3/10/03

If it makes you feel any better, I haven’t written in my regular journal in WELL over a month either. It takes discipline. Unfortunately I can only discipline myself into a few things at a time, and lately it’s been sit-ups and reading 2 or 3 books a week.

Nothing exciting has happened anyways.

Well, maybe that’s not true, it’s just been so long that I forgot!

So March 1^st was Peace Corps Day. Officially, it’s to support the third goal of the Peace Corps, "To strengthen Americans' understanding about the world and its peoples." Traditionally, it’s a day for former volunteers to go into schools in the US and talk about what they did. But for the occasion, we did a community activity here. For over 10 years, all volunteers have stayed in the town of Babonneau in St. Lucia for the first portion of training. One volunteer liked it so well she stayed permanently! Actually, that’s where her assignment is, but she’s still very much a part of the community. So as a group, we decided to do something to give back to the community in Babonneau. There is a map-painting project in the international kit of Peace Corps projects to do in your community. It’s intended to be something that you can use as a math, geography and art lesson. It involves taking an 8.5 by 11 map of the world and using a grid to blow it up to any size. We decided, after several rounds with the school officials, to paint the world map on the side of the infant/primary school. In conjunction with that, we wanted to hand out some HIV/AIDS info, since that’s one of the primary focuses for us here, and help the school to have a bit of a fundraiser. I was in charge of invitations, T-Shirt design and some food donation. The day went really well, despite a few small glitches. The pictures are available at http://photos.yahoo.com/cebouche, under PC Day.

The week leading up to that, I was sick. It was something flu- or strep-like. Nothing a couple days off work, with some ginger tea and antibiotics didn’t take care of.

I’m working on a complex and detailed description of the social situation here. As in, who to be friends with, who not to be friends with. It’s all very third grade.

Lastly, here is an anecdote. The other day I got on the bus. There is a very complicated system of where to sit on the bus, which seats to fill up first and that kind of etiquette. So I sat in my seat, and I happened to be next to sort of a bush man. He was dressed for working outdoors and had on knee-high rubber boots that were full of grass. As soon as I got on, he started chatting me up. He was asking where I live, what I do, etc. I could tell that all the other people on the bus, and especially the three women in front of me, had an ear cocked and were listening in. Like most every other Lucian man who I’ve ever talked to, this guy turns the conversation to getting together with me. So when he said "so, are you married?" I said "YEP" really loud and confidently. Everyone else on the bus started laughing, and I couldn’t help but laugh too. Then for the rest of the ride, the guy had to tell me "leave your husband, I’ve got more looooove….." yeah, right.