Week 2:

It’s hard to believe that I’ve been here only a week. It seems so much longer. When I despair about ever speaking Spanish fluently, I have to remind myself that I’ve only been here a week and I have made a lot of progress (even if my accent is horrid).

It is very cold here. We don’t think of 50 degrees as being so cold outside. The problem is that it is 50 degrees (or 40) inside! I feel like one of those Russian dolls where you take layer after layer off and the dolls keep getting smaller. It is 7:30 a.m. and I am wearing two pairs of socks, a pair of long johns (thank you, Grace, for making me take those), a pair of jeans, the top to the long johns, a long sleeve tee shirt, a polar fleece jacket and my red fleece jacket. I also have on a pair of fingerless gloves and will put on my pair of polar fleece gloves after I finish here (kind of hard to type with gloves on your fingers). Oh, I also have my polar fleece hat that Susan Hedding gave me years ago when we used to walk in the cold mornings (the one with the flaps over the ears). And the polar fleece scarf that Grace insisted that I take (thank, God). Our biggest problem is that we have to sit in the classroom rather than move around. That makes you feel the cold more.

Most of our classes are in our areas (we are split into two groups and my area is Paso de Oro). However, yesterday we all had to be in the Peace Corps training center in Guarambare. To do this, we have to take two buses (or walk 3 km and take only one bus). It takes about the same amount of time to walk the 3 km as to take the bus that runs along the 3k route but since most of the other volunteers are so much younger and more energetic they walk and I take the bus. Coming back, most of the time we end up walking most of the way because the buses are either too full to get on or just don’t come in time.

Yesterday (Wednesday) after class at the PCTC we all went out for beer (or in my case, ice cream). It was nice to just sit there and talk with the other trainees.

Time to get to class. I’ll write more later. Hopefully, I get this e-mailed tonight. Last night I was so tired that I couldn’t even eat supper. I ate a few spoonfuls of soup and toddled off to bed.

Today, Thursday, it was actually warm outside during the day. It´s about 6 pm right now and I´m at the house in back of my house. It belongs to a cousin of my house mother. The house isn´t even finished adobe bricks ” it looks half finished but it has every electrical appliance known to man. I just have to laugh that you can´t tell by appearances! My house mother (Eladia) said that they would be happy for me to use the internet (for a small price). I´ve been here an hour just reading e’mails and I guess it is about time to give up my space.
We are going to the supermercado in another town on Saturday. I can hardly wait to go shopping. Who would think that a person would miss shopping.
That´s it for now! Everything is going great and we are learning so much about business, etc.
Michel