Written Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Wow. . .its hot. And I know that’s its only going to get hotter. It doesn’t help that its against cultural norms to wear shorts or tank tops… well, tank tops at times are acceptable. But most of the time, shirts need to have some sort of cap-sleeve, and skirts or pants must be at or below the knee.

What I would give right now for a pair of shorts, a tank top, and a cold beer. Even Ceu is passed out from the heat right now, sprawled across the floor, eyes shut, mouth open and panting. Poor guy… a fur coat in this heat? Unthinkable.

The weekend passed by without anything major happening… did some laundry, dishes, cooked a bit, hung out with Sota, hung out with my neighbor and did some reading. Pretty uneventful stuff, but I suppose I’ve now fully entered the life of a “peace corps volunteer”.

Yesterday I went to the hospital in the morning- again, I’m finding myself at a loss of things to do there, so I kinda just wander around for a bit, bring books or work with me, or talk with the Peer Educators. I’m trying to help out with some of the paperwork, but that’s not my job, nor is it a sustainable thing for me to do. Afterwards I went to Acomuza to try and get a head start on this SWOT analysis, or to download some Microsoft programs on their computer… but to no avail. The people I needed to talk with weren’t there, so I hung out for a bit, and then wandered back into the villa.

Bought some things for lunch/dinner – made a soup of rice and veggies (which tastes great cold today for lunch) – chatted with a few shop owners, and then headed back to my house. I did a great yoga workout, took a cold bucket bath – refreshing – cooked dinner, and watched a movie.

Today I went again to the hospital, helped them with some paperwork, talked with the Peer Educators, and started looking up research for my palestra about agua next week with Despertai…. Afterwards, I stopped in at Acomuza just to say hi, and then headed into town. Again, talked with some people in the street, bought some bread for the dog, and came home to eat lunch/read for a bit. I have a REDES meeting today at 3pm, so I’m just killing time until then with my book and this blog.

Tomorrow I have a meeting with Acomuza, then am going to head over to Inharrime to pick up a pair of pants I had made at the modista – think MC Hammer pants – in a crazy awesome print. They are totally wild, and I’m stoked about them. Yep – any and all fashion sense that I may have had before PC has gone right out the window. But I suppose that happens with the best of us… people don’t really care what you look like here – you are already an anomaly haha.

Again, I really wish I had more to say or to write about my life here, but so far this week as gotten off to a slow and semi-boring start. Such is life here some days, but I welcome it, and will try to grow and learn from it – if anything I will read a lot of books, and play with the dog.

With a nice sweaty hug, and a tail wag from the pup – I wish you all a pleasant week, and hope to hear from you all soon.

xo

td