One month

Wow it's hard for me to imagine that it has been one month in site already. I still feel at times that I am not doing anything but i know that i am. It is just a very slow process. Lets see alot had happened in these last few weeks and yet very little. Life here in my village moves slower then in the US or my training site. Things happen when they happen and people do things when they want to. A different way to look at life. It is peaceful and frustrating at the same time. You have something scheduled and it falls through on that day and time. Then a week later someone says we are doing to meet tomorrow at 4. So you change a few things in your schedule and life goes on. When this happens you grumble under your breath and stomp your foot in privet. On the flip side to that you are never really late for anything except maybe work. Something starts at 4 and you either leave the house then or begin to get ready then. I enjoy this because there is no pressure to get somewhere on time.

A good example of this happening would be the No Violence event that was to take place a week ago. I was in charge of helping with the pinata and doing the games. I had my part done and when it came time to do the pinata only two people came. The date was rescheduled for the following week when no one showed. The following day was to be the meeting to put the finishing touches on the plans for the event and once again no one comes. The day of the event comes and goes and nothing happens. So i ask around and am informed that it has been moved to Jan. date and time unknown. I sigh and nod at least it is not canceled it will still happen.

I have started my group of youth we are doing arts and crafts today would be the third day. Things are going well there is only 8 people as of now but i have faith that it will grow. They all seem enthusiastic to continue and enjoy bracelet making the most so far. I am now looking for more designs to teach them. I find it hard to explain the instructions at times with my limited Spanish but i find that they eventually understand and can do the work correctly. I can only get better and teach them more things. I am using this as a way to show them that trash can be used as a product. Later on I want to teach them a small business class and encourage entrepreneurship. Hopefully this will give them some ideas on what they could do.

I am also in the process of planning an adult basic English lesson and a baking class. Both of which were requests from the community. It will also give me something more to do. The problem is that both have to be at night because that is when adults will be free. I am now currently looking for something to fill my mornings since my nights are busy.

I thinking i could do the garden and i am but there are many barriers that i am running into. The ground here is very hard almost imposable to break through. I have been soaking it with water to form a mud like mixture then breaking to soil that way. Long and hard work and very impractical. I contacted Peace Corps for an idea and got the response to get a tone of cow poop and form a mound over the garden and use that. Now I have the joy of finding and scooping cow poop. Isn't my life grand here? Once i have all of my poop I am going to recruit little ones to help me with the planting and shifting etc.

On the social end of things. It is hard to break the circle and get people to open up. It is always the same conversation when i try to talk to people. Where are you from, what is your name, what did you study, how long have you been here, do you like Nicaragua and my village etc. I wan to break out of this to get to what they like to do and have a real conversation. There is only one person in town that i really talk to. I mean like a real conversation. It is amazing and releasing to have someone like that. It has taken time to find her now i just have to find others like her. In time I'm sure all of this will work out fine and my site will become home. Now don't get me wrong i love it here and i feel happen here. Just adjustment is difficult.

My family is Jehovah Witness and I am currently going to their services which is an interesting experience. Not my kind of religion but i am learning Spanish this was and I am meeting people so kill two birds with one stone. They don't really celebrate holidays so my Christmas this year will be very different than usual. I am thinking of seeing if i can join in on my counterparts celebrations but i don't want to intrude. This will be a very delicate line that i am walking on.

I have started my Spanish lessons and it is going surprisingly well. I have them almost everyday and we are going over basic sentence structure and pronunciation. My tutor is my mom who is also the Spanish teacher at the high school. I hope that i start to improve faster now. It is tiresome not be able to say what i want to people. I also have to break out of my shell and get out more to talk to more people. Easier said then done.

Ah one last things or so i think. I have made a shaky friendship with one of the kids that lives next door. He invited me to his farm the other day. He is also the one who is going top help me with the poop. He has a bunch of cows and i got to see milking being done. Very fascinating in it's own way. As well as help herd cow to the pasture. If only i got to help with the milking didn't ask didn't want to so anything wrong and ruin things. They had a great system going.

Until next time, love you all and miss you. XOXOXO