A refreshing weekend.

Cow milking is not going to be my new profession...

Tim and I went into this week feeling productive and refreshed from a really cool weekend. Did anything particularly spectacular happen? No. Did we

travel anywhere especially awesome? Nope. What we did though was hang out with some super people and had plenty of time to gaff with them. Peace Corps Volunteers are some of the raddest people in the world!

On Thursday and Friday I attended the Peer Support meeting in the PC Office in G/town. As always, this meeting left me feeling positive. The new Guy23 volunteer representatives of Peer Support joined us this time so we had a bigger group than usual (a whole 5 people!) and I think we have such great ideas as a group! Go team! We did some sessions practicing active listening and responding to crisis situations. We also did a ton of brainstorming for how we can continue to foster a network with in PC Guyana where our peers take an active role in providing positive, confidential support to each other. I think we had a great meeting!

Tim joined me in to office on Friday to get his toe checked out by Nurse Jean. He had stubbed it about a month back and we both thought it was broken back then. He decided not to go in and get it looked at then because, really we know there isn't much you can do for a broken toe. But recently he took a closer look and saw a black bruise looking spot on the toe and he got worried so he came in for medical attention. Guess what was in his toe!!?! A chigger! Ahhhh! I was so totally grossed out when Tim described to me how Dr. Benjamin had to use a needle to scoop the chigger eggs out of his skin. Nasty, right? Anyway, the x-ray showed no breaks but he has been advised to “take it light” for two weeks and keep his chigger wound clean. Tim would like to add that he is very proud to have survived his first chigger in Guyana. Okay, enough of chiggers.

While we were at PCHQ for our various reasons we were pleasantly surprised at how many PCVs were in the office for their own reasons. We got to catch up with a few people we hadn't seen for a few months. We also got to spend some time getting to know the Guy23 PCVs better. What cool peeps all around! The gaggle of us ordered food from the new sub place in G/town that I mentioned in this post (buffalo chicken sandwiches!). We also ordered pizza and ate bacon cheese burgers at a new burger grill. Nothing makes PCVs happier than spending are hard earned stipend on overly priced food that reminds us of home. Best thousand dollars (Guyana dollars) per meal ever spent!

On Saturday we headed over the Demerara river to visit Mark S. and his host family. Mark S is new friend of ours, a PCV from Guy23 who was assigned to Region 10 with us. He lives about 2.5 hours outside Linden, down a dirt road, and when he come through Linden he'll sometimes stay with us. He and Tim get to talk geeky guy stuff together and commiserate over the fact that they are both over 30 years old. Well, Saturday Mark's host family threw him a birthday party which was attended by a ton of Guy23 Volunteers. Tim and I rolled out and enjoyed the food and hospitality of his family.

We stayed at the host family's house over night and in the morning Mark's host dad introduced me to his cows (he is a cattle farmer) and even tried to teach me how to milk one. I am not cut out to be a farm girl. If I had to feed myself off of cow's milk, I would have a thimble full of milk and starve. We did get loaded up with fresh food from their gardens and kitchen; pumpkin, boulanger (egg plant), ginip (a sweet fruit sort of like a leechi), cake and roti.

All in all we had a productive and social weekend. We met new people and got to know old friends better. As I type we are simmering a pot of pumpkin curry and listening to new Guyanese music that another PCV gave us. Happy times!

We can totally take our own picture!

Hot Dog face with Jillian!

Mark S with his host mom!

Some Guy23ers enjoying the party!

Beautiful rice fields behind the host family's house

Even the kids in Mark's host family enjoyed watching me fail at milking the cow.

Three Cheers for Internet!!!!

Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!

So, I'm excited, what of it? We have our computer back and I can barley contain my contentment. I wanted to post a few pictures on some of our blogs and write another one.

While Chelsea has been doing law school applications, I've been working with some teachers using my manuscript. These last four weeks I've done professional development sessions with 13 teachers at least once a week. I've been going from school to school, meeting with the teachers, going over some strategies in the book, and then giving them homework to complete for the next week. It's mostly hands-on and strategy based with me modeling the strategies and then having them try to do it themselves. After the session they are suppose to practice one of the strategies at least three times before we meet again the next week. So far so good. Next week is my last week of PD sessions for the summer term, but I think I am going to try and do it during the school year.

We also had a 3-day workshop facilitated form a educational professor in the states. It was pretty cool. She did a great job. Some pictures are below. And some pretty pictures just for kicks.  

Methodology Manual

Teachers about to do a "Word Play" Skit, to practice their vocabulary technique

Teacher working at the Literacy Workshop

AmerIndians in Moruca taking the shade. I like their colours. 

Shell Beach Shot. Man I still can't get over how beautiful it was. 

Setting Sun. Guyana is amazingly gorgeous. 

Rainy Holiday Day

Happy Emancipation Day Guyana! Today's holiday brought to you by the emancipation of the African slaves in Guyana in 1834.

Tim and I didn't have big plans for the day, although we thought we might join our neighbor on a trip to the creek. However, the torrential rains decided for us that we should stay in today. Instead we are making pizza for lunch and dinner and our most exciting plan for the holiday is to open a bottle of red wine that we bought in G/town. We are enjoying the cooler weather that the rain has brought us. Tim has been reading all day and I am "entertaining" myself by researching law schools and trying to decide if I should take advantage of my LSAC fee waiver by applying to more schools in California. More schools = more possible scholarship opportunities? Maybe? I am thinking of maybe including USF, USC, Golden Gate and Pacific McGeorge. Anyone have any thoughts on these schools? Oh and I am also working (re-re-working) my personal statement, ugh!

Law school stressy-ness aside, this weekend has been a lovely three day weekend! Saturday Tim and I went to Georgetown to have lunch with our fellow PCVs for one of their birthday's. We ate at a new sub shop (think Subway!) and had buffalo chicken sandwiches. It was a lovely taste of home and one of the healthier meals we can get in G/town (better than Pizza Hut or Jr Burger). Yesterday we were invited over to Tka and Amy's house (the Guy23 volunteers in Linden) for dinner. Tka made Jamaican meat patties and Amy made pizza (okay, wow, now that I think about it we are eating a TON of pizza this weekend).

The "Sub"

Tomorrow we head back to work, but only for a few days since I have the Peer Support taskforce meeting in Georgetown on Thursday and Friday. We are excited about getting our computer back on Wednesday and then, at the end of the month, heading to Barbados and onto Oregon for two weeks!

We also wanted to let everyone know that we are FINE! We were not affected by the Caribbean plane crash at the Guyana airport. No one we knew was on the plane that, due to a pilot error, skidded to a horrible stop on the Cheddi Jaggan runway and cracked the plane in half. No one died, only injured. And, mom, there is totally NO need to worry about us. But we are glad you do anyway, since it just means you love us.

RED ANTS!

This morning was a typical Guyanese morning: I was scheduled to film the last sequence for the next episode of Health Watch but the producer had double booked himself and had to reschedule. No problem for me, I could have a leisurly morning with Tim. So, we made coffee mochas and used up the last of the Trader Joe's Peppermint Hot Chocolate mix that Lisa gave us. Then we decided to do a load of laundry. Sudsing, scrubbing and rinsing everything was no problem. However, when I went to hang the clothes on the laundry line I was attacked by biting red ants! There must be a nest in my yard under my laundry line because at least 15 ants crawled on my feet, and even hands when I dropped a clothes pin on the ground. These little bastards have a bite like fire! When I get bitten I swell up, then the bite turns into a blister and itches and burns for days. Today I got at least 10 bites and my feet and hands look like lumpy cheese. So NOT fun! I was glad I did laundry but so pissed off at these ants! How do I get rid of them/avoid them in the future? I have no clue. If I had rain boots I would wear them while I am hanging laundry, but alas, I will have to find another solution. Sigh. I do expect this day to get better though. Tim and I are taking a day trip into G/town to go on our 6th run with the Guyana HashHouseHarriers. Four more runs with them and we will be christened with a Hash name (something silly and crude I imagine). Looking forward to it, ant bites and all.

Internet Silence

We haven't been blogging much recently. This could be due to the fact that we don't have our computer right now (Tony brought it back with him to the States when he went on vacation to get it fixed and he isn't coming back until the first week of August. We did hear though that it IS fixed, so YAY!). I think it also just that life is fairly predictable and steady now.

"Life and work as usual". That's how I described this phase in my PC service. Tim and I spent Monday facilitating sessions at the Guy23 (PC group that came to country a year after we did) reconnect conference. Those volunteers, who have only been at site for three months, are feeling the same trepidation, anxiety and frustrations that we were feeling at that stage. Everything then felt new and and was so fraught with BIG emotions. I was glad that Tim and I had climbed over that mountain and arrived at a more pleasant time in our service. I could only offer the newbies words of encouragement that it will get better and, before you know it, life in this strange land will seem normal.

So, right now for Tim and I it is life and work as usual. Not much to report. Projects progress, it is still hot as always, Rasta kitty is doing great, and cold showers don't seem quite so bad anymore. We are looking forward to coming back home in September for a brief jaunt, D+L's wedding, seeing Dal, baby Eevee and family, stocking up on coffee and clothes to last us through the 7 more months of PC servie that we will have left when we return to Guyana. Good times. Hopefully this justifies our relative internet silence and we promise to write more, even life as usual things, when we get our computer back. Love to all back home!

Law School Applications, GACK!

I have officially started the law school application process. UGH! GACK! And other expletives!

Most law schools don't actually let you start working on the applications until the admission period opens in September or October. But, there is plenty to do in preparation before fall. First I had to request that my transcripts be sent from any and all universities I attended. For me thats two, UCSD and Cabrillo, even though I only took two classes at Cabrillo when I was in high school. Okay, so thats done. Check. Then I had to pester the two amazing individuals who magnanimously agreed to write my letters of recommendation. Now, courtesy demands that I send them a self addressed and stamped envelope to mail out my letters. But, oh shucks, I am in Guyana. I don't have any US stamps and even if I did the letter may or may not reach them in any sort of a timely fashion , if at ever. So, I have to get my mom (THANKS MOM!) to print the required forms from the LSAC website and mail them to my recommenders for me. That should be done next week. Yippee.

The other, most loathful, thing I am currently working on is my personal statement. That has to be the most challenging thing in the world to write. Trying to write a persuasive essay on who I am, and showing evidence as to what makes me unique, and why I sould be accepted into law school all in 2-4 pages, double spaced, is torture. I have a shoddy first draft and am going to mangle it up a few more times before I barrage all my friends and family, begging for constructive criticism (another thing I loathe, but I know is good for me). Ugh. Gerr.

I know it will all be worth it in November, when my applications are sent in, well ahead of the February deadline. Then I just get to sit on my hands and freak out for a few months while I wait to hear back from schools, oh and I'll need to start the FAFSA applications for financial aid, oh and apply for scholarships, oh and, oh and....Okay, so maybe I still have a loooong way to go, but at least I am getting started. Sigh. I guess it will really all be worth it in April, when Tim and I embark on our month long trip in South America and we know what school I got into and where we will be living. Only 8 1/2 months....

Happy Birthday, Here's a Sea Turtle!

This past weekends was one of the most spectacular weekends we have had in Guyana so far! We celebrated two birthdays (my friend, and fellow PCV Jillian and America's), spent 12+ hours in speed boats on the rivers in the rainforest and saw 11 leatherback sea turtles!

On Friday Tim and I left Linden with Sara, Amy and her boyfriend Gene, and headed to Georgetown where we met up with 6 other PCVs. We traveled to the Essequibo Coast (where we did our training 17 months ago) where we planned to spend the night and toast to Jillian's 25th birthday, promising her turtles as a gift) before we took a 6 hour boat ride from Essequibo to Shell Beach.

Shell Beach is at the Northern-most point of Guyana, you can practically see Venezuela, and is home to one of the world's few nesting places for sea turtles! The Shell Beach Turtle Project is an NGO dedicated to the protection and conservation of 4 species of turtles. The dedicated folks at the Turtle project patrol the beach twice a night every night, protecting the turtles from predators (poachers who hunt them for meat and eggs, dogs, and birds who eat the eggs etc). We heard that if you go out to the beach you can walk with the patrols to see the nesting process of this endangered species. This month is the last month that the leatherback turtles come to nest so we got our butts out there to see this miracle. I say miracle, because the leatherbacks who are born in Guyana on Shell Beach will always return to nest there and no one knows exactly how or why.

Well, we endured the long but beautiful 6 hour speedboat ride (Tim note:The Rivers here are so crazy! We rode down these huge swathes (and sometimes not so huge) of water surrounded by bush on each side. The mangroves twisting and writhing around each other like petrified limbs remind me of tangled spider legs, while the swamps and wetlands boast both grass and trees intermixed dancing around the mangrove wall.), with our tour guide, and turtle conservationist, Romeo Audley and got to the beach in time for lunch on Saturday. We settled in to the guest house, an open air structure with tents inside and took a swim in the Atlantic ocean (it was salty and brown, but not as muddy as the waters in most places in Guyana). By night fall we were ready for patrol and hoped to see turtles. But before we could do that, we had to protect ourselves from the MOSQUITOES! As soon as dark fell the mosquitoes swarmed like I have never seen before. I was wearing insect repellent and long sleeves but these damn bugs ate through everything, even my jeans! Anyway, we had turtles to see so we would not be deterred.

Right as we were about to leave on patrol, a villager brought a bucket full of 10 baby hatchlings inside. They had tried to get to the ocean but were chased by dogs. The conservationists have trained the local community to help save these little dudes, so they were brought to us and we got to take them down to a safe place on the beach and release them in the sand and watch as they scooted themselves into the ocean to face countless dangers. If they survive, they will come back to the beach in 8-10 years when they are mature to nest. They were so squirmy and cute! I hope they make it.

After releasing the little ones, we walked down the beach for 4 hours, in almost pitch black, since it was a new moon. The brilliant stars above us, the ocean crashing softly to our left, silhouettes of palm trees and jungle to our right and the hope of seeing adult turtles in front of us, we walked. And walked and walked. We saw a whale skull that had washed up the beach years ago but NO turtles. Needless to say, we were disappointed. Back at camp, we slept well but unsettled, dreaming of elusive turtles.

Sunday was spent chilling on the beach, taking photos, swimming and chatting with the turtle project folks, learning about turtles. That night we headed out again on patrol, wishing that we would find at least one turtle so that our trip wouldn't be fruitless. we walked for 2 hours, seeing nothing and decided to sit down and rest our feet for a minute. After about 20 minutes of sitting I was feeling disheartened, thinking we might have to return to camp turtle-less. But then our guide suddenly said, "Look, a turtle is coming out of the water right now." And there she was, a huge mass in the waves, slowing scooting herself up the beach. Right in front of us, as if she knew we were there! We watched in awe as she climbed up above the tide line, then we snuck closer and watched as she dug a hole, over a meter deep with her back flippers and then laid her eggs. When turtles are laying their eggs they go into a sort of trance so we were able to take pictures and even pet her. It was SO cool! Then we watched her bury her eggs (well actually, she thought she was burying them but the conservationists had removed them from the nest, since it was too close to the water and would get washed away, so they moved them to a safer man-made nest). Then the mama headed back out to sea.

I felt so blessed to see this whole process, from start to finish. Only 1 out of 1000 eggs laid will survive and return to the beach to lay their own nests. It is so rare and wonderful and Tim and I got to sit, snuggled up together on a beach in what seemed like the farthest corner of the earth and be part of this phenomenal event.

Then, on July 4th, we all packed up and headed back to our sites, stopping for beers in a small Amerindian village in the river and stopping again on the road to pick up a present that a fellow PCV had made for us for the Fourth; cupcakes with candy hotdogs on them.

It was a stellar weekend! One I will never forget!