.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Not-So-Minimum Wage and Country Clubs
5-13-09
Part 1.
So not only are schools closed Thursday and Friday for the holidays but in Central (my department or state) almost all the teachers are striking, which means kids only had class on Monday. The teachers are striking for the usual things people strike for--wages and rights. In Paraguay there is a minimum wage, but since very few people except (beginning only very recently) government employees receive it, it seems like a bit of a misnomer. Assuming the numbers my host brother gave me are correct, minimum wage comes out to about $280 a month or $3360 a year. I´m not sure how much the teachers are making. There are three shifts of classes in a school day: morning (7am-11/noon), afternoon (1pm-5pm) and night (5pm-9pm). Most teachers I´ve met teach in at least two of those shifts, if not all three. That being said, the schedules do rotate so they wouldn´t be teaching every hour of the day. All kids here wear uniforms, though those uniforms are frequently open to individual interpretation at the poorer schools.
Moving on with this number game, I believe I make about minimum wage. It is enough for me to live comfortably and simply, though I´m obviously only supporting myself. I pay my host family rent which ends up being 200,000 Guaranís or $40 a month. They also feed me most of my meals. I buy some groceries and eat a great deal of lunches at the community center and the community kitchen. (These meals are usually rice or pasta based with some meat or corn ball (vorri vorri), and the infrequent vegetable.) Breakfast consists of cafe con leche and white dinner rolls. Dinner could be anything--left overs from lunch, yogurt and alfahors (sweet bread), salad. In between breakfast and lunch if I¨m at the community center I´m given bananas or empanadas before wonderful refreshing terere. I don´t know if I´ve mentioned this before. I am not sure how that would be possible. Terere is such a huge part of Paraguayan culture. Everyone has a thermos filled with cold water and herbs (lemon grass, limon, and mint are my favorites) if it is morning. Supposedly having yuyos (herbs) in your terere in the afternoon will make you sick. (Also, supposedly if you mix terere and watermelon it will explode in your stomach. Think Pop Rocks and Coke.) Then you pour the cold water into a cup called a guampa that is full of yerba (tea leaves). The guampa is frequently made from a bull´s horn. You drink out of a straw called a bombilla. There are lots of little rules and traditions that go along with terere. When it gets colder people start drinking yerba mate, which I have tried only a couple of times thus far. I just don´t think it is cold enough for it yet.
Part 2.
I´m on the bus heading back to my barrio. Today I went to meet a municipalities volunteer for lunch in her site. We then took a bus to San Bernadino to take a look around. San Ber, as it is known, is the most resorty town in Paraguay. It has an open season during December and January where the town comes alive with rich Asunciónites visiting their summer homes. The town is, not surprisingly, really beautiful and on a gorgeous (though apparently extremely polluted) lake. I was very impressed with the lake, although the only bodies of water I´ve seen in the past four months have been garbage strewn mini rivers so maybe I´m not a good judge. I talked our way into a country club for a look around. There were all sorts of sail boats, jet skis, paddle boats , and motor boats. They had a restaurant on a pier, the nicest grass I´ve seen, and a fishing area. I saw a little boy fishing and asked if he had any luck. Not so far, but he usually does, he said. What kind of fish does he catch? He looked at me like I had two heads, ¨Big ones.¨ I´m looking forward to going back during the season just for the experience. But for now I´m heading back to Limpio.
PS- Tonight at dinner I asked if the brown things in my rice dish were mushrooms. They weren´t. They were chunks of kidney. The love for organ meat is really taking some getting used to.
Part 1.
So not only are schools closed Thursday and Friday for the holidays but in Central (my department or state) almost all the teachers are striking, which means kids only had class on Monday. The teachers are striking for the usual things people strike for--wages and rights. In Paraguay there is a minimum wage, but since very few people except (beginning only very recently) government employees receive it, it seems like a bit of a misnomer. Assuming the numbers my host brother gave me are correct, minimum wage comes out to about $280 a month or $3360 a year. I´m not sure how much the teachers are making. There are three shifts of classes in a school day: morning (7am-11/noon), afternoon (1pm-5pm) and night (5pm-9pm). Most teachers I´ve met teach in at least two of those shifts, if not all three. That being said, the schedules do rotate so they wouldn´t be teaching every hour of the day. All kids here wear uniforms, though those uniforms are frequently open to individual interpretation at the poorer schools.
Moving on with this number game, I believe I make about minimum wage. It is enough for me to live comfortably and simply, though I´m obviously only supporting myself. I pay my host family rent which ends up being 200,000 Guaranís or $40 a month. They also feed me most of my meals. I buy some groceries and eat a great deal of lunches at the community center and the community kitchen. (These meals are usually rice or pasta based with some meat or corn ball (vorri vorri), and the infrequent vegetable.) Breakfast consists of cafe con leche and white dinner rolls. Dinner could be anything--left overs from lunch, yogurt and alfahors (sweet bread), salad. In between breakfast and lunch if I¨m at the community center I´m given bananas or empanadas before wonderful refreshing terere. I don´t know if I´ve mentioned this before. I am not sure how that would be possible. Terere is such a huge part of Paraguayan culture. Everyone has a thermos filled with cold water and herbs (lemon grass, limon, and mint are my favorites) if it is morning. Supposedly having yuyos (herbs) in your terere in the afternoon will make you sick. (Also, supposedly if you mix terere and watermelon it will explode in your stomach. Think Pop Rocks and Coke.) Then you pour the cold water into a cup called a guampa that is full of yerba (tea leaves). The guampa is frequently made from a bull´s horn. You drink out of a straw called a bombilla. There are lots of little rules and traditions that go along with terere. When it gets colder people start drinking yerba mate, which I have tried only a couple of times thus far. I just don´t think it is cold enough for it yet.
Part 2.
I´m on the bus heading back to my barrio. Today I went to meet a municipalities volunteer for lunch in her site. We then took a bus to San Bernadino to take a look around. San Ber, as it is known, is the most resorty town in Paraguay. It has an open season during December and January where the town comes alive with rich Asunciónites visiting their summer homes. The town is, not surprisingly, really beautiful and on a gorgeous (though apparently extremely polluted) lake. I was very impressed with the lake, although the only bodies of water I´ve seen in the past four months have been garbage strewn mini rivers so maybe I´m not a good judge. I talked our way into a country club for a look around. There were all sorts of sail boats, jet skis, paddle boats , and motor boats. They had a restaurant on a pier, the nicest grass I´ve seen, and a fishing area. I saw a little boy fishing and asked if he had any luck. Not so far, but he usually does, he said. What kind of fish does he catch? He looked at me like I had two heads, ¨Big ones.¨ I´m looking forward to going back during the season just for the experience. But for now I´m heading back to Limpio.
PS- Tonight at dinner I asked if the brown things in my rice dish were mushrooms. They weren´t. They were chunks of kidney. The love for organ meat is really taking some getting used to.
Substitute Teachers and Fist Fights in Church
5-11-09
Today I went back to that seventh grade class to observe. Unfortunately the teacher was not there. A woman told me that she was filling in for the day. The kids were louder than last week and even crazier. They were given nothing to do for the last 30 minutes of class so I ended up giving an impromptu English lesson to the handful of students who actually stayed in the classroom. Apparently the teacher is a lawyer and had to go to court today. He sent his wife to fill in. Hopefully it isn´t a long trial...
On Saturday I went to a meeting at the local church. Since my neighborhood doesn´t have a plaza in town, the church acts as a meeting place. Unfortunately though, the priest who has been here for the past five years just left, leaving no one to cover mass and the church activities. I went to a meeting with my host mother who teaches catechism classes. There were representatives from many of the church groups. One man, who is apparently the current leader, talked nearly the entire time--ironically he mostly talked about the importance of working as a team. I say ironically because he refused to let anyone else speak. There was a bunch of yelling (mostly in Guaraní) and a woman broke down in tears, pleading with the group to remember they´re in God´s house and can´t we all get along?? I must say, I found it rather entertaining. I just kept thinking of my real mother and the amount of swearing she would do when she came home from vestry meetings when I was young.
This Thursday and Friday the schools are closed yet again, this time for Mother´s Day and Independence Day. I´m starting to think that kids here are never in school. I may or may not be in a parade this Thursday with the community center.
Today I went back to that seventh grade class to observe. Unfortunately the teacher was not there. A woman told me that she was filling in for the day. The kids were louder than last week and even crazier. They were given nothing to do for the last 30 minutes of class so I ended up giving an impromptu English lesson to the handful of students who actually stayed in the classroom. Apparently the teacher is a lawyer and had to go to court today. He sent his wife to fill in. Hopefully it isn´t a long trial...
On Saturday I went to a meeting at the local church. Since my neighborhood doesn´t have a plaza in town, the church acts as a meeting place. Unfortunately though, the priest who has been here for the past five years just left, leaving no one to cover mass and the church activities. I went to a meeting with my host mother who teaches catechism classes. There were representatives from many of the church groups. One man, who is apparently the current leader, talked nearly the entire time--ironically he mostly talked about the importance of working as a team. I say ironically because he refused to let anyone else speak. There was a bunch of yelling (mostly in Guaraní) and a woman broke down in tears, pleading with the group to remember they´re in God´s house and can´t we all get along?? I must say, I found it rather entertaining. I just kept thinking of my real mother and the amount of swearing she would do when she came home from vestry meetings when I was young.
This Thursday and Friday the schools are closed yet again, this time for Mother´s Day and Independence Day. I´m starting to think that kids here are never in school. I may or may not be in a parade this Thursday with the community center.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Rainy Days and Medical Advice
5-7-09
I´m quite happy right now. It is pouring rain--which Paraguay has desperately been needing--and I´m full of yummy quasi-Mexican food. I say quasi-Mexican because it was really more like Tex Mex meets the Paraguayan kitchen. It was also the first time, strangely, that I have ever cooked meat by myself. I´m pleased with the outcome. My host brother and I joked that we were both very impressed with my cooking skills as long as we´re not all running to the bathroom in an hour vomitando. (I love cognates.)
This week has been interesting and has certainly picked up. I´ve been observing at schools, had a few meetings with school principals, met with the head of the community center about our goals and interests, and started working at the community kitchen. My schedule is still very open but I´ve been filling at least some of my time. There is a seventh grade teacher who has an incredibly rowdy bunch of kids to whom he teaches History/Geography, Ethics (I initially thought etica meant etiquette but was sadly mistaken), and community development. I´m definitely planning on working more with him and his class again. There was a near fight until he stepped in. I´m also really enjoying the community kitchen which provides breakfast and lunch to kids in the community who can´t afford it. They have enough money to provide daily breakfast and lunch to 50 kids but 75 have been showing up, so they´ve been figuring out ways to have it stretch. They do all this with the equivalent of $20 US dollars a day. I went to a meeting with the women´s group who run the comedor and community parents yesterday. For whatever reason the woman introducing me said that I was an educational psychiatrist. I clarified that I did graduate from college, studied religion and philosophy, then did some social work and counseling afterwards. The meeting ended. A middle aged woman and her mother approached me afterwards, asking for some advice about the middle aged woman´s daughter. Apparently she is 13, got her period for the first time then hasn´t had it again and two months have passed. There was a great deal of motioning and repeating in order to get this idea across to me. I´ve been asked some strange questions after saying I graduated from college as a religion major (i.e.: What religion is best?), but have never before been asked a medical question. Who knew studying religion made me qualified to answer medical questions??
I´m quite happy right now. It is pouring rain--which Paraguay has desperately been needing--and I´m full of yummy quasi-Mexican food. I say quasi-Mexican because it was really more like Tex Mex meets the Paraguayan kitchen. It was also the first time, strangely, that I have ever cooked meat by myself. I´m pleased with the outcome. My host brother and I joked that we were both very impressed with my cooking skills as long as we´re not all running to the bathroom in an hour vomitando. (I love cognates.)
This week has been interesting and has certainly picked up. I´ve been observing at schools, had a few meetings with school principals, met with the head of the community center about our goals and interests, and started working at the community kitchen. My schedule is still very open but I´ve been filling at least some of my time. There is a seventh grade teacher who has an incredibly rowdy bunch of kids to whom he teaches History/Geography, Ethics (I initially thought etica meant etiquette but was sadly mistaken), and community development. I´m definitely planning on working more with him and his class again. There was a near fight until he stepped in. I´m also really enjoying the community kitchen which provides breakfast and lunch to kids in the community who can´t afford it. They have enough money to provide daily breakfast and lunch to 50 kids but 75 have been showing up, so they´ve been figuring out ways to have it stretch. They do all this with the equivalent of $20 US dollars a day. I went to a meeting with the women´s group who run the comedor and community parents yesterday. For whatever reason the woman introducing me said that I was an educational psychiatrist. I clarified that I did graduate from college, studied religion and philosophy, then did some social work and counseling afterwards. The meeting ended. A middle aged woman and her mother approached me afterwards, asking for some advice about the middle aged woman´s daughter. Apparently she is 13, got her period for the first time then hasn´t had it again and two months have passed. There was a great deal of motioning and repeating in order to get this idea across to me. I´ve been asked some strange questions after saying I graduated from college as a religion major (i.e.: What religion is best?), but have never before been asked a medical question. Who knew studying religion made me qualified to answer medical questions??
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Its the Little Things in Life that Mean So Little
5-1-09
Thinking about the fact that it is the first day of May made me realize that I´ve been terrible about blogging. I´m sure that my blog´s avid followers have been crying themselves to sleep. The good news for that person or two is that I think I´ll get much better about blogging since I now have a very open schedule. The bad news may be that, thanks to that open schedule, I have very little to write about. We shall see.
So, going along with that theme, I´ve been allowing myself congratulations on a job well done when I´ve accomplished extremely minor things. I am pleased if I do two things in a day. Day 2 that meant going to a Teacher´s Day celebration at the community center. Some cute little preschoolers did a traditional Paraguayan dance, everyone sang, stood around, then ate cookies, dulce de leche cake and stuff that tastes like hot chocolate but is always served cold. I stood around somewhat (read: very) awkwardly, chatting with the five or so people I knew there and being gawked at by children ages 2 to 8. First of two productive things of my day done. The second? I went for a run with Santiago to the grocery store to buy cereal, instant coffee, and a notebook. We ran back. Second productive thing--check. Day 3: had a great lunch back at the community center to celebrate the head of said community center´s birthday. I had some delicious wine and coke while being ridiculed for not drinking more and not drinking whiskey. (I am slightly worried that thanks to Paraguay I¨ll never want normal room-temperature red wine ever again. What if I´m that weird aunt or the rest of my life?!?) I taught a bunch of funny drunk women the macarena. They were disappointed by my lack of knowledge in the country-western dance department. (Note: I´m really a truly horrible dancer. I know this about myself. I feel kind of bad giving the US such a bad rep on dance floors across Paraguay.) My second productive thing was a run by myself. Today I kind of helped clean the house. My work was minimal. I actually drank terere with the family when they took breaks from cleaning, then unpacked all of my stuff. My run was the only time I left the house.
I will go ahead and say that the past three days have been good productive days. I tried explaining this to my sister today on the phone. Being the great sister she is, she tried to relate by saying that after law school ended, she has been really surprised at all her down time--"Now I only work from 9 to 6!¨she told me. Ha.
Thinking about the fact that it is the first day of May made me realize that I´ve been terrible about blogging. I´m sure that my blog´s avid followers have been crying themselves to sleep. The good news for that person or two is that I think I´ll get much better about blogging since I now have a very open schedule. The bad news may be that, thanks to that open schedule, I have very little to write about. We shall see.
So, going along with that theme, I´ve been allowing myself congratulations on a job well done when I´ve accomplished extremely minor things. I am pleased if I do two things in a day. Day 2 that meant going to a Teacher´s Day celebration at the community center. Some cute little preschoolers did a traditional Paraguayan dance, everyone sang, stood around, then ate cookies, dulce de leche cake and stuff that tastes like hot chocolate but is always served cold. I stood around somewhat (read: very) awkwardly, chatting with the five or so people I knew there and being gawked at by children ages 2 to 8. First of two productive things of my day done. The second? I went for a run with Santiago to the grocery store to buy cereal, instant coffee, and a notebook. We ran back. Second productive thing--check. Day 3: had a great lunch back at the community center to celebrate the head of said community center´s birthday. I had some delicious wine and coke while being ridiculed for not drinking more and not drinking whiskey. (I am slightly worried that thanks to Paraguay I¨ll never want normal room-temperature red wine ever again. What if I´m that weird aunt or the rest of my life?!?) I taught a bunch of funny drunk women the macarena. They were disappointed by my lack of knowledge in the country-western dance department. (Note: I´m really a truly horrible dancer. I know this about myself. I feel kind of bad giving the US such a bad rep on dance floors across Paraguay.) My second productive thing was a run by myself. Today I kind of helped clean the house. My work was minimal. I actually drank terere with the family when they took breaks from cleaning, then unpacked all of my stuff. My run was the only time I left the house.
I will go ahead and say that the past three days have been good productive days. I tried explaining this to my sister today on the phone. Being the great sister she is, she tried to relate by saying that after law school ended, she has been really surprised at all her down time--"Now I only work from 9 to 6!¨she told me. Ha.
Home, Sweet Home.
4-29-09
I´m at my new home in Limpio. This marks my first day here. I got in yesterday at 1:30, took a nap, then had my 15 year old host brother ask if he could come with me to get my other bag from the Peace Corps office. It was nice to have some company on the hour bus ride each way...he is on his way to becoming my new best friend. My family situation really couldn´t be more ideal. I´m living with a really open, hard working, interesting and chatty family. The mom, Mimi, works at the community center which offers a nursery school, vocational classes (hair dressing, auto mechanics, etc.), and has a newly refurbished garden. The dad, Juan Carlos, is as hairy--and wonderful--as Chuck Bauer, and walks around shirtless as much as a man in the Reeve family. He works at a printing press and has a beard that he once grew out to take a Bin Ladin look-a-like photo. Sari is my great contact who I´ve already mentioned. Santiago is my new best friend. He is hilarious. We now have our own handshake. Juan Carlos´s mom may or may not be living with us. She was living there for a while but is now visiting her daughter for an undetermined amount of time.
It is strange being here and super slow right now. I don´t really know where to begin. I really want to unpack but don´t know where to put my stuff...I´ve taken Santi´s room and he is still using the wardrobe.
I didn´t finish this blog. Oops.
I´m at my new home in Limpio. This marks my first day here. I got in yesterday at 1:30, took a nap, then had my 15 year old host brother ask if he could come with me to get my other bag from the Peace Corps office. It was nice to have some company on the hour bus ride each way...he is on his way to becoming my new best friend. My family situation really couldn´t be more ideal. I´m living with a really open, hard working, interesting and chatty family. The mom, Mimi, works at the community center which offers a nursery school, vocational classes (hair dressing, auto mechanics, etc.), and has a newly refurbished garden. The dad, Juan Carlos, is as hairy--and wonderful--as Chuck Bauer, and walks around shirtless as much as a man in the Reeve family. He works at a printing press and has a beard that he once grew out to take a Bin Ladin look-a-like photo. Sari is my great contact who I´ve already mentioned. Santiago is my new best friend. He is hilarious. We now have our own handshake. Juan Carlos´s mom may or may not be living with us. She was living there for a while but is now visiting her daughter for an undetermined amount of time.
It is strange being here and super slow right now. I don´t really know where to begin. I really want to unpack but don´t know where to put my stuff...I´ve taken Santi´s room and he is still using the wardrobe.
I didn´t finish this blog. Oops.
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